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Rabbi Mendel
often complained: And so another day begins. The hectic nature of daily life swings into full gear as we prepare to engage in the activities that seem to claim our lives -- caring for children, commuting, working, going to meetings, shopping, paying bills, getting the car fixed, coaching Little League, phoning family members, mailing off packages to distant relatives, cooking, cleaning, caring for pets . We know that we are over-committed, but when we look at the roles we play and the tasks of each role, there seems to be little chance of whittling down our responsibilities. In this arena of frenetic activity, we become easy prey for the promises of advertisers and marketers. They persuade us that if we will buy just one more thing, the responsibilities that feel so onerous and time-consuming will be relieved. They will sell us convenience foods to lighten the burden of cooking, computers that can manage our information and keep us connected with others without demanding our personal presence, cell phones and fax machines so that we can get our activities completed no matter where we are, paper organizers and PDAs so that our numerous activities can be classified and categorized, portable phones so that we can do more than one activity at a time. But, at the end of the day, we still feel like we've been run over by a Mack truck. Our body is weary and our soul is empty. We seem to lack the sense of significance and fulfillment that we thought we were supposed to have in life. If we examine the activity of our lives closely and objectively, we often find that much of our energy is being given away to activities imposed on us by people who believe that what is really important in life is 'getting things done.' We all want to be valued and valuable, so we work to 'get things done' even when it leaves us feeling dead in the midst of life. We find it difficult to extract ourselves from this repetitive, routinized way of 'being' in the world, because we have misunderstood the role of activity in our lives. Over-Commitment
Is Not an Issue of Time Jesus was
not advocating that we all sit around and do nothing. He was saying that
we must not allow activity to steal the best part of life from us. 'Getting
things done' is necessary to life, but it is only one part of the experience
of life. We need activity and accomplishment, but not at the expense of
the loss of our own inner identity or the neglect of the relationships
that are a part of making us more fully human, more fully alive. We need
awareness and the presence of mind to keep An old priest was walking along the street and saw a peasant woman busy weaving a basket. She was so focused on her activity that she didn't even look up as the priest came near her. The priest asked her what she was doing. She quickly told him that she did not have time to talk to him. The priest persisted and asked her again what she was doing. She still refused to look up and merely said that she was weaving her basket and couldn't be interrupted. The priest said that he understood, but he still wondered what she, herself, was doing. When there still was no response the priest said to her "Everything that you are worried about is in the hands of God. You need only have a reverence for and astonishment of God." The peasant woman looked up from her work and for the flash of an instant was reverently astonished. The real issue is that we have allowed our lives to become so full that every ounce of our energy must be spent just trying to get everything done. It takes 'looking up' and being 'reverently astonished' to see that our focus has been misplaced. It takes 'looking up' and being 'reverently astonished' to see how robotic we have become. It takes 'looking up' and being 'reverently astonished' to finally see the wonder of the life that we have been given. So take a chance. Look up from your work for a moment and be reverently astonished. Surprisingly, you will then have a sense of how to balance your activities with the call to 'become' and 'participate' in this exciting expedition of life. Of course, you will continue to be asked to take on new roles and responsibilities, and you will continue to look for ways to eliminate unnecessary activity in your life. The following questions may help you gain a clearer perspective of what is claiming your life:
Ending
and Beginning
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