“I’m too busy!” As a child I heard that a lot.
“I’m too busy!” Now I hear it all of the time from friends and family.
The most disappointing thing is when I hear myself say it. “I’m too busy.”
It seems more and more I see all of us spinning our wheels and claiming to be too busy for the good things in life, a relaxed conversation with friends, a leisurely meal, time to savor an interesting book.
Maybe I used to be better at handling a multitude of interests and activities. When people would ask me how I could do so many different things I would snidely say that the Lord blessed me beyond belief because I got 24 hours every single day.
Now sometimes, as I ponder my day, I wonder what happened to all of those hours. Many times I can’t remember exactly what I accomplished when I lay my head on my pillow at the end of the day.
Oh sure, in the last few months I have directed a play, stage managed another, and taken a pilgrimage of sorts. I have gotten a few things in order that had kind of gone off of the rails, but overall I don’t know exactly where the days have gone.
Most days I would think about things I wanted to write, but somehow never found the time. I had made a resolution to work on my book and as with most resolutions, I didn’t get past January 2 before I had abandoned that idea.
If you are not intentional with your time, it gets away from you. In “All I Really Need to Know, I Learned by Being in a Bad Play”, the narrator says that one of the main things that you learn during rehearsals is “time is our friend and then our enemy.”
If you’ve ever been in a play, you know exactly what he means. Really this is true with so many things in life. At first you see the show as weeks away. You set your schedule and you begin your process. As you learn lines, do research and find your character, you dole out chunks of time like small pieces of cake- just right to keep you satisfied and working in the right direction.
And then during tech week, you realize that half of the cake remains and you only have a few days left to eat it all. And it is on the verge of growing mold if you don’t cram it down and get to it! All of that time that was stretched ahead of you as you began this journey is now gone and you have more to accomplish than you have minutes in the day to work on it all.
Life is a lot like that. We feel as youngsters that we have all of the time in the world. We can use time, waste time, ignore time. We can say we are too busy when in fact we are spinning our wheels more than we are really accomplishing anything. We can turn down love, our friends, our family because we are just too busy.
And then one day we lose a loved one or we see our own mortality and realize that maybe we don’t have unlimited time. Maybe we are human after all and our days are numbered. Maybe what is keeping us “busy” isn’t quite as important as we thought it was.
I have sought out and gotten help to work through the issues that have filled my brain since my mom died. It was difficult to realize that I was not as tough as I had always thought, but in ways I was tougher. For someone who was raised to “just handle it” and “don’t cry” it was hard to ask for guidance and support. It has been a process that has definitely proven the old saying of something having to get worse before it gets better!
During that process, I was almost afraid to write. In revealing so much about myself to someone, I was worried I would just do the same while blogging and none of us are ready for that! I try to be honest when I write, but too much is too much!
Our pilgrimage to Texas was fun and enlightening. It is an ongoing process as well and one I DO hope to share in the days ahead. I even remembered to take a few pictures!
I am hoping that I can get a hold on my time management and have more time for writing and other things that bring me joy in the months ahead. Months ahead, did I say?? Hell, years ahead! Time is fleeting and can be your friend or your enemy. For me, I want to try to be friends with time and enjoy the time to come.
I also want to find the time to write more here. I have missed writing this blog and have missed hearing from you. So . . .
I’m back, I hope.
