Arranging my time...
For the past few months my life has been busy. There have been quite a few changes at church, which brought about an increase of responsibility and more opportunities, that lead to me being so busy. While all of these new opportunities have been great and they have stretched me a TON, they have also left me exhausted. So, going into this little two week break I knew some things had to change.
Last week, I came sat down, looked at my calendar, and started to think about what changes I could make to my schedule, and here they are.
- All my meetings will occur on two days - Tuesdays and Thursdays. With all of my staff meetings and other meetings already scheduled for these two days this decision was a no brainer.
- I'm going to leave Mondays and Wednesdays free to think, write, send e-mails, plan, and pray about upcoming gatherings and direction for the church/teen ministry. Recently, I was meeting with a successful businessmen and he shared that this is something he does every week - takes time to think about the direction of his business and plan upcoming meetings. In fact, he shared this has made him a lot more effective. I'm hoping it makes me more effective. (To be honest, this will be the hardest change for me because I love hanging out with people. But truth is I need more alone time so that I can truly "be there" when I'm hanging out with others. By the way, does anyone know of a good coffee shop where I can do this? I won't be at church during these down times, so I need a good place to hang.)
- My sabbath will be a regular part of my weekly routine. Right now it's Friday and I need to get back to taking the WHOLE day off. Ceci and I are even thinking about how we can have the same day off, which would be way cool. (During my sabbath I'm even thinking about turning off my cell phone for the whole, and possibly not even checking e-mails or blogging.)
- Know my limits and when to delegate. I need to get some things off my plate, which means I need to give others the opportunity to do them. Yes, this means they might do things differently than me, but that's ok. They might do them better!
- Begin my day in prayer and reading the Bible. Sadly, this doesn't happen that often because I'm tired. I know it's a lousy excuse.
2 comments:
Hey Dave, I was talking with a friend at my old job who's husband is a pastor and she was saying that for one of his classes he had to read the book "Keeping the Sabbath Holy", which had a lot of the same thoughts about a "true Sabbath" as you mentioned above. My friend said that both her and her husband committed for a time to "keeping a Sabbath", and she said that it turned out to be more difficult than she anticipated at first, but that it was great after they got into the habit of it. I don't know if you've read the book, but perhaps if you needed some creative hints for "Sabbathing" it'd be a good resource.
I hope that you and Cec get the same day off, that'd be a lot of fun.
dave, sounds like some very good thinking, especially the sabbath day.
i'm thinking the fast from cell, tv, email, blogging and computer would be healthy. also getting outdoors on that day to hike, fish, kayak, swim, etc.
blessings with your new efforts!
ty
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