Why is summer so busy!

Whoops, it's been a while since I've blogged!  It's the busyness of summer...summer gets loaded with so much 'stuff', and before you know it, it's over.  It seems like every weekend gets booked with work, family get-togethers, plans with friends, church activities, and if you're lucky, a chance to do some of those tasks around the house that need to get done.  After all that though, there's barely any time for you and your family.

So how do you stop and smell the roses in such a busy season?

1) Stop.  It's as 'simple' as that.  Notice how simple is in brackets?  I realize this is a difficult thing to do.  But sometimes we just need to stop everything we're doing and take a breath (or 10), and smile at the blessings around us.

2) Deliberately schedule time to rest.  This can also be a tough one.  When there are so many things on the to-do list, it's hard to schedule time to not do anything.  This may lead to an inner battle, where you'll be fighting to tell yourself that you are not wasting time in those moments.  But rest assured, you are not.  You are giving your mind and your body some much needed rest.

3)  Enjoy the small things.  Not everything has to be big for us to enjoy it.  We don't have to go on a road trip every weekend.  We don't have to make it to every out of town family gathering.  Some things on the to-do list can wait a few months.  An hour at home or at the park with the family can be better than driving two hours to get somewhere 'fun'.

4)  Don't forget about God.  When life gets busy, what's the first thing that gets dropped to make room for everything else?  Let's not sugar-coat it, for a lot of us, it's our devotions.  But when you're doing 'busy' without God, that's a recipe for disaster, stress, fatigue, and the classic 'grass is greener' syndrome, to name a few.

There are lots of other tips, but we're already busy enough without trying to remember 15 different things.  Pick one or two of these, try them out, and see how you feel.

Now to put it into practice myself...wow, those roses outside my window really are quite pretty...

Friday Thoughts

It's Friday, December 20th, 5 days to go until Christmas...and there are a thousand thoughts whipping through my head.  This truly is one of the busiest times of the year...

The first thought is work.  Finishing up everything I have to do today so that I can rush home and do a thousand things at home.

The second thought is Christmas shopping.  Sadly, I haven't started.  I really tried to be better this year.  I REALLY tried.  But it's tough to find the time!  This is part of the thousand things mentioned above.  The saving grace is that I know what a few of my gifts will be, it's just a matter of going out and actually getting them.

The third thought running through my head is scheduling out the next week and a half.  My family wants me to drive down and visit them this weekend...but I'm not sure if I'll have time to do that with everything else still on my plate.  I work for a couple of days next week, then head straight out of town to see family for 4 days...then come back and head straight out of town again to visit the other side of the family for 4 days...and then it's straight back to work.  Meanwhile, where's the time to go Christmas shopping, and the time to relax a bit on my own and with my wife and son at home?

The fourth thing - vacation!  But this is not a relaxing thought...at least not yet.  When I think about going on vacation for a week starting on Christmas day, the thought right now is about everything that has to be done before I go.  And then it comes back to the scheduling mentioned above.

And the fifth thing on my mind is trying to slow down and not let Christmas rush me by.  I've been trying to do this all along, but it hasn't really happened.  I really do want to take time over the next few days to reflect on this season, and make sure I know what we're celebrating.

Fifth should be first, I know.  Maybe that's my problem.  Maybe that's why I feel like I'm so rushed, because my priorities are all out of whack.  And so maybe the order of my priorities changes today.

Where's the time?

It's crazy how busy life gets, isn't it?  Work, school, volunteering, church activities, sports, driving the kids around, meetings, cooking, cleaning, spending time with friends and family, homework/helping the kids with homework, chores, errands...just to name a few.  And when we finally DO have a minute to stop, either we're so tired we don't want to do anything, or we feel like we're wasting time because we're used to being so busy.

Sound familiar?

So how in the midst of all that, are we supposed to fit in spending time with God?  It's like we're already stretched to the max with the busyness of everyday life, there just does not seem to be 10 minutes anywhere to do our devotions...except maybe when we're laying in bed at night, just barely keeping our eyes open as we're reading the bible or praying; that, or we're thinking of all the things we have to do tomorrow.  Well no biggie, God understands, right?

No, the plain truth is - it IS a biggie.  I've been learning this a lot so far in 2012.  Just to set the record straight, this is not meant as a preachy thing.  It's more of "this is what Tim Maassarany is learning, and I hope it helps you too."  Why do you think I can list all those things above?  Cause busyness is usually my biggest excuse too.  Yes, even we Christian radio DJ's can struggle with a daily quiet time sometimes.

A few weeks ago at a Superbowl party I got into a discussion about this with a friend, and he completely challenged me.  He came straight out and said it - "Tim if you're not spending time with God everyday - even just 10-minutes each day for the most important thing in your life - then you need to go back to high school; go back to youth group."  He hit me square in the face with that one.  He's right, that's the stuff that was pounded into me in youth group, the importance of spending time daily with God.  That's the foundation.  Now that I'm an adult, that should be a well established practice.  He was basically telling me to grow up and stop making excuses.

Then yesterday Charles Stanley (on LIFE at 12:30) was talking about the same thing.  He said when we become too busy - or THINK we are too busy - to spend time with God, we're falling right into Satan's trap of lies, deception, and distraction.  He said Satan is always trying to distract us from God, and what better way than busyness?

Both of these hit me big time.  In 2012, I've really been making a more concerted effort to be consistent with this.  Mike at the superbowl party nailed it - no more excuses.  It's time to get serious about the most important thing in our lives.  We can't do that if we don't spend enough time with God to really get to know Him.

Busyness is the worst excuse of all, and yet so many of us use that one.  Enough's enough.  If Christ is what my life is all about, then I'm going to get serious.  And not later.  NOW.

You with me?