When your life is too full of too many things you can feel like you are going crazy! Is your life too busy? Mine is at times.
The point is not that we should never be busy. The point is that we should build times of rhythm into our life. Busy needs to be balanced with rest. We need to slow the pace of our life down.
In a previous post (4 Negative Impacts of Hurry) I talked about the negative impact of hurry. So in this post I want to share some Biblical strategies to slow down your life to a more rational, reasonable pace. These strategies are the exact opposite of what our culture teaches and encourages. But if you do these things you will find your joy going up and your stress going down.
1 – Learn Contentment.
“I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.” (Philippians 4:11)
If you’re serious about slowing down don’t start with your schedule, start in your heart. You are not by nature a contented person, neither am I. It is our nature to want things to be different, to want them to be better, to want them to be something other than they are. But if you’re going to slow down your life, you have to learn contentment. It’s learned over time.
How do you do that? Paul says “There is great gain in godliness with contentment. For we brought nothing into the world and we can’t take anything out of the. So if we have food and clothing we will be content with that.” (1 Tim. 6:6-11) Paul reminds us life isn’t about things. I didn’t have anything before I was born. I’m not going to have anything after I die. So while I can use things while here on earth, contentment comes when realizing I don’t need more in order to be happy.
There are three myths of our culture which encourage this attitude of discontent in our lives. 1 – Having more will make me happy. 2- Doing more will make me more worthy. 3- Life is a competition. These are all false.
Child listening
2 – Listen before speaking.
“Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak….” (James 1:19)
You may not realize this but your mouth actually controls the pace of your life. The speed and how you talk to other people actually influences your heart rate and your stress level.
It’s very obvious if you watch television that we have become a nation of interrupters. Have you noticed that? People don’t let others complete their sentences. They talk over each other. You see and hear it all over. People interrupt each other.
It seems that everybody’s talking and nobody’s listening. Why is that? Why has America gotten so rude? One of the answers is because of the speed of life. We have become so impatient that we’re unwilling to let other people finish a thought. So we butt in. We’re so eager to say our piece, to get our point across, that we won’t even take the time to let somebody finish a thought before we interrupt.
If you are quick to listen, and if you learn to be slow to speak, your life will slow down. Proverbs 29:20 says “Do you see a man who speaks in haste? There is more hope for a fool than for him.” Slow yourself down. Be in the moment. Be intentional about listening to others and think about what you say.
3 – Pause and pray before making a decision.
“Also, that the soul be without knowledge, it is not good; and he that hasteth with his feet sinneth.” (Proverbs 19:2)
To make a decision, you need proper information. Otherwise, you may make a mistake. So before you make a decision, stop and pray. Now that doesn’t mean wait a year before deciding something. It may be a few days, or even a few weeks. It may be just 15-20 seconds but stop before making a decision and ask God, “What do You want me to do, God? Is there anything You want to say to me right now? Give me wisdom.” And you wait. You don’t tell anybody this. You don’t say, “Excuse me a minute. I want to pray.” You keep your eyes wide open while you’re looking at that client, or customer or boss. And then you silently pray, “What do You want me to do, Lord?.”
When you stop and pray you get perspective. Perspective helps you make wise decisions. When you pause before making a decision, it’s then that you are slowing down enough to can gain wisdom and guidance from God.
I hope this helps you slow your life down a little.
Do you have any help to slow life down?