On this lovely Sunday afternoon, I'm looking around wondering what I need to get done. I'm getting tiny ever increasing flutters in my stomach--a nervous feeling that I can't exactly pinpoint the cause of. I'm anxious, but I don't know why. Is there an email I need to send out? No. Is there an job application due soon that I need to fill out? Hell no. So what's the problem?
Doing nothing makes me nervous. It's one thing if I need a break because I've been doing so much...then I'm resting. But after resting usually I get right back to work. This sensation of not having anything to do at this precise moment is a novel one. So of course I had to alleviate the anxiety I was having by looking up graduate school programs. I immediately felt better.
This got me to thinking. Americans in their work-driven frenzy are in constant motion, working hard to get somewhere that--quite frankly--may not exist. In our culture, we work for the bigger house, the bigger paycheck, the prestige, the power, but we never take a moment to just stop and be. Vacations aren't even a form of rest anymore. We take a break from work to numb our minds with entertainment like the garbage known as Jersey Shore or the latest blockbuster movie. But it is all just a mechanism for not thinking about the many things we still have to get done. We work ourselves into an pill popping, anxiety ridden, stress overload, and then wonder why Americans suffer from so many health issues.
I have to learn how to rest. How to stop. How to breath. It makes life easier. Worry is not my friend. Anxiety does not have my back. Fret is not a good color on me. I can't be worried all the time. The Bible tells me not be
"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"-Matthew 6:25-27
...so I'm learning. Slowly but surely...I'm learning that it's ok to have nothing on your to-do list. Now I'm gonna go read a book. For leisure....and I'm okay with that.
