“Lately, Life Has Been a Roller Coaster”
Do you ever have those periods of time when life is, well, crazy? When EVERYTHING hits the fan, deadlines are coming, stressors are numerous, money is constantly on your mind? When you’re trying to live life to the fullest, be a great man, attend to your responsibilities and give everything your all? I’ve had a few straight months of living like that. Where life wouldn’t seem to slow down, and you’re always looking ahead to see if there’s an oxygen break coming soon.
Over the past two months specifically, I have been experiencing a lot. LOTS of uncertainty and unknown. Lately, life has been, as they say, a roller coaster. TrueManhood.com Blog has been the recipient of a serious amount of neglect from me, and to my passionate readers and daily-blog-followers, I apologize. I have some great stuff planned, that should be coming your way soon.
When life gets like this, I try to do a few things. For instance… when I have uncertainty, I tend to pray more. I try to listen harder to what God wants from me. I try really hard to be aware of what’s happening in my life, taking an objective view of what is going on and what it could possibly mean. I also tend to be better with money, realizing that only because we’ve been good with money when it’s fruitful and abundant can we make it when things are, let’s say, tighter. I try to spend as much time with my family as I can, when life gets crazy busy. The more time with them, the more focused I can be when I’m working – always remembering that work is work and home/family is home/family. To name a few.
If life is throwing high-heat, curve balls, screw balls and spit balls at you, call time out and gather yourself. Rely more on God. Listen to Him more. Step back for a moment and see what’s important and urgent. You’ll make clearer decisions, reduce your blood pressure and overall, be a better man. Oh yeah, did I mention that this sort of behavior is like working on growing in virtue?
TrueMan up!
A Man, His Wife, a Snowmobile and Wide-open Spaces
I’m a lucky man. I had the opportunity to get away this weekend with my wife. We got away for a half day on Friday, stayed overnight and had a whole day together on Saturday. With children, full-time jobs, a full-time ministry and life, we rarely get a full weekend together. A big thanks goes out to my brother, a friend of ours and to my in-laws for their help in watching the kids while we were gone.
The overnight date was perfect, just what we needed. A time with my best friend, a time of relaxation and rejuvenation, a time for some excitement and adventure. On Friday, we traveled to a small mountain town about 2.5 hrs away. When we arrived in town, the shop was ready for us. We signed in, grabbed a helmet for each of us, then traveled about 3 miles outside of town to start our back country snowmobile trip. We jumped on a touring sled and hit the trail. We couldn’t have asked for a better day – the sky was blue, the sun was out, the snow was pristine. It’s days like that when you really enjoy God’s creation… it was as if that day, God had created it all for us specifically. We toured around for a few hours, enjoying the scenery, the cool wind and each other’s company. The trip was incredible.
That night, we relaxed in a meager hotel room, enjoying each other’s company, the fact that we didn’t have to put any children to bed and the realization that there was no work in sight! The next morning, we got up early to hit the slopes, enjoying a day of skiing at a favorite ski resort. Again, God blessed us with an incredible day of blue skies, warm temps and time together.
What’s my point in telling you all about my wonderful overnight weekend getaway? My point is simple: take time to rejuvenate yourself. Find something – it doesn’t have to be snowmobiling and skiing – but find something that gives you life and make time for it in your life. As a man who is a glutton for a busy life, I can attest to the facts of life and what a busy, stress-filled life can do to a man. If you don’t have an outlet for your stress, your worries and your cares, they’ll catch up with you. If you don’t have a source of energy to fill you up, you’ll continually give of yourself until you run dry. For me, it was 1. time with my wife, alone without our children 2. time away from my computer, work and projects and 3. an opportunity to do an activity (2, in this case) that was life-giving! After this weekend, I’m ready to tackle my life and everything that life throws my way.
Whatever it is that you need in your life, be it a stress-reliever, a life-giving “fill up” or an outlet of any kind, make special time to make it happen. It will do you, and the others you are entrusted with, a great deal of good.
Man up!
