Making the best use of your time

Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil.      Eph 5.15-16

So I’m exploring this idea. What can I do with the time that I have? What can I do today, this week, this year? Obviously how much time we are allotted is unknown. But man, hour by hour, day by day, year after year, how many hours I had lived staggers me. How many hours have I played? How many hours have I worked? How many hours to make something that is eternal? And how many hours have I wasted?  I guess I’m looking backwards. But I’m also looking forward to the time I have today. What can I do with the time that I have?  

Due to my stroke I’ve been tracking my time. I guess I started tracking it as a way to check my progress. So I started a log to track my time, how much time I had before I hit “the wall”.  Generally it sounded something like this: therapy, 1 hour, writing, 1 hour, working on a project, 1 hour, reading, 1 hour. When I started tracking it, all I could do was four hours.  Fatigue is a big deal when you’re dealing with a stroke. In my case, fatigue decides how much time I have to do what I want to do.

Three years later, well, unfortunately, four hours is still what I have. I don’t know if this will ever become better?  I don’t like that. Man I don’t like that. In the middle of the day, it generally consigns me to my recliner.  I’ve tried to punch through my fatigue, you know, tough it out. And I can. I can override my fatigue. But there is a price to be paid. The extra hours are subtracted from the next day. 

I’m realizing time management is essential in my new life. Thankfully my life wasn’t shortened but my productive hours have been shortened. And it has made the decisions about where I want to spend my time more important. 

When I started this post I titled it, “Four hours a day”. But in the middle of writing it I changed the title to “Making the best use of your time”. Why? Because it doesn’t matter If you have four hours or 16 hours of usable time. What matters is what to do with it. 

Time management is a hot topic. Lots of books have been written about maximizing our time.  The tools we have today, like smart phones, digital planners and AI, make it easy to plan our time. But generally time management devices aren’t used to simplify your life but to fill more things into your life. Whoo yoo, my life is full?!! But that feels wrong. Obviously I want to be full but I also want some space. I suspect the stories of our lives would read better if they were double spaced with margins. 

Another problem with time management devices is they can’t add a minute to your day. Your time is finite. I’ve never thought about how time limits us. One of the limitations in our life is time. Limitations mean we can’t do everything, we’re limited, we have to choose between things. Maybe the most important choice is what we do with our time.

I just read a book about time management. The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, by John Mark Comer. Here he suggests another way of living, and he starts with my favorite verse. I mean, he started with it. Before the book begins, in ½” tall font is this:  “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”  Matt 11.28-30

Wow, I like those verses. Those words, “come to me”, came to me on my porch. Those words that started my journey. A journey I am still on. Along with that, I want the easy yoke. The light burden. Rest for my soul.  Back in the day, generally what I did with my time was cram more things into my life. Having a stroke has been a blessing of sorts? A way to start over, set new priorities and change my habits.

Habits, yeah. That is what “The ruthless elimination of hurry’ is about, our habits. Comer begins with describing what is happening in our crazy rat race world. Then he talks about the solution, the easy yoke.  But the core of the book deals with four spiritual disciplines. Four things that Jesus did. Things we need to do if we want to follow Jesus.

Because spiritual disciplines take hard work, it seems counterproductive, working hard for the easy yoke, for the light burden. But it also makes sense. Often what seems easy in the beginning becomes heavy. To quote Dallas Willard,  “The cost of discipleship is high, but the cost of non-discipline is even higher.” Often hard work leads to an easier way, they lighten our load. Following Jesus’ example leads us to the easy yoke – Come to me, I will give you rest.

If you want to know the disciplines John Mark Comer recommends, I guess you will have to read the book. It is an easy read. And although it was written for people in the thick of it, Millennials, it also had something to say for those, like me, who are older. So I’m giving it a thumbs up.

I want to make the most of my four hours. And I’m praying for a life that will be double spaced with wide margins. Whether my life ends up being easy or hard, I want it to be lived under the easy yoke.