The Illusion of Busy

Once again finals week hits... campus is filled with bleary-eyed students clutching coffee... or anything with some boost of caffeine.

Everyone's in a hurry, rushing through the misty wind, looking down, avoiding puddles, pulling coats a little tighter around themselves. The lingering, talking, laughing is slowing and everyone is simply focusing on the task at hand: get done and go home.

And I begin to realize my problem...

I make every week into finals week. For me, everything is a stress-escalating, no-time-for-anything, moaning-and-groaning-about-everything-I-have-to-do crisis like most people's finals week.

My default setting is stress. As bad as this is, I often find my worth or importance in the things I accomplish. So if I'm always stressing and everything is a crisis, then I begin to think that the thing I'm doing is somehow really important... even if it is a pointless task. Slowly, I let the tiniest things become the most important... inhibiting my relationships with people.

As the semester draws to a close and two of my closest friends are graduating and getting married, I'm beginning to look up and realize that some of the things I've been stressing about are not worth the time. Ending well and enjoying these relationships for as long as they are close are what truly matter right now. Of course school is important. But sometimes... relationships matter MORE.
I've been learning this since freshman year. And still I'm a ball of stress... grimacing when people "intrude" on my "get things done" time, because "I'm so busy."

The worst part is that as my mind spins with my typical load of stress, when I sit down to work on my to-do list... all I can think about is how MUCH I have to do. Not just homework. Life. The terrifying question: What are you doing after college? How are you going to pay for that? Where are you living next year? student teaching. change. friends getting married. graduation. a seemingly infinite amount to process. And so then I dink around. Five minutes. 10 minutes. an hour. three. And then I don't even know where the day went. But I'm still sitting at my computer, staring at a menacing, blinking cursor below "Lesson Plan Day #1." I know it will get done. I just simply can't bring my mind to focus on the task at hand. But I continue to tell people I'm busy.

Those who know me best begin to pick up on this "illusion of busy" that I paint for myself. I remember several conversations that went something like... you know what, I think you enjoy being stressed. Even if you didn't have a care in the world you'd find something to stress about. I laughed when it was originally said. But I hear it echo once more in my ears, and I begin to realize that it's true.

Allowing myself to be stressed is giving in to the lie that says that my worth comes from being busy. That my worth comes from what I get done. So the more I make it known that I'm busy, the more I declare my worth... right?

That's why I love grace. Because grace doesn't care what you do. In fact, grace declares that you can't do anything... but extends love and acceptance anyway... regardless of what you do.

When I continue to keep a cluttered mind with stress gnawing on every corner of my soul, I'm not living a grace-filled life. I cannot extend grace to others. I cannot bring rest to others. In fact, I am rejecting grace... rejecting freedom... and once again crawling into the cage of legalism, stress, and bondage.

The thing about creating an illusion of busy for myself is that ... it's just that...  an illusion. false. And when I finally come to terms with the fact that I'm really not as busy as I make myself out to be, I also have to come to terms with the fact that I'm not worth anything because of what I do. No matter how hard I work and how hard I try, I cannot improve my worth. Or devalue it. Because my worth isn't based on what I do. It's based on Whose I am.

I'm thankful for those precious, grace-filled people who continue to stand at my side and offer me truth (even when it hurts), despite knowing that my working, achieving, stress-filled tendencies still haven't kicked the bucket.