There’s no time to rest when we’re simply trying to survive. But life in constant survival mode will kill us as well. We must allow ourselves regular times to recover to keep fighting the good fight God has given us.
For example, after running a race a runner needs time to recover. And he becomes less and less effective if he continues to run one race right after another.
And even gazelles running from lions can’t run forever. They must find a way to either get back to the herd or otherwise hide or they will die from the running itself.
The same is true for us.
Certainly, there are seasons in which much is required of us – we’re in overtime and we simply have to keep grinding it out.
But we can’t live in perpetual overtime. At some point we have to take a break and recover.
This might be remembering our Sabbaths, putting ourselves in the path of beauty, or simply taking more time to breathe deeply. But whatever it looks like, it’s allowing time for our souls to be renewed, refreshed, and revitalized.
And we likely need more time to recover whenever we find ourselves constantly exhausted or irritated, getting sick more often, or when it’s taking longer and longer to complete simple tasks. Things start to break down without this adequate time to recuperate.
And even when the show must go on, we can still be kind to ourselves and not demand of ourselves optimal performance as if we were not depleted. Until we’ve recovered we might have to approach life in a lower gear – scaling back many expectations until our souls can catch up.
We’re more likely to give into hopelessness and despair and become more vulnerable to any number of temptations when our souls don’t have the space needed to recover from the demands of life.
Denial is not your friend. You can’t keep running one race after another while pretending you don’t need time to recover. Create the space for your soul to be refreshed and restored.
Photo by Anthony Mapp on Unsplash
