In Search of the 80% Life

     "Margin is the amount allowed beyond that which is needed.  It is something held in reserve for contingencies or unanticipated situations.  Margin is the gap between rest and exhaustion, the space between breathing freely and suffocating.  It is the leeway we once had between ourselves and our limits....we don't know when we have overextended until we feel the pain.  As a result, many people commit to a 120-percent life and wonder why the burden feels so heavy.  It is rare to see a life pre-scheduled to only 80 percent, leaving a margin for responding to the unexpected that God sends our way."

Richard A. Swenson, M.D.
"Margin - Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives"

   If you're like me, Dr. Swenson's message about margins makes sense.  If you're like me, you know something about overextending yourself, you know something about seasons of 120% living, when you've overextended yourself in ways that have made your life almost unmanageable.

   And if you know something about living at 120%, you know the pitfalls.  Lack of margin in our financial lives creates a crisis when those unplanned expenses occur.  Lack of emotional margin can leave us frazzled and harried, a prisoner to our own fractured emotions that are without anchor.  When we don't have sufficient physical rest, we can find ourselves exhausted and inefficient, irritable and unable to perform at our best.

   Sometimes I feel like the proverbial hamster on a wheel, running endlessly and getting nowhere.  I know what it feels like to get stuck in the rut of an unhealthy 120% life.

   And I'll just bet you do too!

   So, I'm on a quest for the 80% life.  I'm in search of living a simpler, less cluttered life, an orderly, disciplined life that pushes back from the table while there's still food remaining on the plate.  I've set my sights on establishing some wiggle-room. 

   I know this won't happen overnight.  Having spent way too much of my adult life living at the edge of financial, emotional and physical crisis due to lack of margin brought about by poor planning, the inability to say "no", breached or non-existent boundaries, the inability to resist the lure of instant-gratification, and an entire host of other miss-steps and blunders that have way too often kept me weary on the hamster wheel going nowhere, I realize that old habits die hard.

   But one thing's certain, Dr. Swenson is right.  Over-eating, over-spending, over-scheduling and over-working diminishes margin.  When we use it all up, and then some, we don't have the necessary reserves to handle life's little unscheduled, unplanned and un-budgeted surprises. 

   Ever try to quench your thirst with a cup that's been drained dry?  

   So join me in this noble quest for the 80% life, a life with some reserve, a life that is not teetering on the edge, a life with some wiggle-room, a life with healthy boundaries, a life not driven by appetite but anchored in wisdom....

   a satisfied life...

   a life with enough...

   a life of margin.


Grace and Peace!

Pastor Randy