Excess Baggage

Just how much stuff do we need? I keep getting taught over and over that we don't need much. I am not sure though that I am listening to the lesson. When I packed to go to the beach a little over a week ago, I thought I was being consevative. I pack all four of us plus a cooler and some fun gear into the trunk of our Toyota Corolla. I thought I was doing well. Nevertheless, at the end of the week some of the 'fun gear' never left the trunk and about one-third of my clothes never got touched! I was reminded of how little I need and how much I tend to over compensate.

The lesson came home to me again this morning as I transitioned back to work. I wrote a 'to do' list of epic proportions and crammed a tote bag full as I headed off to the office. Something nagged at me about both. It wasn't that I didn't want to do the things on my list. I think my discomfort was more how self-deluded the whole process seemed. Who am I kidding with my massive to-do list other than myself? And what purpose does it really hold?

God-incidentally, as I was driving to work thinking about writing a post on this phenomenon, my seat belt alarm spontaneously went off. The random alarm confused me at first and then I realized that my tote bag was so heavy that the passenger seat thought someone was sitting there. Good grief! Am I really carrying so much stuff it can be confused for another person? The sad answer is 'yes.'

So what to do? First, I am going to toss my to-do list as I currently have it. I am writing down five things that I know require my attention. When I am done with those I will renegotiate a list of three to five new things. I am going to see how that goes. I am thinking it will be very freeing in many ways.

The idea came to me from a new game I learned this past week called bananagrams. It's a game somewhat reminscent of Scrabble in which you race against other people creating crossword puzzles from lettered tiles. One afternoon I decided to make a massive crossword puzzle from all of the tiles. I would have been overwhelmed if I had flipped all of the tiles at once and tried to create the puzzle. Instead I started with a twenty one tiles and once every tile was used, I would draw seven more. If I couldn't figure out how to use a letter I would dump it, but had to draw three in its place. That gives you a high incentive not to dump. This is going to be my new to-do strategy. I will be doing five from my epic list and nothing gets considered until those five are done and then I will draw a new set. My traditional bottomless list that keeps getting re-configure is out of the picture for at least this week.

To me all of this boils down to--How do we practically live out Jesus instruction, "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." In a way my truncated list is a one day at a time approach. I am letting go of imposing unrealistic if not impossible expectations.

I would love to hear from any of you who have tamed the to-do list beast. I will report soon on my progress. Until then, I just finished one thing on my list and am moving on to the next. Blessings from The Practical Disciple.