Rushing and Doing

Maybe Moody blues and maybe Monday blues but I woke with a start and began working thru the list this morning. Then I remembered something I read in “MY Utmost for His Highest”—the old devotional book that was used by Bill W. and Dr. Bob and other early AA’s.

In the “Utmost” devotion for October 19th is says that “The press and rush of tremendous activity that we regard so highly is not for the Master. The central thing about the Kingdom of God is our personal relationship with Himself, not public usefulness.”

Ouch! I am so very invested in my “press and rush” and in the “public usefulness” part of my identity. Dare I reframe that to do less and be more?

It’s not the first time this question has come around, but to see it right there and to know surrendering doesn’t mean do more, it means let God do the doing.

Let’s see how I do the rest of this week.

My Hamster Life

A cartoon this week showed the headline of a fake newspaper. It read:
“Hamster Found Dead: Police say he fell asleep at the wheel.”

That’s my life this week. Running, racing, hurrying, scurrying and all on my own self-made hamster wheel. Work, projects, people, self-care even begins to feel like pressure and yes, even recovery begins to feel like something to dash to and from and check off my list. (I just wrote “life” instead of “list). Freud? Yes. Thank you.

I am checking off my life like it’s a long list of things to do before I get to live.

Whose life is this? The pain of long recovery is that I don’t even have the satisfaction of blaming someone lese. I make these choices. I choose this life. No victims only volunteers. Dam.