Postmarked “URGENT”

Urgent lives are fully lived lives. Not burned out just burn-ing, this self-sustaining flame burns eternally.

I have often wondered if there was a way we could formularise life.

That is, might it be possible to make a pattern for a good life that we could copy, model, and therefore reproduce?

One thing is for certain in my mind; that to live an urgent life—one that is not necessarily “hurried”—is the attendance of that time-respected wisdom of God.

Switching Our Paradigms

So many of us are caught up in a whirlwind of thought on the subject of burnout—the very ‘urgent’ lack of real and meaningful rest. There’s no doubt this is a trap for both younger and older players alike.

To have a life postmarked “urgent” is nothing about acceding to burnout at all.

It takes things at, and to, and on, an entirely different spectrum.

When we can conceive a life where we’re literally burning and not burning out, we’re close to the realisation of the fact; urgency can become us, but not in haste. There is order and purpose there... meaning to sustain our hearts.

The Reason for Much Burnout – Lack of Purpose and Meaning

At some point for basically all people who burn out they lose their grip on the purpose and meaning that’s otherwise driven and sustained them; bringing them to that very point, often in much achievement and acclaim.

They might’ve done much and they might’ve done those things with great and inspirational gusto... and then, the silence of God!

What’s that all about?

The silences of God are many times about the carpet of life that’s pulled from beneath our feet. We get to a point where there’s a nothingness present in the fact of our mission. We ask, “Why now, God?”—“Why now, when all was going so well?” Then for a time, it remains a mystery. Perhaps it’s one that’s never solved.

Many people seem to struggle to recover from these bouts of burnout where the spiritual fervour just plummets into the abyss.

Turning Our Attention to the Way Home

This is a suggestion; that’s all.

As one who’s suffered from burnout I can see what led to it, and I can also see the sort of things—on the other side of burnout—that propagate enough balance to sustain and grow the purpose and meaning we need to both survive and inevitably thrive.

The way home is an urgent and inspirational life. It’s the mental and spiritual resilience to make the absolute most of every opportunity. This is not just about working our guts out. But it is about making the absolute best of Sabbath rests so we can come back fresher and newer every time.

Rest is the key to the urgent life... sprinkled, effective rest through the bursts of purpose-lived and meaningful activity.

The urgent life needs its rest and its balance. The urgent life is hurried in bursts only; it always just as easily walks away from the hustle and bustle of life in an instant. The urgent life, therefore, takes dire control of things and the management of the life becomes its most central of all purposes.

© 2010 S. J. Wickham.