ESCAPE PLANS
My family is on a five day vacation. We are talking, laughing, and eating….. a lot. The tasks we will return to don’t feel as stressful now that we are recharging.
Life is extremely busy. There is something necessary to be done on a daily basis. It is easy to get so caught up in living that we forget to focus on the things that matter most. This is why having an escape plan is a must. In fact, one of the most influential pieces of literature in all of history considers an escape to be a commandment: remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. This means remember the day of rest, and keep it set apart.
My little family of five struggles immensely to escape from the tasks of life. Part of this comes from the nature of our jobs, part of it comes from having children, and the last part comes from our own desire to accomplish the things that “must” be done.
In our home, the weekend days are work days. We clean the house, we shuttle to sports, and we run the children’s programs at our church. During the week, we work all day, and almost every night has either a meeting or a sporting event scheduled. I say almost every night because over a year ago we set aside one night for our family only.
Wednesday night is the night no one is allowed to schedule anything. It is family fun night. Each child gets to pick one thing for the night: the activity, the meal, or the dessert. This one night a week, we focus on nothing other than being together. It is a short escape from everything else. We love Wednesday nights, but it isn’t enough time to really escape. As soon as the kids are in bed, we frequently pull out our laptops and get to work. If we did not plan for it, even our Wednesday escapes would not happen.
This is why an escape plan is a must. Without a plan, it does not happen. There is always something I feel I must be doing. I even feel guilty when I do rest. My task driven nature is slightly upset if I am not checking something of my to do list. It is time to add rest to my list of things to do because it is a commandment.
Item number one on today’s checklist is take a Sabbath: a day set apart to rest.