Margin: Part 3
(This is Part 3 of a series on Margin and Leadership. You may want to read Part 1 and Part 2 if you haven’t already.)
Listen to the five-minute Margin: Part Three audio program from Coach’s Corner.
Do you have rhythm? Can you move your body like a great dancer, looking effortless as if it took no work to become so graceful?
How about your life? Does it have rhythm in this same way? If so, did it just happen or did you have to work at it just like a graceful dancer?
Today’s post is third in a series about leaders and margin. Today I’ll be writing about rhythm and the role it plays in margin. We’ll also explore the often misunderstood concept of balance.
If you’re a pastor or leader in a church, you know the concept of rhythm better than I do. You have weekly rhythms that dominate your life. You also have yearly rhythms that cause some seasons to be much more intense and others to be much less so.
Of course others of us also have rhythms—school teachers, factory workers, restaurant owner. Most all of us have weekly and yearly rhythms to one degree or another.
Because of the natural rhythms of our vocations and of life itself, the idea of balance between margin and work becomes a dynamic concept that changes from day to day and season to season.
Jack Groppel is a consultant who helps pro athletes and people he calls “corporate athletes” to maximize their performance. Jack teaches that in order to maximize performance, people need to seek times of great challenge and stress followed by times of intentional recovery. This is how pro athletes get better every year, and it’s the same with us.
To seek a constant balance is not only impossible, but unhealthy. Nothing alive achieves a static balance. Life is not a flat line. In fact, when a doctor says someone has gone “flat line” it means they are dead.
As we look to achieve this optimum work and margin balance we need to understand that it will ebb and flow like any living thing. Seasons of stress followed by intentional recovery.
I believe this abundant life that God has promised us will exist of seasons of stress and challenge that go well beyond what we believe we can do. But these days or seasons of stress need to be followed by time of intentional recovery. God will grow our capacity way beyond what we know we can do. Just like Jesus did, we also need to get away from the crowds and recover, especially with times of intimacy with God.
Ecclesiastes 3:1–3 says:
There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under the heavens:
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot,
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to tear down and a time to build,
That sounds like rhythm to me.
Of course all of this gets complicated when you try to integrate your seasons of stress and recovery with those in your family and those in your organization. This isn’t easy, but it’s important to be intentional about it. The easy thing to do is to overwork and get trapped by the rhythm of the so called “rat race,” where even if you win, you’re still a rat.
Ever ask someone near the end of his or her life what they might have done differently? I’m pretty sure I’ve read that when asked, two very common answers come up:
- I would have taken more risk, and
- I would have spent less time at work
This is worth thinking about.
If you were offering advice to a friend that had the exact same dynamic balance of margin and work as you, what advice would you give that person?
Really, think about it for a minute.
Whatever you would tell them, do it yourself. I’m sure it’s solid advice not only for them, but also for you.
Until next time, I pray that you experience God’s rich blessings.
Post by Rodger.
Image by Chantel Beam.
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