We have to figure out how to manage all this stress.” Richard Swenson’s first suggestion: Live intentionally.
“If you don’t fix these problems in your life, nobody else will,” Swenson said in a lecture at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary March 27–28 in Kansas City, Mo.
Swenson voiced the attitude: “There’s the kingdom of God at stake. There’s Jesus telling me how to walk. I’m not gonna let this culture terrorize me, bully me and push me around.” Romans 12:1–2, he reminded, exhorts, “Do not be conformed.”
“What does that mean? Be a clone?” Swenson asked, answering, “It means to be transformed by the gospel.”
His second suggestion: lower your expectations by accepting human limits.
“It’s not a spiritual crime to admit that we have limits in our lives. It’s a sign of maturity,” Swenson said.
The world says, “You should know no boundaries. If you can dream it, you can do it,” he recounted.
“I’m not against dreams,” Swenson said. But, he reminded, “It’s the kingdom of God, the Spirit of God, the power of God who works through us. … We should have excellence and marvelous vision. We should look at the world and see it whole. God should stir our hearts to have a mighty vision for what He wants to accomplish through us.”
Third: Prioritize your values.
“If you have 36 hours of things to do and you have a 24-hour day, it’s easy to see that you have to say no to 12 hours’ worth,” Swenson said, reminding that people’s priority systems should tell them when to say yes and when to say no. Progress automatically increases the pace of life and, in the process, Swenson said, “Don’t you think that perhaps we will start missing something of the presence of God? When I go at a nanosecond pace, I forget to pray. I have no time to wait upon the decisions of the Holy Spirit informing me.”
Another way to reduce stress is through laughter, he said.
Other ways of reducing stress and overload, Swenson said, include:
- Cultivating simplicity and contentment in their lives. The people who are most free in the world, Swenson said, are not the people who have everything, but the people who need nothing.
- Taming technology. “Technology is wonderful, except when it isn’t. It can serve you; it can also drive you to the brink of insanity,” Swenson said.
- Seeking solitude from time to time. Swenson pointed to the Old Testament in citing the need for solitude and rest. All the great figures of the Bible headed to the desert from time to time, he said.
- Turning off the television.
- Controlling debt and spending.
Individuals urged to avoid overload; author says pastors prone to syndrome
Americans are “hitting the wall and collapsing in exhaustion,” Richard Swenson said. “Everyone is talking about how weary they are.”
Swenson, author of “Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives,” spoke on the problems of stress, complexity, speed and overload in American culture in Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Scudder Lecture Series March 27–28 in Kansas City, Mo.
Swenson, of Menomonie, Wis., is a full-time futurist, researcher and author whose books also include “The Overload Syndrome” and “Hurtling Toward Oblivion.” He spent five years in a private medical practice before accepting a teaching position at the University of Wisconsin Medical School, a position he held for 15 years.
Speaking from a physician’s perspective, Swenson said doctors as well as pastors are especially prone to living overloaded. “If I don’t do it, who in the world is going to do it?” the pastor’s thinking goes. “The whole Kingdom is going to collapse if I don’t put in this extra time at 3:30 in the morning.”
A clear understanding of who God is is necessary to feel a sense of peace in life, Swenson said. “And if you lack that understanding and you think the kingdom of God depends on your effort and your effort alone, you’re not going to make it.”
The futurists of the 1960s predicted something much different for the 21st century than the “overload syndrome” epidemic, Swenson said. They thought each American family would have only one wage earner working 20 hours a week. Technology, progress, computers and automation were expected to increase productivity to the point of people having too much leisure time. They thought the risk would be boredom, not overload.
Research, however, shows that 30 million American men describe their lives as being stressed out, Swenson said. Thirty-six percent of Americans say they are rushed all the time and the average office worker is interrupted 202 times a day. Instead of having one wage earner per family working fewer hours, Swenson said many households have two wage earners, each working more than 40 hours per week. “There’s something going on out there and we need to understand it for the sake of the Kingdom, for the sake of the flock,” he said. “There’s going to be enormous attrition in the Kingdom because people are so tied up and so busy with this cultural treadmill.
“God himself taps us on the shoulder and we give Him the busy signal,” Swenson lamented.
“Progress always leads to more,” he continued. “Everybody I know wants more. That’s the definition of happiness in America: more than I have now. The trouble with progress is that we have limits. Progress cannot afford to acknowledge these limits.
“This is what the futurists completely forgot to factor in during the 1960s. The overload epidemic is very real and it is after your career, your profession, your pastorate and your flock, just as it is after physicians,” Swenson said.
Stress is not all bad, he said, explaining that God designed people’s bodies to be very adaptable, and he invented the stress mechanism as a way to adapt to change. On the other hand, Swenson said, too much stress can make people physically ill.
Progress also leads to increasing complexity, Swenson said, pointing out that Americans on average will operate 20,000 pieces of technology in their lifetimes. While we should allow some complexity in our lives, Swenson said, we should not let it clutter the “important things” in life, especially the gospel message.
Progress increases speed and, at times, speed is appropriate, Swenson continued. The problem comes in going too fast, he said. “You cross the line of dysfunction, a line called hurry. When I’m going at the speed of light, there isn’t time to really stop and reflect and pray to try to discern what the Spirit of God would have me to do.” And when people hurry, he said, it leads to increased mistakes and stress.
The threshold line is human limits, which were God’s idea, Swenson said. “He put that 24-hour day in there for my protection,” he said. When a person goes past that threshold, he becomes irritable, for example, and has migraine headaches. “With other people, it’s apathy or withdrawal or work dread. They get depressed, they don’t want to face life. For some people, it’s moral failure,” Swenson said.
“We all have to live in overload from time to time. In the kind of world we live in, it’s impossible to avoid that. But don’t live there all the time,” he said.
People need a little margin in their lives, Swenson said. Even though culture has pushed people over the line, they can put on the brakes, which takes discipline, he said.
“In the spiritual life, discipline means to create that space in which something can happen that you had not planned or thought about,” Swenson said.
Swenson said his study of Jesus’ ministry is what set him free. Ministry for Jesus was the person standing in front of Him at the time. “To me, the person standing in front of me was an obstacle that I’m trying to get over, under, around or through so I could get down the road. I had a totally different orientation about life because I was so agenda-driven. Jesus healed the person standing in front of Him. He didn’t teach everybody in Israel, but he taught that person, he loved that person.
“In the end, it is about ‘seek ye first the kingdom of God.’ In the end, it’s all about Jesus,” Swenson said.
Various factors can produce stress in people
Pressing deadlines at work. Conflicting family schedules. A midnight call that a friend is in the hospital. Losing a job. Caring for a sick child. Managing the care of an elderly parent. Planning a wedding. Having a new baby. Discovering a personal health issue. What do all these life circumstances have in common?
Stress.
Whether perceived as positive or negative, these things happen in life at different times, each creating a certain amount of uneasiness and lack of control to the daily routine of “normal” life.
When stress is not managed well, it leaves your body open to disease and illness. Properly managing the stress of life (which happens every day to all of us) will help you achieve your wellness goals. See if the following tips will help you to better maintain a peaceful spirit during stressful times.
- Use your sense of humor. On those days when everything seems to be going backwards, choosing to laugh at the irony of your circumstances not only lifts your mood but also puts your situation into an eternal perspective. The Bible confirms this in Proverbs 17:22: “A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.”
- Develop a social support system. You need friends and family. Enlist their help during stressful times. They can always support and lift you up in prayer.
- Exercise. Regular exercise will remove the buildup of the toxic effects from stress and use the “stress hormones” in a positive way instead of a harmful way. Studies show that taking a 10-minute walk during intense times will increase the amount of oxygen to your brain, allowing you to think more clearly and therefore make better decisions.
- Choose to eat nutritious foods. Eat foods that contain healthful sources of nutrients, antioxidants and phytochemicals. God designed these nutrients to help your body with energy needs and to build and repair damaged tissue. Without these, you leave your body lacking what it needs. So, grab that apple instead of a candy bar in the afternoon.
- Maintain a healthy weight. Extra body weight can add to the extensive workload of your heart as it tries to supply blood through the 200 miles of blood vessels per pound of fat. Keeping your weight in a healthy range will enable your body to more effectively deal with stress. Weight is only one of the many health indicators that impact your stress management. See your doctor for a complete picture of your health and ask him/her what is a healthy weight for your age and body type.
- Spend time in relationship with God. He knows your struggles, fears and needs. He understands your worries and concerns. He desires to walk through life with you and give you strength. Consider what He has in store for you or what He wants you to do for others. Seek out the lessons He desires to teach you through your circumstances. Look for His mercy and strength to carry you. This is the foundational element in total wellness of heart, soul, mind and strength.
Stress is inevitable. How you respond to it will determine your growth. Take steps to manage stress as God would desire for you to. “Be still,” God said, “knowing that I am God.” (BP)
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