Add Some Margin

You have six days each week for your ordinary work, but on the seventh day you must stop working, even during the seasons of plowing and harvest. Exodus 34:21

Richard Swenson opens his book Margin with this observation:

The conditions of modern-day living devour margin. . . . [Living without margin] is being thirty minutes late to the doctor’s office because you were twenty minutes late getting out of the hairdresser’s because you were ten minutes late dropping off the children at school.

Margin, on the other hand, is having breath left at the top of the staircase, money left at the end of the month, and sanity left at the end of [the day].^a

Maybe you’d love to take a day to relax, but you’re afraid that work would just pile up.

If there is more to do than you have time for, perhaps you should evaluate what you’re doing to see if it’s all really necessary.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to read this page next year and smile because you’ve finally been able to tackle the beast of busyness and add some margin into your life?