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We’re spread thin. Some of us are spread so thin we can’t truly love the people enough who matter the most to us.
We spend all day pouring our hearts in our job and come home to our family with emotional leftovers. We are wrapped up in every church function available that we are not investing deeply in the lives of those close to us. We have been dealt a bad hand or we have a sense of entitlement. We build a mountain of unhealthy pride and fail to connect with loved ones. We are distracted with a plethora of things, and our energy and love are divided. And this world doesn’t make it any easier. There are so many wonderful things it offers.
In recent years, I found I have become victim to an overly committed schedule. Minimal time at home, rare date nights, brief communication with my family, and my circle of friends kept shrinking. Things were spinning out of control and I needed to reevaluate what was important. I needed to become a quitter. I needed to quit things in my life that were neither edifying nor fitting for my direction in life. I needed to quit to love better.
Are there things you can quit? I bet there are. I bet there are at least two or three things. And I know that voice inside your head that is giving you excuses right now. It’s that same voice we all have telling us we can’t let people down, pouring fear in our minds and letting potential failure and disappointment scare us from good judgment.
And that’s true; we disappoint people when we quit. But often those are the people who come and go in our lives: those circumstantial relationships at work or extended social settings. It’s our relationships with family, friends and loved ones that we must focus on, and must quit other things to make more time for them. Those are the people we shouldn’t disappoint by adding more to our schedule and leaving less time for them.
So jump in and quit something. Quit something and don't look back. It may be for a short season or forever. But note, once you quit something, don’t start something else up. The point is to quit something in order to love others better.
Quit watching 12 hours of Sunday football and hang out with your kids. Quit the late night bar visits and schedule date nights with your wife. Quit the 2am video game marathons so you can perform better for your job the next morning. Quit your 80-hour work week so you can give your family the love and attention they need. The reward is high and the relief is unimaginable.
Take a risk – and quit.