Do you ever feel overwhelmed with the abundance of
information available to you?
The number of email subscriptions you get from vendors you
once ordered something from or that one webinar you signed up for and now
receive their weekly newsletter. The abundance of self-help, healthy living, parenting
or professional development resources and newsletters. I find myself feeling overwhelmed
at the over-abundance of information available to me. It’s a good thing gone
bad. I start to feel like I’m drowning in it, because it’s too much to ever
consume, keep organized and accessible, and with so many great resources it’s
difficult to prioritize because I only have so much time to read/learn in this
life. How do I know which is the best resources?
During this time of quarantine
and “isolation” which definitely doesn’t feel like isolation, as I live with
five other people, the over stimulation of an abundance of content has become
overwhelming. Everybody is sending me emails about free resources online for
kids, free videos, e-books, audio books, movies, shows, etc., etc. Every single
company we’ve ever purchased something from or done any kind of business with
is sending me updates regarding their covid-19 related policies. I have
unsubscribed from numerous websites newsletters, however more keep coming. It
overtakes my head-space and I feel crowded out by good information that I maybe
don’t even need. It’s literally overwhelming and it’s showing me the consequences
of a big issue I have.
I need space in my head. How can I be so overloaded
with what is mostly good, useful information? Many of the subscriptions have
come as a result of me signing up for a free webinar, course or e-book, because
of my formula lie, that I often
subscribe to. This lie goes: if I
read/take webinar/course/program A, then it will solve problem b that I have.
It’s a lie that if I do ____, then my life will come together as
planned, I’ll have control of my life, etc.
Once I was coached/mentored by a brilliant lady named Julie,
who when we chatted about this tendency to always sign up for things and not
follow through due to this formula idea I was fixated on said, “RJ - everything
you really need to know, you already know.” What?! I absolutely didn’t
believe her. How could that possibly be? I have such a hunger to learn a
million things and grow a million ways, how could that be so? And yet, I came
to settle into the truth of her statement that everything else I could learn
would be extra, like bonus material, but not necessary for life. These words
were eventually so freeing for me, because they shocked me out of the formula lie which also ties into the grass is greener elsewhere lie and
causes me to look at my current reality and live fully there instead of longing
for everything to change, as a form of escapism. When I let go of the formula
and change it to if I fully embrace my
current reality, with joy and gratitude and quit covering up my struggles and
look for quick fixes, I actually do
have the resources I need to process them and succeed and grow.
So this leaves for me a lot of questions in terms of how do
I break the cycle of habitually believing this lie and subsequently feeling
overwhelmed this
feeling of too much information/too much content? How do I find the mental
space to dig my heels into my current reality and reflect and pray and be ok
with the current struggles and messiness, and stop believing that anyone really
has a mess-free life?
I remember living overseas in a capital city and finding so
much peace when I came across this verse in my Bible one day. It says in Psalm
18:19 (NIV) “He brought me out into a spacious place; he rescued me because he
delighted in me.” I remember the wonder I felt in reading the words spacious place.
A spacious place
represented the opposite of the cramped, overstimulated busy life I was living
in the city. I imagined the joy and freedom and beauty of being in a wide open
space. But I also imagined that the joy, beauty, peace of mind and freedom that
it says God offers is not due to me doing anything as part of a transaction.
Rather it came when I realized I’m already there, because he rescued me and delighted
in me. In my mind and heart, there can be a cleaning out, a de-cluttering that
makes room for peace and contentment. And in that contentment is where the lies
die off and fall away because there’s no need for greener grass of formulas for
contentment anymore.
This quarantine might be shining the spotlight on the fact
that even though the activities of normal life have slowed down, there’s still a
lot of too much clutter in your mind and life. This clutter comes from a belief
that you can change and control your future if only _____, the formula lie. Maybe it’s impossible for
you to just sit and give thanks for today with both its joys and difficulties,
knowing deep in your souls that it’s really ok for them to coexist. My challenge
to you today, if you believe the formula
and grass is greener lies, ask
yourself the following questions:
(Believe me, I’m asking myself the same
questions.)
- Is there something I really need to know, that I don’t already know? And I mean need, not want. What is it? And where will I learn it?
- Do I really know anyone who really has it all together, or is it an illusion?
- What part (or whole) of my reality am I trying to escape from by believing the lies?
- If the grass isn’t really greener over there, how might it be green right here in ways that I never noticed before? How can I find beauty in my challenges?
· List all the areas you might be believing these lies and journal ways to combat it with truth, for example.
o My marriage – find ways to appreciate the unique qualities of my spouse.
o My parenting – acknowledging that no family is perfect and every parent struggles at times, but my kids are gifts and I will treasure them.
o My job – I only need to do my best work today, using the gifts I have to the fullest, and be thankful to be employed.
Please let me know if any of this resonates with you and if this has been helpful. Thanks for reading and processing with me.
