10/08/2024
The other day, Laura and I were eating supper, and, in typical fashion, I was wolfing down my food while she was carrying the conversation. Two minutes later, I was done eating, and Laura was just getting started.
In reflecting on this less-than-stellar dining experience, she told me that I eat so fast it stresses her out. She feels like my rush through the meal means she has to rush through the meal, or she will miss out on something important…like dessert.
I think I’m beset with what mental health professionals call “hurry sickness,” a behavior pattern characterized by continual rushing and anxiety.
We live in a society that prizes efficiency and productivity above all else and uses time as a tool rather than a limit. Tyler Staton writes in his wonderful book, Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools, “Hurry isn’t an occasional necessity; it’s the new normal” (37).
Dallas Willard was once asked, “What do I need to do to be spiritually healthy?” After a long pause, he offered the response that led to the title of John Mark Comer’s book, “You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life” (Willard, Living in Christ’s Presence, 144). According to Willard, hurry is the great enemy of spiritual life in our day (Staton, idem).
In 1370, the first public clock was introduced in Germany. Prior to that introduction, there was a natural rhythm in life where people awoke with the rising of the sun and went to bed with its setting. Once time became measured by hours and minutes more than daylight and nightfall, cultures began to shift from the passing of time to time management.
Before the invention of the light bulb in 1879, the average American slept ten hours a night (Maas, Power Sleep, 7). By 1960 the modern conveniences of air conditioning and heating, microwaves, dishwashers, and laundry machines were common in American homes. A senate subcommittee predicted in 1967 that by 1985 the average American would work 22 hours a week for 27 weeks a year because of the time saved from this new technology (Anderson, Technology and Social Trends, 102).
And how have we used all this supposed “free time”? A 2016 study found that the average iPhone user touches their phone 2,617 times a day, staring at their screen for 2 ½ hours over 76 sessions. A more recent study in 2019 discovered that in just three years, the figure had more than doubled to over five hours a day (Staton, idem).
In American culture, busyness is one of the top distractions from life with God. The bottom line, according to Michael Zigarelli, is that:
It may be the case that (1) Christians are assimilating to a culture of busyness, hurry, and overload, which leads to (2) God becoming more marginalized in Christians’ lives, which leads to (3) a deteriorating relationship with God, which leads to (4) Christians becoming more vulnerable to adopting secular assumptions about how to live, which leads to (5) more conformity to a culture of busyness, hurry and overload. And then the cycle begins again (ibid., 38).
So, what is the cure for “hurry sickness”? “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). We have to force ourselves to adapt to the pace of God rather than that of our culture. Slow down in your reading of God’s Word and prayer. Train yourself to listen more than talk, rest in balance with work, and, for me especially, enjoy your food and don’t just consume it. When we create space in our calendars and clocks, we create room in our hearts and lives for a deeper relationship with the One who said, “Come to Me, all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
