When you feel tense when you should feel good it is time to rest

Photo by Eduardo Flores on Unsplash

I had finished for the day yet as I drove home I felt tense. I had kept reading email after email and attempted to reply to them. I had felt good just before lunch as I completed a lengthy task that had been on my mind for a while. You know those things that never take as much time as they do in your mind? So I was surprised that I was feeling tense. I was thinking, “It’s Friday, you got so much done today, you cleared a lot of stuff and yet you are feeling tense.”

I stopped off at M & S cafe and as I supped my cappuccino my mind was still trying to work out the feeling. I was just thinking how much people ask for things one after the other. I was noting my resistance to requests on matters I am no longer involved. I wondered why the resistance if it helped someone. My mind began to think of my teacher and how tired he got.

In chapter 6 of the book of Mark at verse 31, I came upon this passage.

Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.

New International Version

As it turned out people still followed him and such was his compassion that he kept giving of himself. Nevertheless, I am pausing with this verse.

There is a time needed to eat, sleep and rest. If we don’t get them we are not looking after our own needs. I often say to people, “If you don’t look after yourself and you fall ill nothing else happens.” My point is we only give well when we feel refreshed, rested and motivated and if we are not functioning we are good for nothing.

I sense the words of the verse are telling me it is time to take a rest. The tension is communicating that but it is easier to hear in this story.

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