The Ministry of Margin by Mike Spray

Ever felt like you don't have time to breathe? Having a margin in your life is the room to breathe, and manage your time.

As most of you know, Teri, Meredith and I are all heavily involved in the Civil Air Patrol. This is not a "plug" for CAP, but I wanted to share some things with you that I have been publishing to other CAP members in Colorado who hold leadership positions. Hopefully, these same issues will be helpful to you and your families, and this will give you "prayer food" if the Lord happens to lay CAP or any of us here at the office on your heart - we ALL need more margin. By the way, Dr. Swenson, quoted several times in the materials that follow, is a Christian physician. Many of the helps he offers to deal with being marginless have to do with prayer and the Lord's leading, but since CAP is a "non-sectarian organization," I had to downplay or sidestep some of the direct faith-based approaches, some of which have been restored in the versions here. I do recommend the book to you, and there is also an accompanying workbook called Restoring Margin to Overloaded Lives that is for either individual or small group use.

More and more, faster and faster, cheaper and cheaper
This is a less-than-flattering definition of progress that was offered at our church around Valentine's Day. Interesting. In his book, Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives, Dr. Richard A. Swenson, MD, writes:

"The conditions of modern-day living devour margin. If you are homeless, we direct you to a shelter. If you are penniless, we offer you food stamps. If you are breathless, we connect you to oxygen. But if you are marginless, we give you yet one more thing to do.
Marginless 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 the children off at school because the car ran out of gas two blocks from the gas station - and you forgot your purse.
Margin, on the other hand, is having breath left at the top of the stairs, money left at the end of the month, and sanity left at the end of adolescence.
Marginless is the baby crying and the phone ringing at the same time; margin is Grandma taking the baby for the afternoon.
Marginless is being asked to carry a load five pounds heavier than you can lift; margin is a friend to carry half the burden.
Marginless is not having the time to finish the book you're reading on stress; margin is having the time to read it twice...
Marginless is the disease of the 1990s. Margin is it's cure." (pp 13-14)

I can identify with "marginless" in my own life, and too often I can easily see the symptoms in others. Dr. Swenson believes the "cure" is possible, but will take some work on our parts, and I'll address some of those in the next few issues.

If you want it bad, sometimes you get it bad!
Help! I'm trying to "be all things to all people all at once all by myself." Do you think I need more margin in my life? To re-phrase from last time, "margin" is defined as the leeway between myself and my limits. Mathematically, the equation is: Power - Load = Margin. Negative numbers in this equation equal overload, and long-term overload easily leads to burnout (or worse). According to Dr. Swenson, "To be healthy, we require margin in at least four areas: emotional energy, physical energy, time and finances." He continues, "Of the four margins...margin in emotional energy is paramount. When we are emotionally resilient, we can confront our problems with a sense of hope and power. When our psychic reserves are depleted, however, we are seriously weakened."

Having furiously read 40 or 50 pages tonight to "get to the bottom line" for you, I hope the following material isn't too condensed to make sense. If you want or need the full text of any of these, let me know.

"If we find our emotional energy gone, how can we get it back? What are the factors to emphasize in our lives that will not only protect our emotional reserves from unnecessary depletion but will replenish the supply at regular intervals? In such a hostile environment, who will be kind to our fragile psyches? Who will feed us and not swallow us? Following are prescriptions that work; take as needed.

Rx 1. Cultivate Social Supports;
Rx 2. Pet A Surrogate;
Rx 3. Reconcile Relationships;
Rx 4. Serve One Another;
Rx 5. Rest;
Rx 6. Laugh;
Rx 7. Cry;
Rx 8. Create Appropriate Boundaries;
Rx 9. Envision A Better Future;
Rx 10. Offer Thanks;
Rx 11. Grant Grace;
Rx 12. Be Rich In Faith;
Rx 13. Hold Fast Hope;
Rx 14. Above All, Love..." (Margin, pp 111-120)

Again, I recommend these materials to you. They're published by NavPress, and the "Margin" is only $13. The Margin workbook is 1-57683-184-1.