There’s something about adulthood that nobody really prepares you for. You eventually realize that there are certain responsibilities in life that you’re simply never going to finish. Take dishes, for example. You can spend twenty minutes cleaning the kitchen, get everything put away, and feel like you’ve finally accomplished something. And then, approximately eleven minutes later, someone walks into the kitchen with another plate. It’s never done.
And the older you get, the more you realize that a surprising amount of life works this way. Laundry, bills, work responsibilities, schedules, parenting, maintaining a house, and about a thousand other things just keep coming. You can become incredibly efficient at managing all of it, but there’s never really a moment when you can look around and say you’ve permanently finished everything you’re responsible for. And I think that’s one of the reasons so many of us feel exhausted.
We’re constantly trying to get ahead of a life that doesn’t actually have a finish line for most of its daily responsibilities. But here’s what I’ve been wondering. What if the problem isn’t simply that we have too much to do? What if part of the problem is that we’ve misunderstood where the strength to do those things is supposed to come from?
The Exhausting Pursuit of Getting Everything Right
I love finding ways to become more efficient. I’m the kind of person who enjoys learning about productivity, better systems, and ways to get more done in less time. And there’s nothing wrong with any of that. But I think our culture has developed an almost obsessive relationship with optimization. We’re constantly looking for the perfect morning routine, the best calendar system, the most effective way to manage our responsibilities, or the one habit that will finally make everything feel manageable. And while those things can be helpful, they can also reinforce a dangerous assumption.
We begin believing that if we could just get everything organized correctly, we’d finally have enough time, energy, and capacity to live the life we want. But life doesn’t always cooperate with our systems. Children get sick. Work becomes demanding. Relationships require more attention than we anticipated. Unexpected problems develop. And suddenly, the carefully organized life we’ve been trying to build begins feeling overwhelming again.
The question becomes whether we can find a better way to live than simply trying to manage everything through our own strength.
Learning to Number Our Days
There’s a fascinating prayer in Psalm 90 that I think speaks directly into this tension. Moses reflects on how brief human life is compared to the eternal nature of God. He acknowledges that our days are limited, that life moves quickly, and that much of what we experience involves difficulty and labor.
And then, in verse 12, he asks God to teach us to number our days so that we may gain a heart of wisdom. I think that’s such an important distinction. He doesn’t ask God to help him accomplish more things. He asks for wisdom to understand how to live well with the time he’s been given. Because there’s a difference between having a full calendar and living a meaningful life.
You can accomplish an enormous amount and still neglect the things that matter most. You can become successful at work while slowly becoming disconnected from your family. You can spend years building something impressive and eventually realize that it cost you relationships, joy, or the spiritual health you assumed you’d eventually have time to develop. And that’s why I think we need to ask a question that goes beyond productivity.
Am I simply getting better at managing my life, or am I actually becoming wiser about how I live it? Those aren’t necessarily the same thing.
Start With What God Has Already Given You
One of the things I think we frequently get backward in our relationship with God is the order in which we approach Him. We spend an enormous amount of energy trying to become the people we think we’re supposed to be. We work harder, commit to better habits, make promises, and try to build lives that reflect what we believe God wants. And when we fall short, we feel guilty. So we try harder. But the Christian life was never intended to be something we accomplish through our own strength.
The foundation of our relationship with God is His love and grace toward us, not our ability to perform well enough to earn His approval. And when we understand that, it begins changing the way we approach everything else.
We can work hard without believing our worth depends on our accomplishments. We can invest in our families without carrying the impossible expectation that we’ll get everything right. We can develop spiritual disciplines because we want to know God more deeply rather than because we’re desperately trying to convince Him to love us. And we can rest.
I think rest is particularly difficult for those of us who are wired to accomplish things. Sometimes slowing down exposes how much of our identity we’ve attached to being productive. When we’re not accomplishing something, we begin feeling like we’re wasting time.
But what if learning to rest is actually one of the ways God reminds us that the world doesn’t depend entirely on our ability to keep everything moving? What if the most important thing we can do isn’t always another task, another commitment, or another hour of work? Sometimes it’s simply remembering that we’re loved by God before we’ve accomplished anything at all.
Building Something That Lasts
At the end of Psalm 90, Moses asks God to establish the work of our hands. I love that prayer because it recognizes that our work matters. The things we build, the responsibilities we carry, and the ways we invest our lives aren’t insignificant. But it also recognizes that lasting significance ultimately comes from God.
We don’t simply want to accomplish things. We want our lives to matter in ways that extend beyond the immediate demands of today. And I think that begins when we learn to put first things first. When we begin with our relationship with God, allow His love to shape our identity, and seek His wisdom for how we spend our time, we become better equipped to invest in everything else He’s entrusted to us.
Not perfectly. Not without difficulty. But with a deeper sense of purpose and a greater freedom from the pressure to hold everything together ourselves.
Putting This Into Practice
If you’ve been feeling overwhelmed by responsibilities or constantly struggling to find time for what matters most, I’d encourage you to begin with three simple practices.
1Start your day by receiving rather than achieving.
For the next seven days, spend the first five to ten minutes of your morning with God before diving into your responsibilities. Read a short passage of Scripture, pray, or simply sit quietly and remind yourself that your value isn’t determined by what you accomplish that day. Begin by receiving God’s love rather than immediately trying to prove your worth through productivity.
2Identify the things you’re actually trying to build.
Think about the next five or ten years of your life. What do you hope will be true about your relationship with God, your family, your friendships, and the impact you’ve made on other people? Write down three things you genuinely want to build. Then look at your current schedule and ask whether you’re consistently investing in those things. Choose one adjustment that would help your daily life better reflect your long term priorities.
3Practice intentional rest.
Choose a specific block of time this week when you will step away from work, productivity, and unnecessary responsibilities. It might be a few hours or a larger portion of a day. Use that time to enjoy your family, spend time with God, do something restorative, or simply be present without needing to accomplish anything. Pay attention to how difficult or freeing that experience feels, and consider what it reveals about your relationship with productivity.
At the end of the day, I don’t think God is simply interested in helping us become more efficient versions of ourselves. I think He’s inviting us into a different way of living. One where our identity begins with His love, our priorities are shaped by His wisdom, and the things we’re building flow out of a relationship with Him rather than an exhausting attempt to prove ourselves.
And years from now, I hope we can look back and recognize that we didn’t simply spend our lives getting things done. We invested our lives in things that mattered.
