reputation vs. reality

Somehow, over the years, I've gained the reputation as the "time management guy" on our church staff. When there is a new or young leader struggling with the demands of ministry, they send them to Jason. "I need to manage my time better", they always say. Most of them feel helped, I guess, but as they leave my office I always feel a little funny inside. They came to me?

I guess I do have a gift there and I have worked hard to build my ability to manage time, but I am not an expert by any stretch of the imagination. Lately, God has been pressing me about how I allocate my time. Even more than that, He's been pressing me about how sloppy I am with the discipline of sticking to the allocation of time I've settled on.

In particular, God has been showing me that stealing time from one area of life to prop up another is neither wise nor profitable. I spent the first four months of this year waking up most days at 4:30am to do my personal time with God and go to the gym. Sure, I've grown a lot and I'm in better shape than I was before, but I've been exhausted and irritable almost all the time.

I have more to say on this subject, but I hate long blog entries, so I'll close with this. Just this week I've started sleeping as much as I should and I feel like a new man. (side note: I've done a good bit of reading of books and online articles about sleep, and all the medical doctors I am reading say that those of us who claim we're fine with 5-6 hours of sleep per night are either robots or liars. they all say the same thing - 7.5 - 8 hours or you're robbing yourself of time on this earth) Amazing what happens when you allow wisdom to rule a specific area of your life. More later on my time management journey.