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Making Room for What Matters | Pay People to do What You Hate

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book

On Sunday, I finished our Breathing Room series at Revolution by looking at how to find breathing room between work, life and everything that has to get done. This week, I want to share 6 simple ways I’ve done that and you can to. I’m going to share one each day so you have time to process them and hopefully put some things into practice.

The first one we looked at was how to get a good night sleep. Tuesday, we talked about why you should take a break every 90 minutes. Yesterday, we looked at what electronics can do to our margin. Today I want to look at what will probably be the most controversial or at least, the one you think is unattainable.

Pay people to do what you hate. 

When I first came across this idea in Randy Frazee’s book Making Room for Life: Trading Chaotic Lifestyles for Connected Relationships, I thought, “that’s what wealthy people do.”

Hear me out though.

Think about the things you hate to do: laundry, yard work, cleaning your house, or something else. What if you paid someone else to do it?

Unattainable? Maybe right now. Wasteful? No way.

The reason I reacted like I did when I first read this was because we had just planted Revolution church. We had 2 kids with 1 on the way. We lived on $2,000 a month and our rent was half that.

Slowly, we have begun to work some of this into our budget.

Why do this? The goal of life is to enjoy it and use it for God’s glory. Not be miserable or wasteful.

You already do some of this, you maybe haven’t been as strategic about it. Every time you eat out or go to Starbucks, you are paying someone to do something you don’t want to do. So before you tell me you don’t do this, you do. Most of the time, we don’t have a reason for it, we just do it in that moment.

Here’s something our family did, this past year as our family expanded to 5 we learned how much water costs and how much laundry we do. So, we saved up and bought the biggest washer and dryer on the market. The ones that save energy and water. Consequently, we do less laundry because the loads are bigger.

Now, could that money go to something else? Yes, but we chose it to save Katie time on laundry so she could do other things.

Don’t miss this about time: You get 24 hours. That’s it. 

Every minute you spend doing something is one minute you don’t spend on something else.

It takes a long time to clean your house? Pay someone else to do it so you can be freed up to do something else.

Now, should everyone do this?

No.

I know someone who has 1 child, the wife doesn’t work and they pay someone to clean. Not to save time but because all their friends do that.

You must be careful about motivation on this.

Some people love yard work and find it relaxing. Others hate it. Yet, it has to be done for all of us.

This might be an area to cut back on.

The point is this: is there something you do that keeps you from experiencing life that you can give away or pay someone to do?

Consider doing that.

Here’s the pushback I get: If you have that extra money, you should give it away and be more generous. 

Here’s my response, “I am as generous as I feel God has called me to be. On top of that, if I can be generous to my wife and kids, why wouldn’t I do that? It is stingy to be generous to everyone but my family.”

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Making Room for What Matters | Cut Back on Electronics

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On Sunday, I finished our Breathing Room series at Revolution by looking at how to find breathing room between work, life and everything that has to get done. This week, I want to share 6 simple ways I’ve done that and you can to. I’m going to share one each day so you have time to process them and hopefully put some things into practice.

The first one we looked at was how to get a good night sleep. Yesterday, we talked about why you should take a break every 90 minutes. 

Today I want to talk about one of the main things that keeps us from having breathing room and enjoying life: electronics. 

I’m not going to tell you that electronics are bad or evil, because they don’t have to be. But, they do need to be controlled in your life.

Why?

They waste time and sap life out of us.

There are also studies being done about how our brains are struggling to handle all the screen time we are getting.

How often have you checked your email, facebook or twitter only to get angry, jealous or frustrated?

Then why do you keep doing it?

Why do you distract yourself at night when you can connect with your kids or spouse? Let’s be honest for a minute, for many people, electronics are an escape from life. At that point, it becomes a sin. It is a way to not deal with something or someone. It is a way to get lost, to escape, it becomes a fantasy.

If you are like me, you need to cut back on electronics. Over the weekend, I don’t check my email. I spend very little time on social media on the weekend and at night. During work hours, I block Facebook on my computer so it doesn’t distract me.

When Katie and I have date nights, we have a strict no electronics policy.

One thing we’ve started to do is to put the Do Not Disturb feature on our phones after 9pm. That means no texts or alerts on our phones. Often, I’ll still pick up my phone to see if I have any alerts and remember, “Oh yeah, nothing will come through.”

Try it sometime.

Tonight, this weekend, your next vacation, sign off of social media and email.

The reason we don’t has to do with fear. Fear we will miss something. Fear that we will discover we aren’t as important as we think. And pride. Pride about how many likes and RT’s our posts get.

So, what are you waiting for?

Tomorrow we’ll look at the most controversial or at least, the one thing you will think is unattainable, yet can make an enormous impact on how much you enjoy life.

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Making Room for What Matters | Take Strategic Breaks in Your Day

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book

On Sunday, I finished our Breathing Room series at Revolution by looking at how to find breathing room between work, life and everything that has to get done. This week, I want to share 6 simple ways I’ve done that and you can to. I’m going to share one each day so you have time to process them and hopefully put some things into practice.

The first one we looked at was how to get a good night sleep. 

The second one: Take a break every 90 minutes. 

I came across this idea in the book The Power of Full Engagement. The point the authors tried to make is that 90 minutes is the length that your body and brain can handle anything. Once you go past 90 minutes, you are less engaged, less alert and ultimately, less useful at whatever you are doing.

So, take a break every 90 minutes.

Immediately, you are thinking, I can’t do that.

You already do this. You scroll through social media, go to the bathroom, stand and talk to someone at work. The amount of time we waste in our day is unbelievable.

The problem is: we aren’t proactive about taking breaks well. We don’t plan them.

Does this always work? Not always.

Here are some ways to do this:

  1. Plan your day and think through when you’ll take breaks.
  2. Don’t lead a meeting longer than 90 minutes.
  3. Check your email at lunch and before you leave work. This one thing will make an enormous impact.
  4. If you sit at a desk, get up and walk around every 90 minutes. We do this with our kids during homeschooling as well (they run around our culdesac every 90 minutes).

Tomorrow we’ll look at how to create margin when it comes to electronics.

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6 Ways to Stay Motivated to be Healthy

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healthy

I get asked a lot about how to stay motivated to workout, stick to an eating plan or just to be healthy overall.

It is a challenge.

Here are 6 ways that I’ve learned to stay motivated:

  1. Make it the next thing on your schedule. This is crucial. Put working out on your calendar. Currently, I workout 4-5 times a week. I put my workouts into my calendar each week. They are a scheduled appointment like the dentist or a meeting. When the time rolls around (whether that is 6am or 5pm), it is simply the next thing I’m doing. Over time this has helped me to get up and go to the gym. Believe me, I can fill that time with something else, but its a commitment I’ve made. The reality for many people is they aren’t willing to give the time it will take to be healthy.
  2. Pick a plan you like and will stick to. I don’t care if you ride a bike, run, do crossfit, zumba or something else. Pick something you will do and stick with. Too often I’ll see people switch plans or programs because they don’t see changes quickly enough. When I started working out, I saw a ton of changes fast. Then I went almost 2 years where I felt like I looked the same, but I stuck with it. Just recently have I started to see more changes.
  3. Set a realistic, attainable goal. Set a goal. Specific. With a deadline. Now, is it realistic? If you do nothing right now, working out 4 days a week at 5am probably isn’t the best first step. Maybe 2 times a week at that time and then build up. Get small wins as quickly as possible. If you lift, set
  4. Eating well is more important than exercising. This is something most people miss. Eating counts more than working out. Don’t kill yourself at the gym and then go home and eat like a guy living in a frat house. Eat well. Food is fuel. If you exercise regularly, you should drink at least 100 oz. of water a day. Limit dessert and other foods that aren’t great for you. You don’t have to cut out gluten like I do, but eat well. Here are some ideas on what I eat.
  5. Weight gain isn’t always a bad thing. If you lift weights, this will be something you need to learn. I stopped weighing myself 3 months ago. Our scale’s battery died and I never replaced it so it wasn’t a conscious choice, but it has been a good thing. Weight gain is not always a litmus for being healthy. If you lift, muscle does weigh a lot. Have a pair of pants that give you a test to see if your waist is growing.
  6. Health is a lifestyle switch. Don’t quit. I know this is the topic of this post, but don’t. Being healthy is a long-term choice. Sure working out feels good, but I do it to stay healthy for Katie and my kids, to have energy to lead well. I want to stay in the game well into my 80’s.
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Balance is a Pipedream

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balance

As the holidays get closer, schedules get busier. There are parties to attend, pageants to go to, rehearsals for Christmas shows, tree lightings, decorations to buy and hang, presents to buy and wrap, food to prepare and all the while, still keeping up with everything else you do.

December 26th will roll around and most people will want to fall over in a heap of exhaustion, but there’s no time. We have to return clothes that don’t fit, clothes that are ugly, buy things that are on sale and get Christmas cards and decorations for next year because they are on sale for 80% off.

Over the next several weeks, people will quietly vent about all that they are doing and will do to friends and family, they will make resolutions in January about slowing down, eating better, working less, checking Facebook and email less, and signing their kids up for less activities. Only to find in February that they can’t wait for summer to hit so they can take a week off and sit around.

But we all know how summer goes.

In these conversations about pace, tiredness, doing too much, working too much, sleeping too little, an interesting work and concept comes up.

Balance.

Whenever someone says they are tired or doing too much, a friend with good intentions will respond, “You need to get balance in your life.” We talk about work life balance. Balancing schedules, checkbooks, planners, and activities.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, balance is a pipedream.

The next time someone tells you that you need to have more balance in your life, ask him or her what that means or looks like. You’ll get blank stares.

No one seems to know.

Yet, everyone is going for it.

Here’s a better way to think about life, work, kids, money, sleep, food and anything else you try to get balance in.

Every time you say yes to something you say no to something else.

Think about it like this. Whenever you say yes to staying up too late watching TV and eating ice cream you say no to a good night sleep, more sleep and a trimmer waist line.

Whenever you say yes to sign your child up for everyone team and activity you can throw at them, you say no to a sustainable pace, family dinners and overall health.

Whenever you say yes to work late you may say yes to a promotion and more money, but you also say no to family time, relaxing, time with friends and unwinding with a good book.

When you say yes to going into debt, you say no to peace in your life and bank account.

When you say yes to that extra piece of pie over the holidays, you say no to health.

Remember, balance is a pipe dream.

Are all these examples wrong? Not at all. You should eat some good dessert over the holidays. You should sign your kids up for fun things. You should buy nice things you can afford and bless others with nice presents. All of those are great things.

Take a minute though and remember last December, last January and February. What did you feel? Exhaustion, a longing for a break and rest that never came.

Now, the question isn’t should I do these things, it is more about, and what do you want to say yes to and say no to. Because, every time you say yes to something, you say no to something else. Every time.

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How we Miss the Point of Adversity & Pain

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adversity

One of the mysteries in this life is how God turns our pain and adversity into joy.

Often, one of our struggles in pain and adversity is that we look for things that are not promised.

While God does give us answers as to why things happen the way they do, He doesn’t always. Not only doesn’t he always answer the “why is this happening” question, when he does, it is rarely on our timetable.

We aren’t promised answers. We are however promised that we can have joy (John 16:24), we can have wisdom (James 1:5), we can have God’s presence and peace (Philippians 4:7).

Here is our problem with that: we aren’t always content to have God’s joy, wisdom and peace. We want answers.

It is this desire for answers, this searching for answers (while not wrong) that causes us to miss the point of adversity and what God is doing in it, through it and seeking to accomplish.

In short, we ask and seek the wrong the things.

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When Eating Becomes a Sin

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food

I get asked a lot about losing the weight I have and keeping it off. Losing 130 pounds was really hard, but keeping it off and is incredibly difficult. I’ll often get asked about eating habits as that is where most people get hung up.

One of the things that rarely gets talked about is that eating can be a sin, an idol. The reality is, we are told our bodies are the temple of the holy spirit and we are to take care of them (1 Corinthians 6:19). Most Christians use this verse to say drinking and smoking are wrong while eating their next 2,000 calorie church potluck meal.

The reality is that eating is a sin when:

  • We do it mindlessly.
  • We do it when life feels out of control.
  • We do it to feel better or find comfort (ever hear someone talk about comfort food?).
  • Or, when we eat too little to be prettier or skinnier.

So what do you do?

The first thing you must do is understand why you eat. What drives you to food. It is not that you are hungry, we often eat when we aren’t hungry or continuing eating when we are full, so there is more to it than that. If you never uncover why you eat, you will continue to eat in a sinful way by finding your god in food.

Because overeating or not eating enough is a sin and can be an addiction, you have to approach the way you would someone who is addicted to porn, shopping, drugs or working too much.

When you approach those sins, you make a plan, create some accountability around them to keep you from falling into those patterns. It is the same with food.

Here are some ideas:

  • Get an accountability partner for exercising or eating.
  • Don’t buy the snacks that are bad for you. If it isn’t there, you can’t eat it.
  • Make a meal plan so you eat well. If you make a last minute meal it is rarely good for you. If you go out to eat, always know what you will eat before you arrive. Looking at the menu causes you to eat more than you should or food you shouldn’t.
  • Drink at least 100 ounces of water a day. Water fills you up and helps to clean out your system which helps to move things through better. Also, if you drink that much you eat less. If you drink this much water, you are less likely to drink soda. I’ve read cutting soda out of your diet can drop 10 pounds in less than 2 weeks.
  • Eat higher protein meals which will lead to less hunger in between meals. I eat 5 eggs every morning and am rarely hungry before lunch. Not snacking makes a huge difference.
  • Start slow. The big mistake most people make is to jump from what they are doing to eating like Bob Harper tells you to eat on the biggest loser. While that’s great if you can do that, it is often unrealistic. Take small steps and then add to it. It took me 18 months to lose 130 pounds but I went slow and have kept it off for almost 4 years now.
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Eat Move Sleep

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bookEvery Tuesday morning, I review a book that I read recently. If you missed any, you can read past reviews here. This week’s book is Eat Move Sleep: Why Small Choices Make a Big Difference (kindle version) by Tom Rath. I actually read this book back in June, but it releases today, hence the review.

I’ve been fascinated by health and fitness for some time, ever since losing 130 pounds and keeping it off. So, Rath’s book was right up my alley.

Two things that are obvious about this book from the title:

  1. Every choice we make matters. They all impact every part of our life. 
  2. Tom Rath looks at how to eat, move and sleep so that those choices make the most positive impact in our lives.

As Rath states,

What seem like small or inconsequential moments accumulate rapidly. When your good daily decisions outweigh your poor ones, you boost your chances of growing old in better health.

Now, if you’ve lived a relatively healthy life, watch what you eat, exercise and sleep well, most of what Rath says will simply be a reminder. While I’ve read a lot about weight loss and health, I still found good tidbits I have never heard before and was reminded of some things that are easy to forget.

Here are a few things that stuck out to me as helpful:

  • The types of foods you consume influence your health more than your total caloric intake.
  • The best performers sleep at least 8.6 hours a day, almost a full hour more than the national average.
  • The top performers in every field typically work/practice in focused sessions lasting no longer than 90 minutes.
  • Losing 90 minutes of sleep reduces daytime alertness by nearly one-third. If you consider all the things that demand your attention in a day, reducing alertness by one-third is consequential.
  • A study of over 80,000 people suggests total intake of fruits and vegetables is a robust predictor of overall happiness.
  • When food is served “family style” from large plates, bowls or platters placed in arms’ reach, people simply eat more.
  • Anytime someone is hungry and in a hurry, it results in a bad choice.
  • The first to order food at a restaurant is an anchor for the rest of the table and sets the tone for what others order.
  • We eat based on the size of our plates.
  • We are more likely to make a bad food choice when a healthy option is available compared with when no healthy options are available.
  • Couples in which one partner has a commute longer than 45 minutes are a whopping 40% more likely to get divorced. 
  • The dish you start with serves as an anchor food for your entire meal. Experiments show that people eat nearly 50% greater quantity of the food they eat first.
  • People consume 167 additional calories per hour while watching TV.

An overall helpful, quick read.

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What to do on “Fat Days”

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fat days

Most you know my journey of losing weight. I once weighed close to 300 pounds. Over an 18 month time span I was able to lose 130 pounds and I have kept it off for the last 3 years. I’ve talked more about that here.

Even after losing all that weight I still have “fat days.”

Everyone does, right? I assume so.

What do you do in those moments? Regardless of your weight and size you have moments and days that you feel fat. You may not actually be fat, but you feel it.

Feelings of guilt, shame hit you. You think back to what you ate over the last day or two and maybe beat yourself up for that extra serving at dinner, that late night snack or dessert, ordering the venti 3,000 calorie drink at Starbucks instead of the tall skinny water. And on and on it goes.

You maybe even vent to a friend in hopes that they’ll tell you that you don’t look fat but that doesn’t help because you feel fat. And let’s be honest, what we feel is what drives us.

Yet, as a mentor told me, what we know trumps what we feel. 

Here are some ways to handle “fat days”:

  1. Uncover why you feel the way you do. It is okay to think over the last few days, but go further back than that. Not to document what you’ve eaten but what has happened in your life to make you feel the way you do. For many people, food is an addiction like drugs, porn or smoking. Have you experienced abuse in your life that drives you to eat? Are you prone to worry when things get out of control and that drives you to eating? Is there something underneath the comfort that comes from eating? Until you understand why you eat what you do, it is unlikely you will find freedom from eating as a god you go to for comfort.
  2. What does Jesus actually say about you. The next thing is understanding what Jesus says about you. If you are made in the image of God as the Bible teaches, your body is not an accident. Sure it is frustrating that some people can eat at taco bell 4 times a day and lose weight and you gain a pound simply by walking by a McDonald’s, but God made you that way. I get it because I’m that way. If I don’t watch what I eat I gain weight fast, that is my DNA. If you need some ideas on eating, here are some things I eat.
  3. Do you need to make changes to your diet. Practically speaking, you might need to make changes to your diet. While eating is a spiritual thing and can be an addiction and a sin, it is also a practical thing. Keep a food diary, write down everything you eat. You will often be surprised at what you put into your body and how that adds up. We often eat mindlessly and very quickly, which leads to weight gain. Most Christians can quote 1 Corinthians 6:19 about our bodies being the temple of God as a way to say drinking and smoking is bad and then go to the next potluck and gorge themselves on dessert.
  4. What image do you have in your head that you aren’t living up to, how accurate is that image? When you think about your perfect body or the body that makes you feel “fat”, how healthy is that image? Is that the way God made you? Again, if you and I are created in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), then we need to see ourselves as made the way God intended. This becomes a trust issue with God. We also need to identify the sin of coveting that comes as we page through magazines or put workouts together in an effort to be skinnier or more muscular.
  5. Stop weighing yourself. On the days you feel fat, you weigh yourself constantly. Every 5 minutes to see if something changed. Did I lose weight in the last hour because of all the water I drank and all the food I didn’t eat? The amount of times we weigh ourselves show where our god is and what we find our identity in. Weight gain, weight loss and exercising can be a tricky thing and not always accurate to what is happening in your body. Recently, I’ve gotten into crossfit and have gained some weight. At first, I was frustrated by this. Then I started to wonder, my jeans still fit. I measured myself and found that my waist was still the same size it was just my chest and shoulders that have grown. Translation, that isn’t fat that led to weight gain. It is important to understand where weight gain comes from.
  6. Go easy on yourself. You can very easily beat yourself up, starve yourself or heap guilt and shame onto yourself. If you are a follower of Jesus, there is no guilt and shame to be had. That was nailed to the cross with Jesus and when he walked out of the tomb, he conquered the power of sin, guilt and shame. Now, followers of Jesus do feel conviction and sometimes this comes in the area of food, how we think about our bodies and how we look at ourselves. This is the Holy Spirit helping us become who we are created to become. If it isn’t from the Holy Spirit, go easy on yourself.

“Fat days” come no matter what size you are. But the gospel transforms those days.

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Two Ideas that Should Change how We Think about our Bodies, Weight Loss & Food

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food

For many of us, when we think of addictions we think of things like drugs and alcohol. In our culture, depending on your background, you may now toss pornography or sex into those categories. Yet, in most churches and among Christians, these aren’t the only addictions that plague us. And no, I’m not talking about debt and money, although those certainly are addictions that plague many people.

What I’m talking about has to do with weight loss, body image and food.

My name is Josh…and I’m addicted to food.

If you are like me, you love food. You might be one of those people who just love to snack. You always seem to have a bowl of candy on your desk, grab a bag of chips mindlessly. Sitting in front of the TV you find yourself eating something. It isn’t anything big, it isn’t a meal, but you are just always eating.

Maybe for you it is dessert. You can’t go to bed without eating dessert. It is a comfort when life seems out of control. A long day is made better with a bowl of ice cream, a piece of pie, or some chocolate.

For me, I was never much of a snacker. When my wife Katie and I would take road trips, I never really wanted snacks. But I couldn’t resist the stops we could make for a hearty meal.

There is something else we might have in common. For you, it might not be food that is a problem; it is how you feel about yourself. The constant comparison to magazine covers or TV ads, the inferiority complex you have as you compare yourself to that guy in your office, the one who can eat whatever he wants and lose a pound, the woman who always looks put together. Your sibling who always seems confident, looks great, and feels great. Kind of like an annoying commercial.

Across the board in America, there is a problem when it comes to food addiction, weight loss, stress, health and body image. Today, there are more people overweight and obese than ever before. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, as many as 35.7% of adults are overweight or obese, and 17% of children (or 12.5 million) are overweight or obese. And consider this: 44% of U.S. women are on a diet, 29% of U.S. men are on a diet, 80% of U.S. women do not like how they look, and $109 million is spent in the U.S. every day on diet and weight loss products. Among those who lose weight while on a diet, 95% will regain all of the weight they lost within the first 5 years. And as far as stress, 43 percent of U.S. adults suffer adverse health effects from stress, according to an American Psychological Association (APA) study.

Is This It?

Maybe you have gotten to the place where you’ve asked, “Is this it? Is this really how life was meant to be lived?” Envying the bodies of someone else, envying the pecs, six pack abs, butt or hips of someone else?

My change began 6 years ago. There wasn’t a magic pill of any kind, I didn’t have a surgery, but things in m heart began to change, which led to things in my life changing.

I wasn’t always overweight. In fact, in college I played soccer all 4 years but when college ended, I continued to eat like I played soccer year round and then my metabolism came to a screeching halt and well, you can guess the rest. I ballooned up to almost 300 pounds. Someone looked at our wedding pictures recently and asked how much weight I lost. When I told them I lost 130 pounds, they said, “You lost a jr. higher.”

Maybe you are reading this and think, “I don’t have an eating problem. I’m not overweight, but I can’t stop looking at the bodies that others have. I starve myself to look a certain way, to feel beautiful.”

Maybe you are like a guy I had lunch with recently. He eats like he doesn’t know fruit or vegetables exist, but he doesn’t gain any weight. For him, weight is an issue others deal with, but he doesn’t view his body the way God does.

Our Bodies and the Gospel

Often, when it comes to our bodies, the only time we bring the gospel into the conversation is if we are talking about sex. This is too small. If the gospel changes everything, if the gospel one day restores all things, then our bodies, health, body image and weight loss should fit into the discussion.

Two ideas have changed how I think about food, weight loss, health, pace in life, body image and how I talk about them. The first is found in the first chapter of the Bible in Genesis 1 where it tells us that we as humans are made in the image of God. Most Christians do not believe this. How do I know? We envy other people’s images instead of celebrating our own.

The second idea is a verse that gets quoted to encourage Christians to not smoke or drink, at least, that is how the pastor of the church I grew up in used it. In 1 Corinthians 6:19 – 20 it says, do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

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