Special to United Methodist Insight
When I wrote a book for new ministers some years ago, "You First Church," (unpublished but available from me as an e-book at no cost), my brother-in-law suggested I rename it, "When in Doubt, Take a Nap."
Over my early years in ministry, I learned two major lessons that I would add to the list Rev. Rebekah Simon-Peter suggests. One, use naps. Two, count your work hours.
Let me discuss the second first. Working on a doctor of ministry degree, our program director put us through a course on time management. One rule of thumb I learned was that pastors have to find a way to keep their hours of work down to a maximum of 60 hours per week and have a full day off, whatever day of the week worked out best. When I looked at how I was operating at the time, I was doing around 80 and knew I was letting too many things slide. I was also not really taking a day off. And I was stressed.
I discovered that because my dog growled at me whenever I came in the door and my kids asked my wife who that strange man was. Not really, but there were family stresses and joys that were not getting my proper attention. I noticed that if I put in more than sixty, the hours jumped twenty or thirty very easily. I had no awareness I had broken through the boundaries of humane effort. I was so tired I was not even aware I was driving myself into the ground. By keeping track of my hours of work, I became aware of what was happening and worked at cutting back. I had a reasonable basis for myself to set limits on my time and energy and did many of the things Rev. Simon-Peter recommends (say no, etc.). I think that, accepting that 60 hours was as much as my body and mind could give and maintain, really helped me survive.
Regarding naps, I had to discover that the hard way. I pushed through exhaustion every day to try to get everything done that I thought I had to do. Of course, I had such a long to-do list that many items began to conflict for my time and I got to where I couldn't make a decision and didn't know how to resolve it. I literally fell onto the couch and pulled a blanket over my head and shook. I discovered that my mind began to shut down and I went to sleep. When I awoke, I let my mind go and the many things, ideas, emotions, and all that had stressed me began to sort themselves out. I lay there about an hour and as my priorities became clearer, I got to the point where I got up knowing what I was going to do.
I put variations on the values of naps in different parts of my book in hopes that the reader would bump into the concept that naps are okay, sometimes the only sane option. - Occasionally, all your brain needs is sorting time and the curling up does not bring sleep. However, feeling energized and oriented again is great to have happen.
My thanks to Rev. Simon-Peter for her article amd her program. Anything to help our brothers and sisters in ministry to deal with the stress of our calling, I'm all for it.
The Rev. Jerry Eckert is a retired clergy member of the Wisconsin Annual Conference.