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You roll into bed exhausted from the day and count how many hours of sleep you will get if you fall asleep now. You think to yourself “Only 5 hours? That isn’t enough”. Your eyes shut and sleep greets you but rest does not make any appearance. You are awakened by the heart-stopping blaring of your alarm. As you force yourself to peel yourself from your mattress you mutter the words, “There is no way that was 5 hours…”. Little do you know that this is as peaceful as your day will be until your head hits the pillow that night. Your morning is filled with crying kids who don’t want to get to school, breakfasts that aren’t eaten, and threats to your children if they don’t hurry up and get out the door! Don’t they know you are going to be late???

The rest of the day doesn’t get easier. It’s filled with deadlines and rushing from meeting to meeting. Peace will surely come when you get home and can relax wrong? Nope! We have to get home, eat dinner, head to soccer practice and then rush off to small group. “Crap! It was our turn to bring snacks to small group! Hurry up and stop at the gas station so we can pick up some chips!”. Does this sound familiar a all? Does this FEEL familiar? This busyness plagued our family years.

Over the last year or so our family has been making some very intentional changes to really pursue a different lifestyle, one that actually resembles one that is closer to the speed Jesus lived at. After discovering the book, To Hell With The Hustle, I knew I had to read it! I recently finished this book and I can’t recommend it enough. It has easily climbed its way up into my top 3 all-time favorite books. If you read it’s contents and apply them (over a lifetime) your life will change. You will slow down. You will pursue a life that is different from the hustle of our world. You will desire to practice The Sabbath. You will see that living an ordinary life is probably one of the greatest things we can do. I wanted to share some of my biggest takeaways from the book. Check them out below!

1. Our culture praises and admires those who Hustle and stay on the Grind. A lifestyle of hustle will inevitably lead to burn out and exhaustion. You will suffer. Your family will suffer. Your business will suffer. The “Grind” is not with your mental health or relationships!

2. Goals focus on the end. When you set goals you live in the future while often dreading the present. This isn’t a good way to live. Formations, however, focus on who you are becoming and shift your mindset to enjoy the journey because it is the destination. (I know this might seem nit-picky, but words matter and ultimate affect your mindset!) When you focus on who you are becoming, you realize it isn’t about achieving perfection but striving to become who you want to be.

3. Everyone wants to do something significant in their life. Start a business that becomes extremely successful! Grow a church from 50 people to thousands! Change the world! I’m not saying these things are bad….but what if by focusing on the big huge highlight-reel moments we neglect the ordinary. Most of our life is spent in the ordinary if you really think about it.
What if the most significant thing you did was love your spouse, your kids, God, and others. I mean really love them, like have a deep and meaningful relationship with them. What if the most loving thing you could do for someone wasn’t to share the Gospel with them, but show up for them and love them over a lifetime. I’m totally up for living a normal, ordinary life.

4. I have to learn to say no to things. By saying yes to everything I am unintentionally saying no to other things. Most likely my family and relationships. I have a set number of hours every day, so I really want to spend them saying yes to things that don’t align with what I value?

5. The Sabbath has the power and potential to shape me in ways that nothing else can. I can write a TON about this (and you will hear me talk about this a lot over the coming year) but for now, I will just say I am so excited for our family to begin to journey and TRULY embrace the sabbath.

If any of the takeaways that I share resonated with you, I want to encourage you to pick up this book!