DEFERRED MAINTENANCE IS THE DEATH OF ME

Everything in my life needs to be maintained. Everything!

On the one side, I can’t wait to get to heaven where I’m praying the earth waters itself like the good ol’ days of Eden. On the other side- this side of eternity- I can’t seem to ever just let stuff go untouched.

Failure to address things regularly leads to mountains of catch up work, stress, and way more effort than had I just simply dealt with it in the first place.

Here’s my observations:

yard work takes an hour if I do it weekly or a whole day a month if I let it go.
my body stays fit if I regularly exercise and eat well. If I let it go, it will take months to fix.
my soul requires daily rest and feeding. If I let it go or ignore it’s cry for attention, I end up depressed, discouraged, overwhelmed, and exhausted.
my marriage requires daily attention. If I ignore it for a day or two, it takes 14 hours of conversations, a grip of apologies, and probably some counseling classes to fix. If I ignore it for longer than that… we become roommates and shuffle kids around. If it goes past that… well, yeah- It’s not pretty.
my kids require daily love and attention. Ignore them for any period of time and I become out of touch, lose my influence, and an observer instead of a participant in life with them.
my school work requires regular studying and process. when I pace myself, I’m good. when I let it pile up, I have to hibernate for 3 days to fix it.
our youth group data base takes a few hours a week to maintain. ignore it for a few months and it’ll take countless hours and all summer to undo.
my cars require regular oil changes, tune ups, etc. When I let them go, I pay hundreds of dollars to repair what could have cost way less had I simply paid attention to wear and tear.
bills have to be given weekly attention. If they are not regularly paid they result in bad credit, fees, and a massive headache.
a to do list regularly visited gets done. Ignore it, and in compounds with interest in intensity and investment by the hour it seems.
my dog even requires attention. lots of attention. I’m not exactly sure what happens when I ignore him. Mostly he just barks at me more and tries to bite me so I’ll chase him around the house.

Here’s my conclusions:

a life that is daily maintained is easy to maintain.
a life that is consistently ignored is consistently impossible to enjoy.
before adding anything to my life, no matter how shiny it is at first, I need to ask myself, “do I have the time and energy to maintain it?”
the tortoise beats the hare every time.