Are you worn out and overwhelmed by your never-ending to-do list? Multitasking. Taking care of family and friends. Driving car pool. Running errands. Filling out paperwork. Meeting deadlines at work. In today’s do-it-all world, women are busier and more tired than ever juggling the roles of mom, executive, volunteer, student, wife or girlfriend, friend, and everything in between. We’ve all been there – feeling frenzied and desperate as we try to keep it all together. Some days it feels like we’re managing everything well, but more often than not, it feels like everything is managing us. It is easy to become emotionally, physically, and spiritually exhausted. But it doesn’t have to be that way. In the midst of life’s demands, it is possible to experience a life of peace and find rest for your soul.
Shaunti Feldhahn
Day 1
Scripture: Matthew 11:28-29
His Yoke Is Custom-Fit for You
When my children were small, money was very tight. The local annual consignment sales were a lifesaver for inexpensively outfitting two quickly-growing kids. I generally bought a size or two ahead so the kids had room to grow for the next year.
I thought the kids looked adorable in their oversized shirts and rolled-up jeans, but they were definitely not custom fit! I was asking them to live, play, and work in clothes that were not tailored to them in any way.
God is not like that. When Jesus says that a key way to find rest is to “Take my yoke upon you,” He is gently rebuking us for taking on burdens that we were not meant to carry, and telling us to instead take on those purposes that He has created just for us.
A yoke is a device that hitches over the shoulders of a working animal (or team of animals) so they can comfortably pull something heavy, such as a plow. Since every animal is a different size and shape, a caring farmer carefully custom fits a yoke to each beast. This allows the ox or horse or donkey to work well when he is called upon, without getting exhausted, being ineffective from pulling at a wrong angle, or getting chafed and sore.
The farmer is also careful not to give a young animal a yoke that is too large. Instead, at every stage of growth, the farmer remeasures the beasts under his care and creates a new yoke. The animal is called to a particular purpose, and he is outfitted for it.
Imagine the difficulty if one animal were to take on the yoke that was designed for another. The ground might get plowed, but oh the pain and strain and heaviness! Oh, the open sores on a weary back! After days and months of this, wouldn’t the animal eventually shy away from the good work of the day?
So often, we are weary and burdened not because of long hours or having too much to do, but because we are taking on things we were never meant to do, or in a way or during a time we were never meant to do them. Let us believe our Lord’s promise that when we take up His yoke for us, we will find rest.
Live According to Your Design
Day 2
Scripture: Isaiah 40:28-29
Plug into Your Source of Strength
We’ve all been there—our phone battery suddenly drops into the red zone just when an important call comes in. Will the battery hold out? Or will it go dead, leaving us sounding unprofessional? Or uncaring? Or simply unable to finish the important coordination with the home health aides who are checking on our elderly parents?
Finally we get to a place where we see a charger and outlet. We can breathe again as we continue the conversation, our battery power slowly creeping back up into the normal zone.
As women, our batteries often run dangerously low. We may try to plug into superficial power, such as an extra shot of espresso in the morning or some online shopping. Perhaps we rely on our friends to give us that boost to make us feel important and needed. Or we look to a boyfriend to fill the deep desire for love and affirmation.
But these power sources don’t cut it. They can’t quite get our battery to a full charge. We’re left feeling frustrated, run down, let down, and even defeated.
There is only one real energy source, and it is not found at the coffee shop. It is found in that moment when we come before the One who understands every minute detail about us and longs to give power to those who know they are weary and weak before Him.
You may feel like you need a nap, but He never grows weary. You may feel weak in the knees as you struggle to understand how to handle a difficult relationship, but He gives you strength. He provides guidance and wisdom and fills every single need of your heart. His charge will take hold and fill you. But here’s the catch: You need to plug into Him.
Maybe that means adding time with God to your calendar every morning or joining a Bible study in order to read Scripture in a fresh way. Maybe it means listening to a sermon podcast while you make dinner or reaching out to a friend as an accountability partner who will remind you of the only true source of strength—God Himself.
Whatever method you try, it will make a dramatic difference in your life. God may not remove the circumstances that fill up your day, but He will give you the strength to walk with Him through it.
Connect with God
Day 3
Scripture: Philippians 4:8
What You Focus On Is What You See
In the classic “Invisible Gorilla” experiment video, created by Harvard University in 1999, six people in black and white shirts pass basketballs back and forth. A voice asks the viewer to count how many times the people in white shirts pass the basketball.
Simple, right?
Half of those who watch the video miss something very, very obvious—a gorilla. Yes, someone in a gorilla suit actually walks through the basketball passers, very clearly faces the camera and thumps his chest, and then walks offscreen. Half of us are so busy counting the passes between the white-shirted people that we never even notice it. When the video asks, “Did you see the gorilla?” we think, Wait, what gorilla?!
What we focus on will change what we observe around us. We will notice more and more of what we focus on or, conversely, less and less of what we don’t want to see.
In the research for my book The Kindness Challenge, I found that this is one of the main reasons for the unneeded stress in our lives, and one of the God-given ways to overcome it. As we focus on the things that annoy or anger us, well, you guessed it, we often completely miss some good and wonderful stuff that could change how we feel. We miss the gorilla! So often, when we are worried about our struggling marriage, frustrations with an adult child, a roommate’s messiness, or our mean coworker, that negative thing looms large in our eyes. We think about it, ponder it, express frustration about it. And we never even see the other spectacular things going on around us.
Yet, as we focus on “whatever is lovely”—those good and true things we like and appreciate—we’ll find ourselves noticing those things more often. And as we do, our negative concerns won’t loom as large.
Suppose that instead of asking why your husband loaded the dishwasher that way (again!), you give him a hug and thank him for cleaning up the kitchen. What will happen to your feelings? You’ll feel better! And as you look for the next thing to praise . . . and the next . . . you’ll find that you don’t really even notice what annoyed you so much before. Instead, you’ll start noticing everything you can be grateful for.
It’s a shift in focus that God asks us to make because He knows it delivers a big impact.
Shift Your Perspective
Day 4
Scripture: Acts 2:46-47
Created For Community
We were not created to do life alone. God looked at His creation and said “it is good,” with one exception: it was absolutely not good for man to be alone. So God made someone with whom he could “do life.” Then, in the first ever small group, God Himself walked in the garden with the man and his wife. Over and over in the Bible, God stresses that He designed us to love and support each other. We are directed (not asked) to live in community with other followers of Christ.
When I was living in Boston, a pastor shared a story about good friends who had moved to California. One night the pastor and his wife were awakened at 3 a.m. with an urgent phone call from their friends, asking for prayer. Raging wildfires were threatening their home and community. From their window, they could see the glow of thousands of acres burning, the fire advancing quickly as they raced to evacuate their home. The pastor and his wife got out of bed and knelt on the cold floor, praying urgently for an hour for the protection of their friends, their home, and everyone in the area.
In the end, although the fire consumed thousands of acres and several neighborhoods, the broader community—and their friends’ house— was spared.
The homeowner called the pastor and thanked him profusely for being a true friend. The pastor answered, “No, thank you. You were the one being a true friend. You thought enough of our friendship that you were willing to wake us up in the middle of the night to ask us to pray. You were good enough friends that you were willing to ‘inconvenience’ us.”
Our lives can be consumed by wildfires—personal family struggles, having too much on our plates, difficulties managing our kids or careers, health concerns, and financial strains. We can see the fires on the horizon, advancing toward us, and our chest tightens as life comes at us so fast. But God has created community for us to call on— even in the middle of the night. Are you willing to inconvenience a fellow believer in order to live in authentic community? That is what God has designed for you. And your willingness to do so will be a blessing to you both.
Create Life-Giving Relationships
Day 5
Scripture: Proverbs 16:3
Know When To Pull Yourself Off The Field
I was training an elite group of up-and-coming female leaders at a huge aerospace corporation. As part of our role-playing case study, they worked on a fictional workplace scenario: after some financial setbacks, their unit had a big opportunity that might keep their whole department afloat. It would require “all hands on deck,” overtime, and weekends for the next six months. Then each person was told they now had a unique personal crisis to juggle (such as a husband diagnosed with cancer, a young child needing speech therapy at 4 p.m. three days a week, or elderly parents who needed help finding and moving into assisted living).
The women crafted a solution for their particular conundrum, then did a role-play to present it to a senior male executive.
The team with the cancer case was first up, with a carefully-crafted solution that involved working early hours and late nights to make up for missing time for the husband’s chemo, and enlisting others to cover for them while they were gone. The women leaders were completely confounded by the executive’s response: “Your proposal is heroic and admirable, but completely unrealistic. I didn’t believe a word of it.”
Awkward silence.
Every competent woman knows that you do whatever it takes to get the job done well. But just as important, we need to recognize when circumstances render us unable to get our job done well. Just as a good soccer player would never insist on playing on a badly sprained ankle, thereby putting the whole team at risk, we sometimes need to realize when we’re actually doing our team—and ourselves—a disservice if we do not pull ourselves off the field for a time. As the tough executive put it that day, “Yeah, we might need you—but your husband needs you more.”
How many times do we realize we have overcommitted or encountered unforeseen circumstances that leave us incapable of finishing our obligations? We need to learn when to pull ourselves off the field for a time, wave our white flag of humility, and enjoy the peaceful fruit of realistic expectations.
God never gives us a calling without providing all we need to get it done, and that includes time and emotional capacity. If we aren’t able to get it done, despite our best efforts, then He has a different plan in mind—perhaps a different person or a different time. Let’s listen when the Holy Spirit gently calls us to set certain things aside and trust that He has them in His control.
Set Aside Superwomen
Day 6
Scripture: James 2:23
God Calls Me Friend
I was really worried about a big decision that would affect the next few years of my life. I had eagerly wanted to go a particular direction. Now, the more I prayed, the more I felt uneasy about it. One Sunday, my pastor advised that if the disquiet was from God, I needed to trust His leading and turn away from my long-planned path. Yet I still struggled.
The next morning, I felt God asked me a question: “What if it was Cassie telling you to change course? Would you listen if Cassie took your hand, looked into your eyes, and said, ‘I can’t explain why right now, but trust me: you can’t go that way’?” Cassie was one of my dear friends, and I thought, Of course I would trust her, because she’s my friend.
And then I got it.
We all know about Abraham’s strong faith and trust in God. What we sometimes forget is that Abraham and God were friends. And because they were friends, Abraham was willing to trust God enough to do whatever He asked—even walking up that mountain to sacrifice Isaac (Genesis 22:1-19). He showed that God could count on him, and he knew he could count on God. Friends count on each other.
That title of “Friend of God” is not just reserved for the greats of the faith. God is our King, yes, but He also wants to be our friend. Through Jesus, God came to earth to do away with the penalty for the sin that was separating us from Him. And at the same time, He also wanted to live the same kind of life we live, to be able to relate to everything we experience as we travel this broken world. After all, shared experiences bond friends together.
Is there something you need to decide today? Something you’re worrying about? Perhaps you have to decide how to pay the bills, whether or not to rescue your adult daughter from her poor choices, and how to cope with the pain of your divorce. Listen to the reassurance from the One who is (or wants to be) your best friend. Whatever course He is leading you to, He asks you to trust Him. Choose to trust God as your best friend, the One who will always do what is best for you. He is the friend who will never let you down.
Have No Fear
Day 7
Scripture: Matthew 7:24-25
Peace In the Storm
As soon as you finish this journey to finding rest and peace, the enemy is going to try all sorts of things to jar you out of it. You may have already seen him at work, in fact. He hates the children of God and loves whipping up storms to cause fear, worry, anxiety, stress— pretty much the opposite of rest.
Friends, let’s not be caught unaware. Let’s be wise and watchful. Over the next few weeks, when you see communication going sideways with your husband or boyfriend, see it for what it is. When you find yourself getting uncharacteristically irritated with your mother-in-law’s political opinions, see it for what it is. If your paycheck isn’t as big as you expected, you get sick, your kids cop an attitude, your colleague quits and leaves you with the entire planning project, and your hot water heater floods the basement—all in the same week— recognize the hand of the evil one at work.
In all these things, refuse to take the bait.
Jesus says there is one sure way to have peace in these storms: listen to His teaching and follow it, even when you absolutely do not feel like it. Trust God with your financial or health situation. Respond with kindness to your kids and your coworkers. Maintain patience, good humor, and self-control as you figure out what to do about the moldy basement and lack of hot water in the house.
As you do, you will become like the house in the hurricane that is built on bedrock. You will not be shaken by the torrents, floodwaters, and winds of life. You can’t change the force or trajectory of the storm, but you can change everything about how you experience it.
Friends, storms will come. Whether the storms are the enemy’s attack to distract you from finding rest, the result of living in a broken world, or simply the consequence of your own imperfect choices, storms will come. And in those moments of irritation, anger, worry, or fear, it is so easy to forget everything Jesus asks of us.
Let’s think ahead and ensure that does not happen. Let’s pray that we see the lure of building on sand and turn away from it. That we cling to the Rock that is higher than we are—the Rock who wants us to build on Him alone.
Build Only on Rock