“I’m running on empty.”

Chances are good you’ve said this at some point during your journey. To yourself. To a loved one.  To God.  To a coworker.  To anyone who will listen and say, “Ummmm, YEAH. You need to slow down.”

You’ve been to one too many holiday parties.  Work is ramping UP rather than slowing DOWN. The family calendar is exploding.  You’ve resolved to do less, but more is constantly nipping at your heels.  Another meeting.  Another event.  Another person’s need that’s not been met.

It’s tempting—when physical or mental or emotional fatigue is a central part of your life—to jump to the conclusion that the issue is your tank is out of fuel.

I think we like this metaphor because this image gives us an easy fix.  To get back in the game, we simply pull into a proverbial gas station, filler’ up, and get on our merry way.

But engines are complex pieces of machinery—as are the inner workings of our spirit—and when we reduce our understanding of both to merely a need for more fuel, we end up doing both a grave disservice.

I have spent this past year doing just that.  Slowing down.  Conserving energy.  Trying to change my pace—and grinding gears with each attempt to shift.  Trying to fill up my tank—and clogging it with an inferior grade of fuel.  Trying to rest—and doing it in all the wrong ways.  Needless to say, it hasn’t helped much.

Perhaps that is because of this one simple truth: when you only focus on the level of gas in your tank and forget that your engine also needs oil, a rendezvous with AAA is assuredly somewhere in your future.

This next series—and, in fact, this entire return to writing for me—comes out of recognizing that there is a lot or grime and grinding taking place in the machinery of my heart, and I’m way past due for an oil change.

WAY.

For the next two months, should you care to join me, we’re going to change the oil.  Reducing inner friction.  Lubricating the moving parts.  Coating the surfaces of our hearts and minds with fresh truth.  Flushing impurities out of its inner workings.  Slowing down wear and tear.

How are we going to do that?

We’re going to dive into the Serenity Prayer.

Now, before you push the back-arrow button, I challenge you— particularly those of you who have probably never read the entire thing and therefore consider it trite and cheesy—to take a moment and read it in its entirety, and you’ll understand why we’re landing here for a little while:

God, give me grace to accept with serenity

the things that cannot be changed,

Courage to change the things

which should be changed,

and the Wisdom to distinguish

the one from the other.

Living one day at a time,

Enjoying one moment at a time,

Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,

Taking, as Jesus did,

This sinful world as it is,

Not as I would have it,

Trusting that You will make all things right,

If I surrender to Your will,

So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,

And supremely happy with You forever in the next.

Amen.

Reinhold Niebuhr 

It is no coincidence that this prayer is largely used in addiction circles, particularly those that utilize the 12-step model.  A quote I found while reading back through my journal from this past year—a quote written right under this prayer—a quote related to this life of desperate striving to change our circumstances—makes this evident:

We have run all the way to the edges of our answers; we have exhausted the possibilities and are now finally ready to admit our powerlessness in the face of the great unfixables of life.

Jan Johnson, Silence and Solitude 

The great unfixables of life.

That which we cannot change.

The first of the 12 steps?

We admit we are powerless over __________, and our lives have become unmanageable.

These are not coincidences.

There is much to be said—and at least the next two months in which to say it.

Whatever it is you are dealing with—whatever it is that drains your tank or clogs your engine—I believe there is a word for you in this scripture-inspired prayer.  I hope you’ll join us, as we pull up to the spiritual Jiffy-Lube, and take a minute to hear what he has to say as he tops off all our levels.

And then?  Share it.  Bring a friend.  Invite a family member.  Talk about it with your coworkers.  Pass the peace by bringing them along on this journey with you. 

AAA won’t be happy, but your engines will thank you.

change fatigue growth limits peace serenity transformation