Are You Carrying All the Stuff?

Earlier today I did a few errands. After parking back at my house, I gathered up all my stuff (or at least made a valiant effort trying to do so!) and made my way up the steps to my front porch.

I was carrying my purse in one hand, my keys in the other hand, my just-picked-up-and-oh-so-delicious-Dunkin-Donuts-medium-decaf-iced-vanilla-coffee, a large box of my Bible study booklets fresh from the print shop in my arms, and I even went through extra contortions to retrieve the mail from the mailbox by my door and put it between my teeth.

I know my mother would cock her head, tsk tsk, and tell me I was carrying a Lazy Man's Load. Instead, I should haul it all in several separate safer and more manageable loads.

I got it all in there though, dumped it onto the kitchen table, and collapsed into a chair with the onset of a well-deserved hot flash.

OK, I admit, I was trying to carry too much.

If I'm honest, I generally try to do this in life too. I carry too much, I say "yes" too often, and I assume responsibility for things that are no business of mine to take on. I have a suspicion I'm not the only one with the tendency to want to carry all the things.

I'm happy to say I may have found a solution to this troublesome habit of mine. A Bible verse I've read many times helps me these days. I use it kind of like a filter; I pass a request or a new potential responsibility through this filter before I say yes or take on that extra chore.

Jesus said, "For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."

(Matthew 11:30)

That verse has become my filter, my IS-IT-TOO-HARD-O-METER? If a potential task feels heavy and burdensome, it's a big old nope. If I feel joy or excitement about the thing, I move forward with it (after praying first, of course).

Are you carrying all the things?

How do you keep from carrying too much?