Today we will be looking at refilling your bucket.
REFILL YOUR BUCKET
Let's continue to look at Elijah and what we can learn from him. He teaches us that if your outflow exceeds your inflow, the shortfall will catch up with you and lead to your downfall. This is because everyone has limited emotional and physical energy to spend. Think of yourself as a bucket. Just like a bucket your emotional reserve can be full, half-full, or dangerously depleted.
Therefore, the more emotional reserve you have the more buoyant, non-anxious, creative, loving, and playful you are. You will probably make better decisions and have more to give your family and friends. You will be able to live out your values better and put out your best work. You will also be able to enjoy your life and days more. So what can we learn from this? Basically, you will be able to be your best self when your bucket is full.
But if you are depleted the opposite will happen. In other words, the lower your emotional tank is the more you will be irritated, anxious, isolated, overwhelmed, dissatisfied, resentful, discouraged, withdrawn, exhausted, insecure, and feeling numb. Because of the lack of perspective, you will lose your temper at the smallest offense. Furthermore, when you lack buoyancy and enthusiasm it is easy to be driven along by toxic instincts. For example, anger, jealousy, resentment, and a fear of failure.
Also, the more your tank is running low the less present you are to your family and friends because you have far less to give them. Your work life could also suffer because when your confidence and self-starting mechanism fail your work life could deteriorate. On the other hand, you could go into overdrive and work a lot harder than is needed so that you can cover the emptiness that you are experiencing inside of you. In the end, this can send you into a downward spiral into a vicious cycle of working harder, feeling emptier, then working even harder which makes you feel even emptier. As this cycle carries on it will ultimately lead you to crash.
When you feel so low it is very easy to start self-medicating or start relying on addictive escape mechanisms like consuming food, alcohol, porn, or drugs and even become glued to your screens in a vegetative state. Other mechanisms are binge-watching a series or constantly being on social media looking at everyone's feeds. But all it does is make you even emptier in the long run and it is a terrible place to be in. Thankfully it doesn't have to be like that. Here are some ways to avoid it.
Honestly assess yourself - look at your life and see what your current emotional reserves are. Do you feel filled up, half full, a quarter full, low, or empty? If it is low or empty then it is time for self-intervention.
Identify what is draining you - many things could drain you, for example, heavy responsibilities, health concerns, financial stress, unresolved conflict, and relational concerns. It could even be your inability to influence someone else's decision making which affects you in the end.
If possible patch up the leaks. But know that there will be some that you cannot eliminate or even limit. For example, you might have small kids and life seems chaotic. However, you have the ability to retain a greater measure of control over the majority of your leaks. For example, you can say no to unreasonable demands that are made on you, you don't have to find your self-worth in your achievements or have a desperate desire to please people so that you can win their approval.
Prioritise the people, places, and activities that replenish you. In other words, who shares your passions, believes in you, and cares about you? These are the people you want to spend more time with. Identify the places that lift you emotionally. Visit these places because they energise you. Think about the activities that make you come alive and do them.
A thought to leave you with - for the sake of others, do the things you enjoy.
Inspiration is drawn from the Purpose series by CityHill Church
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