Entering into Rest by Cutting Yourself Some Slack

Many times people ask me, “how long did it take you to overcome chronic anxiety?” or “how long did it take for the healing process?”

Yet one of the biggest things that has helped me over the years is to be patient with myself and the transformation. I push myself to learn, but it took me time to exercise patience in the execution. So many people get taken out because they don’t see results right away or experience breakthrough soon.

It’s easy to start living out the transformation process. It’s a whole different thing to be patient with the day to day journey. Patience is actually way more important than you realize.

For many of you reading this, your word from God is this: “Cut yourself some slack and be patient with your process.”

Fear is All About Pressure

When we don’t cut ourselves slack, we come under constant pressure. It becomes a yoke that keeps us from His rest.

Faith leads us, but fear is all about pressure. The enemy loves to add pressure onto our process, which drains us and keeps us from enjoying the benefits of growing. Usually the greatest pressure we come under is the pressure of outcome and results.

The problems is, the more pressure you live under, the more your growth gets sabotaged. God is not about putting pressure on you. Fear is all about pressure. Faith involves yielding to God and being led by Him on an exciting journey. Do you see the difference? One is about tension, the other is about adventure.

God is not in a hurry to grow you all up by tomorrow. You wouldn’t expect a 20 year old to act like a 50 year old. So stop expecting results that keep you from walking fruitfully in what God has in front of you. This process is one foot in front of the other.

Engage Rest by Leaving Pressure

Entering into the house of rest means leaving pressure, which includes performance based living, perfectionism and striving. When we enter into rest, we leave those deceptions at the door for good. But it is a process each day.

Letting go of pressure is part of “ceasing from your own works” as the Bible says. To put it plain: you need to cut yourself some slack.

Maybe you need to stop taking yourself so seriously. It may be that you need to stop acting as though you have the world on your shoulders. You may have taken on a superman cape and forgot that Jesus is really the only superhero.

Cutting yourself slack means you let go of the pressure to get healed or free overnight. You stop putting a deadline to the manifestation of breakthrough. The more you focus on your growth manifesting fully, the more you’ll come under pressure and miss out on being present in the here and now.

For so many, you have lived in pressure-filled lifestyle to please your dad or mom. That habit has never left you. Cut yourself a break and allow yourself significant time to heal, grow and walk into rest. It’s critical to your health to daily to enter into His rest, celebrate the victories and give yourself time to grow in this.

Here are a few things to be mindful of when it comes to cutting yourself slack:

1. Process process process

If you want to become a person of transformation, you need to fall in love with process. It’s all about the journey, not just the destination.

In many Christian circles, we emphasise the event way more than the process. We long for the “add suddenly” moment, but we don’t realize the process involved that leads to those moments. We go from event to event, hoping that a moment will rescue us, instead of diligently walking a daily process that points to the better destination.

2. Patience breeds a quicker outcome.

The ultimate place of maturity is actually carrying a capacity of true patience. James said if you have patience, you’re complete and lack nothing. (James 1:2-4) This means we need to use our greatest frustrations, trials and places of tension as laboratories to grow in patience. The more you possess it, the more authority you will carry over your circumstances.

Furthermore, I have found that increasing in patience actually accelerates your growth process. As weird as it may sound, the more patient you are with yourself, the more efficient you will grow and experience transformation.

For example, when I was neck deep in daily anxiety and especially social anxiety, I grabbed onto James 1 and I received a huge dose of patience. I was frustrated with not seeing the results in the time I wanted and something need to shift.

I remember the moment where patience came into play.  I took in a deep breath and said this, “It’s ok. This will take as long as it takes. If it takes me 20 years to get free then it will take 20 years. I am no longer giving into pressure to hurry up and get free. I am just going to keeping walking the process and let God work out the results.”

From that moment on, my transformation experience drastically accelerated; more than ever before. All because I cut myself slack, exercised patience and took the pressure off of myself. It was then that I began to understand what rest was like. God’s grace enters in tremendous power when we fully engage the rest that patience brings.

3. Renounce pressure

This sound simple, but I find it important to take a stand against pressure every day. I despise it. I stand against it. I deny it access.

There is no pressure in God, so why am I listening to it?

I know this is WAY easier said than done, but it’s good to know that God is not putting pressure on you. So let that pressure go more and more each day. Take your stand against pressure in all areas of your life. Let it usher in the confidence of God so that you can crush the obstacles of the day with new resolve and less exhaustion.

I have a little routine that I go through on a regular basis. I renounce and defy pressure in every form. I say it before every project and sometimes shout it when things get stressful.

It’s amazing what I can do when I toss pressure out the window. I have now saved my energy for the enjoyment and delight of what God called me to do.

He’s got this. It’s all on Him. My life and calling was His idea anyway, so why wouldn’t I enter into that rest right now.

The pressures’ off…so get into rest.