Dr. Richard Swenson has written a wonderful book called Margin. Margin refers to the space on the edge of a page where there is no text. The page you’re reading has margins on the top, bottom and sides. If words stretched from top to bottom and to both edges there would be no margin. Swenson believes our lives are like that. We add so much to our schedules that we have no “margin,” no space for leisure and rest and family and God and health.

Swenson describes margin and being marginless this way:

I think just about everyone I know can relate to this. We live in a culture that rewards busyness and overextension as signs of importance.

Swenson discovered marginlessness in the lives of his patients before he recognized it in himself. He is a medical doctor who began noticing all sorts of health hazards that were caused by stress. Stress, he discovered, came from overextension. So he started telling his patients to slow down and eliminate unnecessary things from their lives.

Then he examined his own life and discovered he was in the same condition. He realized that by working eighty-hour weeks he was compromising his health, his family time and his relationship with God. Then it hit him: those are three of his most precious resources! So he decided to cut his practice in half—which meant cutting his income in half. It wasn’t easy, but according to Swenson, it was the best decision he ever made.

I’ve worked hard to create margin in my life, and I discovered the secret. It is simple but very difficult to do: Just say no.

Say no to what? Anything that is not absolutely necessary to the well-being of your soul or the welfare of others. The list of all of the activities that you feel you need to do each day or each week is probably filled with a lot of good things. This is not about good versus evil but good versus good.

Let me give an example. A young woman who was going through the material in this book was taken by the idea of margin—because she had none—so she set out to create some in her life. She had schoolwork and a job, so a set portion of her time was already spoken for. She also believed that her family time is valuable, as is prayer, Bible reading and journaling. Finally, she had a boyfriend, and she wanted to invest in their relationship. However, she realized that her boyfriend took up three to four hours of each day. She prayed about it and realized that their relationship was an area where she could create margin. She told her boyfriend that she wanted to develop their relationship, but she needed at least three nights away from him each week. This would create nine to ten hours of margin.

She later told me how meaningful this decision was. She was able to do better in school, deepen her relationship with God and her family, and go about her day with a rhythm and a pace that made her feel happy and at peace. She and her boyfriend were still able to develop their relationship as well. Remember, God never called anyone to marginlessness.

When we lack margin, it is our own doing and is a sure sign we have stepped outside the kingdom. So be honest and be ruthless with your schedule. Your spiritual, relational and physical health depend on it.