Creating Margin Within

I was talking with some high school kids this weekend about drug and alcohol abuse. We discussed that abuse is often an attempt to deal with stress--to create a recreational space for our minds where they can relax and stretch out a bit. We were also clear that substance abuse created as much stress as it relieved. It's a lousy solution to an over-burdened existence.

There's a lot of literature out there about dealing with stress, and the best of it talks about our need for margins. Margins, of course, as the blank spaces around the edge of the page that keeps the writing ordered and in focus. Authorities on stress suggest that we need these same blank spaces in our lives. We need some kind of buffer, some kind of reserve to draw on in at least four areas--our emotional lives, our physical lives, our financial lives, and our time. Most who write on this recognize that most of us can't maintain reserves in all four of these areas, but we get in trouble if we don't have a margin in at least one or two.

The fact is, though, for many of us it's not clear where we have room for any margin at all. Our lives are wonderfully full, but there's little or no line between wonderfully full and too full. Given our economy, the needs of family and friends, the demands of work, the cost-of-living, it's not clear how to maintain any margin at all.

Ultimately, we need to challenge this. We need to open ourselves to simplicity and ask ourselves if we really need all of the fullness that besets us? But between today and that ultimate destination, I think there's another place we can look for margin. We can look to mindfulness. We can look to the simple act of breathing. We can look to finding presence now, where we are. We can find margin in the midst of the busyness, if we just pause and look for presence.

An example. I drive a good bit every day, and that's always been a time for problem solving for me. Actually, I call it problem solving, but it's really problem-stewing. I have a tendency to simply marinate in my problems, turning them over and over in my mind, ratcheting up the stress, closing down the margin. I've realized, though, that I don't need to do that. While I drive, I can just breath. I can dedicate the time to letting go of the problems--they'll be there when I get out of the car anyway. But in the meantime, I can just breath. I can notice the clouds, the workers by the side of the road, the trees and buildings. I don't need to notice anything in particular about them. I simply notice them, and as I notice and breath, a space opens within me. I create margin. I like that. It doesn't make the stress go away, but it gives me space to cope with the stress--a space within me that no one can take away. Creating margin--it's a good activity for the day.