In Others’ Words: Breathing

I took breathing for granted until I developed asthma.

I had years of inhaling and exhaling without giving it a second thought — I mean, isn’t respiration supposed to be automatic? And then, within months of my family’s move to Colorado, suddenly my chest got tight when I worked out at the gym.

No big deal, right?

I didn’t have asthma.

I convinced myself of that … until the fall day my husband and I tried to outrace a snowstorm on our bikes. We beat the storm. But I collapsed on our bed, unable to draw a complete breath.

I was frantic.

That day, life constricted to my feeble attempts to inhale … exhale … inhale … exhale … inhale … exhale …

The little amount of air I was getting into my lungs wasn’t enough.

Sometimes life is like that.

I’m cramming it full of this, that, and the other thing … and I’m forgetting to breathe. I look ahead and every hour of every day from here to eternity — really, it feels that long — is full to overflowing with too much to do … and no time to breathe.

In God’s economy, life is breathe. Think about it: Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. (Genesis 2:7)

If God equates life to breath … who am I to make it anything else than that?

In Your Words: Are you breathing just a little and calling it a life? How do you add breathing space to your life?

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