Finding Joy in the Margins, Knowing When Enough is Enough

Do you remember learning to write cursive? One of the things you might recall is how important it is to keep your words within the margins. Mrs. Einstein, my third-grade teacher at District #205, would have marked my paper had I gone outside the lines and into the margin in a New York minute. The margins are important. We learned it when we were 8 years old.

Pick up a book, any book, and you’ll find a safe margin on both sides of the page as well as the top and bottom.

Margins make it easier for us to read the story, to absorb it, to drink it in, to see its truth. Who would want to read a book where there are no margins?

And yet, many of us live lives where the words go from the left to the right and the top to the bottom without any space for rest.

But we need margin. We all do. God created the heavens and the earth and then he rested on the seventh day. Since the beginning of time, this has been part of our design.

Americans have a consumeristic mindset. More must be more, right? But what if that’s not true? What if we’ve bought into a way of being that is actually harmful to us?

The Sabbath or “Shabbat” is about rest, yes. I am learning it is also about trust. Trusting in the God who loves us abundantly more than we can even comprehend and depending on His sovereign hand on our lives. Releasing whatever power we think we have and knowing He is God and we are not.

I’m doing a study with a group of other women this summer called “Breathe” by Priscilla Shirer.

Priscilla writes, “In the midst of a universe that cannot exist for a second without constant motion, God transcended the order of nature. He stopped. He rested. And He prescribes the same for you and me.”

For the last three years, I’ve been living much of my own life without any margins. Between returning to school to producing a big conference every fall, every square inch of my life was taken.

This is somewhat manageable for a season or two but not for three years. They were almost all universally good things. From receiving a scholarship to study at Babson College to being on my church worship team and writing and publishing a book, life was busy. It was also a lot to keep track of. The papers in my office started landing in boxes. I never felt caught up. I always felt like I was getting to the next place just in time. There was zero margin. No room for the shoe to drop. No room for anyone or anything to go sideways.

And then it did.

A number of not so great things started happening in early November 2018 and then on December 14th, while taking a client to Tex Tubbs Taco Place for lunch, my sister called three times, within a few minutes. This is the universal distress call between the two of us and likely is in most families. The double call signifies that all is not right with the world.

My Mom had what looked like a stroke that morning. An ambulance had been called and then med-flight but because it was so foggy, they couldn’t take her by air. Within a few hours, I would be standing by mom’s bedside at OSF St. Anthony’s and thrust into chaos as four trauma teams fought for a diagnosis and mom fought for her life.

My Mom, who was always for me, died on January 4th after three of the most terrifying weeks of our lives. We hoped. We prayed. God gave us Christmas and then she went to heaven which is where all angels get their wings when it’s time. This was her time.

Time is a funny thing. As I’ve been thrown into this season of life, it feels like it is both yesterday and today all at once. The person who knew me well from the beginning is no longer here. We can’t joke around anymore about things only she and I shared. We can’t lovingly recall the books she read to me or about the first boy who broke my heart or the ones who thankfully didn’t work out. There will be no more “knowing” looks across the table.

This part of the journey is over, except for the memories, which I will share but never again with the person who I made them with.

In October of last year and a month before the conference I produce would go live, my cousin Jim and his wife and my parents went on a trip together. My mom wanted me to go and I almost bought the ticket but I felt like I couldn’t because I was too busy. This, of course, was true, and my mom was seemingly very healthy but I really did run out of time, this time.

Life on life’s terms.

I’ve taken a few trips with my dad and my kids already this year, one of which I promised my mom we would take in the spring. I naturally had hoped with everything in my being that she would be on that trip with us. I also took a trip with my cousin and his wife. I’ve spent much more time with friends and family. I have time for myself now, time to do the things that are life-giving and time to make memories with the ones I love. Life is good even though I’ve lost my mom, even though I grieve for her, even though it is so hard to imagine a life without her in it. We must go on, changed for the better or the worse. I choose the better.

Doing the Bible study this summer has helped me to understand more about the value of the Sabbath in the normal rhythm of life. It’s not just about working less, it’s about trusting God more than we trust ourselves. It’s about setting healthy limits. It’s about not striving but knowing that if you’re supposed to be somewhere, God will surely get you there without you having to lose yourself in the process.

On that same note, I have decided not to produce Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Wisconsin. I wrote sponsors on Monday, July 1st. I spent many months weighing the pros and cons and discussing my options with those who are closest to this in the business community. With their support, I made the final call to step back this year.

I’m thankful to those who helped bring Women’s Entrepreneurship Day to life in Wisconsin. We had a diverse and inclusive board and stage. We made history in a number of ways. We blazed a trail, made an economic impact and changed lives for the better. Our approval ratings were 94% or above in every single category. We sold out both years. It was a win across the board.

There are still ways to be involved with the movement including scheduling a watch party for the United Nations event on November 15th, mentoring a woman who is at a different stage in business, or by doing business with a woman in business.

However, this woman in business is going to focus on the core including Creative Company, writing and making sure she has the margin to live the life God has given her.

“Cease striving and know that I am God.” it says in Psalms 46:10.

It’s been an interesting year in so many ways. I have learned so much.

Shabbat, the Hebrew word for Sabbath, means “to come to an end, to stop, to pause.” Just as we needed to do when writing cursive in the third grade when we came to the line that signifies the margin, we need to do this in the rest of our lives too. By recognizing that the margins are important, we are liberated from the yoke of slavery, of constant motion, of doing instead of being. Peace, joy and contentment are found there as well as a lasting peace in knowing God is God and we are not.

Here’s to writing better stories with our lives, to enjoying the good gifts God has given each of us and to recognize when enough is enough.

May we remember how free we really are and that joy is in the margins.

Laura Gallagher is a community, local and national business leader serving successful entrepreneurial companies and nonprofit organizations, primarily in Wisconsin. She is the 2019 SBA’s Women in Business Champion of the Year. In 2016, she was recognized by the Governor as a Trailblazer in Wisconsin. She is the founder and President of The Creative Company, a public relations and digital agency in Madison, Wisconsin. Laura is a 2017 Alumni of Babson College’s 10,000 Businesses Program with a Certificate of Entrepreneurship and a 2016 graduate of Harvard Professor Michael Porter’s Initiative for a Competitive Inner City. She is also the author of #180in120 How to Recharge Your Business in 120 Days.