What’s a chapter of your life you’d title “The Hard Years”
— and what got you through it?
People often say that a person’s forties can be the hardest years of their life. That was true for me. I would call that chapter The Hard Years. Not because everything collapsed, but because I came face to face with the consequences of decisions I had made earlier. Some of those decisions had looked sensible at the time. Some even looked virtuous. That was part of the problem.
In those years I realised that I had made myself too available to others. Work, calling, pastoral responsibility, and family life had blurred into each other. The work was deeply meaningful. That was the danger. Meaning made overwork feel virtuous.
When people needed me, I’d find a way to respond. A wedding, a crisis, a funeral, a meeting, a visit, an important project. It was easy to call it faithfulness. But a calling without boundaries can become something else. There is irony in that. Ministry is meant to be about care, love, and investing time and energy into the lives of others. Yet boundaryless ministry can damage the relationships closest to you.
During the same period I was also working on my doctorate part-time while still working long hours. There was the discipline of extended study, the loneliness of thought, the fear that perhaps I did not belong, and the familiar voice of imposter syndrome. A doctorate is supposed to be evidence of competence. Strangely, the process of doing one often makes you feel less competent.
What got me through was not confidence. It was persistence. Writing. Feedback. Encouragement from a good supervisor. Faith. And the slow discovery that I did not need to feel confident in order to keep going.
I also began to learn boundaries, slowly and painfully. One full family day each week. Fewer weddings. Less over-functioning. Reduced work hours to make space for study and restore some balance at home.
Looking back, the oddity of those years is that I was not worn down by meaningless burdens. I was worn down by meaningful ones. A meaningful life still needs boundaries. Sometimes we are not undone by our vices, but by our virtues when they lose proportion. Love can become over-functioning. Responsibility can become identity. Calling can become compulsion. Helpfulness can become self-erasure. The hard years taught me that there is a difference between being needed and being whole.
The Afterword 
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