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23 / 40





The 77% Weekly



The Religion-Outside-The-Box Newsletter






August 2006 – Issue 23/40



In This Issue

  






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Greetings!

The 77% Weekly:
The Religion-Outside-The-Box Newsletter is a chance
for
you to have a dose of
something spiritual but not religious 40 out of 52 weeks a year.


Religion-Outside-The-Box is a web-based 501c3 tax
exempt religious congregation that
empowers people to find and sing praises to (the) God (of their
understanding) regardless of
affiliation or belief.







The “How stressed can I be?” Contest
 

Religion-Outside-The-Box is proud to host its first official
(and utterly sarcastic) spiritual contest.


Everyone can participate!

Simply use this convenient scale to calculate how
many different stress-filled events you’ve managed to
simultaneously survive over the last 12 months. (You can add
additional points if you’ve had multiple experiences of an
event.) Or just be creative and calculate your stress
according to your own scale.

Stress-filled events may include, but are not limited to:

  • Worry.
  • Change.
  • Responsibility.
  • Trouble.
  • Illness.


Total all your applicable stressors and then share your point
total and/or experiences at the Religion-Outside-The-Box
blog.

Grand prize: Perverse satisfaction & pity.
Runner-up prize: More
stress because you didn’t win.

Contest ends August 15, 2006.
Winners will be announced in edition #28 of the 77%
Weekly.

Contest Rules and Regulations:


Religion-Outside-The-Box membership is not required. One
entry per person, please. Artificially inflating your stress for
the purpose of winning this contest is strictly frowned upon
and may result in disqualification. (Does anyone really need
to inflate their stress levels?) Winners will be selected from
those posting on the Religion-Outside-The-Box
blog.







A Sermonette on Stress
 

The above contest — while entertaining — is not meant to be
taken too seriously.

But, the amount of stress we
all endure on a daily basis is not a joke. Life just isn’t
easy.

And strange as it may seem, I can admit that
there are times when I actually take pride in the number of
things I manage to juggle at once.

Our society
gives credit, praise, and kudos to the overwhelmed among
us. Collectively, we’ve developed a rather unhealthy mindset
that encourages the accumulation of stress as a necessity to
drive us to even higher levels of achievement.

This
is ludicrous, no?

It reminds me of the Lily Tomlin
quote: “The problem with the rat race is, even if you win,
you’re still a rat.”

And, as obvious as it seems, let me conclude by stating: our
goal should be to have less stress in our lives, not
more.













With much love,








Rabbi Brian

Religion-Outside-The-Box