Hi friends,
Wow. It's been a long time since my last post. This one isn't from us... This one is from me.
It comes at a time when every day my high school classmates are celebrating the big 4-0. As a summer birthday kid, I get to watch everyone else accomplish this milestone while considering my own 40th birthday at the end of summer. In other words, I get to stay young for a bit longer ha! (That's always been my way of coping with becoming a teenager, driving, etc after my peers...it seems like I'm winning at this point though right? Hehe...)
Anyway, that's a tangent. Facing 40 has me thinking. Facing a return to "normal life" after being shut in for most of this Covid year has me thinking. The fact that this is Friday the 12th, one full year after Friday the 13th in March of 2020 when I said good-bye to my students and "taught" (No one was teaching that day. We were all just loving each other and grieving and wondering...) for the last time in person, has me thinking. No one knew it would be a year, but here we are.
This year has been a journey of a thousand miles in my heart, while going exactly nowhere. And I am so thankful! I've gone through all the stages of grief. I've had days I didn't get out of bed. I've had days where my coping was more hurtful than helpful. I've had lots of nights of sleeping only 3 or so hours and being all wrapped up in my worry. I've enjoyed later work start times and less shuttling to activities. I've enjoyed working in leggings and slippers and smooching my sweetie in the "break room" (kitchen) when we're "on lunch." I've wrestled worry about what is happening in this world and where are we headed and will this only get worse and never better? I've looked at screens more hours than one should in a lifetime--leading to some craziness and lots of blue-light blocking glasses-wearing.
(And I've worked with a counselor a lot. And I've determined that that doesn't mean anything is "wrong with me." No. Let me reframe that. I mean if you're being honest with yourself, you'll admit there is at least one thing "wrong with you;" and if you insist there isn't, you're not being honest with yourself. Regardless of how you're willing to own your stuff I submit to you this thought: I think every one of us deserves to give ourselves the gift of one hour on a regular basis to talk to someone about our stuff who has no direct connection to our stuff or any part of our lives. It has been a game changer for me! I'm thankful to God for creating people to act in those ways in our lives. This is not one of those, "I'm less faithful" or "I'm not close enough to Jesus to be healthy without talking to someone" things. This is one of those, "God reaches out to us by bringing others into our lives to help us" kind of things and I was willing to accept. If you want to talk with me more about that...I'm down!)
Right now, I'm working on defining and deciding what living post-shutdown life for me will look like. Never could I have imagined having an entire year of being forced to stop, to pause, to reinvent. Some people finally come to a breaking point and have to choose that for themselves. But we got a forced opportunity to break whatever cycle we were in. What a blessing!! Some have re-emerged into life already. Everyone's timeline is a little different but I can see mine coming at least a couple weeks out. And I get to choose how it goes for me. At least, I get to choose how I go into it!
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So here are three of the things I'm working on:
1. Eliminating hurry.
I've been really good at doing a lot of things and accomplishing a lot of things and being really efficient. (Did you feel that in how I worded that sentence?! Hurry feels frantic...that sentence felt frantic as I typed it.)
Here's what I've realized. Hurry, in lots of cases, is a state of mind. I can be quick about something without being in a hurry. Hurry feels awful. Hurry means I'm doing too much. Maybe it's because I'm doing something I'm actually accomplishing but I'm also doing a lot of other things in my head--thinking, strategizing, scheduling, anticipating, planning, overthinking.
I admitted to myself recently that up until about 2 weeks ago, I had not been on only one train of thought at a time for years. Years!! But since I resolved not to be in a hurry, the feeling of peace, calm, stillness, and being fully present and enjoying it, is incredible. I can actually pray without ceasing when I'm not in a hurry. I can think of and reach out to others when I'm not in a hurry. I can stop to love on my kids when I'm not in a hurry. I can notice in my husband when he needs a bit of my time and attention when I'm not in a hurry. Basically, I can love myself and those around me when I'm not in a hurry.
When I'm not in a hurry, I can take time to check in on my own thoughts and feelings and my walk with Jesus. Um...Hello?! Priority #1! As Corrie Ten Boom once said, "If the devil cannot make us bad, he will make us busy." Really, busy and hurried are the same thing. And busyness and hurriedness become distractions from God.
It is also not yet automatic for me to live or think this way. I'm constantly recognizing the tendency to hurry and having to catch when an extra train of thought is trying to rev up alongside the ONE I'm choosing to be on.
As I'm thinking about moving forward from this year of pause, this is my take-away with regard to hurry. If I can't operate without hurrying, something is off--I need to adjust mentally or I need to reduce what is on my plate. If you see me in a hurry down the road...help me catch it ok? It's no fun to live like that and it's unhealthy to live like that. I'd like to say I'm done, but old habits do die hard. With God's help, I'm working on it.
2. Declining invitations to argument.
Ok. Hello 2020. If it wasn't the year of "The Covid," 2020 would have been the year of arguing. Every issue under the sun has been argued over. Every argument ever made has been argued over. We even argued over arguing in 2020. And friends, whatever you do, don't read the comments--not even on a seemingly light, positive news story. Some people are just living to argue like it's their life's purpose.
I've been there. That has been me. I'm sorry.
But I realized something recently...It is actually possible to go throughout the rest of my life never arguing again! I think. Can you imagine how great that would be?! (Maybe I'm speaking from only where I sit, I'm nearly 40, I have my house and my husband and my career and my family and I'm really feeling grateful and content at this stage of my life.)
Recently, a small-talk moment with a stranger turned into an all out barrage of frustration from Stranger in my direction about the state of our state, and politics, and Covid, and vaccines, and mask mandates and all the things. It was amazing how a wave and a comment about puppies all the sudden turned. (But I had already decided I wasn't going to argue with people anymore. At least not about those things. I'm going to have my opinions and I'm going to make my choices and I'm going to set boundaries in my own life based on those things and I'm going to live in peace. What others choose doesn't have to disrupt my peace and what I choose doesn't have to be forced on others.) So when I got over my shock at how quickly the conversation changed, I decided it was my time to decline the invitation.
You see, Stranger wasn't arguing with me. I hadn't said a thing about my own opinions on the topics. He wasn't reacting to me. He was arguing because he needed to argue and I happened to be there at that moment. What he was doing was inviting me to argue with him.
But I already had plans. (Not really "plans" per se, but if "spending the next 20 minutes of my life not arguing" counts as plans. Yep! I had plans.) So, the next time Stranger had to take a breath, I declined the invitation. "Ya, I don't really agree with any of that and I'm happy with where I stand. Have a great day!" I said and turned and continued on my walk and had a great day! (I know it wasn't about me; he really needed to get some things off his chest...and I think he did...and I really hope he had a great day!)
Just because someone invites me to an argument, doesn't mean I have to accept. (I'm pretty sure I read that from Glennon Doyle.)
3. Not carrying all the weights.
This last one is probably all tied up in the fact that I am a 1 on the Enneagram...that's another blog post. (But if you're interested check out enneagraminstitute.com and the book Self to Lose-Self to Find by Marilyn Vancil. It's a great way to learn more about who you are and what God made you to be and why you do what you do when you're operating in your default mode.) Anyway, it means I'm a "Reformer"--I have a strong sense of right and wrong and an overwhelming urge to work for what's "right" or what I think is right. It also means, when I'm not healthy, I am critical and picky and judgmental and I don't let things go when they're not going my version of "right." Read: perfectionist, idealist, critical, resentful of things not "ideal."
It also means when I'm healthy, not overwhelmed, operating as the person God meant me to be, I am responsible and trustworthy, I am a hard worker on improving things and working for excellence in myself and things I am involved in.
(Yep. I'm rereading my notes from Vancil's book...It really is from me being an Enneagram 1.)
That brings me to this last one, the "not carrying all the weights" one. As I mentioned above, I've had some really unhealthy moments over this last year. (Come on...how could 2020 not have been ripe for being picky and "Fighting for Rightness." Hello...POLITICS?!) But I've even at times taken to "reading the comments" and needing to take it on myself to correct the mistaken thinking of strangers and even their typos. WHAT?! I look back on that and wonder who in the world I was during those moments.
And in worrying about being right and taking on all the things, I carried so many burden and weights, big and small, not meant for me. (I'm even worrying about how not ideal it is to have so many commas in that last sentence or to have started it with "And"...if you feel the urge to correct me right now, try and put down that weight. It's better that way, really.)
Not all the weights I see are for me to pick up!
- I don't need to correct others. I can let the little things pass and everyone will be ok! (I mean, if you're about to step on a nail or something, I'm going to help you probably, but that's not what I'm talking about.) In social media terms, I can just "keep scrolling!"
- I don't need to say yes to a task, or responsibility, or job just because "I would be good at it." Sometimes it's okay to feel honored to be asked but also decline because you're not willing to get in a hurry and that would be the one thing too many.
- I don't have to feel guilty for not to meeting other's expectations of me. (Audience of One, you know?)
- I don't have to carry the weight of someone else's feelings about my choices about my own life.
- I don't have to second guess everything I say or replay every conversation I have back to myself and pick my parts apart. (I know that seems really foreign to some people, but I've learned it's not just me who does that. For my people, those who do that, how exhausting right?)
The list could go on and I'm sure I'll add to the list of "weights I don't have to pick up" indefinitely for the rest of my life. But I've carried a lot of those types of things way too many miles, and nothing good has ever come of all that work.
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I'm really interested in how you're doing and what things you're considering as you think back on this year. What growth are you going through? What has been hard and what has been great and what have you learned?
Ultimately, I would love if something I shared above resonates with you and if it does, please let me know.
But really, I had to make sure to record these things for myself. Someone I loved dearly, who served as a great mentor to me for many years, was afforded the horrible and priceless opportunity to see his death coming years before it finally did. He told me early on in his fight with cancer, "I would never wish this on anyone else, but I would love for everyone to have the opportunity to start seeing life and every day from this perspective." In essence, he knew that to live like you are dying is the fullest way to live, but the irony is you can really only know that perspective if you really are dying and you know it.
Well, I know there will be times when life is different than it is right now and these realizations will seem less clear, so I'm writing this for me. And I'm hoping that by hitting that publish button, rather than just tucking it into a journal, it might be good for you too.
In love,
Krista
