Friends, I’ve really been struggling to find the time to blog this summer.
Yet, I’ve also been dying to get back into the rhythm of writing, of reflecting on life, of studying the Word.
Tonight didn’t offer me the time I needed to complete my post on the film Black Swan.
So I ran over to The Gypsy Mama to take a peek at her Five Minute Friday writing prompt. I hoped, that maybe, just maybe it would have some pop culture relevance.
And, it did.
New: a buzz word that our culture just can’t get enough of. But, a word that I could do without.
So, I wrote for five minutes, unedited.
Why don’t you give it a try, too?
Link up with Lisa Jo and write your own Five Minute Friday post.
It breeds catharsis, tears, and a perfectly timed gut check that I needed tonight.
GO
When I hear the word new, I hear better, shinier, faster, perfect.
Even God promises to make all things new.
The commercials speak of the sleek stylings of the new car.
My boys want a new toy.
Hubs says he’s in the market for a new motorcycle.
But, I don’t want the new.
I prefer to stick with the old.
Old offers comfort, warmth, a soft place to land.
Old is my oldest friend, my bff who judges me not.
Who’s known me longer than I’ve known my hubs.
Who accepted me even though I wore hideous glasses and talked funny.
Who knows my weaknesses, my strengths, and loves me enough to say Shut up and put your big girl panties on.
With Fall on the horizon, I’ve been worried {freaked out!} about all of the activities that my boys will be taking part in. I’m excited that they’ll be busy, because that gives me much less time for Mommy Fail. But, I’m banging my head against the fridge calendar muttering , How do we balance giving our children opportunities while maintaining our sanity, family time, time for God, etc, etc, etc, etc? And, I’ve recognized that this dilemma is unique to our culture as Americans. So, I did what any mom would do. I invited my blogging bud Loren, who writes about being a good steward of our time, to offer some awesome suggestions to calm my freak out.
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For a lot of parents, back-to-school season means back to being stressed.
There’s homework, soccer practice, piano lessons, church activities, birthday parties for friends – and that’s just Monday.
We want to be good parents. We want to give our children opportunities. But we also want to take care of our health, get adequate rest, have personal devotionals, maintain a loving marriage, and battle that growing mountain of dirty dishes.
How do we balance it all? How can we be good, God-honoring parents, while still being obedient in other areas of our life? How do we make practical and spiritual sense of all of this?
Here are five tips to help orient our schedules and our hearts so we can steward our time well.
1. Cut the Fat
Before you slash away at your schedule, it’s wise to first strive for efficiency. Is there any area, such as TV or aimlessly surfing the internet, that you could reduce or even eliminate?
Be on the lookout for creative ways to do things better. For instance, make detailed grocery and shopping lists and do all your errands at once. Do a week’s worth of cooking in one session and freeze the meals.
Focus. Whatever you’re doing, be 100% there mentally and don’t give in to distractions. You’ll be surprised by how quickly things get done.
Keep break-time in control. It’s easy to convince yourself that you’re flustered and need a few minutes just to chill and relax. That’s fine, but sometimes this is really just procrastination. The best way to deal with this is what I call The Prayer Test,
2. Consider Your Contexts
Throughout your day, you’ll be in different environments that will restrict your activities. Make a to-do list specifically for these times to maximize what you can accomplish.
For example, my wife breastfeeds our baby. A few times a day, she’s got a block of 20 or 30 minutes (which really adds up) where she can’t really do too much. It’s hard to clean up around the house or do yard work with a baby in your arms. But she can enter receipts into Quicken, call family, or read her Bible.
You could have one list of things you can do in short time periods when the kids are around and another list for tasks that you’ll tackle once the kids are in bed. What can you knock out while you’re driving or waiting to pick up your kids?
3. Budget and Schedule
When money is tight, that’s when you count all your pennies and follow a budget. Likewise, when time is limited, sit down and plot out your day to the best of your ability. You’ll be able to think in advance about how to use your precious 24 hours.
Now there’s very little chance that life will cooperate enough for you to follow your schedule, but at least you have a template to work off of. You’ve already thought through why you budgeted your time the way you did, so you’re better able to make decisions on the fly when plans go out the window.
Schedule in the important things if that’s the only way you’ll get to them. If you’re hoping to fit something like personal devotionals in between the cracks of everything else, you may find that the opportunity never presents itself. Be intentional about creating those opportunities, not hoping to find them.
4. Examine Your Motives
Take a step back and look at why you’re doing what you’re doing.
Some are workaholics because they find value in their career and what they accomplish there. Some, particularly mothers, judge themselves by how much their kids participate in and how well they do.
Is much of our busyness merely us striving for significance? Do we seek the praise of men? Or do we find our value in who we are in Christ?
This can be tricky, because it’s easy for us to mistake love for our kids with love for our own egos. After all, we just want to “give them opportunities” – right? But we need to be brutally honest.
Before we can make God-honoring decisions about our schedules, we have to empty ourselves of our own agendas. As parents, we want to serve and obey God by loving and raising our kids well. Are we focused on them – and him?
5. Trust the Sovereign
We are called to be good parents, yes. But we’re also called to be obedient in all areas of our life.
When we pour out love on our kids but neglect God’s instructions for our health, our rest, or our personal spiritual life, we’re essentially telling God that He doesn’t know what He’s doing.
“God, please bless my children and protect them. But that whole part about taking care of my physical health – I’ve thought about it, and I think I’ve got a better solution.”
Our Sovereign God is not going to make an accounting error and require us to cram 30 hours of activity into a 24 hour day. He’s not caught unaware of our trials and to-do lists and obligations and high-blood pressure.
Before he created the world, he knew you’d be facing the stress you’re facing right now. He lovingly wrote the Bible knowing it would help you with all your problems, including a loaded schedule.
The Bible’s words on how to live didn’t become obsolete in 2011. God is absolutely in control, and he knows what he’s doing.
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Our job is to be faithful with the time that we are given and to trust Him with the rest. Even if that means sacrificing “opportunities” for our children, we can trust that our faithful obedience will be rewarded and He’ll more than make up for the piano lessons that were cancelled.
What other tips would you have about how to fight the back-to-school stress? Have you ever had to make some tough decisions to be obedient to God with your time?
Loren is a Christ-follower, a husband, and a father. I have a passion for helping people manage their time in a Biblical way, stewarding their lives for the glory of God. You can find his well written, practical and useful blog at Life of Steward, or follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
I’ve never known what it means to not know Christ.
I asked Jesus to come into my heart at the age of 3.
I hadn’t done any hard drugs.
I hadn’t lived a life of regret.
I hadn’t sought my identity in a gang.
I was just a regular, American kid, sitting in a Sunday school class, offering my heart to Jesus.
In my little girl brain, that meant I got a one way ticket to Heaven and I shouldn’t steal things from my little brother {even though he liked to bite me when Mom wasn’t looking}.
I was raised in a Christian home.
I attended private, Christian school from preschool through university.
None of which I regret, bemoan, or am in any way disgruntled over.
I know, and fully believe, it was all an extraordinary blessing.
I’m forever grateful for my upbringing, the sacrifices of my parents, and the outpouring of love from the village who raised me.
But, what happens when you are constantly fed the Truth in bite size nuggets is that eventually you don’t digest it. At least, that’s what I did.
My faith had simply become just another token of my identity, listed next to my alma mater and favorite movies on my Facebook profile.
I would read something in the Bible, which was so familiar, so ingrained in my head, yet I had no idea what it meant to me personally.
Even on a Cloudy Day
Then…life happened.
I grew up.
I had some tough times {sprinkled amongst the good}.
And, I was forced to face the Truth.
Forced to explain to myself what it is that I believe and why I believe it.
Forced to admit that sometimes life sucks.
And, sometimes it’s hard to get out of bed in the morning.
Yet, the hope that I have is in Christ Jesus,
that there is a purpose to this life,
that the bad will be used for my good,
that the hard times will be used to soften my heart,
that His Strength will be perfected in my weakness,
All so that my life may be a reflection of His Redeeming Love.
And, so often those realizations for me have come through the arts, where I’ve fully grasped the meaning of Scripture in images, narratives, allegories, stories, songs, in the pop parables of my life.
I’ll Keep My Eyes Fixed on the Sun
The lyrics to Cage The Elephant’s song “Shake Me Down” were one such realization for me.
Here’s a moving acoustic performance of the song:
Listen carefully, and you’ll hear the Song of Trust in God’s Protectionpenned by the prophet Isaiah {26} as interpreted by Cage The Elephant:
In my life, I have seen,
People walk into the sea,
Just to find memories,
Plagued by constant misery,
Their eyes cast down,
Fixed upon the ground,
Their eyes cast down
I’ll keep my eyes fixed upon the sun
3You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in You.
4 Trust in the LORD forever, for the LORD, the LORD himself, is the Rock eternal.
Even on a cloudy day, I’ll keep my eyes fixed on the sun.
7 The path of the righteous is level; You, the Upright One, make the way of the righteous smooth.
Even on a cloudy day, I’ll keep my eyes fixed on the sun.
8 Yes, LORD, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for You; Your name and renown are the desire of our hearts. 9 My soul yearns for You in the night; in the morning my spirit longs for You.
Lampshade turned around into a light post
19 But your dead will live, LORD; their bodies will rise— let those who dwell in the dust wake up and shout for joy—
Walk around the corner, Never saw it coming still, I try to make a move, It almost stopped me from belief, I don’t wanna know the future, But I’m like rolling thunder,
12 LORD, You establish peace for us; all that we have accomplished You have done for us. 13 LORD our God, other lords besides You have ruled over us, but Your name alone do we honor.
I’ll keep my eyes fixed on the sun.
No matter what my circumstances, I’ll keep my eyes fixed on the Son.
Writing for five minutes straight, unedited. Here’s what I came with:
GO
Torn into pieces.
In half.
In fourths.
In quarters.
Again, and again, again.
Over and over and over.
Til I’m not who I once was.
That person has vanished amongst the rubble, the broken pieces, no longer recognizable.
I wait for Him.
To come along, pick up the pieces, shard by shard.
Caress it with His gentle touch.
Finding every single bit of me that lay shattered.
His tears fall upon the pieces.
The salty liquid a healing balm.
He restores me.
Touching each wound.
Acknowledging its’ presence.
And, I am no longer pieces.
I’ve traded my ashes for beauty.
I am whole.
STOP
Why don’t you give it a go?
Take 5 minutes to post on your blog, in your journal, or a Facebook note, an email, or {GASP} a letter! You can even leave it here in the comments! I’d love to read your words.
The August 8 cover of Time magazine features an image of a husband and wife battling The Chore Wars.
Sociologist Jopepsh Pleck states that Inequity in the gender division of labor gets rediscovered in pop culture every seven to 10 years as a new generation of women enters early parenthood and that’s the issue that they see. What’s interesting is that the current generation of young moms {that’s me!} is seeing more equality than every before.
Author Ruth Davis Konigsberg, points out that men are actually doing more work around the house than ever and division of labor is nearly equal in American marriages. And, not only are they sharing their household chores, but they see it as integral to the health of their marriage. In a 2007 Pew Research Center poll, 62% of married adults said sharing household chores was the third most important ingredient in a successful marriage (after faithfulness and sex).
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Before I had kids, I had never even considered what the term division of labor would mean for me.
For the first 7 years of our marriage, Mike and I didn’t even give much thought to who did what around the house. Things just got done. And, while we both worked and/or attended university, we had a lot more time on our hands to be sure each task was checked off the to-do list.
But, since having children, the biggest challenge in our marriage revolves around the division of labor. With 3 little ones age 4 and under, there is infinitely more work than one could imagine. Not to mention that we are now homeowners, which brings with it the additional challenges of the {unplanned} bathroom reno, yard work {which we despise} and general upkeep of the household.
The pressures of keeping it all together have at times overwhelmed me to the point of tears. Since I lack the gift of domesticity, I struggle to maintain an orderly household. And, while hubs and I are still working out the kinks, I’ve discovered a few things along the way that have helped to ease the tension between us.
And, now I share them with you!
A How to Guide for Dividing Labor without Dividing Your Marriage
Create a list of tasks. Take a week or 2 to write down every.single.task that each of you does to keep your household functioning. {Bathing yourself doesn’t count, but you should still do it.} You’ll be surprised at how much needs to be done and how much your spouse is already doing that you aren’t aware of!
Agree on what’s important. {This is a biggie.} People have different ideas of what needs to be done and what’s just borderline obsessive.
Divide the tasks according to who enjoys them most or who is the most efficient. If no one wants to tackle cleaning the toilets, alternate the responsibility. Throw traditional gender roles out the window, and focus on your individual strengths here. In our family, hubs is the doggie groomer and kid barber. Most moms tackle those jobs, but Mike is just so much better at it than I am, so it’s his area of responsibility.
Know that the division will not be 50/50. It’s not possible for the division of labor to be split straight down the middle. That’s why it’s important for each partner to take on the tasks that they enjoy.
Just because a task isn’t on your “To Do” list, don’t fuggedaboutit! Be sure to support your partner in their tasks. Put your toe nail clippings in the garbage. Don’t leave them on the table for your spouse to dispose of. Once in awhile, take on a task for your spouse “just because”.
Accept your partner’s way of doing things. If you want something done a certain way, you’ll need to take on that task yourself or have a civil discussion about your preferences.
Outsource. If you have the resources, bring in some outside help. Having your teenage neighbor mow the lawn twice a month could relieve a huge burden. Or, what about hiring a cleaning service to come in once every few months to do a deep clean? Use the time and energy saved to do something special together. {I didn’t say sex, but I know that’s what you all were thinking.}
Git ‘er done! {DUH!} Be responsible for actually completing your tasks. Don’t wait for your spouse to remind you.
Evaluate how things are going. Periods of transition {new baby, new job, even a change of seasons} can increase or decrease the work load. Be sure to assess if the division of labor is still working, or if you need to play musical chores.
Most importantly, approach each task with a servant’s heart. Especially if you don’t particularly enjoy a certain task, think of it as serving your spouse and your family and putting their needs above your own. A verse that I like to keep at the forefront of my mind is this:
3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, 4 not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others. {Philippians 2:3-5}
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What tips or suggestions would you add to my “How To” guide?
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