How was your morning? Were you curled up in a big, comfy chair, sipping a cup of tea and having some quiet time? …while you ate a scone? …in your fluffy robe?
No? Me neither.
In fact, sometimes I think the image of a woman resting like that is a fable. Well, maybe not for women before they have children or women whose children have grown up and moved out. But if you have children in your house, I can guarantee that if you DO get to have some tea, it is often cold. And your fluffy robe likely has a pattern of smeared tears and other “children juices” all over it.
Life for Moms is often full and demanding. If we let the busy control our days, we will become exhausted and frustrated. We begin to resent our situation. [OK, I’m being a bit transparent to the whole world here, but can I just say that if we don’t maintain the correct perspective, we lose rational thinking and let our situation control us.] I have NEVER resented having children, but I HAVE fallen into resenting the fact that I feel like I don’t ever get a break.
Ever feel that way? It’s OK. It happens. When life is busy, it is easy to lose perspective. And when we do, thoughts pop into our head that rob our joy, that make us upset with our situation.
So how do we stop it from happening? I came across this verse recently as I was reading through Proverbs:
We need to keep our spirits from being crushed. If we don’t have a proper perspective, we can be less-than-cheerful, and life will take charge of our hearts.
But how can we be cheerful if one of the kids was up all night with a stuffy nose, there is no food in the house, and we can only find the toddler’s left shoes? Then we think about all the activities ahead of us and see soccer practice, lesson plans, grocery shopping, and laundry, and we begin to feel the crushing happen. We begin to fret. We get stressed.
God tells us that a cheerful heart is good medicine.
How can we approach our day cheerfully? It has to be intentional. And it has to be often.
Include “happy breaks” into your schedule: pull out the play dough, make a quick snack, have the kids create a card for a friend or neighbor, watch a short DVD, take a nature walk around your house with the kids. Any of these things can put a halt to the busy, crazy schedule and provide you with a little quiet, a little enjoyment without any pressure to complete a project.
When you say to your kids, “Hey! Let’s take a break and go outside to collect as many different leaves as we can find,” you have caused the freight train of busy-ness to slow down. You keep craziness from taking over your schedule, and you can regain perspective: You are doing life with your children and showing them God’s great love and goodness. You are raising them to be salt in a world that needs to hear the Gospel. You are reminding them that they are precious in God’s eyes, wonderfully created. And that takes work. And time. Sometimes it will be challenging. So you don’t want to lose focus.
Taking happy breaks will help you enjoy your children more. You have FUN with them as you go about your day.
Our family recently re-watched the movie, Mary Poppins (yes, we love Dick Van Dyke!), and I am reminded of what Mary Poppins sang to the children.
“In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find the fun and, ‘Snap!’ The job’s a game!”
It all boils down to our outlook, our perspective. We need to see that we can joyfully complete our tasks or we can grudgingly do them. If we don’t take happy breaks/perspective breaks in our day, we will feel the busy-ness plow over us.
Celebrate DOING life with your kids. This will fill your heart so that you can see the WHY behind what you are doing.
It is so much more rewarding and pleasant than that clean, fluffy robe or a hot cup of tea!
