a living hope

Flurry flurry, fast and fury, don't stop you're in a hurry.  Work work night and day, never ending, never play.   Can't take a break, can't think to worry.  All this busy, all this scurry leaves me empty, tossed and turning.

This has been my mantra, it plays in  my head as I load the washer, trail behind my children, constantly cleaning, trying to be creative, trying to refinish my chairs, trying to be a fun mommy, trying to educate them, trying to blog, trying to be all things to all people.  And I am failing.  Everything has been crumbling around me and rather than find the leaky whole, I'm cursing the skies pouring rain.  I've been exhausted.  I'm pushing myself beyond my abilities, demanding perfection.  For what reason?  So, everyone may pat me on the back and tell me I'm excellent.  It's a wonderful thing to hear isn't it?  I'm having to refocus my gaze, I do this a lot, and find the true reason for my life.  Uncover my real goals and realize that what I'm striving for is turning my world upside down and stealing from my true passion.

God.  He is all, in all, he is.  He is the first to get the boot in my life.  Perhaps because I am constantly praying I feel that I don't need to get on my face, be in his word.  It's easy to turn on worship music and call it good for the day.  There are millions of people who give their all to their deity and I begrudge a few moments a day to focus on the one who holds my heart.  It's time to push in, to make space to learn, grow and nurture the relationship out of which I live.

Kids.  I have been quick to shove them in front of a movie, pushing them out of my presence so that I can have a moment to accomplish one of the millions of tasks I give myself.  Then when their attitudes are effected and I feel my frustration mounting we enter a vortex of me against them, spinning wildly until we all retreat to our corners. This is my life's work, to steward my children, to uplift, build and strengthen them.  That they may start where I end.  Refocus.  This is my priority.  Time to get muddy, to lie in jammies reading books under the table, to be in their day.

My house.  I love to clean.  I love every corner of my world to be in perfect order.  It makes me happy and when things are out of whack, I feel off.  But no one really cares what my house looks like, in fact my children are constantly fighting my efforts.  I'm learning to let go, embrace the mess a bit more.  Enjoy the life I can live when things aren't always in the correct place.  Laugh at the water puddles on kitchen floor and cuddle my kids while we lie outside in the mud and dance barefoot through the grass.  I do my best to remember that the saddest day of my life will be when there's no one to clean up after.

Create.  I love to make new things.  I am often thinking up fun crafts or projects I want to start.  It is very frustrating when I have to stop in the middle.  I am an accomplisher and in this present state I'm having to learn to be proud of baby steps.  But what I make with my two little hands will eventually fade, it will go out of style, break, or end up in the trash.  What I create with my presence, my words, my actions will grow up into a generation of people who are given over to transformation.

Perhaps I talk about this a lot.  It's what I have to come back to when I start down my own path.  Take the Uturn and press my face into the chest of an Awesome God and beg him to hold me, to lift me up, to give me grace, to sustain me when I'm sinking.  Most importantly to remember that no matter what I think NOTHING matters more than the two lives with whom I've been entrusted.  How blessed I am to be their mom.  I want nothing more than to be in the moments of their lives.  Everything else will slip away, but they will always remain.  My efforts will not go unrewarded, they will be passed down long after I have faded.  I do not effect a child; I effect a generation, a city, a country, a world.  It is a global responsibility to give the best to my children.

Eric asked me once when we were dating why, when their are 'too many' people I'd want to contribute to an overpopulated planet.  My response, if no one raises world changers the world will never change.  I do not want to just have children, I want to raise revolutionists who will transform the life of those around them.  I am not training my children to sit on welfare, but to contribute, to change the world in which we live.   If good people do nothing. . .

Just coming back to base.  Reminding myself where my passions lie.  It is not in the praises of men, but in the 'well done, good and faithful servant.'