I read a book last night and there were passages of it that I hope I can hold before me often. I look around and see other people living lives that seem 'better' than my own. I feel like if I could just get over certain walls that have been created by my past, or that I have built for myself, that I could do more, be better, and I could help. Help who? I don't know! Do more of what!? So many things. I just have this nagging feeling that I am doing something wrong. I wish I could bring in an income for my family and cook healthier meals and exercise, parent much more effectively, and the simple list is pretty extensive. However the list comes from a place of feeling like I am going to end up a failure, because I have not been able to do these things that I value and feel is vital with regularity or to the extent I would like to.
When I try to stand back and look at this I realize that this is the life my parents led and still lead in many ways. They are both still alive but their past trauma and their situations led them to a place now where they have a lot of pain and regret and bitterness and it's eaten them away. I want to walk towards something different but I often feel stuck in the battle. Like I am trying to scoop up the incoming tide and throw it back.
Is there truth in this? That I am doing something wrong? Not enough? Yes I think so. I also think I am doing what I can. There are days when I could do more and I don't. But more often than not I am doing every single thing I can do. It's just embarrassing that I can't do much. I think I always thought I was capable of more. Then the world sort of laughed and said nope.
Last night when I read this though ~ it resonated with me.
'This, at least, was Molly's working theory of life. She saw plainly that her business - every day, every hour, every moment - was to order her way as He who had sent her into being would have her order her way. Doing God's things -that is, what God gave her to do - God's thoughts would come to her. God's things were better than man's thoughts, man's best thoughts the discovery of the thoughts hidden in God's things. Obeying him, perhaps a day would come in which God would think directly into the mind of his child without the intervention of things! For Molly had made the one rational, one practical discovery of being - that life is to be lived, not by helpless assent or aimless drifting, but by active cooperation with the Life that has said 'Live'. To her everything was part of a whole, which, with its parts, she was learning to know. She was finding out the secrets of life by obedience - that is, duty done - for developing even the common intellect. Those who obey are soon wiser than all their lessons, while from those who do not obey, even what knowledge they started with will be taken away."
'The Poet's Homecoming' by George MacDonald
This is a long quote but in reading it I felt a peace come over me. I so often forget that I can ask God what He would have me do. I forget to quiet my spirit and listen. I am overstimulated with the noise and clutter and energy. I am going from thing to thing not accomplishing much. However if I am doing what God has asked me to do - which I think I am that is enough. He has given me children to raise, a house to steward, relationships to give to if at all possible. It has not been much I realize compared to so many - but it is what He has given to ME. So instead of casting my eye around and looking at my lack and failures and regrets I can refocus. I can realize that in obedience I can rest in assurance.
Maybe it doesn't make much sense.
It has been long day and my body and brain are exhausted. My husband, daughter and son in law went snow boarding on a mountain close to us. I try to advocate for my daughter to get to go once a year. She loves to snowboard but it is an expensive endeavour and until she is older and can pay her own way this is what we can offer. Today I was home with all my children and grandson and it was a truly lovely day. Of course every day is filled with a lot of fighting between my children, a lot of whining, and I wash many many dishes and process many loads of laundry and make food over and over again. This holds much loveliness in the moments of eyes alight with thankfulness when I serve a snack that was asked for. Or when I read to someone or snuggle someone or look up when they are calling for me to watch them do something they think is absolutely mind blowing. Today I cleaned the bathrooms and washed barn clothes and cut up cabbage and read a Hardy Boy's novel to my son, and snuggled a baby to sleep multiple times. I went for a walk with my children in the beautiful sunshine and we dressed up like we were venturing out into the Arctic. I worked until my body ached. The three snowboarders came home tired, sore, bruised and happy. They had a great day. We all had a great day. Feeling peace today in amongst the chaos came from knowing that what I was doing was enough. It was what was laid before me and I obeyed.
I am thankful
No comments:
Post a Comment