i'm just back from a family vacation. it was a wonderful amazing time with family and friends and incredible weather and memories of some of our happiest years which were spent in san francisco. it felt too short and we didn't get to visit with everyone we would have liked to see, and we didn't get to eat all the food we would have like to have tasted, or walked all the streets or revisited all the places- because we had a lot of teen / preteen opinions to accommodate so we attempted to be flexible and compromise.
but now i am hibernating in my room trying to find some quiet space away from any opinions or random intense statements (that i really struggle to not react to), because even though i don't want a time out, i need a time out.
we are back to the beautiful but lonely fall of new england. that time of the year when things start to pull back and retreat. shrink, whither, become crispy and fall to the ground. branches become bald and gray and the sky pulls up herself in a hollow draw back. the summer that seemed to wave and breathe and move together in unison is over, and the fall has moved in with it's preparations and isolation. there is a quieting down, and a battening down of things for a long fallow season of scarcity. that season that i dread and will be leaving - winter.
this is my time of preparation. of retreating and pulling back and gathering. of separating from the life that was here for this past year and transitioning our family back to uganda, sans zoe.
this month i will finish work and shift focus fully to packing and prepping for our move back. to purchasing the plastic bins we use at suitcases, to writing course curriculum for what i'll be teaching, and fundraising and getting the medical things figured out and zoe's schedule and appointments. those things seem like a lot- but that isn't what keeps me up at night.
my soul needs tending and preparing. quiet and time. mediation and stillness. listening to the still small voice of the One who is sending me. i am so thirsty for long walks with Jesus. for intentional, set aside time for deeper spiritual practice. so that i can love better. listen better. feel at peace more. en-joy vacation more. not react to intense teenage opinions as much. so that i can shift into adapting a new way that becomes the way, or my way- not just a seasonal thing when i'm desperate. so that i can write more, as this for me is life giving.
living in close quarters, having a 14 year old, having a special needs child, the changing weather, relocating across the world, whatever the things are, they are opportunities for me to see that i have several areas where i am struggling internally. where i am resisting, fighting, where i am failing to observe and be curious from a place of love, but rather am coming in judgement from a place of fear. this is what i mean by seeing that i need some soul tending.
contemplative prayer.
the process of releasing. letting go. pulling back the false sense of control we have over things and others. perhaps like the season that surrounds me. i will enter in.
but now i am hibernating in my room trying to find some quiet space away from any opinions or random intense statements (that i really struggle to not react to), because even though i don't want a time out, i need a time out.
we are back to the beautiful but lonely fall of new england. that time of the year when things start to pull back and retreat. shrink, whither, become crispy and fall to the ground. branches become bald and gray and the sky pulls up herself in a hollow draw back. the summer that seemed to wave and breathe and move together in unison is over, and the fall has moved in with it's preparations and isolation. there is a quieting down, and a battening down of things for a long fallow season of scarcity. that season that i dread and will be leaving - winter.
this is my time of preparation. of retreating and pulling back and gathering. of separating from the life that was here for this past year and transitioning our family back to uganda, sans zoe.
this month i will finish work and shift focus fully to packing and prepping for our move back. to purchasing the plastic bins we use at suitcases, to writing course curriculum for what i'll be teaching, and fundraising and getting the medical things figured out and zoe's schedule and appointments. those things seem like a lot- but that isn't what keeps me up at night.
my soul needs tending and preparing. quiet and time. mediation and stillness. listening to the still small voice of the One who is sending me. i am so thirsty for long walks with Jesus. for intentional, set aside time for deeper spiritual practice. so that i can love better. listen better. feel at peace more. en-joy vacation more. not react to intense teenage opinions as much. so that i can shift into adapting a new way that becomes the way, or my way- not just a seasonal thing when i'm desperate. so that i can write more, as this for me is life giving.
living in close quarters, having a 14 year old, having a special needs child, the changing weather, relocating across the world, whatever the things are, they are opportunities for me to see that i have several areas where i am struggling internally. where i am resisting, fighting, where i am failing to observe and be curious from a place of love, but rather am coming in judgement from a place of fear. this is what i mean by seeing that i need some soul tending.
contemplative prayer.
the process of releasing. letting go. pulling back the false sense of control we have over things and others. perhaps like the season that surrounds me. i will enter in.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.