It has just been one of those weeks where there just hasn't seemed to be much to say. I went to a church retreat over the weekend and, for some reason, I have felt behind ever since. I've just had one of those weeks where my brain is refusing to engage and I am feeling mentally sluggish. Coherent thoughts (and writing) seem a long ways away.
I've been working on doing the Maximize your Mornings Challenge from Inspired to action which basically asks you to get up for your kids not with them. The general jist is to get up before everyone else so you can have some me time for Bible study, exercise, and organizing your day. I have been doing better than I thought I would. Trust me when I say sleep is my dearest friend, and I would rather have a root canal than give up sleep. Pre kids, I would often roll out of bed maybe 15 minutes before I needed to be up and head to work or class and not feel one iota of guilt. I treasure and protect my sleep.
But for some reason, this challenge spoke to me. I think because on the days I don't work, when the kids are home, it often feels like I waste the whole morning. We're up by 7:00 or 7:30 but by the time we get breakfast and I get two kids ready, it's 9. If I exercise or do quiet time, it ends up closer to 10 before I'm ready to think about showering. And we eat lunch close to 11 so then it feels like the day is half over. I guess it was the thought that maybe I could gain an extra hour by getting up an hour earlier.
At any rate, I've been batting about .500 with it. (The getting up early part, that is.) And when I have really been able to focus, the time has been sweet moments of solitude where I have been able to really think about spiritual things. I've found myself having moments of reveling in worship songs, reading and pondering through spiritual words, and actually praying for all of the things on my prayer list.
Compare that to trying to do quiet time when my kids are up.
Where I start reading, go get someone more milk, sit down, go get someone else more milk, sit down, read for a moment, yell at someone to stop making gargling sounds with his milk, read for a moment, threaten a child with loss of life and limb if he doensn't stop gargling his milk, read for a moment, go in and give the evil eye to child gargling the milk, sit down, read for a moment, start to pray, then hear a loud "Mommmmm!" as someone has just spilled the milk, head into clean it up and completely forget to return to do the rest of my quiet time.
So it has been a blessing. But lately this mental fogginess has made my morning time kind of hard, almost unproductive. I just started a Facebook based Bible study with a random group of women, 2 of whom I know, a lot of whom I do not know. (Such an interesting format, hence my need to mention it.) We are studying One in a Million, which covers the Isrealites journey out of slavery and into the Promised Land. So far it has specifically worked to challenge you to think about ways you live enslaved even though you have been delivered. The last couple chapters after that, um, my brain turned to mush and I'm not sure I remember all that well. (And I am a note taker, who takes note while I read but I seriously don't have a darn thing written down.) So I guess that leaves me praying that my brain gets it figured out soon and that at some point in time my mind will quit zoning out while I'm trying to get something accomplished. Interestingly enough, I came away from my church's women's retreat with one major thought in my brain: that God does not love us and pursue us based on our ability to do things for Him or our ability to do Christianity just right. Rather, He loves us just because and there is nothing He desire more than to spend intimate moments with us. So I guess I am encouraged that even if my intimate moments are driven by a short circuiting brain, God still loves that I choose to bring my barely functioning mind into His presence.
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