A note from Janel:
This week, I’m welcoming guest authors Donna Kushner and Amy Schulte, a mother-daughter team who, in Amy’s childhood, served as missionaries in Palestine. Both currently work with refugees in professional and personal capacities. (I personally worked with Donna on a free resource to guide immigrant and refugee families into healing.)
As part of the premise of this blog, I commit to uncomfortable conversations worth having. And the onus of that falls on me—toward authenticity in the midst of my own doubt and weirdness.
So today, I’m opening the convo with something I regret.
A missionary friend told me once of a person she’d spoken with who, as a child in Africa, was slapped every time she asked a question.
I was moved by the person’s insight: “You don’t just stop asking questions,” they’d mused to my friend.
Reading Time: 5 minutes
“What’s one word you would use to describe your 2020?”
I heard someone ask this last week, and was a bit stumped. How do you shoehorn this year into a word?
For most of us, there’s been a lot of loss. A strange twilight of in-betweenness.
But you can’t describe this year without fear.
(Had to laugh at a meme I saw this week: Lord, give me a coffee to change the things I can change, and wine to accept the things I can’t.)
Some of us, particularly as women, I think (1 Peter 3:6), can live so much of our lives as the marionettes of fear. Personally, when I’m exhausted, fear is one of my go-to’s.
But what if it’s taking from me–and my kids–more than I think it is?
I’ve mentioned that in college I grew (or shrank?) perilously close to an eating disorder.
But as much as I’ve studied the patterns and choices delivering me to that point, the one that surprised me?
Control.
Eating disorders aren’t about eating. They’re about the psychological, emotional, and spiritual needs beneath.
I was shocked that control would be an issue for me. Because I’m totally the opposite with others. My husband used to say I was ready to hand anyone the leash around my neck; I was a pleaser extraordinaire.
But that left me feeling…out of control. More than that, I had realized people treated me quite differently when I was thinner. I had also grown my social skills since losing weight–so I was learning a lot of ways to not be rejected. And not be as vulnerable.
I became smooth at avoiding the vulnerability and rejection I abhorred. But a lack of vulnerability also means a lack of genuine connection.
And that’s part of what fear robs from our families: The ability to be truly–rather than ostensibly–connected.
The more we devote to appearances or avoiding rejection, the less we’re connecting at the heart level. We get really uncomfortable talking about negative emotions (sadness, anger, fear, loneliness). More and more becomes secret–becomes disconnected–as we fear people finding out whatever mess we’re hiding.
And in that way, we stunt our own healing.
Beneath some of my most controlling moments as a parent, as a person, often lies fear.
And sometimes, when I peek beneath the surface of those who appear demanding, fear seems to have their hearts in a vise.
That’s not at all to say that our families are better without boundaries, safety, healthy discipline, or managing our kids well. There’s a very healthy degree of control to be had that our culture doesn’t value as highly as God does.
But when we move beyond trusting God to demanding control?
That’s more like someone serving an idol. Just sayin’.
As fear makes us its slave, we enslave others to keep our world safe.
When I interviewed for my first job out of college–a writing job–the interviewer asked why I never wrote for the university paper.
The paper never interested me, I told him. (I didn’t get the job.) But years later, I remembered that I’d joined the high school paper…and wrote absolutely zero.
It was the year following a “mean girls” year in high school…and two of the girls leading the pack also led the paper.
I volunteered for one article, found they hated it and wouldn’t publish it, and never volunteered again. I’d missed the tone, I remember–a completely accurate criticism.
Yet as a whole, fear inhibits us. I’ve written before that after I was married, my creativity crept out like a troll in the forest.
For so long, I’d concentrated on not rocking the boat. I wouldn’t wear red; would walk only on the edge of the sidewalk, even when it was empty.
Fear as a parent has similar inhibiting effects. It may keep our kids from taking risks, ferreting out the fullness of who they are–because fear has a suffocating presence, choking out growth to keep life controllable. It stifles innovation and courage and exploration.
What effect could a fearful parent have on a future artist? Leader? Gymnast? Writer?
Fear might even keep us from obedience. Opportunity. The courage to do what’s hard to go the distance for someone else (like sharing our faith, or entering into someone’s chaotic world).
As a mom of boys, I think of all the competitions my boys would set up for themselves, to the tune of, What’s the highest stair I can jump from without blood getting on the carpet?
They’re testing their abilities, their limits, their aptitudes and abilities to affect change.
They’re constantly challenging themselves for the questions so many men ask of themselves. Am I competent? Am I capable?
But if I don’t let them risk a little? Sometimes, the answer they’re getting is…no.
(See The Many Shades of Fear-Based Parenting from Psychology Today.)
As I’ve intimated, my near-eating disorder was a symptom of something far more disordered than my eating.
In fact, I was so much more comfortable with the mask I presented that I was less and less comfortable should it ever slip a few inches.
In a lot of ways, I still wore it when I was alone.
Fear keeps us from exploring the truth about ourselves or our kids. It might keep us from a diagnosis we need, from wrestling with loss, from working on the real issues in us or our families. Because it’s just more comfortable not to talk about it.
In that lack of emotional awareness and mindfulness, our emotions can tend to manage us from behind.
Maybe we can’t sleep. Or we “out of the blue” snap at someone. We might fall over ourselves to make someone like us. Or turn backflips to shield our kids from disappointment.
But it affects how we love people, too. It’s hard to be fully present with someone…when you’re not even attentive to yourself. They’re not getting the idea, “You can be real here.” Authenticity begets authenticity.
Giving way to fear is a deeply ingrained habit. But it’s not my master. In fact, it’s pretty hard to serve two different bosses, I’ve heard.
Throughout Scripture, it’s fascinating how much God pairs “do not fear” with “I am with you”. He associates it with deep belief in his profound love, care, and control.
So one choice at a time, I’m having to get intentional–at that fork in the road–to choose trust rather than fear.
Only one of those doesn’t rob me blind.
Much Afraid: How Fear Turns a Good Parent into a Slave [INFOGRAPHIC]
The Breath We Breathe: On Fear–and Trust in the Middle of Danger
The Scribbled Heart: Fear-parenting vs. Faith-parenting
Reading Time: 6 minutes
First week of COVID-19 closures: a week of strange dreams.
Once, I dreamt I was driving in the dark, but my headlights kept flipping off. I kept protesting that I could hit something.
Another night, I was unprepared for a trip to a writer’s conference I wasn’t sure why I’d signed up for–but my editor was there, anticipating I would have great things to say. I’d forgotten shoes, blouses, my computer charger.
In real life, I fell back spread-eagle on our mattress. “Why am I so worn out?” I mumbled, eyes closed pathetically.
My mind went to my first days in foreign countries, where I would marvel at my fatigue–which increased the more I interacted with the culture.
Everything seemed just left of my own normal. But I underestimated the piece of my pie it would commandeer.
Of course, none of our COVID-19 stresses happen in a vacuum. One of my friends is in her first trimester, now working with kids at home. Several of us and spouses labor long hours for newly hatched problems. Personally, a family emergency added intense stress to our home.
And this week, my friend struggling with cancer woke up one morning in Paradise, his body now not just restored, but glorified.
(The rest of us did not.)
One morning, I researched the effects of the stress hormone cortisol on the human brain. One of its effects: brain fog (the article actually said this). (I was fascinated and educated by this article’s 11 ways to lower your cortisol .)
But as I’ve written before, I’m learning to pay more attention to my stressed self so I can manage my emotion, rather than the other way around.
What can it look like to respond as parents and humans to #coronanxiety?
The whole country’s stress is ratcheted up a notch.
When someone steers around us to get to the toilet paper first, it takes forethought to operate beneath human generosity and graciousness rather than letting our own fear label what must be their (selfish! panicked! oblivious!) motivation.
It’s a time for more counter-intuitive kindness. Not less.
And we’re more likely to do that when we forbid ourselves to be controlled by fear, but by the God with reins on every atom.
When we, as a friend wrote recently,
trust him more deeply than just having faith we [or our loved ones] won’t get sick.
My sense of security has to be in something greater than my power to control my surroundings.
Comfort has to be in something greater than my stash of food.
Safety has to be in something greater than the healthcare system.
Peace has to be in something greater than any preventative measure I can make.
I’ve mentioned studies finding gratitude so closely linked with happiness, the two are nearly indistinguishable.
Gratitude also lessens anxiety and helps us heal from grief.
Personally, it helps me remember the ways God’s packed my lunch–my personal reference to one night when I was worried as an adult. My mom, who packed about 5 lunches every weekday for at least 18 years, asked if I’d ever had to come down in the morning, wringing my hands. “Did you pack my lunch?”
I smiled when she said this. Not with my mom at the helm, you see. She always packed my lunch. To worry about this would, in some ways, be an affront to her constancy; her faithful care and provision for me.
You see where I’m going with this.
I’m sure I don’t need to remind any of us that urgency is how the news makes its money. (I.e., They live off our fear.)
Yes, we need to know facts. But we don’t need them 24/7. We need some trustworthy information maybe once a day.
And the normal (non-pandemic) stats about social media’s increase of our anxiety, depression, and loneliness are well, old news. I’m sure that brother-in-law constantly posting about COVID-19 doesn’t scream, “Trust God. Dwell in peace.”
Our kids and spouses are absorbing our stress. Need we fuel it?
I realize the Enneagram has its issues (time on your hands? You could try a free online test). Yet one of its valuable aspects to me is its predictions of each personality in its stressed state.
I happen to know I become either the equivalent of a military dictator or, diametrically, maintain the self-possession of mashed potatoes: I’m a passive people-pleaser who’d only like to keep the peace.
Admitted fiction-junkie that I am, I read a great line in a novel this week. It’s one I can’t recommend because it doesn’t meet my criteria, but the line itself smacked me like a bottle of hand sanitizer to the forehead.
“There’s a lot of things you don’t get to decide…I think you can decide about this and you’re talking like you can’t.”
I have to intentionally remind myself I can say “no” rather than being lashed at the heels by clients or shortages or others’ needs.
(If you love the Enneagram, don’t miss this hilarious meme on coronavirus responses by enneagram.)
What narratives are we telling ourselves about what’s going on? Are we taking our cues from our worry, empathy, desire to appear calm and collected?
Around the world, many nations will suffer far more than the U.S. from COVID-19. They don’t possess clean water, adequate health education or facilities, or enough cash to stockpile. When the economy falls, it’s the poor who take the greatest brunt.
We have the power monitor the stories we tell ourselves and our kids. Without being false, let’s exchange discussions of gratitude, a God who’s got this, and with a keen eye to how we’re each responding to stress.
Someone recently told me about a meme that says, “Me homeschooling, Day 1: [image of Mary Poppins] Me homeschooling, Day 50: [image of Annie’s Ms. Hannigan].”
Remember all that stuff I was learning about rest? I think I’m going to have to relearn it.
Because rested, I’m just better at loving. At not being driven–and driving everyone else–by fear.
FamilyLife.com has a free link right now for a “Soul-Care Staycation”–including a great soul-care assessment and tips for Parent-Burnout.
Think about neighbors and friends. Who’s immuno-compromised? At risk for COVID-19? More likely to be anxious or isolated?
Loving a neighbor as ourselves is great to take our eyes as a family from our own bellybuttons.
Maybe it’s picking up the groceries for that neighbor over 65. Or it’s Facetiming the friend who’s anxious. Could be using Marco Polo to check in, or sending a note in the mail. Perhaps it’s walking or running with a friend with 6′ between you.
Kids can join in on this: Thinking about a packaged treat to leave at someone’s door, or who might need a card in the mail or a video over text. They can create a paperchain of people to pray for every day who might be vulnerable or afraid.
It’s good for all of us to maintain virtual community amidst social distancing, rather than isolating, where fear–and for many, despair–grows.
This could be a great time to have the kids pick a reward, and memorize verses about trusting God (I’ve got a couple of printables here for that).
Or have a family competition. Maybe put on a face mask with your daughter and read a devotional. Or cuddle with a child and a cup of tea.
My husband and I realized we need a bit more structure. Kids will be doing a half an hour of school until online learning ramps up. We’ve asked them to have at least 15 minutes of devotional time.
I’m doing a few things like playing instrumental music and diffusing some essential oils (I like some of these blends), totally for myself, since God’s connected my spirit to this body of mine. I’m waking up to exercise, have some chai from this recipe I love, pray, read the Word.
Sometimes this is totally going to look like us sitting down and hashing out, then forgiving each other, over all the little “He’s had the computer, for like, an hour!” and “Could you please not chew that like a cow?”
God seems to get me thinking about how I can set the tone I want in our house during COVID-19.
Who does he want your family to be?
Coronavirus: Tips to Talk to Kids
Spiritual Life Skills for Kids: Courage (with Book List & Printables!)
The Stressed Version of Your Parenting
Reading Time: 7 minutes
But in light of her anxiety issues, and apparently a night last year when she laid awake till 2, she’s already nervous about getting to sleep.
(All those suggestions in the Help! My Kid Can’t Sleep post? Those are hard-won, peeps.)
So we’ll pack her weighted blanket, we decided. And we’re mentally thumbing through other strategies.
But here’s the thing with anxiety–a phenomenon on the rise in teens. My husband and I are constantly dancing on the line of dealing with it in healthy ways. How can we treat her emotions as valid, yet manage them without them managing her?
How can we acknowledge her fears, but raise her toward being a strong woman of courage?
Because courage, even according to the dictionary, is “the ability to do something that frightens one.” Or “strength in the face of pain or grief.”
See, some of the things my youngest son has done, like toddling to the adult pool and jumping in without someone to catch him? That’s not courage, per se. (Not sure what that is? I think the courage is actually required by his parents.)
So often in the Bible, “Do not fear” is followed by this pointed reason: “I”–God–“am with you.”
What’s it look like to raise kids of courage? A few thoughts.
After we were robbed during our time in Africa, a friend wisely wrote me, “The very thing we would protect our children from experiencing may be the very thing that God wants to use in their lives now so that when they are adults, they’ll know how to respond to crisis.”
Reflecting on our son’s cancer scare about this time last year, I wrote about how my son’s mind-boggling response was actually a culmination of some significant obstacles he’s faced in life. He may well be my most resilient, courageous child.
This is hard for a mom who, if she were Elastigirl from the Incredibles, would hands-down prefer to make herself a human shield. It many senses, it’s easier to act as a force field for my kids’ pain, the consequences of their mistakes, any margin for them to fail.
But–to mix my metaphors here–that would create for them a virtual bloodstream without antibodies.
Our kids learn to fight fear and failure and weakness only by encountering it.
Keep peeling back layers. Why is your child afraid of test-taking, or lunch at school, or entering a competition? Peel back another layer. What happens if that bad thing happens? Peel back more. How does this connect to your child’s identity? What truth does God say to that false identity? (I discuss this more here.)
When my daughter’s struggled with sleep, my husband and I have allowed her to sleep on the carpet at the foot of our bed.
But hey, that won’t work so well when she goes to college, right?
And yet, some nights she enters in tears after midnight.
So we decided to give her an imaginary “ticket” she could use once every two weeks when she’s really having a tough time. The idea was to increase the amount of time between tickets–but her use of the tickets has already fallen off drastically.
That child who’s afraid of the water may not be ready for the diving board. But maybe the progression moves from a parent’s arms, to the Puddle Jumper on the pool steps, to fun games while wearing the Puddle Jumper…you get the idea.
Don’t space this step. It’s God who trains our kids to find peace in him rather than how they perform, how safe they are, what they have, or what other people think.
I’m conscious of increased anxiety creating wider neural pathways for fear in the future. I’ve heard neural pathways likened to paths in a forest: The more we tread down them, the wider and more easily-traveled they become.
Along with this science, we also know neurons that “fire together, wire together.” So when your son is bullied by a kid at school, he’s not just afraid of the bully. He can become afraid of school.
So I’m seeking to reward those baby steps of my daughter–to widen neural pathways of courage. When she has a day without using a “ticket”, she earns 5 minutes extra screen time.
Different kids will have different struggles. (My boys get nothing for sleeping in their beds.)
These are the gifts our kids gain through experiences that reiterate, You can.
Though my daughter has a history with stage fright, several teachers encouraged her to try out for the speech and debate club this year. After a competition last Saturday, she returned with a glow in her eyes–and a medal in hand.
This medal means more to me than some that have entered our door. It’s been won in spite of fear.
Sports, and especially the outdoors, can be tremendous places to do this. A couple of years ago, a father and friend of a newly teenaged boy asked my husband about ways to help his son overcome some persistent fear.
My husband recalled that one of his greatest confidence-builders as a teen was all the time he and his dad spent outdoors. When you’re outside, you’re so often conquering something. They certainly did: most of Colorado’s fourteeners (14,000+ ft. peaks), snow caving, snowshoeing, cycling, kayaking. Meanwhile, all those little battles were making my husband a man.
If your kid’s not into this, maybe don’t force them and create more of a complex?! Maybe they’re game for that drawing class, or dance.
It doesn’t have to be something they’ll succeed in. Just something that encourages them to try.
Studies show that deep breathing exercises have a crazy-cool ability to talk our brains down, so to speak, when we’re stressed. (This is kind of cool to me, since God associates himself with breath.)
My son likes the “box breathing” technique: Picture a square. As you travel up the first leg of the square, inhale 4 seconds. Across the square’s top, hold that breath 4 seconds. Moving down the square’s side of the square, exhale 4 seconds (a longer breath out might be more effective). Your child “closes” the square by breathing normally for 4
Vulnerability looks like courage in others–but freaks us out when we have to do it, right? Model the kind of relationships that thrive apart from appearances, accomplishments, and achievements. Grab 8 how-to’s here.
When it comes to feeling accepted as we are, there’s nothing like a safe relationship. Grab a treat with your child, or spend time drinking some cocoa and being close. Communicate your unconditional love.
Statistics show fathers are more adventurous; more eager for their kids to go out and grapple with the world.
Between my husband and I? Pretty durn sure if one of us leads to “overprotective”, it’s not him.
But I’m sure you don’t need stats. Because you’ve probably heard your husband say something like, “You’re okay! Shake it off!” Or “Whoa, cool! A SCAR!”
Together, memorize some verses about courage so you can remind each other (check out Ephesians 5:19).
Wondering where to start? Try
To get you going, I’ve also made three free printable graphics like the one below. Grab them here!
Real-life examples help us start conversations about what it could look like to overcome.
ReadBrightly.com has compiled a list of 10 picture books about courage, starting with Jacqueline Woodson’s The Day You Begin–great to read with a child tucked beneath your arm.
For older kids, R.J. Palacio’s Wonder is a classic (read the book, then watch the movie together). My husband is also reading Corrie Ten Boom’s classic The Hiding Place with my daughter. Other titles to consider:
CommonSenseMedia.org also has a list of movies that inspire courage (bonus: Every title has its own what-exactly-is-in-this review, so you can make sure the movie’s right for your family.)
Spiritual Life Skills for Kids: The Series
Helping Our Kids Turn Suffering into Praise
Blind Wrestlers, Cancer, and How Your Child’s Pain Could be a Gift
Bouncing Back: Helping Your Child Open the Gift of Failure
Reading Time: 7 minutes
It’s a disturbing statistic.
A friend quoted me a study cited in Johann Hari’s Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression–and the Unexpected Solutions (please forgive me if it’s misquoted).
In short, the study asked how many people participants had in their lives who they could call in a time of crisis.
In the 1970’s, the most common answer: 3.
Today’s most common answer?
Zero.
Hari continues,
When [a scientist] put lonely people into brain-scanning machines, he noticed something. They would spot potential threats within 150 milliseconds, while it took socially connected people twice as long, 300 milliseconds, to notice the same threat. What was happening?
Protracted loneliness causes you to shut down socially, and to be more suspicious of any social contact, he found. You become hypervigilant. You start to be more likely to take offense where none was intended, and to be afraid of strangers.
….When they added up the figures…scientists found that being disconnected from the people around you had the same effect on your health as being obese.
It was only a long time into talking with these social scientists that I realized every one of the social and psychological causes of depression and anxiety they have discovered has something in common. They are all forms of disconnection.
Because anxiety and depression are on the rise in children–and more than 1 in 20 children struggles with one of these–living connected feels more important than ever.
To be clear: I’m not talking about electronically connected, or even social-media connectedness, which increase kids’ tendency toward depression and anxiety.
I’m talking community.
Community is about intentionally choosing to connect ourselves in trustworthy, dependent, authentic relationships based not on appearances, but compassionately showing each other Christ. We’re training kids to acknowledge our mutual need for each other.
Two years ago, my family and I returned to the U.S. from Africa. From our own perspective, we’ve been overwhelmed by the disconnectedness most Americans bear daily.
Perhaps this was accentuated by the life lessons Africa gave me: I love the time Africans take to simply shoot the breeze with each other. They might be sorting beans or rice, or washing clothes by hand, or cooking or farming—but they’re talking. They’re relating, spiraling out cords of connection between them.
Far more than activities, I want my life to make a priority of time for people.
It’s part of the reason my family chose to move to a smaller town outside a city.
Like Africa, I didn’t want my kids’ community to solely exist in silos: community from a sport that’s different from church that’s different from school that’s different from the people they see in a store.
But I don’t think it’s just comparing cultures that makes me think we are lonelier than ever.
When I returned, a lot had happened politically. Outrage was the new tact. People seemed as likely to look at phones as look at each other in the eye.
And I was amazed at how hungry people seemed to feel for someone to listen to them. There’s a deeply felt longing for people to share our stories with, depend on, feel known by.
Something, friends, is changing.
And on this trajectory, our kids are headed for a future even more isolated.
But what if there was hope?
What if we started living differently? More vulnerably? More–dare I say–intrusively?
Social media and phones make us feel connected. But let’s get honest. Will we really be our most authentic selves when our interactions involve
To clarify: If our kids are their most vulnerable in the very public arena of social media, we’ve got a problem.
No one should be broadcasting their most intimate feelings where no one’s there to look them in the eyes, ask questions, and receive them.
More often, social media is about image-management. It’s suitable for announcements and things you’d report to a group of friends and/or acquaintances. It’s a little like the family Christmas letter.
Systweak’s got a great list of 7 apps to help manage social media use, so we can keep it in the right place.
Then, nudge your kids into face-to-face relationships.
Hospitality is an intimate form of community. We’re inviting people into our homes, sharing our food and our stuff and even our mess. Keep it from lopping into appearances. Here are some ideas to involve kids, and keep it less on the Martha Stewart side of things, more toward “Wow, that was great!”
Our own image-management is so often what stands between us and the community we need–we long for.
We’ve got to relentlessly banish self-protective insecurity and relationships thriving on appearances.
We can do this by
See this post, Is Insecurity Robbing Your Family?
I happen to have a friend who regularly muffin-bombs my house (you know who you are). When she and her kids make a treat, she just makes more. They stop by the neighbors. Last week, she brought some to the urgent care her family frequents.
Muffins (or cookies, or whatever–even if they’re not homemade!) have a way of making the world feel smaller.
Channeling my inner Fred Rogers, here–part of what draws us into community is the ability to trust and depend on each other. Mr. Rogers is famous for telling kids to look for the helpers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cyOLq6tslnU
Can kids be helpers, too? We can help them grow into community members who receive others’ pain. See this post for solid ideas: Helping Kids Be a Safe Place.
To live in community is to live among each other–but not just exist around each other. Community is about being fully, undistractedly there.
Presence is a precious form of love.
I think of the God who wasn’t content with never being seen, never touching, with a self-centered failure to engage: “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood” (John 1:14
).
Authors John and Stasi Eldredge note,
The gift of presence is a rare and beautiful gift. To come―unguarded, undistracted―and be fully present, fully engaged with whoever we are with at that moment. When we offer our unguarded presence, we live like Jesus.*
We can do this by
Who can kids contact when they have a need—both kids and adults?
Who can they help and pray for in return?
Consider relatives, friends, Sunday school teachers, a babysitter, etc. When your kids need help, brainstorm together about who they can talk to.
Conversely, if there’s a friend in need–get intentional about how you can help. Pray for them. Bring them a meal. Offer for you and your kids to babysit. Help your kids mentally build a structure of people who mutually depend on one another.
It’s cool to help your kids assemble this visually. You could post this on the fridge or inside a cupboard. Get a little excited when you add another name! PRINT THIS HERE, FREE.
The more I grapple with my staggering weaknesses, I pray for other voices in my kids’ lives: people invested in them, abundant in areas I’m sorely lacking, intimately involved enough to speak into my kids’ lives.
Sometimes these other voices may be saying what I’m already saying, but in a different way that resonates with my child.
And–bonus (especially with teens?) without relational static deafening our communication.
You could
Y’know how the most important ingredients in French cooking are butter, butter, and butter?
One of the most important ingredients in community is time, time, and time. (Not thyme.)
We tend to think more activities connect us more with people. But what if the quantity of our activities sucks the quality of our relationships?
What’s one activity you could say “no” to for the sake of being more present with others?
Spiritual Life Skills for Kids: The Series
Guest post: A Prayer for Your Community–Every Day of the Week
Makeup, Vulnerability, and 8 Simple Ideas for More Real Relationships
Reading Time: 3 minutes
After the all-too-recent my-kid-might-have-lymphoma scare? There are some things that have been going right.
For one, after a year of doing my freelance writing and marketing for my only employment, I filed for my own business. I am now the owner of Fresh Ink, LLC. So that’s pretty cool.
And somehow, I’m receiving a windfall of client possibilities and realities I’m pretty excited about.
But something was strange this week: at least two days where I dealt with anxiety. Not panic attacks or anything of that sort–though I know those are real for many people. But more of a low-lying GAHHHHH! That’s not usually me.
Thankfully, I don’t feel like my family is getting the business end of that in any major ways, which is significant for me (and my anger problem).
But I talked to a mentor of mine this morning, also a writer. Paraphrasing my question, how do you know when you’re involved in too many good things?
I think of God’s words to Moses:
What you are doing is not good. You will surely wear yourself out, both you and these people with you. For the task is too heavy for you; you cannot do it alone. (Exodus 18:17-18)
I’ll include his answers below–and you might want to check out The Dangers of Overcommitment, The True Cost of Overcommitment, and Your opportunity…vs. Your Call. (Man. I probably should, too.) I also found a lot of good thoughts in Ruth Barton’s Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership, which I can’t recommend highly enough.
After living so many years out of the country, I’m amazed at how my American ideals of achievement and performance really do color my interpretations of thriving Christianity. I think too highly of myself. My “ministry “plans can be ego-driven plans. I lack the humility to embrace the limits of my humanity, the boundaries God’s put in place. I find identity in what I do for God, rather than what he has done for me.
So I have to constantly re-center my soul on “Kingdom culture” instead–looking under the hood to check out my warning lights.
Shall we?
Reading Time: 4 minutes
Stress is like wearing a flannel shirt when you’re washing dishes, you know?
One minute, you’ve got your hands in the water, scrubbing, the edge of your cuffs kissing the water. Next minute, the water’s bled up to your armpits. (For this reason, my husband’s told me that in Boy Scouts, they always said “Cotton is death”: If you’re wearing cotton when you’re active in the cold, it absorbs your perspiration, and can quickly bring you to hypothermia in bad weather.)
Last week, I had a brief argument with my husband, who I still adore. The thing was so brief, I can’t remember the subject (and don’t really want to try). But I confess. I came downstairs, and upon finding my kids not completely obeying and them chilling out in a messy room? Woe be unto you, children! I stomped around, controlling and ordering the parts of my life that I could. (Most of them are shorter than I.)
At one point, I looked over at my daughter. She perched on a barstool in her green stocking hat, bestowing upon me the stinkeye. I asked her if she wanted to talk about why she was angry. This one, I saw coming: “You take your anger out on us.”
Reading Time: 2 minutes
Do mothers have a sixth sense? I don’t know. I remember padding into my parents’ bedroom in the wee hours, and no matter how softly I laid my feet on the carpet or tried not to breathe–it turning into a challenge at some point–my mom would gasp awake. Everything okay?
Maybe she passed it on to me. A couple of nights ago, my eyes opened with a deep breath. I listened to the silence of a house asleep, the sounds of my sons breathing in the next room. And then, the sheets moving. Was my son groaning? I don’t remember.
It was a baby tooth of his, the one I’d haul him to the dentist for the next day. “I can’t get comfortable,” my son sleep-garbled. I offered him pain reliever, lay down beside him with my hand on his back, on those new muscles from school sports. (He used to fit inside my body.) He tossed some more, breathed deeply, then regularly.
I have realized that this slice of night is never a good time to take my thoughts seriously. As if they had been hiding beneath the bed, worries began to loom in my sleep-addled brain, their shadows casting large. I heard my own breathing accelerate. My mental dot-matrix printer suddenly churned out long, black lists of fear.
![Now You're Speaking My [Love] Language](https://www.janelbreitenstein.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/love-languages-text-1.jpg "Now You're Speaking My [Love] Language")
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