The Big Picture

We got sidetracked yesterday looking at old pictures and videos of us and the kids when they were babies.  We were in the middle of the long-overdue job of downloading photos from the camera to the computer, trying to create space for new memories and we got lost in our archives.

There was our now-toddler caught on video crawling down the hall towards the mini piano his big brother was "playing."  There was our almost-nine-year-old daughter, then an imp-faced baby sliding down the slide at the playground we used to frequent every day.  (I can't remember the last time I went there.)  And then there was the video of our oldest, pushing a recycling bin through the hallways of the derelict high rise apartment building in which we used to live.  That was what we used to do for a good time; he'd practice walking by holding on to the bin and if he got too stir-crazy in the tiny apartment we'd roam the hallways and ride the elevator down to the lobby.

And then there were the photos of my husband and I; hoisting babies up on our shoulders, tickling the kids until they were in fits with giggles, pushing swings, chasing toddlers down the street.   We look so happy, my husband said.  And we really did.

At the time those photos and videos were taken I'm pretty sure I couldn't get through the day without napping alongside my children I was so sleep-deprived, and I know that we were constantly running out of clean clothes and that I was spending hours washing my own cloth diapers and that I once walked into the kitchen to see a mouse rummaging through the dirty dishes and dried bits of dinner on our counter to find its own meal.  At the time those photos were taken I struggled to get through the basics of daily life and household management - I know I did.  I couldn't have been that happy all the time.  I know those kids had tantrums and I had to drag them out of drop-in centers and kicking from play dates.

When I look at my life now it is just as hard to see the big picture - I am usually so caught up by what's immediately in front of me: the futsal session for soccer and the fact that I forgot to arrange a carpool for my son, the bobby pins that are missing when ballet starts in two minutes and my daughter's hair is nowhere near a bun, the scramble for coffee - now! - because my almost-three-year-old still doesn't sleep through the night.

But I don't take photos of those moments.  And when I look back at my life in a few years from now I'm sure I'll have to squint to make them out, they'll be so out of focus.  My little trip into the archives reminded me of the big picture I'm a part of - the picture that actually makes it into the frame - and it's a picture of joy and fulfillment and happiness, not in my day job or schedule or meal plan, not in decorations or house design or number of vehicles or annual income, but a picture of joy in relationships.

When I look back, that's all I can see.  And I need to remember to enjoy the moments that I'm in right now when they're happening, because ultimately, I'm having the time of my life.

There's Always Something

One thing I can say for certain about parenting: it is not boring.  Every week - sometimes every day - it seems something happens either to me or someone in my family.  And here's where parenting really becomes a spiritual practice, because whatever happens we just have to respond, no matter what.  It is great training for the development of those intangible virtues like attitude and discipline and calmness under pressure.  One week someone is sick, another week someone has a big project they need extra support on at school, or there is a week filled with evening meetings or one of us parents is working late.  It seems we never have a "normal" week; something always happens that we didn't bargain on and that adds constant upheaval to the routine.

Last week in my family it was lice, times two.  Now I have never had lice, but my children seem to pick these nasty bugs up all the time and it really throws the whole household into chaos.  Not only do I have to find extra time every day to nit pick (I now have a visceral experience of this expression and it's surprisingly apt), but I have to gather up almost every linen in the house and haul these over to the laundromat for cleaning, since we have no dryer at home.  The trouble is that in our house almost every minute of every day is already accounted for, so when someone gets lice I go crazy trying to figure out how to cram in all the picking and cleaning that I really don't have time for.

And every week it seems there is something like that that happens.  And parents a little further down the road tell me life never really gets any more "normal" or easier to predict.  Older parents tell me they are still surprised by what family life drops on them, week by week: children in tumultuous romances, children messing up jobs, children making choices the older parent never would have made; there's always something.

Thank goodness.  It means we're surrounded by people who need us, people to love.  It means we have something to do, which is better than nothing.  Our relationships gives us a reason to get up every day.  I know I'd be unhappy without my family, lice and all.  But I could stand for them to get it a little less often!

Yay! We're a happy family!

One of the biggest reasons I find parenting to be a spiritual practice is that it is so good at giving me a swift kick in the rear whenever I get too cocky; and it's a function of any spiritual practice to make us think and to call us to account, to make us aware of faults and give us the impetus to change.

I learned soon after my eldest was born that it was really me who was "growing up" as my children aged, and not the other way around.  When I can't get the dishwasher loaded because my toddler needs me to play blocks with him, it's me who learns to be patient just as much as he does.  When the toys we just put back in bins get dumped all over the floor - again - it's me who needs to take a moment and gather some self-control.  And when one of the kids is tired and cranky and grumpy it's me who needs to be charitable and recognize that they are just having a moment and that the moment will, eventually, pass.

Just when I think I've got our routines figured out, just when I've printed the latest, greatest edition of the job chart, just when I think my baby is finally going to sleep through the night (it's been almost three years!), just when I'm about to burst into a song that sings all my praises, something will happen and we're back to where we started: routines that don't happen routinely, jobs that go undone, kids that still don't sleep.

Parents very quickly learn the virtues of humility and modesty.  I am still waiting for a chunk of time to go by where I feel like we get it right as a family, most of the time.  By that I mean that I'm still waiting for a day when I can say with confidence that we've figured out our routines, that the kids are doing their fair share of the work that needs to be done to keep our house running, and that we're all getting enough rest and exercise.

Instead I feel like we're constantly heading back to the drawing board, constantly tweaking and adapting and changing and doing an about-face - but according to one expert, that kind of humility is actually a good thing.

I recently heard an interview with the writer Bruce Feiler (of Walking the Bible fame) who has written a new book called The Secrets of Happy Families.  And it turns out our family has at least one thing going for it when it comes to being happy.  Feiler spent three years researching this book by talking to sources in-the-know - albeit unorthodox sources, like the creators of Modern Family - to come up with more than 200 ideas and suggestions for improving family happiness, one of which is: adapt constantly.  If you're doing things the same way you were last month or last year, Feiler says, you're doing something wrong.

Finally! Some good news!

I often find it demoralizing to know that I'm not getting it right with my kids, most of the time.  But humility is a redemptive virtue.  At it's core it's a virtue about the capacity to change.  And perhaps that's what children really need, not an example of perfection, but examples of adaptability and flexibility.  Because things won't always go right for our children, and the best character trait they can learn to compensate is the capacity to learn and grow and change. 

The Current Thorn in my Side

There is one spiritual fruit I just can't seem to grow: self-control. I can't get one bloom out of this virtue.  Lord knows I've been given enough opportunities to cultivate it.  Every day family life hands me multiple opportunities to stay calm in the face of aggravation, to breath deeply through insult, to laugh instead of getting all in a huff.  I'm handed the seed, so to speak, but I toss it and stomp on it before it ever sees soil.

One of the places I'd like to have more self-control is during the daily piano practice. There is one child whom I have to sit with to keep on task.  At the beginning of every practice session I'm fairly bright and cheery, mainly because we've managed to make it to the "piano practice" portion of the day, which I think an accomplishment in and of itself. By the end of the session it's all I can do not to rip the books off the stand and smash the keyboard.  I get so frustrated with this child.  This little one swats my hands when I'm trying to point out a missed note, or yells, "I get it, I get it, I GET IT!" before playing the same wrong notes.  If I leave the practicing in the child's hands it won't happen.  What to do?  I'm not sure.

I guess like anything in life, when it comes to spiritual growth, it's practice makes perfect.

  

Entertaining Gentleness

This week I decided not to sign up my children for swimming lessons.  Fear not for their souls; they're still doing piano, ballet, soccer, brownies, cubs, x-country running and choir.

I was fully planning on signing them up for swimming.  I had diligently picked up a copy of the Parks and Rec guide, located our local pool, noted the date and time of the appropriate classes - but on Wednesday morning (sign-up day) I couldn't bring myself to sign them up. 

It turns out this year that our Tuesday nights are completely free which, I had originally thought, would work out well for swimming lessons. But when I looked at my calendar a little more closely I realized that making time for swimming would mean lost time on other activities.  I've been wanting the kids to cook supper once a week, for example, and an evening without any activities to rush off to would give me the time to supervise.  And then there is the time they play with the neighbourhood kids.  When an evening is "free" it can actually be spent playing soccer or swinging on the monkey bars. 

I've been thinking about Gentleness; how I'd like to invite Gentleness into my home, maybe make some space so she could stay awhile, but looking at the calendar I see we have been inadvertently entertaining Harshness for years now and that we haven't had much time or space for Gentleness.  Gentleness, it turns out, is one of those guests who asks a lot of us and doesn't coexist well with Harshness or anyone who is rushed and fussed.  Invite her over and you'll see what I mean: try speak kindly to your loved ones when you're late for that evening class you tried to cram in, or try to make time for a grandparent in a nursing home when every weekend afternoon is booked, or try to enjoy the mundane, or to patiently teach an intangible value when you're simultaneously shoving kids out the door to swimming lessons...it can't be done. 

So I've opted to keep Tuesday nights free in our house. I'm hoping it means we'll have time for unexpected visitors.

Space for Gentle Living

This summer I had a mini-revelation.

I was passed out on the couch at the lake, recovering from eleven months of running, my mind a stream-of-consciousness blur, when I got to thinking about Ma, as I often do in moments of exhaustion or self-pity.  For me, Ma has always been the epitome of not just motherhood or wife-hood but simply good person-hood.  I'm referring to the inimitable Caroline Ingalls, whose power and ingenuity has been immortalized in her daughter, Laura's, "Little House" books.  I read the "Little House" series when I was a girl and recently reread them again with my daughter and have come to the conclusion that Ma's pretty much as perfect as a person can be.  Sure she's got her foibles, but what astounds is her gentleness - and it's a gentleness that never falters - even when surrounded by wolves, or when her husband is lost in a blizzard, or during that long winter when she ground their last bit of wheat with the coffee grinder and made what she thought was their last loaf of bread.  Here's the thing about Ma: she never loses it.

I got to thinking about my own ancestors, laying there on the couch at the lake.  My grandparents grew up on farms and their parents were pioneers.  They didn't get a lot of vacations, and somehow they managed to do a lot of work and raise a lot of children without completely passing out.  And I wondered, as I lay there on the couch, how did they do it?  How did they manage all that work, sun up to sun down, day in and day out, year after year after year without the luxury of a month-long holiday?  What would they say if they could see their progeny, one hundred years down the line, depleted, head drooping and drooling?

My revelation was this: what kept Ma's sanity intact and what enabled my own ancestors to work as much as they did were hard and fast margins that protected the blurring of lines between work and rest.  Without electricity, works necessarily starts and ends with daylight.  A life lived in conjunction with the seasons protects time for interior and exterior projects.  And every single week these people took an entire day off to rest and rejuvenate.  That's 52 days a year, much more then my meager month.  Their work (and their ability to approach work and life cheerfully and with optimism) was sustained by the steady presence of serious margins: that time in between time - blank time and blank space - to fill as they saw fit.

I am realizing that a key to bringing a spirit of gentleness into our days and into our very selves is to protect our margins.  This doesn't mean trying to live as though we're always on holiday, that's not realistic, but protecting certain spaces in each day that we might eat well and with loved ones, and sleep well, and walk or garden, or think or play and rest, daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.  It means asking: what really has to happen now?  What time is it?  What season? 

Ma always knew the right answer.

  

"True North"

I read an essay this week about our universal quest (here in the West) for balance, between work and family and our sense of self.  The writer talked about the importance of commitment (read: faithfulness) to our own equivalent of "true north," that central focus or foci that help us locate direction and intention and the right route, no matter where we find ourselves.

Of course this got me thinking about my own "true north."  What part of my life do I focus on the most so that every other focus falls into its proper place?  How am I using my own "true north" to make important decisions, to prioritize what needs doing and when, to structure my days and weeks and dreams?

I suppose the quickest way to answer would be to say, as this particular writer did, that my true north is God and my family, but I have to say that when I think about it my own true north is somewhat more personal.  If I could sum it up in a word it would be this one: Integrity.

I have found that when I focus on making decisions with a sense of faithfulness to my own integrity, that is faithfulness to an inner sense of what I know to be right for me, I find the balance and peace and calm for which I daily yearn. 

I've learned most of this through trial and error, unfortunately.  I don't get life right most of the time but lucky for me (and all of us) life is faithful with its lessons; what I fail to absorb in one form certainly comes to meet me again, and again, and again.  And I have faith that I'll get it, eventually.

A Clue in the Moment

I know that stress is so ubiquitous that's it's cliche, but last week was stressful.  I had a "big thing" going on in every aspect of my life. 

In my work at the church I was organizing a group of teenagers to host a day camp for children living in a homeless shelter.  It was our first time putting on an event of this caliber and length and we had no idea whether the activities we'd planned were going to work out; we didn't even know how many kids were going to show up or their ages until they walked through the doors on Monday morning!

At home we were finalizing plans for our new kitchen, which we needed to order by the end of the week.  This meant that every evening Steve and I were up late fretting over cabinets and colours of hardwood. 

Big deal, you might say.  First world problems. 

And you're right. 

The stress was in coming to consensus.  We have been renovating for two years now - literally all of Sebby's life so far! - and we've had a number of setbacks that have held this project up.  It has been a challenge not to blame each other for the holdups but to see circumstance for what it is and move forward with creative solutions.  Last week almost saw us tear up our marriage certificate over this whole mess...but we didn't!

In the midst of all this our little two-year-old fractured his collar bone, so one evening was spent in the ER and we all suffered through a week of clinging and whining and night-waking every hour; not what one needs when early starts and busy, long days are on the agenda.  The other two kids were in camps - in different parts of the city! - and we all needed lunches packed and to be out the door shortly after 8am to make it to where we all needed to be on schedule.  Ah, summer!

I haven't mentioned that we also had a house guest and had committed to babysitting our neighbour's kid every day until her parents could pick her up after work and that we had to say goodbye to some of our best friends who were moving to the UK...there was literally never a dull moment!

But in the midst of all this stress I was surprised by moments of joy, to use C.S. Lewis' phrase.  The moments dissipated almost as soon as I became conscious of what I was feeling, but for fleeting seconds I would be overwhelmed with a sense of the deep goodness of life and a sense that in certain tiny ways I'm on the right track with my living.  I really sensed God with me in those moments and Spirit really urging me to hold on to the moment, to whatever I was doing right then.  Be faithful to this, I heard.   This is the good life.  And so I've created a little list to remind me of the Spirit's nudges towards faithfulness.

Things to be faithful to:

1. Biking.  Nicky and I would bike to his camp in the mornings since it was on the way to where I needed to be.  Biking on a summer morning has got to be one of the most delicious pleasures life has to offer.  You feel sun and breeze.  You smell fresh air.  You see people walking with purpose and passion.  You really feel free.  And I got to experience this with my son.  It felt good to move my body and exercise at the start and end of each day and I was much less aggravated than when I'm driving.
2. Friends.  As I was throwing together dinner on a particularly stressful evening Steve suggested I make extra and we invite our neighbours over to join us (the people whose kids we'd just been looking after for two hours).  For some reason his timing made me want to throw dinner in his face - but I didn't! - and those friends came over and that was the night Sebby fractured his collar bone and they took our kids to their place while we figured everything out.  They also helped us out two other nights that week.
3. Being Flexible.  There were times at the day camp for the shelter that we changed our plans based on people's needs in the moment and the general vibe of the group and it was always the right decision.  Better to go with the flow than push an agenda; with teenagers and with children!
4. Being Committed.  There were times when Steve really bugged me last week, but as I noted in a previous post I am working at turning towards him in those moments rather than giving the old cold shoulder and silent treatment and turning away.  Being faithful to the reality that I am committed to Steve - despite whatever little argument we're having - gave me a feeling of, well, maturity.  By the end of the week we really felt like a team. 
5. Gardening and Being Outside. Certain things in our "garden" came to a head last week which necessitated me spending some time pruning and weeding and meant that the kids were outside with me while this was happening.  And it was wonderful.  We talked while I pruned and Emma noticed all kinds of things in the dirt and we discovered things, like that it was ladybugs whose eggs were all over the rhubarb.  There was a sense of contentedness even while we worked. 

These moments, when they happen for me, are like stumbling across buried treasure, or more accurately, they are a like a map, leading me closer and closer to my own version of the good life.  The trick is to notice and then follow, to be faithful to those feelings of joy - which is the feeling of feelings and what we're really all searching for, all the time.

Faithfulness

This month I'm shifting focus to the virtue of faithfulness, a virtue that encompasses a whole bunch of other virtues, like loyalty and constancy and being trustworthy.  It is a virtue that asks this question: faithful to what?  Our opportunity for growth is in our answer. 

Each time I've gazed at a new baby placed on my chest in those moments after giving birth I've had the same thought: you are perfect.  As days, weeks and months go by in that baby's first year I can never imagine myself having to reprimand this little one.  I can't even fathom having to say no to anything its little heart desires!  Each baby is just perfect, just wonderful; its needs completely reasonable, understandable.  We are in sync and life is one big, hippie love-in.

Until those babies turn two.  Then I find myself doing the unthinkable on a daily basis: time-outs, forceful "no's," flat-out bribery. 

Almost every day sees me offer up an apology.  This usually happens when I've been unfaithful - what I mean is, that I've forgotten the people I know my kids to be.  I'll think they're rotten or malicious or thoughtless and so I treat them like the rotten, malicious and thoughtless people they are.  And there's my mistake.  My kids might be acting this way, in this particular moment - but I need to remember that that's not really who they are.  Their actions are reactions to a situation or feeling - and my job is to teach them how to act and react well, in a way that doesn't hurt anyone or anything.  To do that I need to remember my vision of the soul of the little person that was placed on my chest years ago.  I have to have faith and stay faithful to the people I know my children to be, guiding them toward full potential.    

Generosity in Conflict

Raw would be the best word for it - how I feel after an argument with Steve.  Like many married couples we have a few "unsolvable" issues.  Different little incidents and events, miscommunications and misunderstandings set us off, but essentially we have the same arguments we've been having for ten years.

I have been focusing this month on any little opportunity I might have to grow in the virtue of generosity.  And I think one of the hardest parts of being generous is giving people the benefit of the doubt, especially when we think they don't deserve it.  Arguments are instances that call for an attitude of openness and generosity but in the midst of an argument, it is so hard to turn away from what we're feeling and what we've experienced in order to hear what someone else is going through, but this would be the generous thing to do.  I think living generously, in large part, means turning towards other people's feelings - facing their emotion head-on - especially when it makes us uncomfortable and squirmy.

One afternoon this past week I was at a large park near our house with the kids when a sudden rainstorm caused us to run for shelter under a nearby gazebo.  Taking shelter with us was a young(ish) couple and what struck me was their overall attitude of generosity towards each other.  It was clear they found each other fascinating.  During the course of the storm their conversation ranged from Star Wars to Renaissance art to their parents.  Silly statements or generalizations were met with laughter, not criticism.  They expanded on examples; corroborated experience.

I couldn't help imagining how this might change once they became sleep-deprived parents or anxious about how to make an oversize mortgage payment with meager salaries, but then generosity is generosity because it's not afraid of ugliness or anxiety or petty mistakes.  Generosity is love unconstrained by ego and vulnerable enough to say, "I want to know what's making you tick right now...what's going on inside that mind?"    

So what is Spirit asking of me right now?  How can I reach out and pick the fruit of generosity and take it into myself?  If experience has taught me anything it's that Steve and I will always have a few issues that are unsolvable.  We would have to be fundamentally different people to solve them and if we were fundamentally different we wouldn't be the person the other has come to deeply value and passionately love.  Perhaps the most generous thing is simply to admit that while not everything about our relationship is perfect, Steve is the still the perfect partner for me.  To remind him that I don't mind having this argument again if it means continuing on through life together.  The young couple offered a reminder: no matter what we're experiencing we can always be generous in our love and sense of admiration of our partners - even in the midst of those "unsolvable" arguments.

The Incident with the Apples

What I find interesting or, more accurately, challenging about the day-to-day work of being a Christian - the work (really) of looking and acting more like Christ; putting more good into the world than bad, bearing more "fruit" as we Christians like to name virtue - is that it's absolutely, totally and finally dependent on those small decisions we make, moment by moment by moment.  I used to think that I'd grow spiritually simply by using the tools of the Christian tradition, tools like prayer and scripture and meditation.  And it's true that these tools definitely help us grow, not because they make us more Christ-like in and of themselves, but because they help to set us up to make "fruitful" decisions.  But, when it comes down to it, growing in the likeness of Christ - the real work of Christian spirituality - depends more than anything on how we choose to live and act in the very smallest details of our lives.

The other day I had the opportunity to grow in generosity.  And I blew it.  The details got the better of me. I'd like to be able to look back at my time as a mother with young children to say that I met the day-to-day challenges with patience, creativity and grace; that, when presented with the option to choose virtue over emotions that come more naturally (anger, resentment, despair), I'd see myself choosing the good every time.  But more often than not this turns out to be wishful thinking.

Yesterday I needed to fit in a last-minute trip to the grocery store in order to have something to cook for dinner.  I was on a deadline.  Steve had an event, dinner needed to be ready by 6:30pm, serious storm clouds loomed and threatened drenching rain and I had no car to get to the store.  What I needed was to get in and out and home again quickly, but I should know by now that in-and-out trips to the grocery store never pan out with kids in tow.

Sebby wouldn't get in to the stroller; I had to strap him in forcefully.  Once we were in the store, Emma wanted to push the cart...and so did Sebby.  I got anxious as we seemed to waste time arguing over which fruit and vegetables to buy, watching the fish in the aquarium, and tracking Sebby as he ran up and down the aisles.

Then, at the check-out, Emma wanted to help pack the groceries.  This was thoughtful, yes, but I knew it would hold us up even further.  The storm clouds pressed closer.  I pictured us soaked to the bone.  I was conscious of how much time the errand had already taken and now I couldn't see Sebby anymore and knew that he was running somewhere in the store.  I looked back to see a line-up of people behind me, all waiting for me to hurry up and pack my groceries already.  So when Emma picked up the bag of apples the wrong way and they tumbled out the opening and all over the floor - a dozen apples, rolling around people's feet and carts and all over the place - I couldn't be generous and help her pick them up and laugh about the situation and show her how to hold the bag so that wouldn't happen again.  "Go find your brother," I snapped.  "I'll do this; I'm better at it than you."

That was just mean or, more to the point, miserly; what I put out into the world was the very opposite of goodness and generosity, which would have been the virtues to reach for in that moment.  There was my daughter, trying to help, trying to be generous herself.  Looking back, I wish I could have given her something in that moment, instead of grabbing at her work and stealing it back for myself.

The 19th century German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, said, "It is in the treatment of trifles that a person shows what they are."  Indeed.  And I don't think there's anything in the world that presents us with so many trifling details as our relationships with other human beings.  If you're like me you have racked up a daily tally of failed attempts at virtue and Christ-like living, but let me say this: parenthood has got to be the best training ground we'll ever get when it comes to opportunity for spiritual growth.  While our relationships present us an endless supply of trifling details, they also act as a natural and intrinsic means of spiritual refinement.  Eventually, we'll gleam. 

Written on the Body

In the same way that one encounters a word or idea and inevitably hears it or sees it in print within a day or two, I had the experience of seeing - for the first time - a tattoo with a message seemingly intended just for me and, within a couple of days, seeing another one!  And then it seemed like everywhere I looked I was seeing prophetic messages on upper backs and wrists and biceps.

Two of these fleshy billboards, in particular, stood out.  I saw the first while riding my bike.  I noticed the woman riding in front of me had two images tattooed on to the back of her upper thighs and every time we stopped at a red light I looked to figure out just what the images represented.  On her left thigh was a replica of a human heart - all valves and ventricles - and underneath a single word: Realist.  On her right thigh was a mirror image, of sorts, the kind of heart we all know how to draw - a Valentine - and underneath, in cursive script, the word, "Optimist."  The second tattoo I saw was on a woman seated in front of me on the streetcar.  She was wearing a tube top so I had a clear view of the sentence she had etched on to her left shoulder blade: "Change is the result of Awareness coupled with Action."

I don't know why these messages stood out for me except that in them I recognized some kind of Truth.  "Which are you?"  The tattooed hearts seemed to ask: realist or optimist?  Do you see things as they are or as you'd like them to be?  The second tattoo offered straightforward observation; I don't think you can argue that no matter how "aware" one is change doesn't happen without diving in and taking action and without awareness, action is just meaningless movement.

There is much meaning in each of these messages but for me they simply offer further proof of Marshall McLuhan's dictum that the medium is the message, after all.  Our Truths are simply what we decide to embody, what we project to others; those words that would reveal themselves on our skin if our skin could write what we are all about.  In sum: we are what we carry within us - those attitudes and actions that we live, day in, day out, at breakfast, lunch and dinner, through endless months of schlepping to work and lessons and grocery stores.  We are, in essence, messages writ large.  We speak through our bodies, often louder than we do in words.

Bend and Flex

When I stop to think about it, I see that I get frustrated when I buck against reality, instead of bending with it, as a tree would bend when faced with the reality of a very strong wind.  Let me be less cryptic: this afternoon - following umpteen efforts to detach myself from Sebastian (a restless sleeper at the best of times) - I finally managed to wriggle off the side of the bed and tiptoe out of the bedroom and into an hour of pressing "to-do's."  It felt good to settle myself into my office chair and know that I wouldn't be interrupted.  Creativity welled...and then I heard the bedroom door bashed open and Sebby come stomping out, howling.  So much for the to-do list.  Now it was frustration that welled inside of me.

For whatever reason my son consistently wakes up minutes after I sneak away, sensing that I'm gone, needing to be close again.  It's not that he's not tired; he falls asleep again as soon as he's in my lap, which leads to my dilemma: my son needs me to be able to sleep and I need to be unencumbered to tackle the to-do's.  It's much harder to type with a toddler on your lap!

Trouble is, when I try to fight the reality of my son's need for his mom I never end up with my tasks complete.  Instead I'm back and forth from computer or chores to the bedroom, locked in a cycle of productivity interrupted that fans my frustration like oxygen on a fire.

Giving into my son, comforting him, holding him on my lap seems a defeat of sorts.  He gets what he wants and I...don't.  At least I thought I didn't.  Today I decided to go ahead with the to-do list anyways, with him sleeping on my lap.  And it's slightly uncomfortable, yes, but I'm getting things done. 

One of the traditional practices of Christianity is the practice of submission - not the kind where you let people take advantage of you - but a deeper recognition that, like it or not, we don't go through life on our own.  Most of us, most of the time, go through life in relationships with other people and sometimes this makes us subject to other people's needs.  We can be mad about this and buck at it, but it doesn't make people's needs disappear - it just makes us frustrated and prone to snap, like a brittle branch.  Submission is about embracing flexibility and creativity - bending to fit our reality, rather than bucking at it.  Lo and behold, everyone's needs get met. 

I know Sebby will grow out of this - this fretful sleeping, this neediness.  His brother and sister both did. I guess that's submission's gift: that it asks us to let ourselves be needed - at least for a little while - because it knows the experience is time-sensitive.