This revelation then turned into a horrible nightmare when a flash forward to my child's wedding day came and I had this same experience: looking at my daughter in her wedding dress, ready to give her away, and realizing that I had missed the moments of her life. That sure, I was around every day and was a mom to her and met her physical needs and clothed her and fed her and disciplined her and went to her activities and events, but I had never slowed down enough to really know her, to really listen, to really meet her holistic needs, and to really enjoy her. And this revelation devastated me and sent me into a desperate desire to change.
To slow down and lighten up and enjoy life as it flies by.
As I try to articulate my desire, it is almost like I want to stand in a raging rushing river and open my body and widen my stance and position myself to slow down that raging current. My life has been busy this past year, and I do not see that busyness or the needs or demands for my attention or energy slowing down any time soon, but rather quickening as I will soon bear a life that will depend on my husband and me. Rather than trying to swim with the current and speed up my life, as I have been doing, I want to stand in the middle of the busyness and the needs and just be. Just take a deep breath and look around and enjoy every moment of this journey.
The well-known slogan, the days are long but the years are short, has been shared with me at least five times by five different moms this month and it is something I want to remember and post in our home in hopes of creating an urgency to embrace the moment and truly invest in our daughter's life at each developmental stage. To hold my newborn and look at her and study her wrinkly toes and teeny nose and to soak up every moment of motherhood as it will be gone in the blink of an eye.
One of my dear mentors recently said, "It lasts 15 second. The newborn and baby stage is gone in 15 seconds." I do not want to get distracted as I so easily can by the details of grocery shopping, laundry, cleaning, and keeping everything in its place. I want to enjoy each moment and release a level of control I have tried to place on my life by recognizing that we are here for such a short time and enjoying and delighting in my daughter.
As much as I want to do this as a mother, if I start this month I realize that I am not a mother yet. My opportunity during this month of October was to do this with my husband. To enjoy the last times we had together as just the two of us. To look at him and listen when he told me about his day and to slow down and calm my spinning mind as to what things we still need to buy and what clothes I still need to wash and what items we still need to get into the hospital bag. Ecclesiastes 3:1 speaks of how life is seasonal, always changing. "There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens." I want to enjoy each season life offers rather than wishing certain parts of certain seasons away. The parallels to our four seasons here in the Midwest create a perfect opportunity to practice this habit. Rather than complaining because summer is too hot and winter brings too much snow and fall is too short and spring is too muddy, to find something about each season to enjoy and to truly give thanks for the good each has to bring. I want to do this in my life as well. To look at my life through the lens of the gifts and the goodness of each season and to truly enjoy.
My husband and I watched the movie Clickthis month which gives a perfect picture of how we can go into autopilot to rush through the parts of life we find mundane. I hate watching this movie because it is watching the nightmare of my daughter on her wedding day unfold. It is the perfect picture of rushing through life and swimming with the current to speed up the parts we dread and missing the moments. But I sucked it up and watched it for the sake of this idea, to remember to embrace the mundane moments in life. And I wept. I don't mean got teary eyed or even cried a little, I mean I WEPT the entire movie and for two hours after and cried myself to sleep and woke up looking like I had been hit by a bus because my face was so puffy from sobbing. The message of the movie, to slow down and embrace every gift life has to offer, hit something so incredibly close to home as I enter this season of parenting.
I want to slow down. I want to enter that place of rest that God has promised in which I can enjoy the life He has given me at each stage. I did not want to wish away this month just hoping our daughter would come or go into autopilot until I am more comfortable or my body is not so swollen or my back is not in pain, but I dared to enjoy each moment of waiting as well as each miraculous breath we took.
I was fortunate enough to hear Priscilla Shier speak recently and will end with this thought she shared which adds to my desire to embrace the mundane. She was speaking at a women's conference with some 20,000 women and was sharing how honored she was to be there and what an incredible ministry opportunity it was for her. Through watching her and listening to her my desire to become an author and speaker was growing and I was amazed at her opportunity to speak to so many women, praying that someday God would give me the gift of such a ministry. But then, as my mind was wandering, one word she said stuck out to me which caused me to snap back into active listening as I was scrambling to understand, assuming I had misheard. She said she viewed this form of ministry (public speaking and writing) as her secondary ministry. I was instantly intrigued to wonder what her PRIMARY form of ministry was, how was she able to reach more than 20,000 people in one swoop?
She went on to say that her first ministry is to her husband and how the goal of her life is that at the end of his life when he stands before Christ, that Jesus will say to him, "Well done good and faithful servant." She was focusing on the reality that she, as his wife, could partner with him to help him become all that God desires him to be and help support him in doing all that God has called him to do. And this is her primary form of ministry. She also then talked about how her position as a mom presents the exact same opportunity, to help her children be all that God has created them to be.
I love this. My primary form of ministry is ALWAYS to my family, regardless of what other ministry opportunities God sends my way. My deepest desire is to create a space and be a support for my family to be all that God has created them to be. And many of these ministry opportunities will come in the form of seemingly meaningless, mundane moments at home together that would be so tempting to fly through with a focus on the details of our environment rather than the endless amount of life giving relational opportunities and teachable moments. Daily meals around the dinner table. Conversations in bed before falling asleep. Afternoon walks outside. Stressful Sunday mornings trying to get everyone ready for church and out the door looking halfway presentable. I have to make an intentional choice to enter into the ministry opportunity before me day and night.
I want to slow down. I want to enjoy every moment of my life. I want to embrace the mundane.
Habit #10: Slow Down
