Life, a thought by me
Sometimes Dan gets a little frustrated with me when we are running errands together. You see, I walk slower than he does. It’s not a matter of my legs being shorter because I think they are actually longer than his. I just like to walk slower. Now, I admit I get irritated when I’m doing groceries and there is a really slow person in front of me. What’s the deal with that? What pace is the right pace? I remember a math question from elementary school that asked something like, “If Sam’s watch says 11:55 and is six minutes slow and Emily’s watch says 12:09 and is eight minutes fast, then what time is it?” If one watch is fast and another is slow, then their must be a right time somewhere in the middle right?
God says go out and make disciples of all nations. A proverbs 31 woman has a well kept house, keeps her husband, children and servants well fed, makes clothes, farms, and dabbles in real estate. Once getting a bachelors degree was enough. Now a master degree is expected. A doctorate used to be the top of the hill but now there is more schooling to be had. It’ quite overwhelming…if you let it.
I was just reading an article that talks about slowing down “Take It Easier” by Carol Smith in the Christian Single magazine. I may not be single anymore but I sure like the articles. It really got me thinking.
The interstate where I live has lots of exit ramps one right after the other until all of a sudden with out warning there is no exit ramps for a good ten minutes which is a long ways when you’re driving 65 mph. I wonder how our lives are similar to that. We have roads we exit off of and those roads lead us to other roads. When we are young, there always seem to be an endless amount of off ramps. Then one day we take stock and see we haven’t seen an exit ramp in quite sometime or maybe we took one we didn’t think through. Now I don’t mean the exiting of our lives of course, but as our lives move forward we get more specific in what our life will be like. Carol Smith explains, “One of the biggest problems with a fast-paced life is that we don’t have time to actually think about what it is we’re doing. Yet if our life is running like a raft through the rapids, then we had better hope that there aren’t many alternate paths in the river. After all, who has time to look at a map and make decisions when it takes everything we have to just navigate the current? But life does have alternate routes – plenty of them.”
Carl Honore, author of In Praise of Slowness says, “the aim is to do everything at the right speed; Sometimes fast. Sometimes slow. Sometime in between. Being slow means taking time to get the most out of life.” This is what Jesus did. Sometimes he ministered to many like the Sermon on the Mount and other times only to one. I struggled for a long time with writing because I wanted to be published right out of the gate. I didn’t start writing for fear that it wouldn’t happen. Each season of our lives, each step for that matter has it’s own pace. One isn’t too slow or two fast.
While were are discovering how to go the write pace at the right time, there are ways we can figure out how to be prepared for every off ramp, turn and speed change whether minute or extreme. Every organization, corporation, government and church has a purpose statement, a mission statement and or a vision statement. Why not do this for yourself? If a corporation has staff meetings and business trips, why not treat your self like the industry that you are as an individual? Sit down and write out your desires from little to big desires, and your strengths and weaknesses. When you are 100 what do you want to look back and see? Write that out. Then write out practical steps to get there. Maybe a little research is needed. When I was single, I wrote out a list of all the things I wanted in a husband. I found Bible verses to support the ones that were Biblical. I prayed over it and gave it up to God. When I had a prospective guy in my vision I looked at the list, prayed, meditated over God’s words and left that guy at God’s feet as well. I am happy beyond words with my husband. He is more than I could have every imagined. As Dan and I face the future and all it’s uncertainty with leaving the Air Force and hopefully starting a family we did the same for our marriage and our future. Dan and I had a business meeting the other day over dinner. We wrote out the desires of our hearts. We listed things from a growing relationship with God all the way to details in our future house we want (Craftsman’s style for me, a place for woodworking for Dan). God says in His Word that He wants to know the desires of out hearts. Not one is to insignificant to Him. We took that list and through prayer, we put it at God’s feet. We are excited for our future and every time we get anxious we go back to God. He works every time.
God says go out and make disciples of all nations. A proverbs 31 woman has a well kept house, keeps her husband, children and servants well fed, makes clothes, farms, and dabbles in real estate. Once getting a bachelors degree was enough. Now a master degree is expected. A doctorate used to be the top of the hill but now there is more schooling to be had. It’ quite overwhelming…if you let it.
I was just reading an article that talks about slowing down “Take It Easier” by Carol Smith in the Christian Single magazine. I may not be single anymore but I sure like the articles. It really got me thinking.
The interstate where I live has lots of exit ramps one right after the other until all of a sudden with out warning there is no exit ramps for a good ten minutes which is a long ways when you’re driving 65 mph. I wonder how our lives are similar to that. We have roads we exit off of and those roads lead us to other roads. When we are young, there always seem to be an endless amount of off ramps. Then one day we take stock and see we haven’t seen an exit ramp in quite sometime or maybe we took one we didn’t think through. Now I don’t mean the exiting of our lives of course, but as our lives move forward we get more specific in what our life will be like. Carol Smith explains, “One of the biggest problems with a fast-paced life is that we don’t have time to actually think about what it is we’re doing. Yet if our life is running like a raft through the rapids, then we had better hope that there aren’t many alternate paths in the river. After all, who has time to look at a map and make decisions when it takes everything we have to just navigate the current? But life does have alternate routes – plenty of them.”
Carl Honore, author of In Praise of Slowness says, “the aim is to do everything at the right speed; Sometimes fast. Sometimes slow. Sometime in between. Being slow means taking time to get the most out of life.” This is what Jesus did. Sometimes he ministered to many like the Sermon on the Mount and other times only to one. I struggled for a long time with writing because I wanted to be published right out of the gate. I didn’t start writing for fear that it wouldn’t happen. Each season of our lives, each step for that matter has it’s own pace. One isn’t too slow or two fast.
While were are discovering how to go the write pace at the right time, there are ways we can figure out how to be prepared for every off ramp, turn and speed change whether minute or extreme. Every organization, corporation, government and church has a purpose statement, a mission statement and or a vision statement. Why not do this for yourself? If a corporation has staff meetings and business trips, why not treat your self like the industry that you are as an individual? Sit down and write out your desires from little to big desires, and your strengths and weaknesses. When you are 100 what do you want to look back and see? Write that out. Then write out practical steps to get there. Maybe a little research is needed. When I was single, I wrote out a list of all the things I wanted in a husband. I found Bible verses to support the ones that were Biblical. I prayed over it and gave it up to God. When I had a prospective guy in my vision I looked at the list, prayed, meditated over God’s words and left that guy at God’s feet as well. I am happy beyond words with my husband. He is more than I could have every imagined. As Dan and I face the future and all it’s uncertainty with leaving the Air Force and hopefully starting a family we did the same for our marriage and our future. Dan and I had a business meeting the other day over dinner. We wrote out the desires of our hearts. We listed things from a growing relationship with God all the way to details in our future house we want (Craftsman’s style for me, a place for woodworking for Dan). God says in His Word that He wants to know the desires of out hearts. Not one is to insignificant to Him. We took that list and through prayer, we put it at God’s feet. We are excited for our future and every time we get anxious we go back to God. He works every time.
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