Kristen Anne Glover

Five in Tow

30 Days to Enjoying Your Children More: Avoidance {Day 9}

The beginning is a great place to start! Click here for Day 1.

 

The days turned into weeks, which turned into months, but still there was no rain.  The entire landscape looked like it had been filmed through a dusty lens.  Even the clouds wore an odd orange hue as if the  earth had risen up to beg for the waters of heaven.

But there wasn’t any.

Slowly the river sank into the earth and the ground beneath it cracked open, choking for more.  The town was forced to ration what was left of the water in the reservoir.  Every day, the faucet turned on for a few precious minutes.  My brother and I waited by the spigot, and when the water came on, we filled everything we could think of as quickly as we could before it shut off again.

With only a limited supply, water ruled our thoughts and controlled our actions.  We were careful how much we drank, used the bare amount necessary for bathing or dishes, and even saved the dirty water for flushing toilets.  Difficult decisions had to be made, like which plants to save and which plants to let die under the incessant sun.

It was unthinkable—absolutely unthinkable—to use the water for anything but necessities.  Imagine if I used some of it to wash the car or water the lawn!  It would not happen.  If I wasted the water like that, my family might run out of water to drink.  Every drop had to be reserved for the most precious purposes because when it was gone, we couldn’t get more.

Eventually, the drought ended and water became commonplace again.  But I often think back to that season as a parallel to this season of my life as a mother.  It is a little bit of a drought time, in the sense that I have many needs to meet and very limited resources.  Every day, I have only so much time and energy, and there is no way to get more.

I forget this sometimes and try to do too much.  I say yes to things without considering that there’s only so much of me to go around.  That leads to stress and anxiety and negatively effects my attitude and behaviors toward my children and spouse.

It starts off innocently enough.  I say yes to hosting a playgroup at my house.  But then I also say yes to making three dozen triple chocolate cupcakes for a bake sale and yes to having the youth group over for a BBQ and yes to making a meal for a sick friend and yes to trimming my neighbor’s hedge.  Then somewhere between scrubbing toilets and making frosting my child asks me to read a book and I snap.  “Please just leave me alone so I can get this done.  Don’t you see I’m busy?”

It’s like pouring a whole day’s worth of water out on the grass.  Sure, a playgroup is nice.  Cupcakes are tasty.  Clean toilets are more than just a nicety.  But none of those things deserves first place in my life.  None of those things is worth being impatient, irritated, or unloving toward my children.

If you ask me, I will say my priority is to love God and then my family.  I may even believe it.  But if I am giving away the best parts of myself to secondary people and purposes, I am deceiving myself.

I cannot enjoy my children when I am piecing myself out to please or serve other priorities.  Quite the contrary.  When I am spread too thin, I find myself pushing them aside so I can put on a good show, make myself look good, or please the people who will reward me with affirmation and instant fulfillment.  Because let’s be honest, “That pie looks great, Kristen!” sounds a whole lot better than, “His piece is bigger than mine!”

Often, when given the choice between things that must be done, I do not choose to serve my children first.  I serve them last.  I pour myself into the secondary things because it pampers my pride.  People appreciate me.  They affirm me.  They actually say thanks.  It is the same old sin we humans have struggled with since the dawn of time.

When I put the secondary things first, my family loses.  It’s like watering the lawn with the little bit of water we have left to drink, and it is wrong.

One of the most essential things I can do to enjoy my children more is to realize I am limited.  There is only so much of me to go around and a myriad of “good things” to entice me away from my true calling.  I will never be lacking in heart-wrenching causes, fulfilling relationships, or even sacrificial ministries that compete for my affections.

That’s where the word avoidance comes in.   As parents, we must avoid committing to anything that depletes us of the emotional and physical energy our priority requires.  We must avoid giving ourselves away bit by bit to all the “little things”—even good things!—that slowly drain our resources.

Think of your emotional and physical resources like something tangible, like a precious bucket of water.  Every day, you get one bucket and no more.  You can spend it however you want, but once it’s gone, it’s gone.  Any needs that come up after it’s used up simply won’t be met until new rations are given out.

Some expenditures are unavoidable.  We all have to feed our children, some of us have to work, we might have elderly parents to care for, etc.  But most other activities and relationships are choices that impact our quality of life and our ability to love and enjoy our children.  If you pour out your energy on all those good things, you will not have enough left for your family.

It’s important, especially during this very short but intense season of our lives when our children are still at home, that we avoid this temptation.  We must conserve the best of what we have for them.  Our priority deserves more than just the leftovers.

That means avoiding consuming and/or depleting relationships, and putting boundaries on the relationships you have.  You simply cannot text with your friends and give your attention to your children.  You cannot listen to your gossipy neighbor and still have enough emotional energy to kiss one more boo-boo.

Avoid time-sucking tasks, even if it’s labeled “ministry.”  You already have a ministry.  Evaluate your energy gauge before saying yes to anything more.  Ask yourself, “Can I complete this obligation without becoming irritated with my children or unduly depriving them of my attention?”  If the answer is no, avoid it.

Avoid recreation you have trouble controlling.  Maybe it’s Pinterest or Facebook, a stack of fiction novels, computer games, or hobbies—we all have recreational activities that can be addicting.  If you have a tendency to stay up too late reading, avoid that activity.  Avoid opening Pinterest if it means you will not get school lunches made and will be yelling at your children in the morning because of it.  Do not do it.  It’s like pouring water on the grass!   Make the lunches first.  Open Pinterest later.

Avoid serving pride in place of love.  This is a tough one.  We are so easily deceived into thinking we are loving our children and spouse when in fact, we’re doing things to make ourselves look better.  For example, I like to bake.  I love to bake crazy desserts that take three days to make.  My children would be 95% just as happy with the chocolate chip cookies they can help me make.  So why do I kick everyone out of the kitchen and waste myself trying to replicate something out of a magazine?  Because of pride.  I want the “wow, look at me!” factor.  Yes, I do.  And so do you.

There will be time for Caramel Machiatto cheesecakes in the years from now when the children are gone.  There will be time for Facebook games and long cups of coffee with friends.  The water will come back on and there will be time for extra ministries, career opportunities, and keeping your house looking like a museum.

But this is not that time.  This is a season of limited resources and abundant need.  Don’t pour your water out on the grass.

A season of limited resources

Please join us tomorrow for Day 10: Appearances

For further thought

1) Do your actions confirm your priority, or do they show that you actually value secondary things more?

2) Think about the ways you spend your energy.  What things deplete you the most?  What things can you cut out?  What things can be rearranged so your priority gets the best of you?

3) Sometimes, pride masks itself as love.  What things do you do to serve your own pride?  Can you show love more by doing less?

30 Days to Enjoying Your Children More: Freedom {Day 8}

The beginning is a great place to start! Click here for Day 1.

 

Nothing on this earth scares me more than the mother who has it all figured out.  You know the type.  She lurks in church nurseries, grocery store aisles, and chat rooms and tells everyone how it is.  She looks for opportunities to educate you from her limitless vault of parenting knowledge.  Her expertise includes everything from the benefits of baby Mozart to the dangers of Santa Claus.

The mom who has it all figured out thinks of herself as a superhero, a heroine of safety and a child advocate par excellence.  If she hears your child crying, she will assume it is because you are doing something wrong.  Fear not, incompetent mother!  She will tell you exactly how to fix it.

Have you lived up to my standard today?

This woman asks no questions and takes no prisoners.  In less time than it takes you to diaper a baby the wrong way, she will turn your confidence into self-doubt and guilt, with an extra shot of shame.

The mother who has it all figured out, as well-meaning as she may be, is a prison warden dressed up in high heels and pearls.  The checklist she uses to measure you by is a snare.  It holds you captive to a false gospel that says if you just do everything right, you will be good enough.  She readily provides a formula that doesn’t require any faith or very much love.  It reduces parenting to an external standard by which you can measure yourself and judge others.

Even though you know better, you’ll be tempted to listen to her because you really do want to be a better mother and she sounds like she knows what she’s talking about.  In between all the rules, she has some pretty good advice.  She’s got the books to prove it and all those lists make everything sounds so…safe.

The trouble is, there is no formula.  There is no standard.  Even if you could find one, you’d never be able to measure up to it.  External standards cannot help us because they are based on the every-changing ideas of fickle and faulty humans.  Just as soon as you get one standard under control, someone comes along and changes it.

What’s worse, you will find yourself struggling to stuff yourself into a standard that just doesn’t fit.  It’s worse than trying on swimsuits right after Christmas dinner.  No standard takes into account the uniqueness of individual parents, children, and circumstances.  If you try to measure yourself by it, you will be weighed down with insecurity, guilt, and failure because the only thing an external standard does is make you aware of your need. 

There has to be a better way!

Thankfully, there is.  Not only is it better, it’s much simpler.  It is so astonishingly simple that you will be tempted to think there must be more to it.  You will be tempted to add more to it.  Because you’d think that for all the arguing we do over the rights and wrongs of raising kids, and the viciousness with which we proclaim our opinions or judge other parents, the Bible would have a lot to say on the topic.  But it doesn’t.

In fact, it says very little.  It’s kind of shocking how quiet God is on the whole subject of parenting, especially since raising godly kids is kind of a big deal.  In fact, the whole of God’s parenting advice can be summed up as follows: love God, then love them.

That.  Is.  It.

It is shockingly simple, a little scary, and altogether delightful.

In between those two greatest commandments is a whole bunch of free space to live and move and have your being in your home.  You are free to be you in your parenting and to let your kids be free in their kid-ness.  There is nothing in there about schooling options, organic food, or music choices.  There isn’t!  God figures that if we take care of the love part, and I mean really take care of the love part, everything else will fall into place.

That means that what is in the best eternal interest for your child might not be the same thing that is in the best eternal interest of my child.  In fact, they might be the complete opposites!  What works for my family as far as scheduling and activities might be the very death of your family so we can all come together and stop holding each other to standards that just don’t fit.

We are free! 

The only thing that binds us is love, and that is an altogether freeing thing to be bound by.  Love always seeks to please God.  Love always desires to serve the interests of others before ourselves.  Love asks “What is the very best thing?” not “What is the easiest thing?”  Love is the best and only parenting formula because it is the only one that always fits.  Always.

When love rules, we can appreciate the different methods and ideas of other mothers without being obligated to do them ourselves.  We can figure out what works for our family without making it a standard for everyone else.

Do you feel the joy in that?  This means you can stop parenting for someone else!  You can stop parenting someone else’s way!

The mother who has it all figured out might tell you differently, but this is truth: As long as you put love first, you are free to parent in the way that allows you to enjoy your children the most. 

That is freedom.

 

 

Please join us on Monday for Day 9: Avoidance

 

For further thought

1) If external standards cause us to feel guilty and insecure, why are we so tempted to accept them and put them on others?

2) Not all parenting advice is bad.  In fact, much of it is good.  The problem comes when we take good advice and make it a rule or a standard by which we measure our worth as a parent.  If we don’t measure up, we despair.  Are you trying to live up to a standard set by someone else?  How does the freedom you have in Christ change the way you’ve been trying to parent?

3) Take some time to ask God for wisdom and strength to parent out of love, not external standards.  He promises to give wisdom to those who ask, and He desires that we abound in love!  When you pray to God for the things He desires you to have, He always answers .

 

30 Days to Enjoying Your Children More: Constancy {Day 7}

Click here to begin at Day 1

It was a cool fall night in Massachusetts.  The northern lights danced as my husband and I sprawled out on an old quilt on a dewy hillside and looked up at the deep night sky.  We had set the alarm and crawled out of bed to look up at the stars.  They hung in the sky the way they had for all the years since the universe was born, brilliant like jewels in the dark of the night.

Suddenly, a star fell out of the sky, like a wish.  Then another, and another.  We watched as one of the most brilliant meteor showers of our lifetime unfolded before our eyes.

It was breathtaking.  The constancy of the stars stood in direct contrast to the spontaneous streaks of the meteors.  It seemed as if the very heavens were coming down to play.

How different the experience would have been without the order and dependability of the stars!  If the entire universe was nothing more than a spinning mass of erratic suns and planets, the meteors would go unnoticed.  Without its constancy, we could not enjoy the spectacular creativity of God and the wonderful diversity of His creation.

Constancy gives us the security we need to enjoy our world.

Even as infants, we cry out for it.  We long to know that we when we are in pain, we will be comforted, when we are hungry, we will be fed.  We feel most secure when we are surrounded by a certain level of sameness.  Order.  Predictability.  It is as if God instilled in us a need for His very character.

And He is the one who fills that need perfectly.  The sculptor of the universe does not change.  He is not unpredictable like meteors but is constant like the stars.  He is a refuge, a rock, and the only place of strength in this world.  Even though the mountains tremble and fall into the sea, He is there.  Constant.

What a comfort that is to me when it seems like everything is falling apart.  I cannot be certain of health, employment, or even the very ground beneath my feet.  But when everything else fails, His love endures.  I never wake up and wonder if God is going to love me today.

I want my children to be able to say the same thing of me.  I want them to feel like this is the one place in the world where they will always be loved, nurtured, and accepted.  This is a place built on a rock, and it will not be blown about by the storms that come.  Inside these four walls, my children are secure in the knowledge that some things will always remain the same: faith, hope and love.

They know that when they wake up in the morning, I will be holding fast to the One constant in this world.  I will look to God to set the standard for my conduct in our home, and I will look to Him to set the standard by which their needs will be met.  When I do this, security and joy fill my home.

From this place of strength, creativity and spontaneity can shine.  Order sets the stage for the beautiful and unexpected.  If my children are secure in my love for them, they will be free to exhibit their own unique personalities without fear of rejection.  As parents, my husband and I will be free to be impulsive or imaginative without fear of degenerating into complete disorder.

But constancy must come first.  If we reverse the order and put creativity first, as I am so tempted to do, it doesn’t work.  Creativity before constancy is chaos.  God ordered the universe before His imagination filled it.  His eternal attributes gave birth to the temporal stuff of this world.  There is something to be learned from that.  Constancy is not the opposite of spontaneity.  It is the basis of it.

Constancy is the foundation of our relationship with God, and it must be the foundation of our relationship with our children.  God planned it that way.  In showing our children constancy, we show them something of God.  We build trust and security in them from which they are able to take on the uncertainties of the world.  I do not do it perfectly, but I do it better the more I keep my eyes fixed on the One who does not change.

And the more focused I am on the constancy of God, the more my children feel secure in my love, and the more I can enjoy their wonderful diversity.

 


Photo credit: NASA

 

Please join us tomorrow for Day 8: Freedom

 

For further thought:

1) Countless times throughout the Bible, God is called our refuge and strength.  Psalm 46:1-3 is one of those places.  How does it help you to know that God is unchangeable?
2) Sometimes, it helps to do a little self-evaluation.  Do you think your children feel secure in your sameness?  Have you created a pattern of trust in your home, or is this something you need to address?  Ask God to help you be more constant in your relationship with your children.

3) If you are creative like I am, you might feel claustrophobic by the words constancy and order.  How does it help to think of constancy as the starting point of creativity?