Just One of Those Days

Do you ever have those days when everything seems like it going wrong? If you answered "no" I would like to gently ask you to come back down to earth. Because the reality is we ALL have those days. Now, you may not be as overly dramatic as I am (I would NEVER admit that to someone face to face) and think that the bad days are not so bad. Honestly, I am usually an optimistic person. The skies are always blue, the cup is half full, yada yada yada. But when I am having one of those days I am just downright pessimistic.

Every little thing that could go wrong, does. For example, this last Tuesday was our last day of Bible Study. I was running a tad late, which immediately stressed me out. I had to go to church set up all the tables, decorations, table settings, coffee, kids stuff, and the list goes on and on. As I was arranging the tables and chairs I smashed the tips of my fingers between two of the chairs. Can you say OUCH?! I persevered though! I kept going (while still running behind and stressing out a little more by the second). But things kept going wrong. Not huge things; just little snags that  became huge tears in my self-confidence and self-composure. Pretty soon I was a walking geyser ready to explode into tears at any second. And admittedly I did....a couple of times. Miraculously Bible Study went as planned and the women really enjoyed the morning as I had hoped.

I wish I could blame my emotional roller coaster on this one issue that was beyond my control....or better yet on being hormonal, but I couldn't. The only reason I was stressed to the point of tears was ME. I wanted to be superwoman! You know with the mask, knee high boots and accessorizing cape? Just kidding. I wanted to be the kind of superwoman that thinks she can do all things and be all things for everyone. I was so wrapped up in doing, going, making, baking, talking, drawing, cheering, cooking, and don't forget the cleaning (whew that's a lot of verbs!) that I forgot to take a few moments to rest, slowdown, and regroup.

I heard once that we need to set up margins in our lives. Consider a piece of notebook paper for a second. You know those red lines on both sides of the paper that my 2nd grader chooses to ignore? Those are margins. Those margins are set up to tell us when to start and when to stop. It forces us to leave a little room on the paper for blank space. Imagine what it would look like if those lines weren't there. It would look like my daughters written reports, with sentences running from edge to edge with no room on either side. It would look very crowded and very messy. That's what our lives look like when we don't have margins. When we don't set up those red lines in our personal lives we become busy people who don't know when to start or stop. Our lives become chaotic and stressed to the max leaving less and less room for blank space (aka, rest, relaxation, and regrouping). We just go, go, go and pray that we remember everything we have committed to along the way.



I realized something else that my lack of margins hurt: my ability to reach out to the people in my life and to nurture the relationships that God has blessed me with. I was so busy that I didn't have time for lunch with a friend or a quick phone call with my Grandma. I couldn't slow down enough to encourage people that needed encouraging or pray for people that needed prayer. In essence my doing for everyone became very selfish. I was wrapped up in me and what I needed to do at that moment.

I learned something these last couple of weeks. I may not be able to control the business of the day, but I can set up margins. I can say no to things that will make my plate too full. I don't have to be superwoman (capes aren't very flattering anyway) and most of all I need to take each day one step at a time and remember to breathe.

I will leave you with a very cute, very funny, very encouraging song that makes me smile every time...you could say this could be my anthem. Enjoy!

This is the Stuff

Until next time....



This is totally what I would look like if I was Superwoman ;)