Busy

I came home from my weekend away and it was a blissful weekend. Amazing. Restful, fun, refreshing. And it makes me want to move there, it is so beautiful. I will post more on that later. In the meantime, a tremendous thanks to my hostess. She is awesome. She even gave up her bed for me, which in my world, is one of the biggest gifts a person can give.

And then I came home.

And no one made me pay! It was the first time I have been away where I haven’t been punished for it. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about, enjoy that!

However, I did start to feel extremely overwhelmed and anxious. Just with looking at the calendar and my home. Which made me feel silly, cause the calendar isn’t bursting, nor was my house messy. Yes, Hoty rocks. But there it was. Big, deep, paralyzing anxiety. Ick. As I lay awake, tossing and turning, I asked myself why it’s so different being away. What is it about travel that is so relaxing? Even when we were in Lesotho, and it was stressful, that anxiety, of the day to day was gone. And so I started to answer my questions.

When traveling, there are fewer expectations. From others and myself. There is more free time. There are only the essential possessions. And most importantly, my mindset is different. I don’t feel busy. And busy, for me, equals anxiety and stress.

Then I asked myself what I could do to make my day to day different. I decided I could remove the possessions in my life that make me feel possessed (all puns intended) instead of me possessing them. I also decided that I mostly need to change my mindset. Why do I feel busy all the time?

And I did it. I asked myself the dreaded question that my counselor would have asked. In fact, it may have been her voice in my head.

‘What do I get out of feeling busy?’

This makes me uncomfortable. Deep breath. Feeling busy, aka anxious, makes me feel that what I am doing with my life must be important.

It makes me feel important.

As if what I am doing with my life isn’t important enough if I am unhurried and relaxed.

I am appalled at myself. Because I see that when I am busy and anxious, I am short and mean with my kids, too stressed to connect with my husband, feeling stretched thin all the time. It achieves the opposite to actually being important and validated.

I was so stunned by this piece of self awareness that I fell asleep, but dreamt all night of ruining meals. The next morning I picked up a book I had just started reading.

‘One Thousand Gifts’ made it onto my bedside table because I had seen so many references to it on blogs. I will admit that I was skeptical, which is what happens when something becomes BIG. And since I’m still in the first half of the book, I will not respond with my opinion on it yet. I will say that I was surprised at how Christian it is. I guess I somehow missed that.

Anyway, I picked up my book and read,

‘ “Being in a hurry. Getting to the next thing without fully entering the thing in front of me. I cannot think of a single advantage I’ve ever gained from being in a hurry. But a thousand broken and missed things, tens of thousands, lie in the wake of all the rushing…. Through all that haste I thought I was making up time. It turns out I was throwing it away.”

In our rushing, bulls in china shops, we break our own lives.’

-One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp

Yup. Truly. That was what I read when I opened up the book. Could it have been any more apt? I’ve been so stunned by this realization that I haven’t really been getting anything done. I’ve been automatically moving from one thing to the next. I think I’m still asking myself if it could be that simple? Sure, making some changes like getting rid of excess crap, and being more streamlined, will help. Avoiding over-booking the calendar and being intentional with my time will help. But none of it will remove the anxiety unless I stop trying to get my sense of importance from being busy.

I never thought I would be a stay at home mom. It was never my dream or desire. I am, because it’s the best thing for my kiddo’s right now, it makes the most sense financially, and I am grateful that I have the option.

However, I am not one of those mom’s that is fulfilling her deepest calling by staying at home. I think I must have bought into the idea that if I still looked busy and stressed, that must mean I was doing important things. Being an important person.

Silly me.

PS. Please remind me of this post the next time you see me rushing around…