Season to Just Be
Could it be life more abundantly involves slowing down, resting in His presence, and ceasing to strive and choosing instead to just be? This season has forced my hand in this department of “being”. I’m a doer by nature --- fix, nurture, teach, train, do and then breathe and do more --- full steam ahead. Someone always needed me, and I was more than willing to comply. Without even trying, I had allowed my worth to be defined by what I did. My mentality embraced the lie that “being” wasn’t enough; there’d be time for that later.
Fast forward to later… my kids are off to college literally across the country (I either did something terribly wrong or terribly right; the jury is still out). I was working in a job that I loved and believed I did well. However, it was full of stress, busyness, and time restraints mainly due to the nature of the work. Little time was left for me to just be and pursue my passion of studying, writing, and speaking. My husband and I had this harebrained idea that if I quit, we would be able to come and go freely as his job was flexible. We could spend weeks, even months out west watching our kids swim competitively for their colleges (they weren’t escaping us that easily). We could integrate a little of the Midwest with west coast life and thrive. “Let the adventure begin” became our motto!
Little did I know that this would be a season of such personal renewal and rebirth. For the first time I don’t have deadlines, kids to run here and there, piles of laundry (who knew that my husband and I weren’t the dirty ones), less food to prepare, and responsibilities at a minimum. The quiet and solitude that I had feared was exactly what the Physician of my soul ordered.
The thought of evaluating your life to date and exploring the coming season can be daunting, even a bit terrifying. But I found doing it with my Creator and Perfector was not at all as scary as I had anticipated. Even in review of my shortcomings and failures, I saw my Heavenly Father’s hand as he added grace and offered a generous learning curve. When I would feel myself drifting to what I had not been able to accomplish, my loving Father pointed out that the detours had added experience, depth, and compassion to my life story. The journey truly had been the substance of His story in me; it entailed the critical crisis that each story must have to be authentic and purposeful.
Every life goes through multiple seasons and various pit stops where we regroup and take inventory before moving forward. We can choose to ignore the season, hibernate until it passes but it just might be the season you’ve been awaiting. I know this present season of just being, ceasing to do and achieve, won’t last forever, but while it’s here I’m going to seize this season of life more abundantly --- I’m going to take time to slow my pace, enjoying the seemingly small things in life that are actually huge in soul nutrition (for these things are fleeting). I’m going to dare to try new things just because I have the breath, health, and energy to do so (someday I may not). I’m going to stop striving, cease performing, and just be in His presence (because I miss a lot when I don’t). This season has been given to me to remind me that being is enough and more than sufficient! So go on… just be!
“Oh! May the God of green hope fill you up with joy, fill you up with peace, so that your believing lives, filled with the life-giving energy of the Holy Spirit, will brim over with hope!.” Romans 15:13 The Message