Even in the jungle...

By midday I was feeling uncomfortable and trying to work out why.  I know God has me here in the jungle for a reason, but maybe it was not for what I imagined. (Again?!).  

My body got fed up long before my mind did and I was wondering why I was feeling so awkward.  Finally, I realised that the wooden benches and concrete or dirt floors were making me physically uncomfortable, but perhaps they just mirrored what was going on in my mind.   

I feel like a foreigner again.  Yes, I have been with the Shipibos many a time.  There is nothing overtly ‘new’ about them, but yet I am still so foreign to their ways. I am still unaware of what is ‘normal’ behaviour or just an individual acting out of the accepted norm. And it is uncomfortable to feel like an outsider. 

Is picking lice out of one another’s hair acceptable ‘normal’ behaviour or normally ‘done-in-private’ behaviour? Is a toddler walking around with no clothes on his bottom half a practicality for an un-toilet-trained tot or a result of Mum’s ability to keep up with the laundry (or did he escape before his mother could dress him properly)?  Do the mothers mind me photographing their children? What do the giggles mean? 

And reflecting with the ladies in group time, I find myself wanting to get to a point, to move the conversation in a certain direction, impatient and frustrated with the limitations of translation, trying to understand and empathize but wondering if that is even possible.  

Talking with Mark this evening, I realise how driven I am by efficiency.  My life in Lima has to be super efficient to get everything done and to give different people the time they need. Our week is so scheduled, even my ‘free’ time comes in one or two hour slots.  Today we spent 8 hours in the village and I was only ‘being effective’ for 2.5 hours of that time leading group time.  The other hours were spent chasing Kaleb around the village, taking photos, listening to the main sessions and hanging out with the Shipibo women and children.  And yes, even as I write I know that those things matter too - I just am not used to jungle pace and jungle life, which is so contrary to my time-slot existence. 

And in Lima our life is so scheduled and tight that I have to make every hour count.  I have to take every opportunity and choose to engage with the children and our team whenever I can because it is so often now or never. We have chosen our priorities so as to maximise our potential, and sitting on a wooden bench getting a sore bum, seems such a...waste!
(Perhaps the other problem is that it gives me too much time to reflect!) 

And yet as I do reflect I know that even in a foreign place surrounded by foreign people there are things I know to be true that I need to still practice: gratitude; chatting with God throughout the day; taking those moments I remember to pray; being present in the moment rather than allowing my mind to rush off.  I need to remember that God’s presence and His ability to answer my prayers is the same, so my faith should be the same too.  I need to remind myself that it is good to be part of a team, to slow down and that my value is not in what I do, but in who I am in Christ. 

So, Jesus, I am sorry when I have believed it is all about me when it should be all about you.  Thank you that you are the same here, there and everywhere. Help me to remember the foundational things. May tomorrow be all about You. 

When The Balls Come Too Fast

As I talked about in the last post, recently I have been struggling with anxiety and a non-stop mind.  And much of it, God showed me was about perfectionism… 

I realized that the tensions I am experiencing come because I like doing things well – I like to focus fully on one thing and do it well – and in recent years – I have been able to manage that.  Maybe shifting focus here and there, but knowing the vision and sticking to it.   

But now the balls are coming too fast and I can’t hit them all back and I am running around crazy trying to hit them all, rather than trying to return just one at a time.  And I realize that so many of my anxieties could be left to one side if I wasn’t driven by this annoying back-seat driver who shouts: Are you sure that is good enough for God? Are you sure you are being a good enough mother? Are you being a good enough support for Mark? Are you attending enough to those in the team? Are you investing your creative gifts enough? (Remember the parable of the talents!!) And I swerve this way and that, breaking hard and turning suddenly, all the time knowing that this isn’t the life Jesus was talking about.

And I picked up a book about peace and even in the open pages I suddenly saw the problem.  I was making everything too complicated. I had despised simple and looked for the new revelation when all the time it was in the simple – in what I already knew to be true.  I actually needed to reverse.  Or in John the Baptist’s words: repent.

It is not about ensuring the children learn everything they possibly could learn this year.  Daniel does not need a saturated timetable of academic and extra-curricula activities.  He needs a Mummy modeling a God-seeking, trusting regardless of the storms, life. Homeschool is about simplicity: 2 or 3 simple goals and working towards them.  Had I asked God what they should be yet? Umm…no.

It is not about taking on the pastoral responsibility of all the people in the team.  It is not about making sure everyone is happy and well and thriving and if they are not it is my fault.  It is about simplicity: 1 or 2 simple goals each week.  Had I asked God what they should be yet? No, not yet.

It is not about being a adoring, doting, grateful, sexy, helpful, encouraging wife all the time and maintaining those high, high, standards I have set myself.  It is about simplicity: 1 or 2 simple intentional goals to show Mark I love him this week.  Had I prayerfully considered what they should be yet? You know by now, I haven’t.

And it is not about having all the ideas and vision and blogposts and other creative ideas all worked out this week.  It is about simplicity: 1 or 2 simple intentional goals.  Embracing the step by step.  And you know I need to spend time seeking God about that too.

And so as I keep telling myself ‘Keep it simple’, waves of peace are beginning to break, and this car which is running out of gas is coming into a pit stop.  I know I need to take a moment to readjust my life.  To put time into my calendar to work out what this week’s priorities are and to prayerfully consider all the different aspects of my life. 

How about you? Are you in need of a pitstop?

‘A plain and simple life is a full life.’

– Proverbs 13:7b (The Message)

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Related post: Keep it Simple

When My Mind Drowns Out Peace

Anxiety has been a heavy itchy blanket I have been trying to put down over the last few weeks.  I feel like I have been rushing here and there – from helping to lead a team, to trying to be a loving, listening wife, to homeschooling and parenting the children, to taking the odd moments to write down the many ideas I have in my head and think about how to turn them into writing. 

I keep trying to shake this blanket off.  And trying to be still.  To spend time in worship in the mornings and quiet myself before Him.  But this noisy parrot of a brain keeps on at me, reminding me of this or that. 

I had enough.  Didn’t Jesus promise peace? In the storms He slept and He told the disciples: In this world you will have many troubles, but…I leave you my Peace.

Peace.  That is what I am struggling to feel right now.  How is it that I can lose a baby and feel His overshadowing peace through it all and now I can’t even feed Kaleb porridge without losing the peace I have gained in my quiet time?

So I spent a week, waiting for peace to come.  My mind all over the place, urging me to keep on, keep busy, keeping going, all the time knowing this needs to stop.  The tensions of ministry, motherhood and creativity surely don’t have to look like this?

So I asked God to show me the roots of this anxiety. 

I surprised myself when the first word I wrote down was ‘perfectionism’.  Now perhaps this won’t surprise those who know me, but it actually surprised me.  Not because I am not aware of a past of perfectionism, but because I was surprised it had become a present.  Yes, I like to do things well, but I am actually generally very flexible with things not being done and I generally don’t have a problem extending grace to others.

But then again – how good am I at accepting grace for myself?

Where had doing things in His strength and His freedom and His Spirit suddenly become about doing it in mine? These standards, this legalism that I was holding over myself – why had they just intruded my being?

And once again, I realize that I had made it about me, instead of about Him, and so it was no wonder that I couldn’t hold on to the ever-accelerating roundabout. 

And I realized how much of my life is supernatural – that I can’t do anything without Him and it is truly Him who holds it all together. 

And so I have decided to hand it all back over to Him again.  Because He can do it peacefully. And I can’t.

God, the one and only—

    I’ll wait as long as he says.

Everything I need comes from him,

    so why not?

He’s solid rock under my feet,

    breathing room for my soul,

An impregnable castle:

    I’m set for life.

God said this once and for all;

    how many times

Have I heard it repeated?

    “Strength comes

Straight from God.

Psalm 62:1 & 11.