My Kid-Placemant Life

Today's Unglued Blog Update

Wow...I am moving right along through this book. Maybe I should blog about all my books so I will actually keep reading them. I know I have lost some folks along the way & that's okay. I'm doing this for me so that I can stay focused on finishing this book & working through my imperfect progress. As usual, I'm mostly putting Lysa's words here....& throwing in a few of my own.

 

I'm now on to Chapter 8: My Kid-Placemat Life

 

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ~Philippians 4:4-5

 

My goal in processing unglued reactions is to pull the swinging of my emotions pendulum back from the extremes of the ugly unglued & keep them swaying in the gentle middle. Finding the gentle middle between exploding & stuffing can be hard, but God is working on me. Certainly identifying my tendencies is a great start. And developing strategies to process & diffuse emotions without stuffing & exploding is crucial. But there's yet another layer I must add before I move on. It's perspective.

 

Perspective calls forth a gentleness I can't seem to find any other way. And this Bible verse hits it right on the head: "Let your gentleness be evident to all" (Philippians 4:5). Now, I can have moments of gentleness. I can perform acts of gentleness. I can be extremely gentle with the girls when we are around other people. But gentleness doesn't ooze from the core of who I am. This is especially true if I am sleepy or stressed or hungry. I saw this last night & I'm ashamed to say, it can be SO me at times:

 

I don't want this to be how my kids remember me. I don't want this to be how I remember me in this season of life. God didn't skip over me in distributing the gentleness gene. Regardless of the stress I'm under, I am capable of displaying God's gentleness because the Holy Spirit is in me. The Spirit is in me when I feel calm and when I feel stressed, when I'm in front of people with the girls and in the privacy of our home. Gentleness is in me!

 

I just have to learn to reclaim the gentleness that is rightfully mine. And I can reclaim it by practicing the one word that appears right before, "Let your gentleness be evident to all" (Philippians 4:5). That little word is rejoice: "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4). The more my heart is parked in a place of thanksgiving & rejoicing, the less room I have for grumpiness.

My girls are driving me crazy? At least they are healthy enough to have that kind of energy (Rejoice!). My laundry is piled to the ceiling? Every stitch of clothing is evidence of life in my home (Rejoice!).

 

The more I rejoice, the more I keep things in perspective. The more I keep things in perspective, the gentler I become. That's why I have to intentionally seek out perspective-magnifying opportunities (serving at a soup kitchen, volunteering at Fayette Cares, serving in the church, delivering gifts to a family, adopting an angel). If I want the gentleness inside me to be unleashed, I have to break away from my everyday routine. I have to go where perspective awaits me.

 

Next Unglued Blog Update: Reevaluating My Kid-Placemat Life