Space for Joy

As a mom with pretty little kids it always seems like someone is on top of me, and they frequently physically are. And not not only is our house full of our family, it’s full of our STUFF. 

Clutter doesn’t bother me a whole lot, I know my husband feels it a lot more than I do, but I still don’t like having spaces overwhelmed with this and that. It feels like the fullness of the exterior world adds a layer of anxiety and chaos to my interior world that I am constantly seeking to control.

There are also a lot of things cluttering my interior spaces in their own right – worry, fear, anxiety, and my innate tendency to lean towards a scarcity mindset. And don’t even get me started on the mental load of running a business, taking care of a family, homeschooling, and having a baby.

It’s just a lot of clutter really. Everywhere.

It’s clutter that actively keeps me from resting. 

This last Sunday I went into the day fully intending to take my standard Sunday day of rest, and I found that I just couldn’t. I didn’t have any space in my brain. I couldn’t turn off the to do list, especially the list of service people I needed to call the next day to deal with our all-of-a-sudden falling apart house. #yayhomeownership 

I ended up spending way too much of the day scrolling Instagram out of paralysis and when the day was over I hadn’t done anything productive or anything restful, so I felt like I just lit the day on fire and watched it burn.

It really drove home for me how much I needed to be intentional prior to Sunday to create the space for me to be able to accept God‘s gift of rest. Because creating that space would lead to rest, and that rest is what allows me to really listen to God and it is listening to and experiencing God that leads to joy. It’s a process and I can’t take out any of the steps and expect it to still work.

We are never going to perfectly declutter our lives or minds and it’s foolish to think that we could. But, on the other hand it’s also foolish to disregard the clutter in our spaces and mines when it comes to affecting how we rest. It’s a personal balance that we need to strike, and I find that I don’t necessarily need my house to be spotless, but I do need my to do list written down, the floors clear, the dishes done and my bed made. 

But that’s me. That’s my balance. I encourage you to find yours – what kind of decluttering does your life need for you to be able to embrace rest more fully?