Lessons Learned 4 – Spend Time With God

For many years of my life I have lived in pain.

Pain from numerous injuries that were never fixed and so have never healed. The doctors basically said to learn to live with it because surgery either didn’t or wouldn’t heal what was wrong.

I have prayed for my healing.

Others have prayed for my healing.

But with the prayer I also prayed that if this was to be my ‘thorn in the flesh’, that God would give me the endurance and strength to deal with it.

He has allowed the injuries to subside into a pain and a limitation that I can deal with on a daily basis, and given me the strength to withstand the flair-ups.

More than a year ago I began to have pain in my upper arms, excruciating pain that kept my arms immobile for minutes at a time when I moved just wrong.

Pain that woke me from a sound sleep in the middle of the night and kept me awake for hours with each movement.

Nights of little sleep quickly led to late mornings; and late mornings took me into days without time spent in God’s Word, without a quiet time of prayer to start my day.

And from there my days always went downhill.

A couple months ago, I re-injured my lower back (one of those injuries that I have been dealing with for years); and have been dealing with flare-ups since then.  This has only added to my pain-filled- days and sleepless nights.

Pain kept me in a constant struggle with daily tasks and quickly turned into more work from dropped articles that ended up back in with the dirty laundry, and broken glass that needed to be cleaned up when I could not hold onto whatever I had picked up.

When I spent the first moments upon waking talking to God and reading His Word, these things did not bother me overmuch.

Yes, I was irritated that we would have to eventually spend money we didn’t have to replace the broken item, and I was irritated with the extra laundry that I had just washed but that needed washing again; but it was not some major catastrophe.

However ….

On those days when I slept late and so lost my time with the Lord, everything that I was struggling with, all of the problems, took on a life of their own.

When days led into weeks of sleepless nights and late mornings and no quiet time, my mood took a sharp nosedive that I could not pull myself out of.

But God is leading me through this even as I write these words.

He has healed the right arm of the pain, and I am praying for and believing in a healing of the left arm.

My back pain comes in waves of pain and then will lessen for a week or so, then returns if I sit too long or move just right; but I am learning how to manage it.

LESSON LEARNED —

No matter what you need to do to accomplish it, always start the day reading the Bible and talking to God.

That bedrock of strength and grace is needed each and every day that we wake up here on this earth.

© Drusilla Mott and https://drusillamott.wordpress.com, 2014

Lessons Learned 3 – Find Time For Self

We all need time for ourselves, something to do to take our minds off the everyday cares and worries.

Whether it is sitting down with a good book, some kind of craft project, or going for a walk or run, each one of us needs that time for some activity to give us balance.

I have written more than once about the lack of spare time in my life. I not only set aside my writing for a while, but also set aside my time spent scrapbooking and card making.

With the baby crib set up in the middle of my office, there is no longer room to set up my craft table to work on my paper crafting. I have tried to set it up in the living room, but the living room is small and there really is not room for it to be left there.

The kitchen table is the same. If I spread my supplies out in the morning to create, it all has to be picked up before lunch so that we have a place to eat.

With all the other struggles I was facing, being unable to find that time for myself only added to my unhappiness.

Finding time to exercise also presented its own set of problems.

I find that I have to get up at least by 6 AM in order to have time to spend with the Lord and then to do my exercises before the day gets into full swing. It is best to be up shortly after 5 AM to ensure that I have enough time, and don’t have to skimp on my Bible study. But sleepless nights do not make for early rising. (More on that in a later post.)

I found that sleeping later gave me only 2 options, neither one of which I particularly cared for. I could take care of myself and let others fend for themselves, or I tended to others and not take care of myself. Not a good set of options. So I have begun going to bed earlier with the hope that I will get enough sleep and will be able to be up with the sun.

LESSON LEARNED —

A balanced schedule is called for, one that will give me some time to myself while ensuring that all the other necessities get taken care of.

So, make time for self, to breath, to settle the tumult inside. Find something that you enjoy doing and then make the time to do it.

I have also discovered that using the using the quiet times in the day to immerse myself in God’s Word does more for me than spending that time doing some kind of craft or sitting in front of the TV.

It settles my mind, gives me time to unwind and best of all, helps me to understand my Creator a little better.

© Drusilla Mott and https://drusillamott.wordpress.com, 2014