I hesitate to mention that I am writing a book along the lines of this blog. As in, ramblings about motherhood, housekeeping and faith. I hesitate because I don't know how long it will take me or if, indeed, anyone will want it. But I am just putting it out there for you--if you would buy (probably for like 99 cents on Kindle) a book of devotions etc. by me, then maybe you'd let me know? So I won't feel like it's a silly thing for me to try to do?
So today I read a friend's blog post on how she gets nervous when showing her writing to others, and self-doubtful. And I've also been talking to someone else who's been experiencing a wave of self-doubt, and I got to thinking about patterns in my own life.
See, when I was in college I used to have this recurring dream/daydream/feeling that there was, somehow, a class I had forgotten about. Like a whole class. I went to the first few lectures (in my mind), then forgot about it and only discovered that I should have been attending right before finals. In my dream I would then try to cram a whole semester of learning into the day before finals.
This is funny because I never did anything remotely like that. I tended to have all my assignments done ahead of time, and I graduated with a 4.0 GPA.
Later, when I was a nurse, I'd have dreams that I'd forgotten to record a narcotic dose (which I'd also forgotten to give to the patient). Or I'd be sure that somehow, I'd mortally offended a doctor who would be lobbying for my dismissal.
Again, funny. I made a grand total of three medication errors in my career, none of them serious, and one of them only about bookkeeping. When I left the job at which I would get nervous about angry doctors, all of the doctors asked me to please remember them if I ever wanted to come back.
It was at this last job where I finally realized what was going on: I was being attacked. Hoodwinked. Tempted.
Some days I would feel great about my job--as I should have. It was a really good job. Good pay, friendly colleagues, nice boss, good facility. Other days, when nothing had changed, I would feel horrible about my job. I'm not talking about the kind of day that you sometimes have in healthcare when a patient dies, or when there is something that you can't fix. I mean literally that I'd feel good on Monday and bad on Tuesday.
When it occurred to me that nothing had changed in the interval of feeling good and feeling bad, my mind (it turns slowly on these things) began to tick. And I understood that if nothing's changed, then suddenly feeling despair about my job was a Lie. And if it is a Lie, it's not from God. It's also probably not just a problem I have, me being a Despair-er.
Because I have an Adversary who doesn't want me to be happy or effective at anything I do, he would come along and whisper things in my ear like "I bet Dr. Soandso really was ticked off about your mistake today. Yeah, you'll probably get fired." These things weren't true. They were a temptation to doubt.
It was amazing, once I figured this out, how such moments vanished. All it took was a few times of, when the thoughts would come into my head, saying "No. That's not true. Lord, thank You for my job. I trust You to handle it. Please help me reject these thoughts."
Eventually those thoughts about my job almost ceased.
Lately the Enemy has been trying the same thing with regard to my children. It's easy as a mom to focus on all the things you're doing wrong: soandso isn't potty trained, we haven't been faithful about early reading, we don't have family devotions with anything like regularity, and, on bad days, I'm sure my kids will become foul-mouthed gangbangers whose idea of a spiritual experience is to join the Rainbow Family.
(My opinion of the Rainbows is colored somewhat by the fact that the year they had their Gathering in my home state, the Park Service had to spend a month cleaning up after them because of "illegal shelters and all the human excrement" left in the campgrounds.)
Really nothing much changes between Monday, when I feel good about my mothering skills--teach reading, and make really good meatloaf--and Tuesday, when I feel horrible about my mothering skills--snip gum out of hair and make frozen, dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets. If I can keep in mind what I've learned about two other endeavors in my life when I was trying to do something very important, I'll realize that what I'm dealing with are not legitimate feelings.
Because it isn't really self-doubt. It's doubting the Lord. He's the one who's given me this tribe of rampaging proto-hippies who disdain clothing and want to eat raw bacon. He doesn't ask me to do impossible things. But He does expect me to use the enabling that only He can give me.
So, as I have never yet forgotten a class, taken home a dose of a patient's medication, or (my latest) forgotten a child at the store, I will trust in the Lord to make sure that doesn't happen.
What are you trusting Him about today?
Cheers,
Breanna
So today I read a friend's blog post on how she gets nervous when showing her writing to others, and self-doubtful. And I've also been talking to someone else who's been experiencing a wave of self-doubt, and I got to thinking about patterns in my own life.
See, when I was in college I used to have this recurring dream/daydream/feeling that there was, somehow, a class I had forgotten about. Like a whole class. I went to the first few lectures (in my mind), then forgot about it and only discovered that I should have been attending right before finals. In my dream I would then try to cram a whole semester of learning into the day before finals.
This is funny because I never did anything remotely like that. I tended to have all my assignments done ahead of time, and I graduated with a 4.0 GPA.
Later, when I was a nurse, I'd have dreams that I'd forgotten to record a narcotic dose (which I'd also forgotten to give to the patient). Or I'd be sure that somehow, I'd mortally offended a doctor who would be lobbying for my dismissal.
Again, funny. I made a grand total of three medication errors in my career, none of them serious, and one of them only about bookkeeping. When I left the job at which I would get nervous about angry doctors, all of the doctors asked me to please remember them if I ever wanted to come back.
It was at this last job where I finally realized what was going on: I was being attacked. Hoodwinked. Tempted.
Some days I would feel great about my job--as I should have. It was a really good job. Good pay, friendly colleagues, nice boss, good facility. Other days, when nothing had changed, I would feel horrible about my job. I'm not talking about the kind of day that you sometimes have in healthcare when a patient dies, or when there is something that you can't fix. I mean literally that I'd feel good on Monday and bad on Tuesday.
When it occurred to me that nothing had changed in the interval of feeling good and feeling bad, my mind (it turns slowly on these things) began to tick. And I understood that if nothing's changed, then suddenly feeling despair about my job was a Lie. And if it is a Lie, it's not from God. It's also probably not just a problem I have, me being a Despair-er.
Because I have an Adversary who doesn't want me to be happy or effective at anything I do, he would come along and whisper things in my ear like "I bet Dr. Soandso really was ticked off about your mistake today. Yeah, you'll probably get fired." These things weren't true. They were a temptation to doubt.
It was amazing, once I figured this out, how such moments vanished. All it took was a few times of, when the thoughts would come into my head, saying "No. That's not true. Lord, thank You for my job. I trust You to handle it. Please help me reject these thoughts."
Eventually those thoughts about my job almost ceased.
Lately the Enemy has been trying the same thing with regard to my children. It's easy as a mom to focus on all the things you're doing wrong: soandso isn't potty trained, we haven't been faithful about early reading, we don't have family devotions with anything like regularity, and, on bad days, I'm sure my kids will become foul-mouthed gangbangers whose idea of a spiritual experience is to join the Rainbow Family.
(My opinion of the Rainbows is colored somewhat by the fact that the year they had their Gathering in my home state, the Park Service had to spend a month cleaning up after them because of "illegal shelters and all the human excrement" left in the campgrounds.)
Really nothing much changes between Monday, when I feel good about my mothering skills--teach reading, and make really good meatloaf--and Tuesday, when I feel horrible about my mothering skills--snip gum out of hair and make frozen, dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets. If I can keep in mind what I've learned about two other endeavors in my life when I was trying to do something very important, I'll realize that what I'm dealing with are not legitimate feelings.
Because it isn't really self-doubt. It's doubting the Lord. He's the one who's given me this tribe of rampaging proto-hippies who disdain clothing and want to eat raw bacon. He doesn't ask me to do impossible things. But He does expect me to use the enabling that only He can give me.
So, as I have never yet forgotten a class, taken home a dose of a patient's medication, or (my latest) forgotten a child at the store, I will trust in the Lord to make sure that doesn't happen.
What are you trusting Him about today?
Cheers,
Breanna
2 comments:
Thank you, thank you, thank you! You're a great mama to my grandkids, and I appreciate the fact that you haven't forgotten one of them in the produce isle. A book encouraging us to trust Him would be greatly appreciated.
You know I'd read it! Also, thanks for the reminder that God won't set us up to fail. There are those days when I find myself saying "I AM NOT A BAD MOM!" While silently thinking, "I bet that's what ALL the bad moms say..."
Kindra
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