Hello March blog!
Today’s blog is coming to you via dictation through my Notes app on my phone. I am on a walk in Ashley‘s neighborhood pre-roundtable, and figured this is the best way for me to write my blog! #efficient
What a month! It was a bender of three out of four weekends out of town, full of retreats, a wedding, some silence, 360 reviews, my grandfather’s 86th birthday, the fellows summer birthday surprise celebration, and much, much more. Just when I thought February was full, March came in to one-up that.
I’m grateful for the amount of content I was given to absorb this month. March held one of my favorite retreats, led by John Richmond, on the 10 rules for living life well. I was inspired by the simplicity, yet profoundness of the rules and how they played out over the time of raising his family. It’s hard to pick a favorite rule, but the one that has stood out to me over the following weeks was to “happen to your life.” To recognize that we are not in control, but we have great influence on our lives, humbles and charges me at the same time.
It felt like I was running a marathon getting to the end of the month, and I was so grateful that silent retreat was at the end. It was there that I realized just how exhausted I was and in need of silence and solitude with God. When life gets “crazy” and “busy” (realizing more that it always is), I tend to be less and less consistent on keeping good rhythms and taking care of myself both physically and mentally. Again, this became deeply apparent to me, not necessarily in silence, but coming out of the silence and back into the real world. God has been revealing the ways that he desires me to take care of myself more and more. Learning how self-care can be a way of worshiping God, taking care of His creation, has been really beautiful.
I deleted social media (as much as I can because unfortunately my job surrounds social media), am looking for more ways to move my body and be active, and am continuing the fight of getting up early in the morning with God (pray for this one specifically). I’ve been really grateful for these rhythms, and am still grateful for a season of fellows where the schedule is full, and the commitments are vast— but God is always kind in telling me to slow down right where I’m at.
With Fellows soon coming to an end, I continue to pray consistently for the Lord not to let the things we’ve learned be lost on me. It’s been nine months of underlining and bookmarking all that’s being shared with me so that I can come back to it again and again after this time is over. I’m expectant to see how the Lord will use this experience and put it into practice as I face more of the things I’ve seen and heard.
Cheers to the last full month ahead!
Until next time,
Carsyn