If you’ve ever been sick and had it affect your inner ear or equilibrium you would understand how important balance is to our lives. A good friend and mentor of mine was once suddenly struck with a strong case of vertigo with which she found herself on the floor in a spinning room, unable to move and overcome with extreme dizziness and nausea. Vertigo is a balance disorder caused by something going wrong with the nerves or fluid levels in the inner ear and my friend was completely incapacitated.
I’ve found to be true that balance is not only needed for standing upright and walking in a straight line, it is so essential to every aspect of our lives and if something is amiss we can find ourselves mentally, emotionally, physically or spiritually incapacitated. When we find ourselves stumbling through life, experiencing random episodes of dizziness and nausea, how can we find balance and in turn establish our footing to live a more productive and peaceful life?
This question has been at the forefront of my mind as I’ve fallen halfway through the summer months feeling like every day is just as hectic and overwhelming as the day before. Not only have I experienced dizziness and nausea, but depression, anxiety, impatience and most of all that feeling that all mothers have from time to time, the desire for escape. Escape to that wonderful distant tropical island where I can sit on the beach sipping something fruity with my life as far away as possible.
Sometimes it is possible to get away from it all whether it is with a vacation or a women’s retreat, but at the moment with bills piled up to our necks and a baby at my breast, leaving life behind is not possible. Instead I feel the need and the opportunity for the Lord to work in me and in my life giving me tools I need to face what’s before me. The first tool that I’m counting on is balance.
Starting out right
When I was younger I loved to dance. I took lessons in ballet, jazz and modern. Just recently I started teaching my daughters some dance and it’s been fun to have different steps and techniques coming back to me. I remember learning to twirl. The key to twirling was finding a focal point on the wall in front of you. You’d keep your eyes on that point while your body turned and at the last possible moment you’d whip your head around and find the focal point again. This would keep you from getting dizzy while your body would spin round and round. The technique is something that has to be learned and is crucial when keeping your balance throughout the dance.
As another example, Peter was able to walk on water as long as his gaze stayed on Jesus Christ. The moment he looked away and at the waves crashing around him he started to sink. Likewise, the moment a dancer loses that point of focus and takes in the room spinning by, she’s likely to fall.
Similarly we need to learn to focus on Jesus through reading the bible, prayer and listening to what He has to say throughout our day. Listening to God is definitely something learned as we get to know Him better. I was just reading John 10:27 which says, “My sheep know my voice; I know them and they follow me.”
Something that I love to do is turn on praise music (first turning off the TV) and allow the positive messages and scriptures in the songs to penetrate our busy and hectic household.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
New blog
I started a new blog at www.jewelwheeler.blogspot.com which is for all our family news and pictures.
Someday when I'm not changing diapers I would love to be a life coach and this blog is dedicated to my dream of helping women with encouragement and prayer, so I'll try to keep this blog updated with inspirational articles, writing information for our writing group and helpful resources.
Much love,
Jewel
Someday when I'm not changing diapers I would love to be a life coach and this blog is dedicated to my dream of helping women with encouragement and prayer, so I'll try to keep this blog updated with inspirational articles, writing information for our writing group and helpful resources.
Much love,
Jewel
Monday, July 21, 2008
Monday, June 2, 2008
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
A sweet end to memorial day weekend
We had a lovely time at Kayak Point beach yesterday evening. The weather was perfect and the water was calm and peaceful. I'm guessing everyone had had their fill of the beach over the Memorial Day weekend so on Tuesday night it was almost deserted. A couple sat down a ways from us and the man was playing beautiful classical and latin guitar music which is my absolute favorite. I carried Brayden over and asked him to play a song for us. If you have never listened to classical guitar music I recommend you see a live show...it's amazing! His name is Gil Piger and he's a composer who studied guitar in Spain and Mexico City as well as the US. Here's a website where you can listen to a sample of his music. http://cdbaby.com/cd/gilpiger2
P.S. My husband thinks I'm strange:)
P.S. My husband thinks I'm strange:)
Sunday, May 11, 2008
My mom taught me to pray
My mom gave me something that I will always be grateful for. In fact, as a mother and a wife, I don’t think there is anything that she could have passed down to me that would be more important. She taught me the importance of prayer.
We had an interesting life when I grew up. We lived without electricity for awhile and the doors of our cars sometimes had to be held on by the passengers riding in them. I think those things may have been a reason that prayer was a very central part of our lives. Whether we were praying for silly things like that our car would make it to the next gas station without running out or more serious things like illness in the family, my mom taught us to pray.
When I was a teenager I probably caused her to take her prayer life up a notch. I was determined to live life the way I wanted and it came to the point where the only thing my mom could possibly do was pray. My mom was so faithful. She’d wake up in the middle of the night and pray. She prayed without ceasing. And I felt it. Not only did she intuitively know what I was up to most of the time I felt like I could not get away with anything. I’d be on my way to somewhere I shouldn’t have been heading and my car would break down…for no reason. So I’d have to call my parents and they’d come and pick me up. Francis Thompson wrote a poem called “The Hound of Heaven” and that would be the best way to describe how God was after me throughout my teenage years. I had plans for my life but God had something different planned.
Then just a few years ago when Emma was born some of you may remember that she was bleeding internally and had to be rushed down to Children’s Hospital. That was a scary and an amazing time for us. Her second night there they sent us home knowing that she was still bleeding from one of her organs and we felt so incredibly helpless. I think it was the first time that we really prayed together with faith that God knew what He was doing and He cared for our baby. And she was healed that night. We went back to the hospital the next day and her bleeding had stopped. Not only that but they did numerous tests on her and her organs were perfect, no tears, rips or scarring. We had plans for how her birth was going to go but God had something different planned; something better.
As mothers when our children are born we know that they are God’s children first and He loves them so much more than we are capable of. Unlike us who look at people through a cloud of fear, God sees them through perfect love, seeing who He created them to be. When we pray we are invited to see our children through His eyes and through that come to a deeper relationship with him as our Father.
Romans 8:26-27 says “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.
We had an interesting life when I grew up. We lived without electricity for awhile and the doors of our cars sometimes had to be held on by the passengers riding in them. I think those things may have been a reason that prayer was a very central part of our lives. Whether we were praying for silly things like that our car would make it to the next gas station without running out or more serious things like illness in the family, my mom taught us to pray.
When I was a teenager I probably caused her to take her prayer life up a notch. I was determined to live life the way I wanted and it came to the point where the only thing my mom could possibly do was pray. My mom was so faithful. She’d wake up in the middle of the night and pray. She prayed without ceasing. And I felt it. Not only did she intuitively know what I was up to most of the time I felt like I could not get away with anything. I’d be on my way to somewhere I shouldn’t have been heading and my car would break down…for no reason. So I’d have to call my parents and they’d come and pick me up. Francis Thompson wrote a poem called “The Hound of Heaven” and that would be the best way to describe how God was after me throughout my teenage years. I had plans for my life but God had something different planned.
Then just a few years ago when Emma was born some of you may remember that she was bleeding internally and had to be rushed down to Children’s Hospital. That was a scary and an amazing time for us. Her second night there they sent us home knowing that she was still bleeding from one of her organs and we felt so incredibly helpless. I think it was the first time that we really prayed together with faith that God knew what He was doing and He cared for our baby. And she was healed that night. We went back to the hospital the next day and her bleeding had stopped. Not only that but they did numerous tests on her and her organs were perfect, no tears, rips or scarring. We had plans for how her birth was going to go but God had something different planned; something better.
As mothers when our children are born we know that they are God’s children first and He loves them so much more than we are capable of. Unlike us who look at people through a cloud of fear, God sees them through perfect love, seeing who He created them to be. When we pray we are invited to see our children through His eyes and through that come to a deeper relationship with him as our Father.
Romans 8:26-27 says “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
LinkWithin
