I both do and don't mean this. I love God; I have no desire for God to go anywhere; I'm not about to lose my faith; I'm not getting bored.
I've had true and authentic experiences of the Divine that have changed everything. If I could split myself in two and live a parallel life walled up in a cell chasing after those experiences while still being a mother to my children and a wife to my husband, I'd do it. I'd also take a million dollars and a bicycling catfish.
The thing is, I'm doing too much God stuff in my free time. I'm happier than I have been in years to be working in a church environment and actually thinking thoughts that go beyond diapers and Dr. Seuss. I'm spending a lot of my prayer life trying to figure out Big Issues that are both worthwhile and a little bit tiring. I have reading to do every week from EfM. I'm teaching Sunday School. I'm on the Missionary Society.
All of this is fabulous, but then I go and fill my Netflix queue with things like Into Great Silence and Merton: A Film Biography and Therese and Clare and Francis, all of which paint me as more Catholic than catholic, anyway.
I just don't want to watch this stuff, frankly. Those rare few hours when I'm done with work and done with parenting and don't have 6,000 loads of laundry to fold, I want to veg out with Good Will Hunting and a bag of Pirate's Booty.
I want to read a People magazine. I want to get my nails done and drink too much wine and wake up late the next day and play some ridiculous sport like racquetball. Or squash. Or Jai alai.
I got on the treadmill last night and ran so long and so hard listening to horrible-yet-awesome music like Kanye West and House of Pain that my workout ended twice before I wanted it to. I just kept adding more time to the display. It was the best thing I've done in weeks. God was doing his own thing, and I was doing mine. FABULOUS.
We need a more differentiated relationship, I think. I need to stop thinking I need to fill every minute of my time with Lauren Winner or some obscure tome on Reconciliation in the Episcopal Church. I need more MNO's (Mommy's Night Out!) and more crappy fiction and more shoe shopping. I mean, God is amazing and incredible and Really Truly Very Important, but so is my right to watch a whole bunch of X-Files and eat chocolate so that I can actually go out there and focus on the work that God has given me to do.
I read an article a couple of years ago about how sometimes what we most need to take on as a spiritual discipline for Lent is an indulgence if trying to so rigidly structure our time in the "right" ways has become an unhealthy habit. This might be becoming the case for me, and PLEASE LET ME TELL YOU, I am the first person in the room to be curmudgeonly about easy, feels-good "spirituality."
This is different, though. I don't want to get burned out before I even get started.
More reality television STAT, although I'm going to need to be careful what I watch. Is there any possible way to look at a Kardashian and NOT remember that we are dust, and to dust we shall return?
2 comments:
You have always had so many keen, witty, and interesting insights about life in general. I have missed hearing about them in a non-sermony way. Balance is a good thing, my friend.
Thank you for your kind words, Anonymous. I know this blog has changed quite a bit since its inception. The thing is, I've changed since its inception, too. I don't know if I see redoubling my efforts at honoring my free time translating to a less Jesusy blog, because to be honest, Jesus is what winds my clock these days. This is the space I tend to write about that. So more balance IRL...but that might not show up here. Show up in my real life, though, and we'll hang out! You can be a part of the non-sermony balance.
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