When bloggy friend Omis was in town a few weeks ago, he made a wise comment to me. I was complaining about how busy I was, flitting from work to church activity, trying to fit in visiting friends and getting my house/job/life in order in between groovy sister reserve weekends. I think I made some remark about what a shift it would be for me to be in novitiate, without 10,000 things to do.
His comment was something like this: "You should do a little bit less and a little bit less, and have a little more time each day for prayer and reflection. That way by the time you head to novitiate it will be a natural progression."
That made so much sense to me. But seemed so impossible. Yet so desirable. I’d been thinking about it for a while. He just put some sensible words to my fuzzy thoughts.
Well, today I made a big change. I submitted my resignation from the Pastoral Council. It was just too much of a drain time and energy wise. Plus I know there are great people on the Council who will give good advice to the pastor and do good work. I’d been toying with the idea of quitting for the past six months, but felt like I "should" stick it out.
But then a favorite saying of my friend Jackie kept coming into my mind. "We can should all over ourselves sometimes."
I’ve gotten positive responses to my resignation. I think they understand.
Now the trick will be to avoid filling up that sudden free time in my life!
4 comments:
Huh?
"We can should all over ourselves sometimes"?
Somebody was tired! :)
Mark
Wow, hon, that's a big step for you!
Peace!
Mark - The "shoulds" of our lives can sometimes take over, I think is the point of that saying. Normally that sentence would have a not so nice word for a bodily function in place of the "should."
The first few times my friend J used the saying, it seemed crass to me. But over time it really started to speak volumes to me.
There is a lot to be said for responsibility. Fulfilling of obligations. But sometimes we can get so stuck in doing what we think we should be doing, that we're spread so thin we aren't able to really do anything with integrity. That was the situation I was finding myself in.
Omis - aren't you supposed to be on a silent retreat?????
But yeah, this is a big step for me.
I love that quote! I'm thinking of having it framed and giving it to my mom (and myself) for Christmas!
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