Tis the season to be… I know instinctively the words to the famous carol will chime through your mind. .. Jolly fa-la-la-la-la… The pressure is on to be happy and loving and busy with all the fanfare of the season. I know when you read this post the food would have been eaten, the gifts would have been opened and the festivities are quieting as we anticipate the New Year. But, what if we just left it as “tis the season to be”? What if we slowed down enough to be Present, Prayerful, Prepared, Proactive and Pliable as we close out the year and step into the next.
Be Present. Presents mean nothing without your presence. Give the gift of intentional time with your loved ones. December always reminds me of how fleeting life is. So I try to be present with those in my presence. I’m not super human so I do get distracted with my chores with my phone and with TV like the next woman but I do try to pause and play a made up game with my children sometimes. I sit and talk and laugh with my family. Nothing beats a belly laugh springing from joy in your heart. Scripture calls it good medicine (Prov. 17:22). Be present enough where you live or work or traverse through the day to notice someone else who may need you to look them in the eye with a caring face so they feel less alone.
Be Prayerful. Prayer has evolved for me. Its not just the words I whisper when I wake in the morning or before bed. It’s the open line of communication I have with my Creator. So I’m rushing out of the house and I cant find something, I say Holy Spirit lead me to it help me. I’m making a purchase and I’m asking God to help me figure out if its both a good deal and a buy it now deal vs a good deal but wait for another time deal. In other words, I involve His input. I use the brain He gave me to reason and make sense of it but I pause to listen for His voice and to get a sense of His Peace.
Be Prepared. You know I was a Brownie and a Girl Scout and in my day our motto was just that “be prepared”. The idea was that any challenge you faced was more surmountable if you prepared yourself physically and mentally. So let’s get to goal setting. Write out the vision you have for your life, break it up into small pieces and set measurable targets to conquer those small pieces. I won’t get it to details on how to plan but you can connect with my friend and Christian Empowerment Coach Crystal http://crystaldaye.com/. She has a beautiful purpose planner for 2020 that is a free downloadable resource on her site.
Be Proactive. To prepare or plan is the first step. However being proactive is like doing a risk assessment for said plan. In other words, start looking at the possible obstacles to what you’ve set out to do and figure out how best to get around them. The new decade is upon us and I’m not sure how your year went but mine felt like I was hiking barefooted through a dangerous forest and I misplaced my supply bag. In retrospect, I think that while I made a plan I wasn’t proactive. I didn’t assess the risks enough to be mentally prepared. So when some of those plans fell through I was devastated and without a plan B.
Be Pliable. In my previous post I spoke about the Illusion of Control, which I believe was one of my major life lessons of 2019. My aim going forward is to be more pliable, more malleable when a circumstance flexes its muscles in its attempt to break me. I want to be like water. It can adapt to the shape of its container, or flow over when it needs more room, it can be as solid as a wall or flexible enough to allow things to pass through. Water stops at nothing in its quest to get to its destination. It will find away around rocks through cracks through anything. Water can be playful and fun yet intimidating and dangerous, if not respected, all at the same time. I want this to be true of me.
See you in the next decade.
Write Fully Yours,
Lady Kavan
