back and forth

It's the end of fall break for the kids and two-thirds of them will go back to school tomorrow.  I'm looking back over the week we've had and ahead to the one that's beginning.  To-do lists and calendars by nature are just inclined to fill up like the lint trap in a dryer.  But while I'm standing here in this fleeting in-between place where one week has ended and the next one begins, I'm trying not to dwell Back There in a way that makes me drag through the days before me or to rush too far Ahead making the coming days a frenzied blur. There has been rich goodness Back There and there's too much more of it to come Ahead to step through it all haphazardly.

I'm still whittling away at Ordering Your Private World.  On a single page before every chapter there is a one-sentence "Memo to the Disorganized", a new memo for each chapter.  This evening I am slowing myself down and resisting rushing headlong into planning for tomorrow and the next day and the day after that in favor of reflecting first on these memos I've read so far; a self-assessment and system diagnostic.

I'm cleaning out the lint trap before booting another load of laundry.  Because I think it's wise and it's worth the time, and really, who wants a fire because their lint trap's too full?

Memo(s) to the Disorganized*:

If my private world is in order, it will be because I am convinced that the inner world of the spiritual must govern the outer world of activity.

If my private world is in order, it will be because I make a daily choice to monitor its state of orderliness.

If my private world is in order, it will be because I recognize my proneness to operate according to schemes and patterns not made of God but fashioned by a disordered past.

If my private world is in order, it will be because, having faced up to what drives me, I listen quietly for the call of Christ.

If my private world is in order, it will be because I see myself as Christ's steward and not as master of my purpose, my role, and my identity.

If my private world is in order, it will be because I have made daily determination to see time as God's gift and worthy of careful investment.

If my private world is in order, it is because I have begun to seal the "time leaks" and allocate my productive hours in the light of my capabilities, my limits, and my priorities.

If my private world is in order, it will be because I have determined that every day will be for me a day of growth in knowledge and wisdom.

I'm reflecting and assessing, but mostly stopping to be thankful in retrospect and advance for Back There and Ahead.

trees are even better when friends get married underneath their branches

sweet tiny folded hands of a sleeping boy

proving how they've grown

*(Chapters 1-8, Ordering Your Private World, Gordon MacDonald)