Thoughts from the Retreat #1

I really enjoyed the session where our speaker, Lori, talked about time management. On her handout there were 4 boxes in which we filled in some examples:


Urgent and Important
Crisis situations
Toddlers
Babies
Important telephone calls


Urgent by Not Important
Children's extracurricular activities
Too much time at church
Holy Huddles (Christian bubble)
Phone ringing often
Other people's demands of you



Not Always Urgent but Important
Christian growth
Time and connection with spouse
Connecting with children
Friends
Exercise
Vacations/Times of refreshing
Sleep
Sharing your faith


Not Urgent and Not Important
Facebook
Texting
Internet surfing
Soap operas/TV
Novel-addiction
Movies
Indulgences (spas, manicures, etc.)

Everything is permissable, but not everything is beneficial

Invest in the eternal--Am I wasting time on things that are not urgent and not important?


Most of our lives as moms of young kids is lived in the urgent and important box. It can be a challenge to fight for strength and time to make the important-but-not-urgent-things a priority. In whatever down time we have it can be so easy to fill our time with pressing-but-not-important-things like too much housework or too many church commitments or not-pressing-and-not-important things like a computer addiction or other escapisms. While reading a book or using the computer, etc. aren't bad things, they have to be kept in balance lest we waste our lives on the good instead of living our lives for the best. Finding the balance and the tension between all of these things in our lives is what we must continually strive for throughout our lives. And I know someone will say, "But what if I text my husband to remind him I love him?" or "What if I use facebook to share the Gospel with my unsaved family?" or "What if soccer is super-important to our family?" I'm not sharing this list to say those things are bad. You can make your own chart with your own answers for the quadrants. These are just some ideas folks had at the retreat and are a springboard towards sorting out one's priorities. Are you living your life to the fullest for the glory of God? Are you maximizing the time, talents, and money He has entrusted you with? Are you balanced in all of these areas or are you stuck in one box of being overly busy with things that aren't the MOST important things so that you don't have time for family devotions and prayer or rest time? Are you wasting too much time on video games, TV, fiction books, facebook, blogs instead of serving your family, encouraging your friends, or taking banana bread to a new neighbor?

Some good thoughts to consider!