Bless Our Exhausted Hearts

Most days, I rush through the process of brewing my tea.

Years ago, I learned that brewing a cup of tea offers the tea drinker a meditative moment in an otherwise hurried day. When done correctly, this engages all five sense- We watch as the tea leaves color the water in which they are brewed. We listen as the kettle boils and the water fills the cup. We feel warmth as we cradle the steaming cup in our hands. We inhale the aroma of the tea as it brews. Finally, we taste the tea. (In my case, it is always sweet and milky.)

Comfort in a cup.

Then, a couple of years ago, an English friend let me in on his tea-brewing secret. “I have found,” he said, “that if I dunk the bags in the hot water a few times, squeeze them out, dunk them and squeeze them again, that the tea tastes pretty much the same as if I allow it to brew normally.”

Ah-ha! I thought. A shortcut!

And no one, NO ONE loves a time-saver more than me because frantic over-productivity is my drug.

Too often, I rush through my days, anxiously careening from one task to another. Sometimes, I even feel guilty about all I haven’t accomplished even as I am working my fingers to the bone on something else.

Work. Work. Work.

Fall into bed exhausted.

Get up the next day and start it all over again.

I am pretty sure I am not alone in this. As a matter of fact, I think this impulse began the day Eden’s gates clanged shut behind Adam and Eve. I think this is why, at least in part, that God gave us the Sabbath— Sort of a divine time-out for all of humanity in which God throws a weighted blanket over us, tucks us in, and kisses us on the forehead as we flail about, crying and whining about all we have to do when he knows what we in our exhaustion can’t comprehend—We just need a bit of rest so that we can be sane again.

I know this. I really do. But dang it, but most days I can’t even allow my cup of tea to brew in its own sweet time. And if I do manage to commit to leaving that tea bag in the water for five LONG minutes, I then look around to see what I can accomplish while it brews. Bless my poor, frazzled, exhausted heart.

Maybe this is a struggle for you too. Let me leave you with these verses from Psalm 127, sweet words of comfort and peace that God brings to my spinning mind over and over again.

Unless the Lord builds the house,
    the builders labor in vain.
Unless the Lord watches over the city,
    the guards stand watch in vain.
 In vain you rise early
    and stay up late,
toiling for food to eat—
    for he grants sleep to those he loves.

Psalm 127:1-2

Peace, and rest, to you, my friends …

A Little More Mercy, Please

I have begun tentatively looking for a new home. Ideally, this would have been a change I made back at the end of my divorce. But…I had cancer and I felt like a move just might have killed me.

So, I made difficult financial choices to stay in the house where I reared my five children. It was an expensive mercy, but one we all needed. I don’t regret that decision, but lately I have begun thinking that mercy for myself might look like moving on.

Yesterday, I went to see a gorgeous home in a small town about an hour and a half northwest of where I live now. It was built in 1911 and once was the home of a senator, so I hear. It received an update in the early 70’s or late 60’s and has remained untouched since. It was like stepping back in time. There was a lot to love, but to say it needed work would be an understatement.

My friend who went with me to tour it, bounced up and down a bit in the dinning room before solemnly pronouncing judgement- “This floor doesn’t feel right.”

Yikes.

We wandered room to room as I dreamed of what could be. I lovingly ran my hand over the breathtaking banister of the main stairwell and the original tiles gracing one of many fireplaces. We climbed all the way up to the unfinished third floor where a cold January wind whistled through the broken front window. My friend pointed to a dark corner of the space and asked the realtor, “What is that!?!”

It was something dead. Rat? Bird? I didn’t look, and no one else wanted to get too close to figure it out.

Back downstairs, we thanked the realtor and exchanged contact info before race-walking to the warmth of the car. It wasn’t until I sat down in the driver’s seat that I knew the truth-

I am way too tired to buy that house.

Isn’t it strange how we are sometimes unaware of our weaknesses and limitations until life throws up a set of circumstances we can’t manage? I spent a lifetime refusing to accept my limitations. (It is what the women in my family do, darn it!) I truly believed that if I drove myself to the brink mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually, that I could do ANYTHING.

Oh, how I had to suffer to find out that I indeed have limitations.

Cancer on the heels of divorce gave me many gifts, but the realization that I too need mercy is one of the sweetest. I am learning to offer myself kindness, compassion, and rest. Over and over I hear the tender voice of God whisper in the depths of my soul, “You are a child, not a slave. Mercy and rest, daughter. Mercy and rest…”

I’m not very good at it, but by the grace of God I am trying to do better. Perhaps walking away from my 1911 HGTV nightmare is step in the right direction.