Why I Always Expect To Be Busy

Sometimes I find myself asking questions like, is this worth it? or do I have time for this? Or, something I see a lot now days: Are you too busy? Slow down!

I find myself frequenting these question like you might a coffee shop. It is like a habit, daily routine, methodical thought-numbing process.  On one hand, this thinking causes me to doubt myself more often....  On the other hand, I am also learning to think twice before saying yes.
 
God does not reward his people for sitting idly, waiting for Him to make the first move. Sure, it might happen sometimes...but more often than not, God wants us to take action.  A few examples of this are in Proverbs 31:27, and Matthew 20:1-16 (1 Thessalonians 5:14 even says that we should admonish and encourage the idle!)
 
I am constantly wondering if my time and energy are spent in such a way that I am not a part of this 'idle' category.  I will be the first to admit that I am a great procrastinator, I enjoy a lazy Saturday afternoon (who am I kidding? Sunday too!) and I do not always use my time wisely.
 
However, my husband and I are also doers.  We like to pour into our friends and family.  We want to fellowship with other Christians.  We appreciate spending time together doing things we love.  We like to hit up the gym after work so we can keep our bodies healthy.  We spend time studying at home so we can reach our professional goals.  We play soccer. We host, or attend, social events and bible studies. We enjoy the feeling of accomplishment after a hard day of work, around the house or at the office.  We both work full-time jobs.
 
Most of the time, we ARE busy. 
 
Is that so bad?

"Youth is wasted on the young." -  George Bernard Shaw

I often hear this quote, and wonder if I am one of the young who is wasting away my youth.  I frequently find myself wishing that time would slow down so that I could revel in the moment.  It hasn't, and never will.   While our system isn't perfect, we try to pick and choose which things that are worth our time, and those that aren't.  Sometimes, it is a challenging decision.  I won't deny that there are things lacking in our life.  Like most others, we could spend more time in God's word, less time on Netflix, and be better prayer partners for one another.  And, those are things we have to work at (perhaps sleep should be added to that list as well!). 



Jason is very busy snuggling Citra

Another thing I see quite often are articles or blog posts discussing the negative points to being busy.  They say if you are 'too busy' that you aren't managing your time well. That you are probably lazy, or selfish, or petty... and the list goes on.

I am not saying that the type of busy my husband and I experience does not have its downsides, because it does.  Sometimes we are exhausted, and don't get around to cleaning the house, taking care of this n' that, or doing the other things we want.  However, over the last few years I think we have significantly changed how we value our time, and this has led to good things for us...and I sincerely hope it continues to do so!

I have come to realize that I will ALWAYS have a to-do list. And I am okay with that.
Busy becomes a problem when your 'busy-ness' detracts from the things that really matter.  For us, those things are God, our marriage, and relationships with family and friends. 

Oddly enough, those things that matter are one of the reasons we are, in fact, busy.

I hope that we can continue to grow in this and learn to be more discerning with our time.  After all, we don't know how much of it we have on this earth.

The Crash of Twenty-Thirteen

No, not a stock market crash. Something worse, much, much, worse...Just kidding. Let me get to the point:
A couple weeks ago I posted a picture of Jason and I on our first date.  Well, as I was searching for the photo it occurred to me that my hard drives (yes, plural) had crashed several months ago. In fact, I think it was actually last year (hence the crash of 2013).  I haven't been taking a lot of photos lately, so this has not been on the top of mind.  Anyways, I'm searching for this photo and cannot find it anywhere.  I looked in my pile of back-up CDs from ages ago (do people still use those?), I looked on Facebook, Picasa, checked the hard drives I have that DO still work...nothing...then, it occurred to me that I had made a photo book from Shutterfly in the last few years which had those photos! I log in, and there it is! Woohoo!

This weekend, Jason and I completely finished the pond demolition, and proceeded to weed, then fill in the entire area with dirt. We have been working tirelessly on various home projects and were admiring how much we have accomplished:





The pond extended from the far right of our vegetable garden, under our walkway and all the way to the edge of our windows.  It hadn't actually been used in nearly 30 years.

More practical than stagnant pond water.

Now, I know this probably looks pretty insignificant to you, I mean, all we did was move some rocks and pull some weeds? Right?... WRONG.  I would love to show you some 'before' pictures, but that too was lost in the hard drive crash of 2013. When we moved in, there was a rose bush the size of my car (okay, maybe 2/3 of that)...roses have been transplanted (and pruned) to a new space, and now we have beautiful hops.  The pond and several trees are gone. We have a fire pit, a vegetable garden, and a nice fence.

SO. MUCH. WORK. 

 

The rose bushes were so overgrown that you could not open the gate to our deck.

Slowly but surely, our sweat equity is bearing returns.  Actually, it turns out I enjoy pouring my energy into our home.  It feels good to know that I am caring for this space where I will spend several years with my husband, my cat, and maybe someday children (sorry honey, we are NEVER moving).  Hard work not only makes me feel accomplished, but it is biblical!  Perhaps some of my efforts are spent out of pride and vanity, but I would prefer to hope otherwise.  I hope that our efforts are making our home a place where we can better practice hospitality.  I want guests to come into my home and feel at ease.  Actually, I want them to feel comfortable before they even get to the door.  When we are comfortable we start to lower the guard and become vulnerable.  I diverge, this is not what this post was intended to be about.  I'm sure hospitality will be a topic for another day!

Anyways, the point is that I am disappointed in these now non-functioning hard drives... my trip to Australia, our honeymoon, and random moments from here n'there were on those devices.  Surprisingly, I am not too upset.  However, I am wondering how I am going to store photos from here out.  Simple is preferable.

So, all of that to say, I have a question for all of you.  What do you rely on for digital storage? Discs? Hard drive? The cloud? Any specific programs or providers?  There are downfalls to each - CDs and hard drives will not last forever, online storage is likely to have some sort of ongoing subscription cost, etc.

Your turn.