Time Away, Family and I Quit

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I’ve been away from my blog for almost an entire month!!!! So I’ve shared a TON of photos! This past month we took some time away to enjoy one another as family. We went to a cabin way up in the mountains, shut off our phones, set aside our computers and played! We climbed rocks, trees and mountains. We swam in beautiful lakes, made fishing poles out of sticks, had picnics, relaxed in a hammock, flew down a mountain on an alpine slide, played in an arcade, rode on a boat, spent time with friends, stayed up late, baked chocolate chip cookies, read stories by a fire, and laughed a lot.

Despite the ever so painful and terrifying story of us all going for a hike and getting attacked by a swarm of hornets like something out of  a horror film….aaaaaaand the car sickness on the way back down from the mountain that ended up with us all on the side of the road with vomit everywhere in our car…we had a wonderful time. 🙂  (Gross I know, but hey, I promised I’d always be real!!!)

Taking time away from the routine was something like a cocoon for me. It felt sort of like a pressure cooker of growth. I had so many questions swirling in my mind and so many topics that needed to be thought through, talked about and prayed over. Matt and I used the time while driving and the quiet late nights with no technology to sort through these things on our minds.

We left the mountains with clarity, direction and an excitement for some big changes…but it doesn’t mean those changes are easy.

The sum of our conversations could be whittled down to two words:  

“I Quit.”

Now, before your mind goes crazy with what it is I am quitting, let me be more specific….

I quit closing off my heart to the things I’m afraid of.

I quit the rat race.

I quit doing things that I’ve always done, simply because I’ve always done them.

 

Very practically, those big themes look something like this….

• I’ve decided to pull my children out of public school to homeschool instead. (I used to swear I’d NEVER EVER homeschool…more on this later….)
• I’ve intentionally stopped investing in two very toxic relationships with unnamed individuals.
• I am throwing many things away that I no longer use even though I’ve held onto them for years.
• I am opening my ears to listen to others who know more about certain topics than I do in regards to healthcare for my family (more on this later too…)
• I am asking the question “Why do I do that?” instead of saying “I’ve always done it this way.”
• I am finding new ways to organize our lives to work FOR us rather than us just living in survival mode.

These things make for huge changes, and are choices that require a great deal of time, money, intentionality, patience, boldness, a sound mind and a relentless determination to not give up…because gosh, can I just say, it’s so easy to give up?! At the same time, though, I am more convinced than ever that this life is short, our days are limited and I refuse to continue on not examining how this could go better.

I’m tired of saying I’m tired…

I cannot imagine a caterpillar feels comfortable in it’s cocoon. I would imagine that a caterpillar feels cramped, tired, overworked, frustrated and hopeless at times. I often wonder if caterpillars have any idea what their life will be like when they get out of that tight space…flying must seem like a fairy tale for a creature who has only known incredibly slow crawling. But oh how worth it the struggle in the cocoon must be in the end when that bug begins to soar!

So, I’ll just put this out there….I have no idea what soaring is like right now either, but I’m making every effort to bust out of this tight space to try and find out….

It’s your turn! Share with me…

Are there things that you do or don’t do because you’ve just “never done it that way” or “always done it this way?”

Is there something that you know is not best for you or your family that you need to eliminate?

Is there something that you should be doing but you are afraid to try?

Is there a time when you’ve just said “no” to something to be able to say “yes” to what matters most?

I can’t wait to hear from you!