One of Those Days

You know you are a mom when you have one of those days.  I was in the laundry room changing out loads, folding a few things, getting another load  ready to go, and then I turned around and walked back into the living room to discover hair on the floor...lots..of..hair..on the floor.  And then I followed the trail of hair and found the owner....Olivia.  At the end of the trail was the scissors...the weapon of mass destruction!  Yup,  Olivia has a new haircut.  One we have deemed the Achy Breaky Hair Cut  in honor of mullets. 

And that was just the beginning.  After watching Olivia willingly put herself in time-out,  Nathan proceeds to yell out from his bedroom that something was the matter with his mouth.  I race into the bedroom (with the scissors in my hand)  to find Nathan holding a crown from his tooth.  My crown fell out mom!  Okay,  I'll call the dentist after I vacuum the hair off the floor. Don't lose your crown!  Put it in a ziploc bag!

Another cup of coffee, some tylenol for the headache that had set in, and a deep breath.  Remember the rewind button we have on our refrigerator?  I pushed it.  I pushed it hard!  I didn't want to just rewind and start the day over.  I wanted it to disappear.  I wanted to make a fast forward button to replace the rewind button.  Better yet,  I needed a delete button too!

What would I tell another mother if she were to come to me and vent?  Swearing is good.  It is a release, right?  A pan of brownies is good.  But then I will have to walk around with all the stress on my stomach or my hips or thighs.  Who can pray after that morning?  Who feels like believing that all things work together for our good?

All I heard beneath my swearing was Breathe.  Just breathe.  Swear if you need to, but give more attention to breathing.  You are an all things kind of mom.  Move your attention to the creation of solutions to all things. Replace stress with love and solutions.  

I thought about what it would be like to replace stress with love.  How does that go?  What does that feel like? How is it so easy to want to stay, and even love being in the stress mode?  Kids off to school and Olivia in dad's care for a little while why I got my act together, I thought about that.  I felt the stress in my head... a headache.  I felt the tension in my shoulders.  I felt the heaviness of  the events in the ache of my back.  I started to write down what I loved about this situation.  I loved that Olivia still had hair, and that really, it was only hair.  I loved that hair grows back.  I loved  that Nathan's tooth wasn't in any pain and that we have the ability to pay for a dentist to put it back on his tooth.  I loved that Olivia didn't hurt herself with the scissors and I loved that Nathan doesn't mind going to the dentist.  I began to relax and breathe a little deeper.  I began to breathe in the love and breathe out the stress.  Giving love dissolved the stress.  Giving love changed the way my body felt.  Giving love, I received grace.  Giving love changed the rest of what I experienced that day.  I went to the grocery store and could smile, genuinely smile, at the checkout girl and tell her to have a nice day.  I could wait in a long traffic line while construction workers slowly moved a truck around, and instead of being impatient, I could bless them and thank them for fixing our highways in my thoughts and pray for their safety.  That felt so much better than muttering less than gracious adjectives underneath my shallow breath. Giving love, I could forgive myself for being so upset with Olivia, and I could forgive her.  I could reassure her little four -year-old mind that I would still give her love.

An all things mom gives all things to God, who is Love.  An all things mom believes that with God, who is LOVE, all things are possible, and all things (LOVED) do work together for God's greater purposes.  It is LOVE that causes us to bear all things, even a four-year-old's attempt at cutting her hair, even a crown that fell off a tooth.  I am learning to try and turn to love's side first, instead of anger and fear.  I am trying to allow God to re-train my heart to cling to love instead of stress.  The kingdom is going to contain crowns that fall to the ground and hair-dos that won't hold a tiara, but when I purposely seek LOVE (which is what the kingdom is built of)  and give my mind to God's righteousness (right-thinking and right action) all these things will be added unto me.  Luke 12: 29-31.  And might I say, all these things were added unto the checkout girl and the construction workers.  Thanks to love's grace, they received some of that love too.  They didn't have to bear my stress or my anger or my negativity.  To their heart, God magnified and multiplied love and blessings from my heart. 

I can do, survive, and thrive in all things through Christ (LOVE) which strengthens me.  Love filled me and strengthened me to see the day in a new light, and to really trust that the day is truly perfect because now I see it through the lens of love instead of self-pity. 

For the seed (LOVE) shall be prosperous; the vine(LOVE) shall give her fruit, and the ground (LOVE) shall give her increase, and the heavens (LOVE) shall give their dew;  and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things.  Zechariah 8:12  Every thought and feeling of love is a seed of prosperity, it is the vine that will give me fruitful solutions.  It is the ground of love that I must firmly plant my feet upon and move forward on its path, increasing love and blessings to everyone I meet on that path, be it construction workers, grocery check out assistants, teachers, neighbors, or children.  It is my openness and willingness to be love that causes us to experience heaven here.  The remnants of my soul belong, and are possessed, by love and all things loved.

A crown and some hair taught me to breathe deeply,  love more readily, and helped fashion my all things ministry as a mom.  All things good and not-so-good are going to happen when you have three children.  I am certainly not responding to all things perfectly.  I will probably swear under my breath again, and I will probably have to put myself in time-out again.  I will probably have to rewind, fast forward, and delete many of my failed attempts.  But I am willing to be re-trained, re-minded that I AM  LOVE and I have the grace to choose a loving response to all things, and that is exactly why I pray in the morning.  That is precisely why I give my mind and my heart over to Silence every morning.  Because when I don't lay my spirit before God's feet, I forget the ground of love beneath my feet that supports my every step.  I forget that my heart is heaven and  my mind is the kingdom, and I have a body that is helping me to increase the message and actions of love, prospering love, and helping others possess love while on this earth.

I guess it took a little hair and a tiny crown to deepen love in me.  A little hair and a tiny crown did work together because love was given a chance to let things work out the way they were supposed to.  Love was given a chance to work on my heart. Every thing that happens has the holy potential to mold us and  transform us into our natural state, which is only love.  All things work together for the good of those that love the Lord and are called according to his purpose. Romans 8: 28.