How do I get out of Reaction Mode?

Early in the year, I discovered a wealth of prayers. They’re ancient to those who know them already, but to me, brand new. One was the Morning Offering. There are many versions, but the intention of the offering is to give the day — all of it — to the Lord. I began to make that my habit, and with it, made changes to our homeschool plan to simplify, so started September with hopes for an excellent and peaceful year.

One week into September, and our days had been going perfectly. The kids were having fun, I felt productive and competent, so when the phone rang just as we were taking a break, I answered.

The caller said, “Do you have a minute?”

I had a minute, even five while kids got a quick snack. Yet twenty minutes later, thirty minutes … I was still on the phone, now pacing the driveway trying to wind up the call and get back to work. Finally, I rushed inside fiercely in the grip of the Get-Back-On-Track monster.

It’s amazing how one small change can tip that single domino that then cascades like a swollen river to overtake all of life.

We got back on track, sort of, but I sacrificed some afternoon work time to do it, which meant the next day I found myself trying to squeeze more of my personal/work Must-Dos into the cracks of school time, which meant that whenever I had an extra ninety seconds, I’d pull out my laptop to work on a book launch invite, write a review, reply to an email.

And in the rush of that day, I forgot about starting the crockpot, so started my afternoon “work” time with finding a new plan for dinner, which carried into the next day and ….

The next few days went from fulfilling, if full, to overflowing the edges of time, one task spilling into another and none of it done with any peace or intentionality. I went from leading my homeschool day to responding to every looming deadline (real or self-imposed). I went from living on purpose to living in constant reaction mode.

“I was living life of reacting—not to God’s direction—but to urgent tasks all shoving to be FIRST.”

I still did a Morning Offering, giving the day to the Lord for his work and his intentions. Except by 8:30 am, I’d stopped taking the time to ask … I didn’t have time! I had too much to do!

Until one night when I couldn’t turn off the Must-Do lists in my brain. It was stuck on repeat, first in a scratchy whisper, then in a technicolor shriek, “you have to add that email list to the next campaign, and post to social media, and reply to Emmy’s teacher, and reschedule that appointment, and do your course preps, and make sure the kids practice piano, get those books back to the library, the meeting is at 4, so pick Emeric up at 3:30, which means leave by 3, and have dinner in the crockpot by … ”

As I flipped my pillow, again, I realized something. Very little — even the things I enjoyed on a normal day — brought real joy because they were done in a get-it-done-and-move-on frenzy.

Something had to change.

Being crushed by to-dos and daily responsibilities.

Doing vs. Being

At last I fell into an exhausted sleep. The next morning I went to Mass by myself. I got home and scrapped the day’s homeschool schedule.

“Kids, who wants to go for a walk at the park?” A surprised and delighted chorus of, “Me! Me!”

I had dreams for my family life, for the kids education, for my own recreation time (which currently clocked in at daily total of zero minutes, zero seconds). I longed to do things like knit, read books with real pages, write for the joy of it. Instead, I was living life of reacting—not to God’s direction—but to people’s momentary expectations, urgent tasks all shoving and bickering to be FIRST on my list.

I was desperate to get back to the most important focus of every day: being. Being, at every moment, in the center of God’s will for that moment.

The Lord has a design for my day, a to-do list already written out for me. I had only to still myself enough to hear his voice. Stillness only comes for me when there are no spinning wheels, no shouting to-dos. This is not a new realization.

For a long time I thought I just had to DO all the things, and THEN I could experience stillness. If I ruthlessly evaluated my schedule, cut things, crossed tasks off in wild bouts of extreme productivity … or if I scheduled with the right method of time blocks or a certain app, if I offloaded tasks to others, accounted for every waking (and sleeping) moment …

Problem being, the method doesn’t matter. The length of the list doesn’t matter. I was looking at my day the wrong way.

What if … it’s not about to-doing?

What if there is a way to find stillness in the midst of the ocean waves? What if I can find stillness even when those waves are crashing and rushing across the rocks in my head?

One of our favorite spots.

Those who follow the daily readings will know that it’s unusual for the same passage to appear multiple times, especially in the same week. But this past April, a passage repeated in church services not once, not twice, but three times. It was a passage I knew well: John 15, “I am the vine, you are the branches.”

I knew it so well, in fact, that I wondered why God didn’t send a more dramatic passage. Something loud and exciting and not so … familiar.

Yet, familiar as it was, I didn’t know it.

I’d read it. I’d studied it. I’d memorized it at some point in my teens.

But I didn’t know it, or else I would be living it.

What does it mean to Abide?

As a cluster of grapes takes its nourishment from the vine, I take my nourishment from Jesus. I mean that both literally (he is our “daily bread,” after all) and spiritually. To abide in Christ means I can’t take my nourishment from … what people think of me online, what meal my kids love that isn’t what I cooked, what I’ve checked off my to-do list, what weird noise the washing machine is making or what my editor set as the deadline or …

“My to-do list hasn’t changed, my laundry hasn’t started washing itself, and I still feel the pressure of not enough me to go around.”

Practically speaking, for me this means I take time to seek the Lord. My Morning Offering, an evening time of prayer, but also during the day. If my head feels like it’s spinning off my shoulders from stress, multitasking, kids’ behavior, all the to-dos, I’ve made a commitment to stop. I will go up to my room or walk to the mailbox or just sit for a second and breathe. I’ll tell the Lord my struggles: what’s making my head spin? Why am I overwhelmed, or stressed, or afraid?

And then, the hard part, I listen.

He will direct me, will remind me of what’s most important. Sometimes I’ll be reminded of an actual important to-do, perhaps an email to send or item to discuss with my husband. Or I’ll be pushed in another direction. “Don’t spend your time on that, do this instead.” Or I’ll be told to simply rest.

But what about the laundry, the deadline, the—

Rest.

The dinner dishes, that text I forgot to—

Rest.

And so in every instance, I obey, abide, repeat as many times in a day or even hour as necessary.

My to-do list hasn’t changed, my laundry hasn’t started washing itself, and I still feel the pressure of not enough me to go around. But there is enough HIM to keep me going and doing what he wants me to do. Sometimes it’s the laundry, sometimes teach a new concept in math, and sometimes it’s learning to crochet a granny square.

Getting out of reaction mode is not about the do-ing, it’s about the be-ing.

It’s not a once-and-done prayer I can check off a list; it’s about be-ing ever and always attached to the Vine.