Finding Balance.....

"Balance. It's like a unicorn; we've heard about it, everyone talks about it and makes airbrushed T-shirts celebrating it, it seems super rad, but we haven't actually seen one. I'm beginning to think it isn't a thing."                      --Jen Hatmaker

Every year about this time, I start making a list of all the things I'm going to do differently this year. You know, the usual realistic goals.  Become a bible scholar, learn to cook like Julia Childs, develop the same exercise discipline as Jillian Michaels, organize my home like Martha Stewart, write a masterpiece, and lose 100 lbs.   And in my spare time, I'll be the perfect wife, the perfect mother, the perfect daughter, sister, neighbor and friend.... aaaannnddd carve out some extra "self-care" time for me!  It sure sounds like I have found the key to a healthy balanced life, doesn't it?  

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

This year, I'm going to do things much differently.  Yes, I'll set some goals, but I'm going to add a lot more grace in the mix.  My Wednesday Morning Girls Group recently finished reading Lysa Terkeurst's "The Best Yes" and it rocked my world.  Learning how to not only figure out what to say "yes" and "no" to, but how to make room in your life for your "Best Yes's" was truly eye-opening.  We can't just wait around for life to bring us opportunities and then decide which of those opportunities we will say "yes" to.  We need to figure out what bring us JOY in this life and create those experiences for ourselves sometimes.  We need to take time to examine our souls and find out what passions God placed in our hearts.  When we do that, it's so much easier to figure out what we should be spending our time doing.  

Our society definitely puts pressure on us all to GO, GO, GO and DO, DO, DO!  Looking at each other's social media feeds is sure to make us all feel like our lives are lacking somehow.  A couple of weeks ago I saw a good friend who had posted pics from her beautiful family Christmas. I immediately felt like a big Christmas failure.

--- Her tree looked exquisite!  Mine looks like Charlie Brown's.  

--- Her table settings looked like they could have been in a Southern Living magazine!  I don't own fancy Christmas dishes, but I DID send The Hubs down to Dollar General to buy real napkins.  WE CAN BE CLASSY TOO. 

--- Her turkey looked moist and cooked to perfection!  My turkey came out too undercooked... THE THINGY POPPED OUT I SWEAR!....so after carving it and realizing the pink color of the meat indicated a problem, we put it back in the oven and over cooked it to crunchy perfection.  Think "Christmas Vacation".  The kids told me it was delicious anyway.  My kids are excellent liars.  

Sigh..... #ChristmasFail 

And just like that, I decided it was time to take a social media break for a couple of weeks and it was one of the best things I did in 2016!  Social media breaks will definitely be something I incorporate into my 2017 routine.  I recently read statistics that showed links to constant social media use with depression and anxiety.  More stats show that people who constantly check social media get less sleep, feel less satisfied with their lives, and suffer from mood-swings.  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE many things about social media.  I love that when I'm halfway around the world, I can look on friends and families pages and see what they have been up to. It's a great way to stay connected to people you care about that maybe you don't see often.  But just like anything good, if it's not used well, it can become a bad thing in our lives.  So in an effort to keep my life... ahem... in "balance", I'm definitely going to cut back on my social media time.   Or at least that's the plan.  HA!

When I think back on all the hours I spent cruising around on Facebook in 2016, I don't see a lot of value that it brought into my world.  So I'm hoping to find other things in 2017 that I can do with much of that time that might actually have productivity involved.  Something to show from all that time spent.  Maybe I'll actually get some new songs written and a new CD recorded.  Wouldn't THAT be lovely!  :-)  

SO....instead of making a list of what I'm going to ADD into my life in 2017 to make it more fabulous, I've decided to make a list of what I'm going to DELETE from my already overwhelmed schedule.  Or at least what I'll cut back on!  Social Media time is definitely at the top of that list.  Balance may be as elusive as a unicorn..... but I'm still gonna try my best to find a sliver of it in my crazy world.  And instead of striving to be like Julia, Jillian or Martha, I'll give Marcia much more grace to just be... well... Marcia.

What about you guys?  What is something that you can DELETE from your lives this year that will help you find the elusive unicorn named "Balance"?   Do tell.....

Here we go 2017.  Let's do this!

All the love,

M