the ONE thing i would have done differently on vacation that would have made it a whole lot better

When we left for vacation I was wound tighter than a ball of string.  Work was extremely stressful.  We had several participants pass away over the weeks leading up to my vacation.  We were also working through one of the most intense scenarios with a participant that I have ever experienced and I was leaving for an entire week!  I kept seeing all of the back to school pics on Facebook and knew that I would be returning home to the excitement and anxiety of one child starting junior high and the other high school.  I was anticipating the pattern of high stress that my husband faces every fall.    On top of that I was not exercising on a consistent basis and felt like I had gained 20 pounds.  BLAH!  I needed the beach!

So I drove for two days with one thought on my mind . . . I need the beach!  We arrived at the condo.  I unpacked the suitcases, made the beds, traveled to the grocery store twice (stupid tin foil!!), cooked dinner and prepared the overnight French toast for my husband's birthday breakfast the next morning all with one thought on my mind . . . I need the beach!  By then it was dark and I was exhausted so I fell into bed knowing that I would be up at the crack of dawn which is exactly what I wanted to have happen. I couldn't wait for morning!

My eyes flew open at 6AM.  I grabbed my book, my chair and my mug of coffee.  Running over the dunes I leapt across the sand landing in my chair.  Book open, coffee sipped, the sunrise shimmering across the waves.  Ahhhhh . . . I'm at the beach! 

Let me repeat that.  Ahhhhh . . . I'm at the beach!  Wait - Why was I not relaxing?!?!?  Random thoughts kept popping into my mind.  My skin felt tight.  I had a headache.  My body was not responding to my command to RELAX! 

This happened over and over throughout the week.  Riding the waves . . . not relaxing.  Playing Monkey in the Middle in the pool . . . not relaxing.  Watching an amazing lightening display over the ocean . . . not relaxing.  Watching a movie . . . not relaxing. 

I kept telling myself to relax.  But those random thoughts were like an unending bag of popcorn in the microwave!  I kept trying to stuff them and tell them to leave me alone!  I was here to relax.

Before I knew it, it was Friday morning.  My last morning on the beach.  As I had planned, I took a tablet and pen with me down to the shore.  I wanted to be "prepared" for life when I got home so that I returned ready to roll while holding on to this state of relaxation I was to have achieved while away. 

I sat in my favorite spot with the sun shining on my face and the surf nibbling my toes.  I looked out over the waves . . . Come on!  It's the last day.  RELAX!!!

"Give your burdens to the Lord, and He will take care of you."  Psalm 55:22 NLT

What was that? 

"Give your burdens to the Lord, and He will take care of you."  Psalm 55:22 NLT

Seriously????  I can be so stupid some times.  God had literally been staring me in the face the ENTIRE week.  I was so busy trying to ignore my stress-filled thoughts and relax that I ignored Him.  God was right there waiting for me to hand Him my stress and worries.

So I sat there in my chair in my favorite spot with the sun shining on my face and the surf nibbling my toes and had a nice long conversation with God.  By the end of our talk I had written down the three things that were bothering my the most and identified two action steps that I would take in each area when I got home.  I closed the tablet, walked up to the condo, put the tablet in a dresser drawer, walked back down to the beach and had the BEST day of the entire week.

Next year I'm having this conversation on day ONE of my vacation!

Thank you Lord for a great week at the beach - and a great life lesson!

Finding Silence in the Drive-Thru

We spent this weekend visiting our friend Bill.  It turns out that Bill is not a coffee drinker.  In fact, Bill does not even own a coffee pot.  (Seriously!?!?  Bill - I'm getting you one for Christmas!)  Being the type of person who has her coffee set to brew 15 minutes before her alarm goes off and who takes her first sip of the arousing brew before her eyes are fully open - this was a bit of a problem.  So in the morning, I pulled my hair back into a messy ponytail, grabbed the keys and flew down to the McDonald's drive-thru the moment my brain even considered waking up.   

This morning I pulled into a parking spot and enjoyed my steaming cup of coffee and flipped through the pages of a magazine. Thirty minutes later as I re-started the car and headed back to Bill's, I realized that I had just spent thirty minutes in silence.  Music had not been playing.  No one was talking to me.  The theme song to Good Luck Charlie or the sounds of players tackling each other on Madden had not been echoing around me.  There were no outside sounds such as traffic or even birds.  No interruptions.  Just silence. 

When was the last time I sat in silence?  To tell you the truth . . . I don't remember.  (When was the last time I looked at a magazine somewhere other than in the bathroom?  I confess that I don't remember that either!) 

As I drove, I realized that the car was still silent.  I had turned the radio volume down as I went through the drive-thru and had never turned it back up.  At first I felt a little strange.  There was a kind of white noise in my ears.  Then I realized that I actually felt calm and relaxed. 

Later in the day as I waited for my family to pack up their belongings (Driven by my caffeinated state of being, I had my stuff packed and in the car before the rest of the gang got moving!), I searched the web for "the benefits of silence."  One writer compared spending time in silence to plugging your cell phone into the wall - you get re-charged (www.omtimes.com).  Another compared the brain's need for silence to the body's need for food (www.arinanikitina.com).  Both agreed that spending a brief time each day in silence increases creativity and decreases stress. Several other articles talked about silence boosting the immune system, lowering blood pressure and regulating hormones. 

I found my favorite comment on the benefits of silence several pages into my search.  An article from www.top7business.com entitled Enjoy the Silence: The 7 Powers of Silence in Business said,
          "Those who enter a period of silence each day learn to hear the song of their heart. 
            They learn to listen to the song that only they can sing."

I have to be honest that I had never visited any of these websites before today.  I was actually surprised that after going through several pages of my Google search, I did not find any articles by prestigious universities or well-known (at least to me) authors.  Some major medical research center HAS to be doing research on the benefits of silence, don't you think?

Regardless of who is saying what about the benefits of spending time in silence, I felt refreshed by my silent time this morning.  Getting a break from the noise of the world and having the opportunity to mindlessly turn the pages of a magazine while joyfully sipping my hot coffee was a real treat. 

There is a McDonald's not far from my house.  Maybe I should drive down there for coffee on a Saturday morning every once in a while instead of making my coffee at home.  Though I'd run a much greater risk of running into someone I know as I sit in my car wearing my PJ's having my first cup of morning coffee than I did at Bill's house.