In which I celebrate discipline Archives - Page 2 of 2

A Spiritual Late Bloomer, I Learn from Failure in my Messy Beautiful Life

When my daughter Zoe was born, twenty-one years ago, frazzled between nursing, and impractical plans of still writing, I made a mental prayer list to pray through as I pushed her stroller round our neighbourhood.

And blush: All those items are still on my prayer list.

1 Losing Weight. I still have 12 pounds more to lose of the 20 pounds I gained when pregnant with Zoe. Another pregnancy, with Irene, didn’t help, though that weight I have lost!

2 Running an orderly house. Well, we are now doing so, though, alas, there’s still clutter. I am doing the hopeful 365 Less Things project—a concrete way of getting rid of things by shedding one thing a day–and am hopeful that I will eventually have nothing in my house that is not both beautiful and useful.

3 I wanted to wake up at 5 a.m. because I have romantic associations with 5 a.m., and am still trying! I now go to bed around 9.35 p.m. so waking earlier will gradually becoming easier

4 I wanted to write a big beautiful book—and I still do!! And though I now write pretty much every day, having so organised my life that I feel sad and uncomfortable on the days that I don’t write : that book, ah!—I work on it in fits and starts.

Ouch! Same goals, 21 years later.

* * *

That’s what life is like for an ordinary Christian.

Oswald Chambers (of My Utmost for His Highest), aged 27; Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, and Bill Wilson, Founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, absolutely surrendered themselves to God, once and for all.

Jack Miller made fun of Samuel Johnson’s continual efforts to wake early, saying that that was because Dr. Johnson had not learnt to rely on the power of the Holy Spirit.

And Priscilla Shirer writes that a failed diet is “a direct sign that we have not submitted ourselves completely to the Lord.”

Yup, that’s me. Just learning how to lean on the Holy Spirit. I have surrendered myself to Jesus, but then indiscipline gets the better of me, or grumpiness, or laziness, or… most of the deadly seven!

* * *

However, there are many ways of being a Christian, many concentric circles of discipleship. There is John, the beloved disciple who leans on Jesus during the Last Supper, hearing all the secrets of the universe.

There are Peter, James and John whom Jesus took with him at the Mount of Transfiguration, when they saw his glory, and at Gethsemane, when he wanted moral support. Then there were the twelve apostles, the seventy-two, the hundred and twenty, the five hundred and, of course, the 5000 men, in addition to women and children, who listened spellbound to the Sermon on the Mount.

It is possible to walk through the Sinai desert in ten days, I’ve read. It took the Israelites forty years, as they wandered in circles, grumbling, dispirited, losing their bearings. They are ordinary believers. They are our grandfathers and grandmothers in the faith.

* * *

Wandering in circles: That’s true of things people struggle with for forty years.

One could get one’s house decluttered and organised in six months Marie Kondo says; 9 months according to Joshua Becker. Many struggle with this for decades, all their lives.

Most people could lose their surplus weight in a year through healthy eating and exercise. I could do so myself! Yet, many battle with this for decades, or for all their lives.

One could write a book in a couple of years, at 250 words a day. But many…the blushing, flushing woman you see is me!

Mark Batterson writes in his brilliant book, The Circle-Maker, that the biggest factor in spiritual and occupational success is waking early. We all know it’s better to be awake from 6-8 a.m. than from 10 to 12 p.m. Yet, many struggle with staying up too late, and sleeping in too late all their lives. And I am still grasping at 5 a.m.

* * *

There! I now feel thoroughly downcast over issues I have battled with for two decades when perhaps I could have had them sorted in a year.

What beauty could there be in this mess? What gold among the shards?

1) It’s given me patience, compassion and understanding of my own and other people’s struggles.

Two steps forward, 1.9 backwards is progress. Slow, but definite.

It’s made me realistic about how hard it can be to follow Jesus. And he was realistic about it. Think about his metaphor. Carry your cross and follow him. Walk the narrow path into life.

We are not all fire like Beth Moore or Billy Graham who go for Christ, 100 %, though I’d like to be!

Some of us have feeble arms and weak knees. But we are still in the fight.

2) I have learned the limits of my will, my resolve. Trying to do life on my own and failing has taught me that I need Jesus. It has taught me that it is hard for me to accomplish my goals without the power of the Holy Spirit.

Becoming a Christian for me was, initially, and for many years, an intellectual decision. I was—and am!!—convinced that Jesus was God, and the Bible inspired, and reorganised my life accordingly. Sweeping changes: tithing, prayer, Bible study, church attendance, trying to obey what Jesus taught, implementing the wisdom of Proverbs in my life, that sort of thing.

The true magic of being a Christian is now rose-tinting everything, like sunrise. I am moving from grammar to poetry, from chords to the symphony. The magic: That I can ask Jesus to change my heart. To make me love vegetables. To love to walk and run. To love to sleep early and wake early. To love order. To love the discipline it takes to write.

3) We value virtue through experiencing the opposite. The beauty of domestic order through knowing chaos. The endorphin glow after a run through knowing the misery of physical sluggishness. The joy of writing through knowing the misery of not creating.

4) My failures have given me an increased awareness of the love of God. I have had successes. I opened a letter saying I had been admitted to Oxford University to read English. Opened a letter saying that I had won $20, 000 from the National Endowment for the Arts for my writing!

But I am most conscious of the love of God when I lean into it in failure and low spirits and realise that he loves me anyway. Who knows, perhaps he loves me more fiercely because of my failures and weaknesses, as we fiercely love our toddlers, puppies and old dogs!

5) I note that I have partially failed in all those goals I had as a woozy young mum, pushing my stroller around the neighbourhood, and wryly smile.

Because failure has lost its sting for me. Honestly! My failures make me wryly smile.

Because they are not final.

They are a way of learning. Who I am. What works for me. What does not work. How to pick myself up and go on after “failure.”

I have rarely stumbled on something which has worked for me at the first attempt. It takes trial and error.

And failure has taught me to answer a question of the catechism: Where is God?

God is not over there somewhere, experienced by the perfect and prayerful and good, but right here, in middle of failures; food instead of prayer; newspapers instead of writing; coat dropped on the living room floor; hello, snooze button.

God is not only encountered in prayer and Bible study. He appears, like the beneficent beings of fairy tale, when I most need him. In the trenches of struggle.

* * *

Yes, taking a lick at a dragon, desultory sword thrust by sword thrust, instead of cutting off his head as I might have done were I St. George or a better girl has taught me many things.

Humility for I am not as A type as I imagine. Mercy with others who struggle. The importance of persisting and continuing looking for solutions.

I see the road out of the messy beautiful desert, and I walk down its zigzag paving stones, less conceited than had I achieved my goals quickly; with more to teach, perhaps; with more inspiration to offer such as I who wander in circles until they find the straight path, but finally leave the desert, radiant, leaning on their beloved.

Carry on, Warrior.

New Year’s Resolutions, 2014 : A Long Obedience in the Same Direction

By Anita Mathias

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“The essential thing “in heaven and in earth” is that there should be long OBEDIENCE in the same direction, there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living; for instance, virtue, art, music, dancing, reason, spirituality– anything whatever that is transfiguring, refined, foolish, or divine.” Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

29% of people break their New Year’s resolutions by Jan 14th.

I have cunningly beaten those odds by not formulating them until Jan 14^th!!

No new projects this year–phew!!–just working on my ongoing goals, but with alignment with God and his power, and hopefully more focus, discipline and wisdom. A long obedience in the same direction.

* * *

So I’m peeking at my 2013 goals and hopes, seeing what worked and what didn’t, and formulating my 2014 goals.

Writing

A) I am hoping to complete and publish my memoir, Mind Has Mountains, this year. Have organized it, and written some chapters.

B) Bible Blogging—I have blogged quite a bit on Genesis and Matthew, and would like to complete my reflections on these books, and publish them.

C) “Little Books: ”What we want is not more little books about Christianity, but more little books by Christians on other subjects–with their Christianity latent.” C. S. Lewis

I wrote a little meditation on the Beatitude “The Meek Inherit the Earth,” and an illustrated picture book, “Francesco: Artist of Florence,” last year. The latter is still being illustrated, but will hopefully be on Amazon within a month.

D) Blogging goals—Post 5-6 days a week, taking Sunday off. Do shorter posts (200-500 words) and do more guest posts for other bloggers.

Try to write evergreen posts which can still be read and enjoyed in a year or five years.

II Health and Weight. Diet and Exercise

I lost 5 pounds in 2012, and 10 in 2013.

I would like to lose 26 in 2014 (but won’t be crushed if I lose 11).

How? Steadily build up endurance, walking at least 10,000 steps every day, and 1-3 longer walks every week.

Am doing Yoga most days, because it induces a “change of state,” like prayer does. It helps me feel calm, clear-headed, mentally fresh, emotionally at peace, tension and conflict resolved with all that stretching, quietness and breathing. The mind and body, well, they are inextricable!!

Diet—I plan to avoid sugar and white flour as much as possible. Limit carbs; increase veggies.

I have been physically healthy this year, just one cold and cough, no flu or other illnesses, no doctor visits. That’s because I have changed my diet, having green smoothies 2-3 times a day, and lots of salad and veggies. I have eccentrically been having a spinach and romaine salad with feta and olives for breakfast along with my green smoothie, and intend to continue this!

Am slowly moving to eating more vegetables and beans and fewer carbs.

Am planning to watch out for emotional eating, and only eat when hungry. And ask, “Is this going to be a blessing to my body?”

A Stickk commitment helped—I handed over $5 to charity every week that I did not achieve my weight loss goal of .5 lb!! It kept me focused on how exactly I was doing, and to see beyond daily fluctuations. It made me 10 pounds thinner, and well–poorer too!

III Waking Early

In “The Circle-Maker” Mark Batterson, wrote that early rising is the most important predictor of spiritual AND occupational success.

Last year’s goal was 5 a.m., and I reached 6 a.m. I plan another gradual assault on 5 a.m.

IV Domestic Order

I read once that most gifted under-achievers live in domestic chaos. And I did for a while.

However, since 2008, we’ve had a cleaner once a week, which means we’ve picked everything up for the cleaner once a week. But I haven’t reached William Morris’s and my own domestic ideal of having “nothing in my house that I do not believe to be beautiful or know to be useful.” Or my ideal of having everything in its place.

What’s really helped me since August has been the 365 less things project of getting rid of one thing a day. (Well, okay, I get rid of 7 things the day the cleaner comes).

It’s helped because of the paradigm shift—What am I not using? What can I get rid of? I usually get rid of far more than 7 things. And anticipate having a house with nothing in it that’s neither beautiful nor useful within 1-3 years.

At the moment, I am finishing the decluttering in our bedroom, and working on my study and the library. We bought a romantic, old rambling house, bigger than we needed, which means we have more housework…

V Gardening

I wanted to resume gardening last year, and did so a bit, but then it got dark early, and I got absorbed in writing.

Maybe once I wake earlier, I will have time to do some work in the garden in these short January days.

VI Reading

I so want to recover the girl whose greatest delight was reading, but since I believe in small changes, I will be content if I read one book more than I did last year.

I have started switching off my computer an hour before bedtime to tidy our bedroom, do some yoga, and read myself to sleep, so have that reading slot, and read in the first thing in the morning slot, and a little bit before I write to get the rhythms of good writing into my blood.

The secret of forming a new habit is to find a slot for it, and I am working on that.

So I hope to continue working on these goals, more a long obedience in the same direction, than New Year’s resolutions.

The “I Don’t Do” List Makes Possible the “I Do” List. You Must Revise Your Life

By Anita Mathias

Have you ever thought of creating “I Don’t Do” lists instead of being “crazy-busy?” Check out Shauna Niequist’s or Mary DeMuth’s or Ann Lamott’s.

These lists have humility at their heart. You realize that if your goals differ from every other mum’s in church or at the school gate you cannot do what every other mum at church or at the school gate does. And this fact will come with some sadness and a sense of failure, and you accept that.

You recognize that you are never, never going to do what God has called you to do if you try to do everything that everyone else does. You realize that you can, at most, do one thing well, and so you focus.

* * *

Here is my extreme list, formulated through trial and error, through doing the opposite, and wearing myself out.

What I Don’t Do

1) I don’t cook. At all. I have never learned to. Fortunately for me, I am an erratic cook. And a messy one. Fortunately, for me, too, my husband Roy is an excellent cook.

2) I don’t clean. At all. We do have a splendid cleaner, and have weekly four hour cleans.

3) I don’t enter stores!! Roy buys food. I buy clothes, books, and everything else I need online. And I only shop online for a definite need, not even looking at catalogues or websites or sales. No frivolous shopping any more.

4) I don’t volunteer at my children’s schools. At all. I did some when Zoe was little for the joy it gave her, but I did not enjoy the experience, and would rather relate to my kids one-on-one.

5) I don’t do gyms any more, but walk and do yoga instead.

6) I don’t take meals round for people, except for close friends or in cases of genuine need. I did do that for several women who were ill or had babies, but the sight of the husband lolling with the remote control while we rushed there with their dinner was too galling.

Men are not genetically incapable of boiling spaghetti, grating cheese and chopping a salad, and women should not impose on the good will of other women by asking for meals to be brought around in an age of grocery stores with healthy cooked meals and delivery services. Rant over.

6B) I resent the trivia which churches decide is women’s work. I resist calls on women to serve coffee at church breakfasts; hot cross buns at Easter, and mulled wine at Christmas. Men can heft a decanter of coffee or mulled wine as well as I. Flowers, altar linen, laying out the elements—nah!! Women’s poetry reading and carol services during the work day. Nah!

7) I don’t “do” Christmas. I treat it as a time for rest.

What I Do Do

1) I do pray every day.

Without it, I lose my way, get depressed, forget priorities, get angry about silly things (notice my rant about meals), waste my time, waste my life.

2) I pretty much read or listen to my Bible every day. Many small tweaks in my daily life spring from my daily Bible reading.

Without Bible reading, I would soon lose my enthusiasm and passion for Christ, and for living as a Christian. That’s a fact.

3) I write every day.

4) I read every day.

5) I exercise pretty much every day, as much for mental health as well as for physical health.

6) And I nap every day I need to. Essential if I am to drag myself from my bed somewhat early.

7) We eat a family dinner together almost every day, and family lunches at weekends.

7B I spend time with friends twice a week

(P.S. I’d love to say 8) I wake up at 5 a.m. every day, but sadly, that wouldn’t be true L

Gosh, how much I had to cut to get this into place, and how much more unnecessary “fat” there is to cut. Facebook and Twitter, anyone?

Anne Lamott again: Every single day I try to figure out something I no longer agree to do. You get to change your mind—your parents may have accidentally forgotten to mention this to you. I cross one thing off the list of projects I mean to get done that day.

How about you? What’s on your “I Don’t list”, and on your “I Do list?”

The Best Way to Develop Shiny New Habits

By Anita Mathias

Blogging almost daily for three and a half years has led to self-awareness. I have grown bored of boasting of my weaknesses.

There is a time for self-analysis, and a time for acting on that analysis, and that time came!

And so I am in the process of developing shiny new habits. These are not yet jelled, but the trajectory is looking good.

* * *

The best way I know to form new habits is the most boring, but the most certain.

Start where you are. [Read more…]

Two Difficult Things by December

By Anita Mathias

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Alice laughed. “One can’t believe impossible things.

“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.“

Luckily, I have only two difficult things to do before January, but they are going to take all my focus for the rest of the year.

One is a pilgrimage in Tuscany in September, walking 8-14 miles a day. Since I am currently walking 4.5 miles most days, it will be a challenge! But not an impossible one! My reading (yeah, my first step to doing anything: buy a book!) suggests that one can, relatively easily, increase one’s total weekly mileage by 10 % each week, (and, with steady training, it is possible to go from couch to running a half marathon in six months) so I am optimistic that I will get there. Walking hills easily—um… um..

I think the only way I will be able to easily walk 8-14 miles a day in the hills of Tuscany in September (given my current fitness) is to take up running. Fortunately, I love running far more than walking. (I can’t run fast yet, alas, but running unleashes endorphins and endocannabinoids so that I return euphoric, happy, mentally clear, thinking positively, feeling optimistic and loving, with “calm of mind, all passion spent,” in Milton’s phrase.

In such a state of mind, one feels less need to manipulate one’s brain chemistry to find a high through the highly addictive salt, sugar, fat, or chocolate which has been the bane of my life for so many years.

I am reading a fascinating book called The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg which talks about keystone habits. Implementing these unleashes a cascade of positive changes in people’s lives.

One of these keystone habits, unsurprisingly, is exercise. You end up eating better partly because you need to for your run, and partly because the endorphins your run generates means you need less “comfort food,” and also because it’s hard to undo the effects of a run with a heavy, unhealthy meal. You think better, work better, and sleep better. The confidence generated by taking up challenging exercise spills over into work, relationships, adopting new challenges, etc.

* * *

The other difficult thing I plan to do by December is to complete my memoir of an Indian Catholic childhood, on which I have worked off and on for 15 years, though I more or less shelved it in 2006. But I feel uneasy and discontent until it is wrapped up, and now the time has come to do so.

I have signed with Darrell Vesterfelt of Prodigal Press, and my book will be published in April 2014. Which means I have to finish it by December. Which means serious hours of work.

I feel God has been beautifully stitching my life together. The running will help me be mentally fresh and physically capable of the hours at my desk that it’s going to take to finish this book by December.

I have a first draft of the book, but need the structure (turning in weekly chapters) and encouragement, editing and coaching that Darrell and Prodigal Press will provide to have it done by December.

* * *

I am meditating through the Gospel of Matthew at moment.

Repent for the Kingdom of God is near, (Matt 3:2). So the adult Jesus is introduced in the Gospel of John. Repent, a 180 degree turn from doing your own thing to living in the Kingdom, in the force field of God’s presence and power, doing things as God enables you.

I have had a very pleasant, though hedonistic holiday in Corfu, but now that I am home, discipline feels sweet to my soul.

Repenting, turning, returning. Back to a more disciplined way of eating, turning away from the pleasures of souvlaki, gyros, spanakopita, moussaka, baklava, and halwa to things which unequivocally bless my body, a plethora of fruits and veggies and beans and sprouts. (Roy is becoming a gourmet veggie cook, so don’t feel too sad for me).

No more staying up late, and sleeping in, but returning to a disciplined sleep/wake schedule. Early to bed!!

And lazy beach walks and desultory hikes will be replaced by determined 7-8 km run/walks. Am doing a 7 km race walk in Hyde Park on April 14^th. Join me?

Ah, back to discipline. Reading, writing for long hours, with Pomodoro breaks every 25 minutes to tidy up, and the internet switched off with Antisocial and Stayfocusd, wonderful apps.

Discipline, anchored in the vine! If I try to be disciplined on my own strength, energy and enthusiasm, well, they soon peter out, but anchored in Jesus, with his sweet life flowing through me, ah, in that there is hope!!

What are your challenges for the rest of the year? Tell me!

A Simple Organisation and Time-Management Strategy for Disciples of Jesus Christ

By Anita Mathias

As a young Christian, I (and my church) were influenced by World Harvest Mission’s Sonship Course. I went through it once with our pastor, Bob Hopper, and once with Paul Miller, who had co-written it.

I had not quite been in America for a decade then, and was still quite resistant to the way the American church conflated Christianity and the American way of maximum productivity. Very early on in Sonship, there was discussion of discipleship and daytimers (diaries). About how the battle to have quiet time with God was won or lost depending on when one went to bed the previous night. On the importance of organization.

There was this wonderful precept, “We all overestimate what we can do in the short run, and underestimate what we can do in the long run with the grace and power of God.”

Organization was presented an aspect of discipleship.

* * *

Roy and I were not organized. I, for instance, rarely bothered with calendars diaries or to do lists, preferring to keep things in my head. Which worked in the past, though now that life is very busy, I do need to write important things down!!

However, I have to say that the basic organizational strategy of ranking things according to their importance and urgency, and doing the most important (or urgent) first has begun to bring a sense of peace and harmony to our marriage.

* * *

I have two mid-life reflections on this.

One is that is never too late to change. After a lifetime of being a messy, disorganized housekeeper and I am becoming tidier and more organized, week by week—as I set aside a weekly chunk of a few hours to put everything back in the right place, and get rid of everything I do not need, want or love.

The other is this: We need to be organised and disciplined in our use of time to be able to fulfil the destiny and calling God has for us. Without organisation, we are perhaps unlikely to make either our own dreams come true, or the plans God has for us.

Learning the basics of organisation and time-management is part of our calling to follow Jesus and be fruitful.

* * *

It’s amazing HOW MUCH the stress and the sense of being out of control has been alleviated by this simple tactic.
Each day make four lists,
A) Urgent, to be done that day, or in the next few days
B) Important
C) Good
D) Trivial.
First go through the urgent, then the important, the good and, last of all, the trivial.
Funny, after a few days of doing this, there is not much left on the urgent list, so we no longer bounce from crisis to crisis.

* * *

This famous story (from Evan Carmichael’s blog) illustrates the same point.

Ivy Ledbetter Lee was a consultant for many business moguls of that time: Westinghouse, Lindbergh, Chrysler, and Charles M. Schwab. During his consultancy work for Bethlehem Steel, founded and run by Charles M. Schwab, Lee told Schwab, “”I can increase your people’s efficiency – and your sales – if you will allow me to spend fifteen minutes with each of your executives.”

Schwab replied that what Bethlehem Steel employees needed was not to know more, but to work more… but asked Lee how much it would cost him. Lee said, “Nothing, unless it works. After three months, you can send me a check for whatever you feel it’s worth to you.”

Thus a deal was made: in the span of about a ¼ of an hour, Lee was supposed to be able to give Schwab and his employees a method that would increase company effectiveness by at least 20-50%.

Schwab called a meeting with his executives the next day. Once seated, Lee gave Schwab and the others a sheet of paper and told them to write down the six most important things they had to work on the next day. As they were writing them down, Lee instructed them to do number them in order of importance.

Lee instructed those in the room further: they were to, each morning, pull out yesterday’s list and, at the beginning of their workday, and start working on Item 1 first. Once that was completed, they were to scratch that item out – and proceed to number 2 on the list, and so on – in order. He added that all were to read the list occasionally throughout the day, looking at the item to which they were currently attending.

Lee told Schwab and his executives not to worry if they didn’t complete all tasks on their sheet for any certain day. It was only important that they work on the most important item first, then the next important, and so on – adding that, if this method didn’t improve efficiency, nothing would.

Lee finished up by telling Schwab and his employees to spend the last five minutes of every working day writing a new “must do” list for tomorrow’s tasks. They were to follow these steps every day for 90 days.

Lee called Schwab aside after he concluded the meeting and told him, “Try this method out for three months, then send me a check for whatever you think it was worth.”

Just a 15-minute meeting… and no more than 5 minutes a day for employees to write a list!

A mere two weeks later, Schwab sent Lee a check for $25,000 (worth more than $400,000 in today’s dollars). He clipped a note to the check. In the note, Schwab told Lee that this was the most profitable business lesson he had ever learned – and that is saying something, considering that Schwab had, in earlier years, worked under financier J.P. Morgan! Over time, following this simple method, Schwab and his executives turned Bethlehem Steel into the biggest independent steel producer in the world, surpassing both U.S. Steel and Carnegie Steel, both for whom Schwab had been president prior to founding Bethlehem Steel. One simple method… and Schwab amassed a personal fortune of $100 million.
The simple act of making prioritized lists is meant to increase productivity by 25%!!

In which I Resolve to Wake Early

By Anita Mathias

I remember a talk by Jack Miller of World Harvest Mission which made fun of Samuel Johnson (Dr. Johnson’s) resolutions to wake earlier. “I am resolved to wake at noon tomorrow. Though it be late, it is still earlier than the time I work today–which was noon”
And so it goes, through the decades, going to bed at 2, or 3 or 4, waking up in the afternoon, excoriating himself, resolutions, failure.
The audience roared with laughter. I found it tragic.
Miller concluded that that this cycle of resolution and failure was because Johnson, a Christian, did not know how to rely on the power of God.
Perhaps…
I do know I have rarely succeeded in waking early for any length of time.
Steve Pavlina in his personal development blog suggests that the usual advice given–sleep at the same time, wake at the same time–is faulty. He suggests instead sleeping only when one is really, really sleepy–but waking at the same time, daily.
I should try it. After all, what can be lost by waking up when one is still tired? One can always nap.
I am going to put my alarm 5 minutes earlier tomorrow than it was today, and so on everyday, until I am waking up early.
Stay tuned.