A Life Interrupted

Lately I have been feeling rather defeated by the demands of having a baby/toddler again. My time is certainly not my own anymore. I had forgotten how "on" you have to be. Even when I think The Nugget1 is busy and I may have a 1/2 hour to cook or knit or read, I rarely attempt to take advantage of it. Why? Probably because I know that his "I-No-Longer-Have-Mama's-Undivided-Attention" radar will go off and he will drop whatever he was so thoroughly engaged in and suddenly need me. Why do I assume he is going to need me? Why don't I even try? and What if he does interrupt me? What is the worse that can happen? I can try and include him in my activity or if that doesn't work then I can just wait for the next opportunity to get back to what I was doing. My standard M.O. right now has been to just admit defeat without even trying. It makes me miserable.

Fortunately, I have read a couple of things over the past weeks that have given me encouragement to look at this situation in a different way with different eyes. It really is all about perspective and attitude on my part. The Nugget1 is doing exactly what he is supposed to be doing.

The first is a short statement that really resonated with me. It is "We may not all live holy lives, but we live in a world alive with holy moments." This is from the book Simple Truths by Kent Nerburn.

The second (and my apologies, because it is long) comes from the Plain and Joyful Living Newsletter written by Tonya. Details about the newsletter can be found at Tonya's blog, Plain and Joyful Living. Tonya writes about a section she read in a book called Praying While You Work - Devotions for the Use of Martha Rather Than Mary by Hubert van Zeller. Here is the excerpt she included in her piece:

"The only thing that really matters in life is doing the will of God. Once you are doing the will of God, then everything matters. But apart from the accepted will of God, nothing has any lasting reality.

So if God wills that you should be bowed over the sink in the pantry instead of over the bench in your favorite church, then washing up is for you, now, the most perfect thing you can possibly do.

If you once really appreciate this truth, and act according to its implications, you save yourself a lot of unnecessary heart-searching and resentment. The whole business of serving God becomes simply a matter of adjusting yourself to the pressures of existing conditions. This is the particular sanctity for you.

You will be tempted to say that it is impossible to serve God while worrying about the upkeep of a house, you will tell me that you get so irritable that you cannot see this principle of substituting the present duty for the envied prayer-time, you will point out your inability to direct your intentions towards God when you are so exhausted that you cannot think, you will quote your repeated failures, your bitterness, your manifest falling off from what you were before you came to be overwhelmed with household cares, your dependence upon all sorts of help which are denied to you. You will say you are unsuited temperamentally, physically, spiritually by training....

But none of these things disqualifies. It can only be repeated that your whole business is still to look for God in the midst of all of this. You will not find Him anywhere else. If you leave your dishes, your housekeeping, books, your telephone calls, your government forms, your children's everlasting questions, your ironing, and your invitations to take care of themselves while you go off and search for our Lord's presence in prayer you will discover nothing but self.

This is the first lesson for the Christian wife and mother today: to let go of what may once have been and under other circumstances might now be a recollected self and take on, with both hands, the plan of God. Indeed it is the lesson for every Christian in every age: it is the Gospel principle of dying on one plane in order live on another."

While I must admit that the language used in this piece is not language that I am completely comfortable with, that is solely my issue – one that I am working on. My issues aside, the piece spoke to me. I knew its message applied to me right now. As I have done in the past and in an effort to get beyond the language that bothered me, I tried re-reading the piece with Buddhist eyes. (Not that I am highly qualified in that area.) But, what little I do know about Buddhism does deeply resonate with me. So with my very novice and beginner Buddhist eyes, I re-read the piece. The Buddhist beliefs about suffering and mindfulness and impermanence and non-attachment are prevalent throughout this piece.

Any circumstance we may find ourselves in, whether it be one of sadness or happiness or anger or frustration, is impermanent. We can no more make the good times last than we can make the bad times last. Nothing lasts. Life is ever-changing. We suffer when we become attached to the idea that life should be a certain way for us. Being mindful of these ideas and bringing this awareness to all of our present moments is all we need to alleviate our own suffering and the suffering of others.

So what have I learned: I am causing my own suffering with my attachment to my life as it was before The Nugget1. The Nugget1 is not always going to be a toddler. He will grow up all too soon and will no longer need or even desire my attention. This set of circumstances I find myself in is certainly not permanent, but it is where I am right now. As I have tried to apply these ideas in my every day life, I have felt a transformation this week. I am more at peace. I have experienced more joy and less frustration. And although not specifically my goal, I have accomplished more this week than I have in the last four months combined. I have read. I have knitted. I have practiced yoga. I have cooked both alone, for the sheer pleasure of it, and with the kids. While doing all of these things, I have been interrupted too many times to count. But I have also seen the world alive with holy moments and most of these moments have come during the interruptions.