Unfolding

Unfolding

I’ve got a plan. Do you? I’ve got a plan for Thanksgiving prep, a writing plan for the remainder of my grad school semester, and a food plan for what I will and will not eat during the upcoming calorie-rich holidays. I have a plan for the flowers I’ll do for my niece’s upcoming wedding, a plan for systematically purging the paper in my study, and a plan for sending out the Christmas cards I wrote last week (hopefully well in advance of Christmas).

But what I think I need is a plan to stop planning. At least for a little while.

Every time I spend a few days at my favorite place of retreat, I come away awed at how good stillness feels. And I wish I could become better at letting my minutes and hours and days simply unfold. Not every day. I do have work that must be done to pay bills. But I don’t have to fill every available slot on my calendar with swift and surgical deliberation. I’m not that essential to the operation of the universe.

I normally justify my busyness by saying I don’t want to miss anything. But I see that I could easily justify my stillness with the same phrase. I wonder what I’ve already missed in my hurry to get it all done.

A devotional given last weekend by a friend recommended what he called “focal practice.” Being present in the moment. This is how he said he could know he was there: “There’s no place I’d rather be. There is nothing I’d rather be doing. There is no one else I’d rather be with. I will remember this day/moment/sight/conversation for a long, long time.”

As this day unfolds, I mean to be present in it. And I mean to let that good, unhurried unfolding teach, heal, restore, encourage, and direct me to specific and heartfelt thankfulness.

My God is good. This day is his. And there is no place I’d rather be.

The LORD is the portion of my inheritance and my cup.

Psalm 16:5, NASB