Wait, what season is it?

What season are you in?

There used to be a time in my life when I measured my worth by the balance I had in my life. You’ve seen the diagrams of the perfect pie of life, with sections dedicated to spirituality, family, health, social life, work, service, etc. with the understanding that one visits or participates appropriately in each piece of the pie on a consistent and fruitful basis. And in so doing, one is living a healthy life, of course. David uses the Balanced Person Model (a version of the pie) in many of his presentations. As he presents it, it’s a profound revelation to many. I’ll get back to it later.

I don’t use that diagram or that vision to judge myself anymore.

No, I don’t use that to analyze who I am or how good I am at being me.

The standard that I now desire to try to live up to is to wake up each day and ask: “Lord, am I doing what you would have me do? Stuart, are you doing what the Lord wants you to do? “ I don’t always hear His answer clearly, but I always believe that He will speak if I am quiet. I don’t always get it right each day either, following the Lord’s path. But I want to.

What I’ve learned about following the Lord’s path is that His ways don’t always bring balance either. The Lord has a different way of navigating me around that pie.

We live in seasons.

Some are intense and filled with activity; some are slow and have time for reflection and leisure. Even though it was lovely to awaken to a snowy morning recently, I’m really not talking about the weather here. The seasons of our life may last a few weeks, months, or years. For the last 6 months, I have been in an intense season of hard work in my day job, but a delightful season of focusing on my home and my family in the other hours of my day. This lovely season of focusing on family and home started last June when David and I, while on vacation, had a tremendous notebook meeting that resulted in an agenda of 65 items. (We do not recommend you do this! Please don’t take on that much. You can try it in smaller chunks.)

This massive notebook meeting came after another intense season of focusing on work, publishing my book, and developing our marriage ministry (see The Intimate Marriage Academy at www.impactingpeople.com). Yes, we tried managing our daily personal lives the best we could, but the truth is some things fell through the cracks and some things just piled up.

So as a result of that June notebook meeting, I chose to lay this book and all the marketing down. Instead, I spent more time with my husband and my family, enjoyed the birth of a new baby in the family, participated in the wedding of my nephew and new niece-in-law, and began the journey of celebrating the engagement and planning the wedding of my daughter and our new son-in-law-to-be. (Personal note: I don’t like using the in-law part. I just want to call him our new son.)

You know, you and I might have a tendency to say those are the seasons that matter the most. Those are the seasons that our heart feels the most, the ones with family.

The truth is that all the seasons matter.

So what’s my message here? Let’s go back to the pie. You and I will never live the balanced pie every day of our life. We have to live the seasons, whatever they may be. Acceptance and belief in the One who guides our steps will carry us through.

If we are living with purposeful intention, the seasons that come will cover the pie. I believe God wants me to have a strong foundational pie. I believe He wants our pies to have very full sections. But how and when we focus on each section isn’t always up to us.

Accept and believe.

What season are you in?

Really, what season are you in? Are you overwhelmed and overworked with the business of life falling through the cracks, or are you enjoying a season of peace, calm, and everything’s good? Maybe it’s neither. Maybe you are lost and uninspired. You get to decide and call it what it is. Then here’s the work I want you to do:

Ask the question, and then be quiet.

“Lord, am I doing what you would have me do?”