Have loved talking inspiration with you this week! I hope even just one phrase or idea or reminder has burrowed its way into your soul, so that you feel encouraged to go about this vital business of filling up.

So HOW do we find the time to go in search of inspiration? Isn’t that the big question? All of this is great, but where am I going to find the time to live like this?

Here are a few ideas that have helped me order my life so that this “filling up” business is a value and a priority and doesn’t get completely overtaken by the rest of life.

1. Acknowledge your limits. When we are willing to admit that we have limits and when we do the more sophisticated work of figuring them out, and knowing exactly what we can tolerate in a week and then what puts us over the edge and right into turmoil, we can begin to keep ourselves from getting to the point of totally frazzled and crazed. We can also begin to give ourselves grace. “I can’t do it all. No one expects me to. Why am I expecting myself to?” Sometimes finding our limits takes trial and error. You over-schedule one week and you realize it, and you make a mental note not to do that again. Because you can feel your soul sinking and you realize you’ve gotten the balance all out of whack and that you’re not doing well.

2. Assess your needs. It’s like taking your pulse. I begin to feel overwhelmed. I begin to get panicky. I need to stop and breathe. And then I need to ask myself the million dollar question, “What do I need?” Now, sometimes you can’t just take off and go participate in the thing you need. But at least you’re aware of it now and you can schedule it or share it with your partner or a trusted friend or make a u-turn in your car or something like that.  What do I need? A massage, time alone, time with others, a creative outlet, silence, a shower . . . you get the idea.

3. Exercise your options. It’s so easy to see our lives from the perspective of deficit instead of abundance. There’s just no time. There’s just no money. There’s just no energy. There’s just no help. There’s just no support. There’s just no hope. I want to remind you—as I often have to remind myself—you are a capable, intelligent, resourceful person who is able to think, to creatively problem solve, and to make changes in your life. You have a choice. Again, I have to remind myself of this often, when I feel suffocated and trapped and like the only option I have is whether I’m going to sit on the floor in the living room or sit on the floor in the kitchen and play with my kids. You are rarely, if ever, stuck. I know it doesn’t always feel that way, but it’s true.

You can choose how you’re going to order your life. You can choose to cut things out, to add things. You can choose to dye your hair a weird color or save up enough money to buy a big canvas and some oil paints. You can choose to start shopping at thrift stores or to take 30 minutes out of your week and do lunges around your house or load your kids in the car and drive to the beach even though it’s hard. Now, some of you are already building your case. “Well, you don’t know my life, Leeana. I go to school at nights, I work two jobs. I live in a crappy apartment and all of my extra money goes to keeping my old car running.” Well, if that’s your story, then you really are screwed. No, I’m just kidding. Again, I remind you, you are not a victim. You have choices. Can you change everything? No. Can you change something? Yes.

4. Make a plan. Space is not going to create itself. Money is not going to arrive. Time is not going to all of a sudden multiply. Your boss (or your family) isn’t going to realize you need a personal day. You have to be intentional. Remember, these are acts of self-care, of soul-care, and you do them as a discipline, like you’re taking a multi-vitamin or brushing your teeth. So you need to get a plan in order to be consistent. Do you need to sit down with your husband and say that you’re interested in going to a salvage yard in the next month and you’d like him to try his best to understand that this will make you a better wife. And you are going to use the spare change you’ve collected over the next month as your spending money. And you’re asking for a bit of latitude and understanding as you start making inspiration a regular part of your life and your soul-care. Or do you need to sign up for a class or do you need to re-look at your budget or how you’re spending your Sunday evenings or how much TV you’re watching or ???

5. Live by your values. Elaine Hamilton has this great line in her book, Church on the Couch, that says, “The problem is not just that we are too busy (though, absolutely, we often are), but that we are too busy doing too many things we don’t believe in.” Isn’t that the truth?!?!? You feel it when you’re doing something that you don’t believe in. You’re faking it. You’re de-energized. You’re not totally present. When we spend our precious time doing things that aren’t really all that important to our souls, we are just inviting the numbing. Pretty soon we are doing all these things, but our hearts/souls are disengaged. And we’re busy, but we’re not making a difference, we’re not changing our corner of the world.

Amazing passage from Kathleen Norris’ Acedia and Me on the subject:

“We appear to be anything but slothful, yet that is exactly what we are, as we do more and care less, and feel pressured to do still more. We may well ask: if we are always in motion, constantly engaged in self-improvement, and even trying to do good for others, how can we be considered uncaring or slothful? . . . The culture may glorify people who do Pilates at dawn, work their BlackBerrys obsessively on the morning commute, multitask all day at the office, and put a gourmet meal on the table at night after the kids come home from French and fencing lessons, but . . . are these hyperscheduled, overactive individuals really creating anything new? Are they guilty of passion in any way? Do they have a new vision for their government? For their community? Or for themselves? . . . Their purpose is to keep themselves so busy, so entrenched in their active lives, that their spirit reaches a permanent state of lethargy.”

That’s a zinger.

There is nothing more soul-sucking than doing a bunch of stuff you don’t enjoy or believe in. Do we have to do some of that stuff some of the time? YES.  Do we need to act like a martyr about it? NO. In the discretionary time we do have, we need to exercise our ability to choose and to make choices that align with our values.

6. Be courageous. Change is hard. And sometimes, the people around you don’t like it when you change because it disrupts them and their culture. They think you’re being pretentious or self-absorbed or frivolous. That’s okay. If inspiration is going to be one of your life values, then it needs to be a part of your life. Making room for, taking time for, filling up the empty places inside you might require you to gather some courage. Good for you! Hooray! Courage is the new black!!!!

You may have to break some bad habits and start some new patterns. In the midst of wanting to lead a more awake and alive and inspired life, you might hit up against some patterns of thinking or behaving that are causing you to feel stuck. That’s ok. That’s even a little normal. So, you call up a counselor or a pastor or a spiritual director and you say that you are trying to live your life more intentionally but you keep noticing that some things are getting in the way and you might even say that you’re not sure exactly what those things are, but you just have this feeling that you’re not free. And so, in your journey toward inspiration and soul-care, you spend some time talking through the places where you’re feeling stuck or sad or wounded. And this is all part of the process! If you keep cycling back to the same paralyzing thoughts, the same destructive habits, the same unfulfilling relationships, the same debilitating fear, then you’re a little stuck. And you do your very best to gather some courage and to call someone that could help you get unstuck.

Which leads nicely into the last idea . . .

7. Reach Out. It is rare that we are all, at the very same time, on zero. Just reaching out—through a phone call or email or sending up a flare—can be one of the greatest ways we get ourselves back to believing that we can live this awake and alive life after all. Because chances are, the person on the other end of our reaching out might be able to say, “I’m sorry. I understand. I believe in you. When was the last time you did something that really filled you up? I love you. Now, get to work.”

Than you for reading. I love you. Now, get to work.