It was my extreme joy and pleasure to write the first six days of Goodness, Grounded, on schedule as I had planned at the beginning of this month. In order to accomplish that, I drafted writing in the cracks of each day, and I stayed up late into the night to polish the day’s writing, record the coordinating audio in a quiet house after the kids were in bed, and hit publish somewhere around midnight. It was ambitious. It was very fun for me, and delight powered my late night writing escapades. I almost forgot that I’m now 40 years old and too many late nights in a row turn me into a pumpkin…like the end of season pumpkins that are wasting away in the field when the weather turns cold.
So my writing train-cars piled up a bit and I was unable to continue writing the series on the timeline I hoped to. Still, I am inspired by these “Goodness, Grounded” prompts, and I am here to pick up where I left off, with the hope of continuing the series through December, or honestly, however long it takes me.
If you were tuning in day by day, I’m sorry to have left you hanging. I am at peace with the choice to step out when I needed to, but I also thought this would be a good opportunity to share something that has been pretty hard for me to learn over the years, and that is the reality that I am not a machine.
There was a time when I had no grace for myself or my limitations. I had no patience for the detours I encountered, and if I set out to do a specific thing or pursue a specific goal (like writing and publishing every day in November), I would do everything in my power to deliver, sacrificing sleep or peace (or both) to do it. I believed anything in the way of my declared intentions to be an excuse or a distraction, and that I must stay the course no matter the cost.
I’ll just say, productive work is a wonderful thing, but productivity as an idol, or as the highest priority in life, is actually a trap. Productivity cares nothing for us or our wellbeing. Productivity is a terrible substitute for the love and leadership of God—who, by the way, cares for us and our wellbeing very much.
The days of serving productivity above all else are over for me. I’ve traded that history for a much gentler way of life: seeking the Lord and His will for me followed by working diligently to fulfill it, day by day. I still want to do things excellently, and I will continue to do so as much as I’m able, but I also acknowledge I am a normal mom with normal needs, and sleep really should be at the top of the list. I see now that this commitment to productivity, this striving, is not what God has in mind for me. He has a much more gentle way in mind.
And so I offer a little manifesto for those who find themselves sacrificing (too much) sleep for things they hope to succeed in. Feel free to say the following out loud for yourself, if it helps:
I will not fear failure.
I will rest when needed.
I will not neglect my highest priorities.
I will yield the pace I’ve set when my expectations and capacity are mismatched.
I will remember I am a normal person with normal and reasonable needs.
I will believe God for the strength and focus I need to accomplish what He sets out for me to do.
Whatever might weigh on you—your difficult circumstances, profound anxiety that feels like a thorn that won’t come out, any unreasonable or unsustainable expectations you have of yourself—there is rest for you in Jesus, if you want it. I don’t say that to be trite. It’s a real and true thing that is available if you want rest for your soul; if you want freedom from your striving; if you want a lighter load. This is not to say its easy to work out in real time. I mean, I’ve spent this whole post spelling out my struggle with being at peace with my limitations, not because I’ve graduated from wrestling with them, but because I am preaching to my own heart what I know to be true and need to continually remind myself of.
Let’s remember we’re not machines. We need rest. We need God’s grace and strength and help. We are loved not for what we can produce; it’s a just-because kind of love.
*This is day 6 of Goodness, Grounded, a series I’m writing every day in November. I am intentionally not sending emails to you every day when I publish, since this is a lot of writing to take in. I do not want to overload your inbox and I want you to be able to read at your own pace. About once a week will send a digest like this one with links to each piece I’ve written. If you would like to tune in day-by-day, you can visit emilysueallen.substack.com and find the most recent posts. If you haven’t already discovered it, there is an audio format available for each entry. Thank you for reading, for listening, and for the responses several of you have sent me. This series represents a significant breakthrough for me, and your encouragement means so much.
If you would like to catch up on the previous entries, follow the links below.
I take a packet of seeds and sprinkle them into a shallow, plastic lid. My husband has already prepared soil blocks for me, compressing a damp soil and compost mixture into a handy tool that results in dedicated squares to host individual seeds as they begin their lives. For some reason, I really enjoy the precision of lifting seeds one at a time from that plastic lid with a slightly wet pencil eraser (so it sticks, of course) and dabbing the seed in the center of each soil block. I press lightly to encourage the seed’s descent into the dirt. I fill whole trays and tuck them under the grow lights we have set up in the dining room. I didn’t mean for these grow lights and shelves to become our home decor, but after setting them up along the entirety of the the dining room wall, they have become a year-round fixture whether or not we have seedlings in progress. Perhaps one day I will grow tired of the utility look, but for now, growing is a source of delight and I’m fine with it. For weeks I water and wait. The tender green of new life springs up.
I take my garden tools out to the place where my seedlings will be planted. I rake and ready the spot where they’ll begin an impressive period of growth. My husband has gone before me, doing the harder labor of readying garden plots, leaving the fun part for me. I married that guy for a reason and I know every day it was one of the smartest things I’ve ever done. Nevermind that my eyes were bigger than my stomach, as they say, and the garden space we have to fill is absurdly large. I will do my best, I tell him. I will plant as much as I can manage, seedlings and bare seeds alike. After all, he who sows sparingly will reap sparingly, and that is not the life I want to lead.
I take seedlings from the trays, carefully separating the roots of each from their neighbors. I make appropriately spaced holes and drop them in, carefully covering over with the loose dirt I dislodged when I opened the ground. I plant them myself until little helpers discover what I am up to and beg to be part of the fun. I maintain my post as the seedling separator, since I know my four year old cannot be trusted to do that in a gentle manner, but the little guy can plant like a boss. I love how he is both determined and restrained, caring to do a good job without any damage to the plants. I try not to yelp when he accidentally steps on one with his big garden boots. It’s ok, I say. Just be careful where you put your feet.
I take pruning shears from the drawer in my desk and head down to the greenhouse, which is filled with tomato plants that are now three feet tall. We have to keep up with the suckers or they become a jungle, which I learned from experience last season. Once it goes totally wild, there is no taming a tomato. Best to keep up on it from the beginning, training the vines to grow where you want them. I love the fresh smell of tomato plants at the tender stage. It’s counterintuitive to lop off this leaf and that, but it truly is for the best. I know this is true about me, the pruning God does in my life; the things taken away that do not help me bear much fruit. Now that I am the one who is pruning, I understand a little bit more.
I take gloves to weed the ground around the plants that I put there on purpose. I do pull some with my hands, but more of the time, I use a handy tool that does a fine job of slicing little weeds off at the base. I can cover a lot more ground in the time I have, but it helps to still wear gloves for the grip on the handle. I know if I wait too long to deal with the weeds, it will get out of hand. There is something to be said for the faithfulness needed to keep the weeds from crowding out the good things. I keep my eyes on the prize and I actually find I rather enjoy this step, as long as I’m still in the stretch when the weeds do not become ominous.
I take a walk through the garden gate, letting it close behind me. The rows are in fine form, plants developed and blooms peeking out. The bees and butterflies are all over, and I can see why they’re excited. I check the zucchini plants first because they’re sneaky buggers, and if I don’t give them special attention, I might miss what is ready to pick. I probably have a hundred different things in the garden now, and I like to check on each one. Even the speckled lettuce is exciting because even though I saw it yesterday, there is noticeable growth. A thrill shoots through me when I see the peas are on and the garlic is curling.
I take a tub with me to fill with the currently ready produce. The kids come with, because they love the picking. They reach for everything except the cucumbers, because those are pokey and they hide out deep under the leaves. We have a dozen tomato varieties and a few are ready to pick. They love to pick those. The smooth, rounded shape is perfect for little hands and the best ones are right at their eye level. Down the way, we clip off the scapes and pile them high in their own tub. The first flowers are blooming, and the girls cut bouquets to put on the dining room table. Of course, everyone has to have their own arrangement, so there is a line down the middle of the table with the assorted floral creations.
I take out a cookie sheet, chop the vegetables, and spread them to the edges. Avocado oil and salt is the favorite preparation. We often experiment with different seasonings, but usually end up back at the simple ones.
I take the pan out of the oven when the edges are caramelized the littlest bit and add them to our plates. Roasted vegetables are a taste of heaven, I’m convinced.
My soul and my stomach and my family are filled with the delights of the field, and it is truly good.
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This is a synopsis of five years. It has taken me two days to write this, because honestly, even sharing this much of the story brings me to a very emotional place. I still have a hard time accepting how life is different—how I am different—since the day I woke up with a pain in my back that turned out to be a pulmonary embolism. Even though many good things have come in the midst of this five-year season, I continue to struggle with lingering grief, the internal wrestling that happens when a small, finite mind grapples with the audacious love of God that rescues and restores me. I’m the best kind of wrecked, and also, that wrecked part is not hyperbole. So here is the story by year.
Year One
I am a thriving mom with a lot going for me. I am surprise pregnant with my seventh baby, which I’m thrilled about. I wake up on a normal Saturday morning with just a small, weird pain that I think is going to resolve itself if I stretch or sit with good posture for a bit. The pain doesn’t go away. Days go by, and I feel progressively worse, just a bit at a time, slow enough that I am not alarmed, just less available to my family. It hurts the most to lie down, so I sit upright, both for daytime and nighttime hours.
It’s bad enough by Wednesday that I decide to see a massage therapist to see if we can figure this thing out. I’m still convinced its a muscular thing. She fits me in on Friday and I go in for the appointment expecting to be healed. It almost feels worse when the hour is over. I cry all the way home. On Saturday and Sunday, I do nothing. I am finding it a little hard to breathe, and I have a cough here and there. I cough up a little bit of blood and its so weird, I can’t barely register that it happened. It’s the weekend, and I decide I will call on Monday. Then I cough up blood—a lot more of it—again. I still do not go to the ER because I am an idiot and I think it will be less disruptive to my family if I just go to our family doc on Monday morning.
Family doc sends me straight to the ER on Monday morning, says do not drive home whatever you do. I fret about my children at home and being an imposition on my friend who is watching them, but I go like he says. The ER is expecting me, and I bypass all the other patients, going straight back for evaluation. The staff wastes no time. I do not understand what is at stake, but I am glad to be somewhere that people can figure me out. When they tell me what it is—a blood clot in my lung—I am frozen. I don’t really feel fear because I don’t really know how close to death I came. It takes me a whole year before I can really say out loud that I almost died.
The whole year is a shock. I do the recommended treatment, and see doctors several times a week. I sleep upright on the couch for five months. I withdraw from most relationships because I can’t function. I feel a kind of lonely I hope to never feel again. I do everything I can to have a healthy pregnancy that yields a healthy baby. He is born on a Sunday morning and I have never had a more peaceful birth. I think the struggle, this terrible year, is over, but I am wrong.
Year Two
This year ends up being a couple levels harder. There are more unfortunate surprises for me, including my nervous system lighting on fire. I begin having panic attacks that drop me to the floor in public places, and I am mortified that I cannot control them. I cry all the time. I cannot tell when I will be able to fulfill a commitment or complete a task because the episodes arrive without warning. I have a hard time explaining what is going on because I, myself, do not know. I don’t like to ask for help, but I am at the point where I can’t actually do anything that is needed for myself if I don’t get help. I start with counseling, and I’m convinced that God puts me in the practice of the one person who can get me to a place of equilibrium faster than anyone else can. Counseling helps me so much. So much. I feel foolish that I ever dismissed it earlier in my life. I experience a serious amount of inner healing over months of time, and when I am done, I am somehow still at the beginning of the journey and will be unpacking things for years ahead.
Year Three
We move out of the rental we have lived in for ten years. The move takes us across the state, in a nice neighborhood, and I am relieved to be away from the embattled area we left. I need respite in the worst way, and I find it—just enough to unwind the hyper-vigilance and tight grip I’d been muscling for the previous two years. I sit on the back porch in a reclining lawn chair with a blanket over me, the trees above and butterflies traveling past me. Tears stream down my cheeks regularly, but I think they’re good tears this time. Mostly. Like tears of relief. I feel like maybe this could be, finally, the end of the struggle, but I am wrong.
I cannot sleep for months. I have weird physical symptoms I can’t explain and every time one pops up, anxiety spikes and holds me by the neck, keeping me awake for way too long. It’s always at night, torment that keeps me from any meaningful rest. My nervous system is on overdrive and I weep nearly all the time. This is the tail end of 2020, so things are weird in the world on top of everything else. No one knows me in our new city. I am embarrassed to let them know me while I’m so out of sorts. I am trying to find my way out of the struggle, doing every last thing I can to be at peace. I walk every day, sometimes several miles. I talk to my far away friends on the phone and they comfort me. They do not make me feel like a loser, even though that is what I feel like. They tell me true things and I believe them.
My husband’s company is acquired and within a very short time, all our existing debts (which were many) are paid in full. We have a down payment for a house. We choose a five acre farm, private sale, and have no idea what is in store for us. The good kind of surprise this time.
I can’t believe there is so much space. The land is more beautiful than I ever dared to hope for. We can spread out, and we do. We get our first chickens from a friend, and she hatches a perfect seven of them, which my kids quickly decide that there is one for each of them. They are given names. Belle, Gertrude, Strike, Aqua, Darling, Beef, and Peep. We don’t know until much later that six of them are roosters. This is the first of a hilarious number of animals to come to the farm.
Year Four
Life on the farm is good. More animals arrive. Some pigs first, then more chickens, ducks, cats, and some others. I lose track of the timeline honestly. My husband makes a personal goal to raise all our own meat by next year. We raise 200 meat chickens. If you are thinking to yourself, that is a lot of meat chickens for first-timers, you would be right. But he butchers them all himself, and goes on to also butcher the first of our pigs. He doesn’t totally know what he’s doing, but YouTube has helped a bit, and the guy has yet to meet a challenge he doesn’t figure out somehow. It’s the best meat we’ve ever eaten. If you do not currently buy meat from a local regenerative farmer, this is an invitation to discover the difference.
I have my first taste of growing things from seed. I don’t know why we make our first garden the size of a football field (well, larger than that even? I don’t know. Math is not my strong suit). I am dazzled by the process of a tiny seed coming up out of the dirt, how it grows, how fruit grows on it. It’s like I know this is what God is doing in me, and it gives me hope. He is raising me out of the dirt, showing me His mysteries while I am in the dirt.
My family is doing really well, but I am personally still crawling along. I have good days and new dreams, but I am still hitting some major limitations. I am still weeping often. I am still feeling like I cannot really let people know me in this condition. I am sleeping better, but there are rough patches. I am honestly exhausted, not just physically, but the down in the bones kind. I tell a friend I have this vision of a woman who goes out from her house, walking through fields and forests to the edge of a loud, raging river. The sound of the water crashing over rocks is loud enough to drown out the sound of this woman wailing, weeping, crying out in the most undignified way, aiming her grief and struggle to the great and deep, where there are arms wide enough to receive what no one else can stand to hear. Her pain is expressed with unguarded honesty and she cries aloud until she completely exhausted. Until she is laid out on the grass, emptied of all she has been keeping inside. Then she stands up, smooths her dress, and wipes her tears, and goes back inside her home to make dinner. This woman is me. Not literally of course. But she’s still me.
Year Five
Many things have smoothed out and I have more peace than ever, but I still feel fragile. I am finding my footing, and the terrible days happen less often. I am opening up. Blooming, maybe. I try not to be embarrassed that it has taken me “this long” to get over what has happened, but I do feel like I should be somewhere further, somewhere more steady than were I am. But also, the strength I now have is not my own. It’s coming from somewhere else, and I like it. I realize I do not have to hold myself up. He will hold me. I do not have to race ahead or push the pace. I am still trying to accept that weakness is, or maybe can be, a grace and an invitation to lean harder on God until I really get it. That this is what He has wanted for me all along. To trust Him. To rely on Him. To accept that His strength is made perfect in my weakness and His grace is sufficient.
There is a warm glow in my room when the sun comes up. The first rays come straight through the window on my side of the room, pure light softened through the white translucent shades my husband put up when we moved in. This morning light is one of the most profound comforts I have found in this house. It envelopes me again and again each new day, like a dream, a warm and wonderful one. I want to linger there a while.
My first thought is to pray a simple prayer thanking God for this beauty and this home. I ask Him to be with me, to guide me in my interactions with my husband and my kids, and to help me give my attention to worthy things. At this point, I am still under my covers and just barely awake. My hair is sideways and my face is still smooshed against my pillow. If I close my eyes again for a moment too long, I will slip back into sleep. That happens less often now than it used to, but I am also not waking with small children in the night anymore.
I toss the covers back and shuffle to the bathroom to start my morning. I don’t say anything out loud, but prayer is still part of it. I shower and I am cleansed. I ask quiet (or shall we say silent) questions in my heart like: What does faithfulness look like today? What are the things I must get done? God, will You help me make good use of my time? At this point, I am no longer at risk of falling back asleep, and I take my next practical steps to prepare for the day.
While I’m brushing out my wet hair and applying my moisturizer, I am thinking about my kids—trying to tease out in my mind what each might need from me today. Do I need to have a surprise phone check-in? Sometimes one needs to see if the teen folks are honoring the house rules. Should I follow up on the conflict two of the kids had last night? Yes, I should start a conversation about that on the way into town today. I ask God for wisdom and help, because I know first hand how much I need it.
A few weeks ago, my friend Lynne asked me to share with her what my “prayer life” looks like as a busy mom. I laughed to myself because my “prayer life” is the same as my regular life. It was an honest question, and I know she really just wanted to get some ideas for how to both be a present mom and also get some traction in prayer…well, the secret is: 90% of the time, I pray while I’m doing other stuff. Prayer does not have to be formal to accomplish something important in our lives. 1 Thessalonians 5: 16-18 says,
“Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
To pray without ceasing is to answer an invitation God makes to each one of us—to recognize that He is with us in everything we are doing; the mundane, normal, everyday stuff. Prayer opens us, our hearts and our spirits, to receive from Him, and there is a live connection there. God is really listening. He really knows everything about us, our motivations, our thoughts, and our longings. I have come to believe that acknowledging Him through these, maybe slightly weird conversations in my brain, actually accomplish something rather important in my life.
While I’m acknowledging Him, He is helping make my paths straight. Proverbs 3:6
I believe there is a time to formally regard the holiness and power of God in awe and reverence and times when prayer is a deliberate, sit-down kind of thing, but there is also a great need for believers to recognize we have access to fellowship with God through Jesus and it is not required that we participate in formal rituals or specific religious practice at all times in order to tend that connection.
God is not waiting for us to say the perfectly right words, the perfectly right way. He is inviting us to talk to Him right where we are, while we are in motion in the course of our real everyday lives.
I have come to believe, that every single time we acknowledge God it benefits us.
Acknowledging God is a proactive thing we can do to invite His Spirit to be at work in us. This might sound like a small thing, but it’s actually a big thing to posture our hearts to honor God and be ready to receive from Him. It is a big thing that we would choose to both invite and cooperate with the Holy Spirit to do in us what He wants to do. This is how lives are transformed in small but meaningful ways, in ordinary homes, on ordinary days.
When I first decided to follow Jesus as a teenager, there was a song I used to sing during my youth group worship time, and the words stick with me to this day. It’s probably been the refrain I’ve returned to more than any other. For those of you who listen to the audio version of this post, I’m going to sing it for you now.
Soften My Heart (Rademaker/Park)
Soften my heart with oil, Open my eyes to see Fill me with understanding, Soften my heart to receive
Don’t let my heart be fallow, Don’t let my heart be hard Water me with Your Spirit, Soften the ground of my heart
I want all that you have for me, Jesus all that you have for me Open my understanding, Soften my heart to receive I want all that you have for me
When we have an openness to God, to do whatever He wants, whatever His will is, and we pray these through-the-day prayers to acknowledge Him, seek His wisdom, and make our small daily decisions with Him as our guide, we can expect to find all that He has for us.
Ephesians 3:16-19 “I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.”
