Every day I have so many thoughts rumbling around in my head that I have no rest!!!  Most people around me find no rest either!!!  My favorite question for my hubby is...'What are you thinking?'...his response...'Nothing'...  I find it very hard to believe there are no thoughts rambling around in one's head!
Today my thoughts are many...as usual...but one is...How Does One Rest??  I know we can sleep and we can relax, but true rest befuddles me!  I am a mother of 3 and a wife of 1(thank you Jesus, more than one hubby might kill me!!!).  There always seems to be something to do or take care of.  I have had suggestions to read...and I do...a great deal!!!  But I get so involved in the book I am reading that my mind races with thoughts of what is going to happen next...or worse...how would I have written it differently?  I think my major problem is one of always doing.  Doing this doing that...I think comes from growing up on a farm.  There was always something to do!!!  If we were ever sitting down we were told to get up and do something.  No rest for the weary!  Whenever I am sitting and not doing something I feel like a failure...not being productive is not an option!  Resting is a new idea for me...and I have been struggling to learn how to rest.
In the book Invitations from God by Adele Ahlberg Calhoun, the idea of rest is to 'set aside the compulsion to "do, do, do" and live into God's creational rhythms that nourish and restore the body, soul and relationships.'  "Therefore, since the promise of entering [God's] rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it."  Hebrews 4:1.
My hubby tells me that I have a major illness of 'right hand syndrome'.  When the invitation to do something arises my right hand shoots up and I volunteer to do it!  I enjoy serving, I enjoy blessing others.  What I do not enjoy is the inevitable over doing that happens when I volunteer to do something!  It is not the responsibility that others lay upon me but the desire of approval and perfection that I strive to accomplish.  The problem is that I usually fail because of the desire of perfection of the task and the people's response to it.  I have to be more conscious of the pressure I place upon myself and not be striving for the fantasy response that I have created in my own mind!
While chairing a local Women of Vision Chapter here in Southwest Florida I learned a lot of lessons.  One of them is if God has given you a task then he is going to see it through using you as only a vessel through which it will be completed.  I learned a great deal about God opening and closing doors.  If it is not His intention for something to happen then things will not come easily...the harder you have to push something the more it is not of His plan.
This is also very true of all of life!!!  Not that everything comes easy but that it is not a stressful push of forces.  If it is too difficult to accomplish...not the work but the circumstances...then He must be closing that door.  Stop pushing on it and move on to one that has an opening!!!
Living the life that God has given me has not been easy!  It has not been too hard either.  It has been a challenge of sorts that I could have never planned or predicted!!!  So this life has not offered a lot of opportunity for me to find rest.  Raising three boys while my husband travels away from home for 6-12 months a year has not afforded me the opportunity for much rest!  But I find myself in a season where I am having to learn this idea of rest...and I am trying to embrace it!!!!