30 Days of Proverbs: November 4th

November 4, 2017

Proverbs 4: Wisdom Will Protect You

"Watch over your heart with all diligence,

For from it flow the springs of life." 

Proverbs 4:23

2017 has found me turning myself into a Grandmaw. Basically. 

At the beginning of the year, I set out to more closely examine the areas of my life I use to entertain myself. I figured I'd cull a couple shows from my Netflix line up and that would be about it. 

I WAS SO WRONG. 

Bless my heart. 

I did start there, and was pleasantly surprised to notice that after I'd desensitized my ears to profanity that now, IT HURTS MY HEART TO HEAR IT. But I was surprised when I put down a book my librarian recommended about 13 pages in because I could tell the characters were headed for some pre-marital "fellowshipping" and suddenly I realized that type of story line put a bad taste in my mouth. But that wasn't the hugest surprise. Not by a long shot. 

I DEACTIVATED MY INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT.

 I eliminated social media/time wasters from my immediate, easy access. 

WHAT ON EARTH WAS HAPPENING TO MY LIFE??

I noticed myself becoming increasingly unhappy with myself after watching friends and acquaintances and fancy, beautiful people online. They were doing yoga and running 5ks and renovating houses and buying farms with beautiful lakes and rolling hills while I was sitting here with 4 days of dry shampoo in my hair, hopelessly unable to touch my toes or run down my driveway without getting a stitch in my side and corralling tumble weeds of pet hair from under my couch every afternoon for funsies.  

It was filling my heart with poison. 

We bought our first iPad. It's a used one from a family member that we're using for school work and to watch YouTube videos of how canned pumpkin is made. I'd realized how much time I was slipping into (10 minutes here, 24 minutes there...) scrolling through Facebook or getting lost in Pinterest vortexes while the kids played. My heart was heavy over the neglect I was giving my family because I was distracted by the World Wide Web. So one morning this summer, I deleted IG, FB and Pinterest from my iPhone. I uploaded them to a folder on our new/used iPad, and that basically limits my time to access them to before the kids wake up and after they go to bed. I'll update things online sporadically some days, but since the iPad is usually plugged in on top of a bookcase, gone are the half hour vegging-on-the-couch sessions. 

AND I HAVE NEVER FELT BETTER. 

God opened my eyes to the ways I was filling my heart and I love the reminder these verses give me. When I'm not distracted by unnecessary things, my heart is happy, my parenting is more diligent and my self esteem stems from how closely I'm tethered to Him, not how Pinterestly perfect my life looks. 

I'm glad I'm learning, even if I'm a little late to the game, to diligently watch over my heart. 

Have a Christ-filled day, y'all. And thanks for stopping by~ Katie.