Hello!

If you haven’t seen already, I am going to try to blog on a more regular basis in the form of a weekly update (click to read the blog about it).

Here is my first go!

So, overall, I would give this week a solid 7/10. I’ve felt good, apart from the beginning of the week, when I had a headache and little energy.

Some themes have been: broken toys and new toys, how to make the best out of the rest of my time in curacy (however long that may be), and finding peace in the chaos.  

Broken Toys & New Toys

The week began with my brand-new, super-organised, absolutely-glorious, colour-coded magnetic wall planner falling off the wall. I could have cried. I would have done if it hadn’t have been Nathan who had found it and broken the news to me gently.

My mood wasn’t improved when my laptop (with a line of dead pixels across the screen) alarmingly started beeping which signaled that it was not long for this world.  Added to that, on Tuesday, the breaks on the car started sounding strange, which meant that it needed to go into the garage.

However, the wall calendar was easily reattached (this time with nails rather than sticky pads!), a new laptop was purchased and we have a great garage in Formby who managed to slot the car in early Thursday morning and have it sorted by the afternoon.

I am delighted with my new computer. It’s slick and it has a detachable keyboard so it can be a tablet or a laptop, and I have ordered a snazzy stylus pen to do drawing and graphics with. The only thing is that I don’t like about the whole experience is spending money! Every time I make a big purchase, without fail, I’ll end up with a headache afterwards. The day we bought the car, it was a full blown migraine! It was worth it though.

What to do with the remaining time in curacy

We technically have 2 years left on our contracts, but realistically we could be moving onto new churches sooner than that. We don’t have any plans at present and we don’t know when we will go, but whatever happens, we are now over half way through and so I’ve been starting to think about what experience I would like to get before I go.

It’s a bit of a weird time and I know that change is coming again, but it’s a good opportunity to focus on what I have learned already and what I would like to develop further. 

Finding peace in the chaos

I recently finished a Mindfulness Based Stress-Reduction course at the Cathedral, and I have to say that it was excellent. It has done me the world of good and I feel much better now that I have learned to breathe. I know it sounds stupid, because I have spent 26 years breathing, but, I have learned how to really breathe.

By practicing mindfulness most days for a couple of months, I have found that I am coping with difficult situations loads better. That being said, it still takes a lot of self-control to find the time to stop! I don’t always manage it, to be honest.

Highlight

I think the best bit of this week for me was visiting the lovely year 4 class at school to talk about prayer (see their twitter feed here). I say I talked to them, it was more like they questioned me, to be honest! All 30 of them had at least one question about prayer- all of which were great, and some were really hard!

Memorable questions included:

‘Does God hear all our prayers at once?‘

‘Which part of the church building is most about prayer?’

‘What was your first prayer?’

‘If prayer is like a conversation with God who is our friend, why do we bow our heads when we pray? Because we wouldn’t bow our heads when we talk to our friends!’ 

I was grateful for coffee that morning because those kids really made me think!

 

So there we go, Weekly Check-in number 1.

More next week!