Identity Crisis?

Myriad is such a fitting title because I feel like it summarizes my train of thoughts lately....thousands of thoughts in all directions! Most of it seems to come back to trying to balance the many parts that are me these days. Balancing being a wife, mother, pastor's wife, teacher and friend is a skill that eludes me most days. In the midst of it all I find myself wondering who I am. What parts really are me and what parts are just something I'm doing? How do I chose what to spend my time doing? How do I do it all and take time for the simple things that I enjoy like running and reading? How can I be a good mother when I'm tired? How does God fit into it all? All of these thoughts were running through my head during worship a few Sundays ago, and I was feeling completely overwhelmed with it all. It felt similar to standing in the ocean and being hit with a huge wave that then pulls on your feet as it goes back out to sea. It was in the midst of this that I felt God remind me that I am His creation, His daughter. The most important thing to do balance life came to me quickly.....readjust my focus from the hows and whys to my BIG God who knows the answers. In my hunger for something slow and simple to help me reconnect to the source of my strength, I picked up New Seeds of Contemplation, a book that Allan had given me for Christmas last year. It definitely was not an accidental gift....in it he wrote about the irony of giving a book on contemplation to a new mom but the possibility that it could be more helpful now than ever. How he knew a year ago what I needed, I'll never know but I am so thankful that he did! Of course, in trying to figure it all out, finding the time to read the book sort of slipped away. Now I am slowly digesting the thoughts on contemplation and how that fits in with where I am in life right now. Here is something I read last night. Merton writes "The obstacle (to God) is in our 'self,' that is to say in the tenacious need to maintain our separate, external, egotistic will. It is when we refer all things to this outward and false 'self' that we alienate ourselves from reality and from God."