The Big and the Little of It

No pictures today.  Just words.  So if you want to turn back now, I'm giving you fair warning.  :)  My Man tells me, "The words are great, but people like to see pictures of what we see."  So I try to give you lots of that.  But tonight...or rather in these early morning hours when I can't sleep...I just feel the need to get some thoughts out there.

I just finished a book called "Notes from a Blue Bike: The Art of Living Intentionally in a Chaotic World", by Tsh Oxenreider.  (Yes, her first name has no vowels--fun!).  She gave me so much to think about.  She's a young wife, mother of three, writer, blogger, etc., etc.  Some of the things I highlighted:

"Live the life you long for.  Period."

"...realize that the real hidden cost of everything you buy--is how much life it cost you to get it."

"...life is not an emergency but a gift to slow down and savor.  That it glorifies God to spend our extraordinary life by paying attention enough to the moments that you enjoy God."

"...the moments all matter.  The daily decisions add up to the sum of your life.  And a pail with a pinhole loses as much as the pail pushed right over.  A whole life can be lost in minutes wasted, small moments missed."

There's so much more I loved about her book and could share but I'll just say I definitely recommend it for some thought-provoking reading. 

She defines living life "intentionally" as making conscious decisions...conscious choices about the things most important to us.  And then doing everything we can to make sure we live to those decisions and choices.  Not just letting things happen TO us and having that be the sum total of our life. 

How much of that have I done?  Hmmmmm.  Way more than I care to admit.

I've tried to get better at this "intentional" thing.  So has Max. That's a big part of the reason why we embarked on this Big Adventure.  Sometimes we've been good at slowing down and savoring the intentional.  Sometimes we (mostly me) have let our inner egos screaming for "What's next?  Do something IMPORTANT with this time!  What are you doing just sitting around?!" define our adventure rather than letting the peace in our souls and God define what this time is all about.

People ask me what we've done on our adventures so far.  Typically I think they are looking for the "big things"...the famous or popular places we've seen.  After all, we're traveling, right?  That's the most obvious question!  And we've seen some of those.  We hope to see a few more before this deal is done.  But the moments I will remember the most (I can't speak for Max) I think will be the small ones.  The more personal ones.  The people we've met.  The friends we've made.  The extra special time we've been able to spend with family.  The traveling down the highway to the next place...watching the world go by outside the window...sharing the picnic lunch I've packed as we drive on down the road because it's healthier and way easier than trying to find a place to pull in with this rig...and sharing and talking about the new sites we're seeing with My Man. 

I don't think we've made one plan yet on this journey that hasn't been changed.  It's become quite the joke between us.  And it's taught us to be a bit more flexible.  I used to think I was pretty good at rolling with the flow.  Oh, but God had so much more to teach me about that.  Still is.

So how do all these changed plans mesh with living life "intentionally"?  Maybe some of the things I thought were most important...even some of the Big Reasons we embarked on this journey to begin with...He is telling me weren't the most important after all?  Checking off the items on our Bucket List is fun.  But I think I'm learning the Bucket List should include more than just places to travel to. Maybe I've gotten some of the Big Things and some of the Little Things switched around?

See what happens when you wake up at 3:30 in the morning and can't go back to sleep?  :)

Until next time...  (And next time, I'll try to have more pictures and less philosophy--I promise!),

Hugs to all!

Paula