Action step #1: Work with your season, rather than against it
It can be life-changing when we understand not only our current season of life but also how to do what God has called us to do in a way that “fits” with that season. This allows us to work with our design instead of working at cross-purposes to it. Because when we work at cross-purposes to our season, we tend to not thrive. We tend to have stress, instead of peace and rest.
For example—and this can be really hard for us go-getter women to hear—there are things that we simply cannot do as easily in certain seasons that we can much more easily do in others. For example, if we have a lot of caretaking responsibilities for aging parents, we have constraints that simply didn’t exist at other times. And this is not just a woman thing—this is a human thing. It applies to both men and women.
Let’s consider a scenario. Suppose you’re in a season where you have young kids, you and your husband both work and share parenting duties, and your husband travels a lot for business. Suddenly you are approached about an amazing chance to get a promotion, take a different job, or run a franchise business—some new opportunity that will require significant consistency and long hours during the day.
If you didn’t have children, or if your children were older, it would be a completely different conversation, right? But because you are in a “young kids” season, suddenly there is a different calculus—or at least there should be. (“If I take this job, who cares for little Allie when she is sick and can’t be at preschool? Who takes Ben to T-ball at 5 p.m., since I won’t be off work by then? If my husband says he’ll do all that, what happens when he’s out of town? Do I want to not see my kids until dinnertime? Can I still give the kids what they need from me at this age and do a good job at the promotion/new job/ franchise business?”)
Sometimes, we work it all out. Your husband cuts back to part-time so you can buy into the business, and the kids can still have a present, engaged parent after school hours. Your mom lives down the street and is always available to help with the grandkids.
But sometimes we simply don’t want to consider the constraints of our season and situation. In fact, we’re pretending that we don’t have constraints. We’re assuming we can do it all and have it all and be it all, all at the same time. In other words, we simply aren’t living according to our season of life.
So we try to do it all … and find that we’re not doing anything well. We had to pick up a sick child for the third time this month and close the shop, we missed our revenue targets, and we’re squabbling with our spouse about schedules. The kids are unhappy, people at our job are unhappy, the marriage is unhappy, and we’re unhappy.
And that is why we’re stressed.
Our souls find rest and peace when we lean into rather than kick against the currents of our age and stage. When we tell the franchisor, for example, “Oh wow, I’m honored that you would invite me to be a part of this franchise. I would love that, and I think I would do a good job. But while we have young kids, I’m simply going to have to find a franchise situation that offers me a lot more flexibility.”
And then we embrace the season we are in and enjoy every opportunity to be the field trip/sports/theater mom that we also want to be.
Believe me, as I share in the Find Balance bible study, I personally understand how hard it can be to accept this concept. I don’t want to miss something, and I want to try to do it all, all at the same time.
But what we have to realize is: when we embrace our season, we don’t miss something, we find something. We find the unparalleled beauty of being present in the way God has designed, and have many more opportunities for peace at the same time.
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