hardest thing

Sometimes I take the kids running with me.  This is the time that William finds to pelt me with all kids of questions.  Doesn't he know its hard for me to talk while I'm trying to run?  On this particular day he asked me "Mom what's your hardest thing?"

I asked "what do you mean?  Like something that's hard for me physically? (like running)."

He simply said "not necessarily, just whats the hardest thing for you?"

William my deep thinker.  After a moment of thought I answered "balance"  He said, "Like balancing a ball? or on your feet?"

"No, just to balance everything in life."

He understood right away . "Oh, you mean like us kids and the house work and stuff like that."

"Ya"

Balance my white rabbit.  I sometimes find it overwhelming to try to balance all the things I need to in my life.  That strive for perfection is impossible yet I keep killing myself to achieve it.  In my mind I should be able to balance my health, my children, meals, my home, my yard work, my spirituality, my church callings, my duties as a supporting and loving wife, missionary work, helping and caring for my parents, and so on and so forth.  In my head I should be able to do it all but I can't and it frustrates me to no end.  

I know if I work on one thing I can get that down, but if I perfect one thing something else suffers.  I know what I am supposed to do and I can do it but not all at once or all the time.  So I think its me being lazy and I work harder but then I am so wound up I miss those precious moments that I should be enjoying.  I feel guilty for taking a break when I know there is something that I should be doing, but on the other hand if I don't take a break I burn out so I feel guilty about that. Today as I sat in church and listened to all the stories of amazing women all I could think of was "that's another thing I should be doing" so more guilt washes over me.

As I pondered over all this all consuming stuff I should be doing and perfecting the scripture that talks about everything in its season came to me.  There is no way I can do everything all the time. But I can perfect things in seasons, meaning I could probably focus on just a few things at a time at get them under control then work on others later. That way when I focus on the other things my first things wont be so far behind.

This reminded me of a sand hill we went to at Lake Powell.  It was a large hill and for every 2 steps you took  your foot slid back one, but with enough steps you made it to the top. Sometimes we took a rest half way up but we always made it to the top because the best part was running down it into the cool water.

My sister made the comment during a conversation with my mom that there are times when we build our faith and times when that faith we built carries us.

So I'll keep trekking up my sand hill to get to the top.  I know it will eat at me every time I see some one who has gotten one of their things under control when I am still struggling with it. But for now I am trying to remember that I made it up the sand hill before.  Maybe just maybe if I live long enough I can make it up life's sand hill.