Sometimes I just need a minute. A freaking minute.

To catch my breath. To pull it back in.

Some days I am just reeling from everything that has to be done and from everything that is coming ahead.

Deadlines, goals— the constant reminder that they’re not being met. Emotional needs, physical desires, it stacks up so quickly it can be hard to keep my head on straight.

I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that if you’re still reading, you can probably relate.

My head spins as I’m jumping in and out of roles. Grown-up hopscotch.

Two feet in, one foot out. Back and forth between mother, wife, friend, daughter, employee- enemy?

My mind floats to the feelings nagging at my heart- I’m doing all of my normal tasks distracted- still hanging onto something I saw on social media from a friend. Isn’t that how it goes?

I’m constantly multi-tasking and trying to process emotions and heavy feelings while also hyper-analyzing what someone is trying to say with that re-share button.

Are we even friends anymore? Was that directed at me? Do they have compassion for me?

These are thoughts that once would have been considered ridiculous but are now real possibilities.. only adding to my social anxiety.

We are so pitted against each other, met with a constant slew of hard and heavy topics, how are we supposed to escape?

I’m not sure how you handle yourself when it comes to meeting the emotional demands of all of the relationships you’re expected to fulfill and all of the opinions you’re also supposed to have on hand to present as a dissertation at the drop of a hat- but I don’t handle it very well.

I may try to appear like I have it all together, but eventually I’m going to hit a wall where my head is spinning and information is literally draining from my brain out of eyeballs in liquid form as I slide down the closed door just trying to catch my breath.

Mama needs a minute.

Because it’s not just small hands and small eyes looking to me for direction and support- it’s friends and family down the road and behind screens. There is this unbearably loud pressure to show up and show up big and joyful and ready to support at all times.

It’s a pressure that we both put on ourselves and on other people. We’re doing it to ourselves. And we need to take accountability for that so that we can let go, find sufficiency and live life with peace and joy.

Now I get it, the overwhelm. Some of it is inevitable.

It’s snacks and appointments. Protocols and construction. It’s bills and debt and saving for things you want. It’s meeting emotional needs and longing to be filled up yourself. It’s teaching and gently instructing and slowing the door so it doesn’t slam shut and reveal your true emotion. It’s holding in the tears and redirecting to party planning. It’s not letting anyone see just how lonely you are but laying awake for hours planning conversations and encounters you’ll never have.

Mama needs a minute.

But most of the time we don’t get our minute.

We sacrifice every ounce of our sanity because if we stop we are faced with frustration, tears, little hands and big screams. How can we take a minute without letting something slip? 

How can we expect to add on any more to our plate, especially for ourselves? Just push through. Move on. You can do this.

Until you can’t.  And explosions of sharp words and hot tears and pulsing temples brings us to our knees engulfing us in guttural sobs.

Which is why we need to make the time. Before everything else. Time to surrender to God and feel your cup fill up. To get to the place where you can find peace and joy even in the most frustrating situations. Where you will find relationships easy and the debt has dwindled. True abundant life, through God, gives you a minute.

I see you, wherever you’re at in any of this. It’s ever changing.

It’s going to be okay and you’re going to get through today. If you feel like your hands are tight, relax them. Take a deep breath and let the tears fall. Write it all out and delete what you just don’t have in you to handle anymore. Distance what needs distancing and get off of Instagram. Cut out the onslaught of political opinions and ideas from people who exhaust you. Delete the app altogether if you need to. Escape from the heaviness and allow yourself to feel that weight be lifted off your shoulders. If you can distance yourself, do so. Or there’s always the block and mute button. I used to be afraid to use that because I didn’t want to put myself into an echo chamber, but I’ve started to notice that the people who I was keeping around to keep my perspective open are acting so ugly and treating anyone who disagrees with them with such hatred that I can’t do it anymore, and I shouldn’t have to. That’s not a healthy way to live. So off they go and I’ll just keep praying for discernment and that God opens my eyes if I’m not seeing something the way that I should be. I know I’m guilty of this myself, but maybe we should spend more time just loving people and less time rebuking and calling people out. I know that there is a time and a place for it, especially if God is telling you to say something. But most of the time that is in private situations with people you have legitimate relationships with. Otherwise it’s just a statement to try and make yourself feel better because you’re not confident enough in your opinions or you’re simply trying to make someone feel bad or gain recognition. I know those with good intentions get lost in that, but if we trust that God has got things taken care of and everyone is going to have to deal with either ignoring or not listening to Him when it comes to making decisions, we’d have a lot more peace.

Basically: mind your own business and that’ll take care of a lot of your mental load.

My new thing, and you’ll hear it again if you listen to this week’s episode of the podcast, which is the first episode in season two, is that I’m tired of focusing all on the mess. I get that you can’t have the message without the “mess”, but we’re focusing way too much on just looking at the mess and sitting in it then we are cleaning it up, learning from it and asking God why He let us go through that and gaining faith from it. I’m tired of constantly wallowing in the muck. That’s why I’m saying we need a minute, because we do, to figure out how we feel, but then we need to figure out what it means for us and ask God to give us the strength, instructions and the will to clean it up and move on, having learned from that experience.

So when I say Mama needs a minute, I mean from the noise and the workload and the toil and I want you to take that minute. Breathe, pray, let it all out. Don’t plan to sit in it too long. But don’t feel guilty for taking a minute.

Plan for prayer and rest so that the tasks that need to be done will flow out of that. Rest comes first so that God doesn’t come last.

Psalm 23:1-2

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters.

When you rest, when you take your minute, you’ll find that you do not lack. You will find clarity and you will find peace for you to work out of. And you may just find that the brain fog lifts, that the mess naturally clears up and that everyone’s needs end up being met, even when it feels impossible.

I know that life is hard. But you don’t have to do it alone and you definitely don’t have to do it out of your own strength.

So mama, if you need a minute, take it.

Next time you feel like you’re falling apart, rather than losing it on whoever is in your path or shutting down and doing nothing, I want you to ask yourself: “have I talked to God today?” and regardless of the answer, just start talking. He’ll listen.