Amy Boucher Pye

Tag: replenish

  • Reflecting on #myoneword for 2018, Replenish

    I enjoyed a replenishing time on retreat in February with the Sheldon community in Devon with walks in the countryside and time to try out a new type of writing.
    This quotation from Jeremiah 31:25. 

    My word for the year (#myoneword) has been replenish, which I chose following the exhaustion of writing books and completing an MA in Christian spirituality over a compressed period of time. This year has been for rest, but as we reach the end of it I wonder if I’ve fulfilled my creative hopes that bring life to my soul and refill the well. I’m not sure that I have, but perhaps I started at a very low deficit, being so tired that at times I felt that all I could do was binge-watch a television series. I would cycle between this kind of collapse and then scurrying to finish off my regular deadlines, such as my monthly articles for OurDaily Bread and running the Woman Alive book club, as well as writing other Bible reading notes, such as Inspiring Women Every Day.

    But finally, in this last month of the year, I feel I have more energy for the creative projects that I love pursuing. To make way for them, however, I seem to need to declutter some of the gathered stuff that I didn’t sort out when I was so focused on writing and academic study. I have many more areas of the house to attack, but I’m pleased when I can attend to one, such as the weekend’s job of sorting through the computer table.

    Okay, so we still have a lot of papers to sort through on the top shelf… 

    I really should have taken a “before” photo, for this large wooden-box-on-stilts was filled to the brim with stuff—Christmas boxes, papers galore, and an old computer that needed dumping. I’m thrilled to have it cleaned out. Now the working computer has a new home, releasing the dining-room table from its temporary captivity under said computer, and our daughter has a new workplace for the increased amount of homework she has with secondary school. Do you need to clear out before you can create?

    I like being able to close the doors to the clutter!

    I still have a long list of books to read, creative projects to make, and even Christmas cookies to start baking. But instead of seeing all of the things undone, I can rest in what I have been able to do, giving thanks for that clean dining-room table and tidy home for the computer. In a small way, this approach echoes the way we can embrace the incomplete nature the #myoneword experience over a year. I’m guessing that we probably will not have reached a perfect state of contentment with our progress on the particular word, but we may be farther along than we anticipated.

    And so as you come to the end of 2018, might you take some time to consider how you’ve grown or where you’ve stagnated, particularly in the area related to your word for the year, if you’ve chosen one? As we reflect on how God has moved in and through us, we can give thanks for his grace in our lives.

    Over to you: Did you choose a word for 2018? If so, what was it, and how did having that word before you shape you over the months?

  • Five Minute Friday: An abundance of rest and restoration

    Walking by our local brook, including this view, brings me joy and restoration.

    Today’s prompt for Five Minute Friday, restore, resonates with me strongly. As regular readers here will know, #MyOneWord this year is replenish. A time for filling up the stores that have been depleted from writing two books, completing an MA in Christian spirituality, and facing some other challenges. Yet as I talked with my weekly writing buddies yesterday, they reminded me (lovingly) that I have more replenishing to embrace. That although we’re halfway through 2018, I’m still doing a whole lot with my “regular” writing/speaking load. And that when 2018 ends, I won’t magically have reached a place of restoration. I’m a work in progress, and can look forward to the gift of filling up beyond this calendar year.

    To cite one area of specificity, I’m realizing that replenishing has meant we’ve enacted a more limited approach to hospitality this year than previously. We love having visitors from foreign climes, but with my energy stores it’s just felt too much. Acknowledging that this is a season and that I’m not a failure because of needing boundaries is a good thing, although hard at times too.

    How do you embrace the need to replenish and restore?

    You can read another of my #fiveminutefriday articles on the theme of replenish here. To write your own and link up with the other writers, you can do so here. It’s a wonderful community!

  • Five Minute Friday: Replenish the empty stores

    “How long did it take for you to write the books and complete the MA?”

    “Three years,” I said.

    “And how long do you think you’d give someone else to do that?”

    “Hmmm…. Probably five years.”

    “So you’re two years ahead! You can take some time off.”

     

    As I think about a conversation with a wise friend yesterday, I know I enter 2018 with far fewer deadlines than in the recent past. That’s the plan, for I’m tired and worn out. Yes, I want to write some more books and ponder what I’ve learned about Christian spirituality, but not right away. But how do we just turn off the drive to do, do, do? To accomplish something? To make a difference? And how do we do that in a world of social media, where I see authors signing contracts for their next books while wondering if I’m missing out?

    We – that is, I – need to be intentional in my plan to rest. Yesterday in my conversation I talked about adding another word-of-the-year, this one replenish, one that a friend from high school had uttered a week ago and stuck with me. As I mentioned this word to my wise friend, she shared its Latin root and assured me that it’s an apt word to describe the filling up that I need to do this year.

    Being intentional about resting seems counterintuitive to me, however. I am used to deadlines, goals, projects. I will need to adjust my approach. This week, the first week after fulfilling major deadlines, I’ve allowed myself to flop and watch some shows and not accomplish much at all. Next week I’ll make some gentle goals – such as taking down the Christmas decorations (!), playing around with some craft things, and going for walks in the brook.

    How do you replenish your empty stores?

    This post is part of the weekly Five Minute Friday link-up. You can find today’s prompt here. If you are thinking about using a Lent book here, I wrote one during that busy time on the theme of forgiveness, The Living Cross.