Simply Edify
We are Simply Edify. Our mission is to help strengthen your walk with the Lord. Our goal is to encourage women as we navigate the messiness of life through Biblical studies, personal stories, and practical tips that bolster our walk with Jesus daily.
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Simply Edify
Overwhelmed Heart
Feeling overwhelmed by holiday stress, especially as a mother, is a struggle many of us face. Join us as we unravel ways to realign priorities by discerning truth from lies, and asking God for guidance in our day-to-day duties.
This episode is not just about surviving the holiday hustle but thriving amidst it by shifting our focus from the material to the meaningful. Our conversation encourages saying no to the unnecessary, fostering spiritual and emotional renewal as we head into the new year. By prioritizing what truly matters, we are reminded of God's goodness towards us and we can then walk in peace and love through stressful times.
Hello and welcome to Simply Edifies podcast. Our goal is to encourage women as we navigate the messiness of life through biblical studies, personal stories and practical tips that bolster our walk with Jesus daily. Thank you for joining us in our episode today.
Speaker 2:Hello, we are talking today about an overwhelmed heart and I feel like it's perfect timing because obviously we're headed right in for the holidays of Thanksgiving and Christmas and all the things, and it's a time where stress and overwhelm is high and I think that, especially as moms, a lot of the extracurricular things that happen around this time of year are on us and we want to do all of the things, but in reality we know that we can't do all of the things, so we become stressed and overwhelmed and angry and anxious and all of the things. So let's just take a minute before the crazy hits to actually evaluate what is important and what isn't and what can we do with the feeling of being overwhelmed.
Speaker 3:One of the first things that we can just stop and evaluate how much of this is a lie that I'm believing Right, because often we entertain these lies that were no good. We should quit trying. These are coming from the devotional book. I'm not making this is actually April's thoughts, but we have to remember that those are lies, lives, and god sees our struggles. I love this hero. God sees our struggles and he does not hold our failures over us. We do that. We do that to ourselves.
Speaker 2:We do that to other people, and so we should act based on you know, people around us and who we see and culture and all of these expectations right, and we never really go to our creator, the one who gave us our abilities, the one who gave us our children, the one who gave us our families, the one we don't go to God and say what do you expect of me in this day and in this time? What do you have planned for me? So I think if we were to take a little bit of a step back, before the stress and overwhelm even hits us, and just say God, what do you want me to do today? Like? I have this idea. Like. My kids need to be fed, they need to be taught, you need to be dropped off here, they need to be done. Like, but lead me, guide me. If I need to say no to something, help me to say no Like, let your spirit guide me in my day, and I think if we were to do that, we'd find ourselves in a better place for sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, because God can redirect our priorities, and I think that's kind of the key. When we're lined up with what he wants, the important things become important and the things that aren't as important kind of fall to the wayside. And there are things that we just have to do every day, like we do have to, you know, feed our families for example, which can be very tedious if that's not your thing.
Speaker 3:Even if it is, it can just be tedious to like have to come up with dinner every single night for the rest of your life. That's an overwhelming thought, at least it is for me sometimes. Right, I like to cook, but still just like the creative part of it of trying to come up with food that everyone likes, everyone can eat, everyone will eat. But you know, sometimes I put too much pressure on myself of it has to be a certain type of meal, when sometimes it's okay to serve sandwiches for dinner, you know, and God's not looking down at me going oh you serve sandwiches for dinner.
Speaker 3:Now, if I'm just being lazy and I'm doing that because I mean there's days where it's easier but maybe it's so I can have time to do something a little bit more important with my kids or to actually spend time with them or be able to clean up the kitchen quicker so that we can do something as a family. So that's kind of a very like nitty gritty, practical right Sample. But oftentimes when we pray, like you said, and ask God to just set our priorities straight, I think sometimes the answer is in those little nitty-gritty ways yeah, james, 4, 13 through 15.
Speaker 2:It says go to now. You that say, today or tomorrow we will go into such a city and continue their year and by himself and get gain, whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanisheth away. For that you ought to say if the lord will will, we shall live and do this or that. And that verse is such a good reminder because we can have all the plans and we can, you know, try to basically foretell what our future would be, but without God's leading in it. We ought to say if the Lord will, if God allows, we will do this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we stress out over things. One an old phrase that my mom used to use is, she would say, don't borrow trouble. And a lot of times when we're stressing about the future, we are borrowing trouble Like there's enough trouble. What's that verse that says, like you know, there's enough evil in one day. I can't remember the verse off the top of my head, but sometimes we just have to focus on today and trust God with the future?
Speaker 2:Yeah, to a level of just faith, obviously. Faith in surrender of the moment, of the day, of the plan. Right Plans don't go our way. We get mad, we get stressed, we get overwhelmed. Surrender, god, this happened. You knew it was going to happen. Help me to get over it. Help me to walk on and go and do what you'd have me to in the rest of this day, and I know it sounds super easy, but when you're in that moment, that's not the first thing that comes to your mind, that is not your initial knee jerk reaction. To be like God, you've got a plan, you've got this, I'm just going to go where you want me to. That's not our natural tendency, and so it takes practice. That takes concentrated effort and again, it's one of those. What is your intentions? Begin in the morning with the intention to allow God to use your day, instead of waiting until something bad happens and being like okay, god, I give it back to you now.
Speaker 3:Or God, why did you let it? Why did you let everything?
Speaker 2:spiral out of control?
Speaker 3:Yeah, Maybe no one else does that, but sometimes I'm like, okay, God, where, what, what's happening and what's happening is is me, I'm what's happening, Right?
Speaker 2:I was like hey, you didn't ask. You didn't ask for my help, so I didn't give it. This is, this is on you.
Speaker 3:Honestly, I think there's so many times where we just God just says okay you know, do it your way, just like we do with our kids sometimes.
Speaker 3:Okay, try it your way, just like we do with our kids sometimes. Okay, try it your way. I'm just gonna stand back and let you learn right. Right, and sometimes it doesn't always very well, but I love. I love one of the verses that you added, um in the devotional. It says um Psalms 143, 10, teach me to do thy will, for For thou art, my God, thy spirit is good, lead me in the land of uprightness. First of all, teach me.
Speaker 3:I think that some of us who are kind of perfectionist or used to getting things right the first time, and we can't handle it when we don't get things right the first time, right Like it's hard to accept the fact that we are learning and God is teaching us and it's not an instant gratification of, well, I'm saved now and I'm going to do everything perfectly and, you know, have this all together.
Speaker 3:So that aspect of just you know, telling, asking God to teach you, and realizing that you're probably not going to get it all right the first day. But it says for thou art, my God, thy spirit is good, lead me in the land of uprightness. Again, he's leading us into the land of uprightness. It's a walk, and I hate to use I hate using this word, but I'm going to use this word it's a journey. It's a journey, it really is, and and it's less about it's. Oh, I'm going to say something else that's cringy. Um, it really is less about the destination, but it is like, honestly, he's leading us into the land of a brightness. It's not like leading you into perfect brightness, it's into we're just walking into this place where we're closer to god.
Speaker 2:That's the ultimate goal is to to have a closer relationship with god and pretend I didn't say any.
Speaker 3:Of all that weird stuff.
Speaker 2:No, it's just, it is funny because it's just like you know all about the words. Yes, Forgive me, but.
Speaker 3:I just so many times, when there's these verses about, like what do I do, whatever I'm overwhelmed or I need peace. It says thy spirit is good, thou art um. It says thy spirit is good, thou art my god. Thy spirit is good. Knowing god and who he is changes everything, and being in god's word so that you can know what his spirit is like, so that you can see with confidence you are my god, is very important as you were saying, with the, the very used sayings of journey and destination.
Speaker 2:You know, it's step-by-step, it's consistency, and consistency is hard and that's, I think, where we really struggle. That's I mean, at least I do. I struggle with that consistency of every day. I am going to, you know, pray and ask God to lead me and direct me. And not that, not that I don't pray every day, it's just that mindfulness of surrendering every day to what God has for us, you know, and to take the stress and to take the worry and to take the burden that we feel put upon us, whatever that be, to give that to God so that way, when you know our day comes upon us, we can already be in a place of surrender to his will. So, yeah, it's just the hardness of being consistent and like, if you're not going to talk to your husband every day, you're not going to have that great of a relationship. If you're not going to talk to your kids every day, you're not going to have that great of a relationship and there's going to be a major breakdown in trust. There's going to be a breakdown in just general overall well-being and that's how it is.
Speaker 2:As a believer, you don't have regular communication with Jesus. Your overall spiritual health is going to suffer and, by default, you will be overwhelmed and you will be stressed and you will. The cares of this world will become too much because you're taking back your burden. God says come unto me all you that labor and heavy laden. I will give you rest. Right, we're taking it back. We're saying I got this all on my own. So therefore we're overwhelmed, overburdened and we find ourselves in a bad place. But the remedy is easy. The remedy is not hard. It's just a matter of consistency and surrender. So that's good news, right?
Speaker 3:It is, and I think, on a practical level, going into, like you said, the holiday season, which really started like memorial day, I think yeah it's just one thing after another. It really is um, but seriously, like you know, these next couple months it just feels like you're going non-stop and there's a lot of pressure. And I'm a weirdo who doesn't love Christmas the way a lot of people do, because it just the pressure of it is just too much for me.
Speaker 3:Um, and I do like Christmas, it's just I like Thanksgiving better, where you show up and you eat and that's yeah the food is better, it's just show up, you eat, you talk about being grateful, like I mean, it's a perfect holiday yeah but, practically speaking, something that has been really helpful to me is, just like you said at the very beginning, saying no, like you don't have to do all the things your kids especially for moms, I feel like there's like this massive pressure to keep up with all the stuff you see on Instagram, pinterest and people's Facebook posts of just everybody in their matching pajamas and going to all the things and doing all the things, and some people just thrive on that. I know that me and even my children do not. They end up burnout I mean again, practically just like food allergies and stuff. When you go out to all that stuff. It's hard to avoid and it just causes like trauma and if they do get something, it makes them sick and it's just. It's just a lot.
Speaker 3:And so the last couple of years I've really been working on saying no so that I can say yes to the things that are important, and so deciding, deciding in advance what is the most important stuff and then kind of working backwards from that, honestly, like as a family, we just enjoy, you know, watching Christmas movies in our pajamas and eating cookies, and that's just as memorable and good as going out and spending a lot of money to do an elaborate thing that's going to exhaust you and drain you.
Speaker 3:Sometimes there's a balance. I'm just saying that to kind of free up your mind a little bit. Take a chance at just saying no so that you can say yes, and I said it. I said it's practical and it is. But also it can be very spiritually defeating when you run yourself into the ground in the name of something good or wholesome, um, then you kind of walk into the new year with this just physical and emotional and even spiritual exhaustion, right, and it can be such a letdown. And then you go into those hard winter months where it's cold and it's, you know, everyone's getting sick and all the things, um, and you have to bounce back physically, emotionally, spiritually, and so it's not just practical advice like give yourself some breathing room right, yeah, and you know I love to do all the Christmas things.
Speaker 2:I'm kind of the opposite of you, but I love it to a degree. Like there's definitely a point where I'm like I'm done and we're done and no, for myself is just like I already told the kids. It's like look, this is our spending limit this year. We're not going over this and this has helped us in a lot of ways.
Speaker 2:It's helped them with their expectation of hey, they're old enough now, like they can, they know the prices of things. And I can be like, well, that's not in our budget and so that cuts out on the well, but I really wanted to do this, or I really wanted to do that, or I wanted you know, and it's like well, we have to choose. And this is your Christmas, this is the Christmas budget, this is what we have, and that's very practical, it's very wise. There's nothing wrong with that at all. In fact, I feel that it teaches. It will teach them to do the same to say, no, we have to have a budget and, yes, we can have Christmas and it can still be fun, and we can get presents and do all the fun things.
Speaker 2:But we have to pick and choose. We can't say yes to everything, because everything costs money and we need to be wide stewards of our finances. So, just from that, we need to be wide stewards of our finances. So, just from that practical aspect of it is letting your family know upfront. Obviously, as in military, we don't have extended family here, so I don't have to do that part of it, but even if I did, we've done in the past been like. Well, this is our spending limit. We're not going to get all of the cousins something.
Speaker 3:We're not going to get all of the aunts, and you know what I mean. Like to be fair when you say all the cousins you're talking about like 5 000 people, so there are a lot of cousins I don't think you'd have to have quite the job to get something for everyone.
Speaker 2:But I know what you're saying, can't just have that conversation of you know, yes, we are going to come, we're going to participate in the fun things, but our budget does not allow for this and you know, yeah, it's, it's okay and people can be okay with that. And if they're not okay with that, then maybe they can find another, another place to go for Christmas. Oh my goodness.
Speaker 3:There's so much drama. There's so much drama in this too. I mean, thankfully my family doesn't get too crazy, but I've seen it, yeah, and sometimes it's just not worth it. My sister does something for, like her nieces and nephews, that is has been nice. In the last few years she's been doing more like experience gifts.
Speaker 2:Those, I would take those over gifts, like wrapped in a box.
Speaker 3:any day I was like where were these when they got a thousand stuffed animals every Christmas and, oh my goodness, also just full of toys, um, but it is nice. Like you know she'll have, she'll plan a day with them and and do something with the kids and it's that's been really nice and practical. And then it's less to unwrap on Christmas because man unwrapping presents at grandparents houses, we all get together and um oh my goodness.
Speaker 3:And wrapping paper, just people and wrapping paper and things, and it's so much. I mean it's it's super fun, but also just a lot and yeah, but I, I know that, taking a little bit of a step back, like, we still do things. We absolutely do things. Another, another this is something we discussed in sunday school this morning. Um, we were talking about how god's grace is sufficient and, um, when he is enough, we don't have to be enough, and um, it's because sometimes that's where we kind of start spiraling as well, like, right, I'm not good enough, I'm not doing enough, I'm not this, I'm not that. Right, when god's in his proper place, everything else falls into its proper place.
Speaker 3:The question that got raised in our conversation was what if there was no social media and you weren't going to have that picture, perfect picture to post? Would you still go and do the thing? Would you still do that activity the way you did it? Or is it a photo op for right facebook? Now, don't get me wrong, I love to have cute pictures of my kids, like I've, definitely. I was saying this morning that you know there's been many times I've been like okay everybody smile, smile, look like you're having fun so I can get that picture.
Speaker 3:So I'm I'm preaching to myself here. But you know, if you took that equation away like that wasn't part of the equation and it was just simply for your own, you and your children, or you and your families, or you and whoever, your own enjoyment would you still put in the effort and the time and the stress, even right? And if you wouldn't, then maybe don't do it right for sure.
Speaker 2:And when we are in thanksgiving and christmas, remember that thanksgiving you are to be giving thanks to god because he is the giver of all things good. And this past month it's been actually kind of nice. We've been just me and the kids at breakfast time. In the morning I've been looking at passages on thanks and thanksgiving and then just writing one thing that we've been thankful for, and I've noticed a big difference in the kids attitude, like especially my son. He struggles with whining about things, complaining, you know, and I've definitely noticed a difference in him since the beginning of the month and he, if I've forgotten a day, he's reminded me. You know, oh, mom, we need to do our Thanksgiving verses and yeah, and so obviously it's closer to the end of the month, but that doesn't mean that you can't still do it. Um, and then, as it gets to christmas in december, remember that it's about the jesus birth, it is about celebrating the gift that god gave to us in his son, and all of that means.
Speaker 2:So take time to look up the verses of the prophecy of Christ. Take time to look at not just the passage that talks about when he came, but also read about his death. That's why he came Read about his death, that's why he came read about his resurrection. Without that, we are, of most, all men, most miserable. It it's a good reminder. Like you were saying, we go into the new year and when we let all of these materialistic things get us down, we're we're, you know, depressed in the new year. But what if we took the month of December and remembered what we're supposed to remember, why Jesus came, who he is. And we did it as a family, we do it with our kids, and we really made that the focus. I think we'd find ourselves in a much better place. And that, honestly, that's one of the reasons why I love Christmas is just this.
Speaker 2:Christmas songs, the Christmas hymns are just so rich with prophecy, and not prophecy of just Jesus coming, but also the end time, and it gives you hope, and it gives you joy, and it gives you peace and it gives you all of these things when you let it, you know, when you allow the truth of God's word to really sink in and not become drugged down with all of the extra things. So that is our encouragement for you season. We hope that you do not have an overwhelmed heart, but that you truly can enjoy the season by being intentional and by taking your day to the Lord and asking him what he wants you to do with it, and then taking your holidays to the Lord and asking him what he would have you do with those. Thanks for listening. Bye.
