J. Rosemarie Francis (: 00:00

Hello Solomoms. Tired? Weary? Frustrated? It's the first thought that came to my mind when I first started Solomon's talk. And this week's episode, I want to address something that is normally absent from the single mom life. Rest. And this is kind of a follow-up from last week, but also it was inspired by the sermon.

at church this week. I'm J. Rose Marie Francis. Thank you for listening to Solomon's Talk. If you are a mother resisting rest, needing rest, wanting rest, but can't seem to get to that place of rest. This episode is for you. In this battle.

So why do I want to talk about rest? And how does rest work? If you're a solo mother, juggling work, juggling the kids, juggling activities, juggling your mindset, how does that work? Well, before I go further, that I want to introduce a verse of scripture from Matthew 11, 28 to 30. Come to me.

All of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. And I wanted to put that in there because of course I'm going to talk about rest in the framework of God's will for our lives as a mother raising the children he gifted us with. I often quote first Peter 5, 7, because I want you to understand that God doesn't want to see us weary, burdened, stressed out, and depleted.

So because we are loath to take time out to rest, the taking time away from the daily grind, the turmoil, the chaos, the schedule. But before you hit stop, before you get off this podcast, I want you to think about it. Some of the biggest thought process we go through when we think about rest, before we push it away, we wonder, well, if I rest, who's going to cook?

Who's gonna wash the dishes? Who's gonna clean the house? Who is going to pay the bills if I take a break? If I take a rest, if I step away. And all these questions come up and they're legitimate questions. Because we know that the opportunity cost of resting means something doesn't get done or is delayed. There's no doubt that when we live in a way that is often termed survival mode, that fear grips us and panic.

Overcomes us when we think about resting, when we think about taking a break, when we think about what we need to do instead of rest. One of the quotes that stuck with me from this past Sunday sermon was one of the enemies of rest is our lack of faith that God will provide. And it makes sense. If we're hung up on the fact that there's no one else but us, and if we rest on our laurels, our

Sit on our hands for a minute that the whole our whole world is gonna fall apart. But think about that. If your existence collapse because you take a 30-minute break from all the chaos, from all the work, from all the activities, we have to think about that. If that's what if that's what we're thinking about. And I know when you're a solo mom, you can't simply stop doing everything.

Because we think that if we don't make dinner, dinner might not get made. If you don't pay the bill, nobody else is necessarily going to pay it. And while in a general sense that is true, later on I explain why it's so crucial that you rest. So if you think that resting means that you don't take your responsibilities seriously, but here's the real crux of the matter. We're living as though everything depends on me.

Isn't that what we tell ourselves? But honestly, ask yourself in this moment, what am I afraid will happen? Ask yourself that. If you stop to rest, what are you afraid will happen? And I would like to ask, in all of this, where is God in all of this thought process you're having? Remember the scripture I just read. I actually only read a part of it. The rest of it says

Matthew eleven, twenty eight to thirty, come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am lowly and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. So you see, praying, reading your scripture or trusting God doesn't have to be another to do thing, none of it.

should be a burden. I would even like to go further and say that from my experience, closer to God mean rest in God. And I wanted to introduce this scripture deliberately because hopefully it will help you mitigate the power of the stories we tell ourselves about getting rest. But moving on, so the question I want to ask is are you tired or are you depleted? Think about that for a moment. We all get tired.

I remember when I was in New York City in the middle of raising my two youngest sons, working long days, getting up early, studying on the subway. I felt exhausted. But there's another word for that exhaustion. It's called depletion. Because there's a point at which you are so tired, it becomes something else. Depletion. And depleted means.

Drain, exhaust, impoverish, bankrupt. It means to deprive of something essential to existence or potency. That's from the Meridian Online Dictionary. So think about it. Think about the fact that while you are going through doing all the things you're doing for you and your children, you are experiencing a phenomena.

That makes you feel impoverished, bankrupt. I mean, we use the word exhaustion so much it becomes almost redundant. But I think depletion sums it up well. Because it means to deprive of something essential to existence, to your existence or potency, how effective you are in parenting. So think I want, I wanna I'm keep repeating this.

Because I want it to sink in. That lack of rest leads to depletion. And depletion means to deprive of something essential to existence or potency, efficiency. And when you're depleted, you're irritable. You don't think clearly. You have less patience. You stop enjoying things. You might even eat differently when you're tired.

Because you, you, your body is seeking comfort. And sometimes we're so depleted that even spending time with God can feel like one more thing on the to-do list. And to wrap up this section, I want to give you an example. I want to drive this home with this example. Imagine you're driving, you're going on a trip, and you pass a gas station, you look at your gas gauge, and it's on E. But you tell yourself,

You're in a hurry, you have to get there, you can't stop. Because stopping is going to mean that you're going to lose time. But a mile or two down the road, your car comes to an abrupt stop because you run out of gas. Now imagine how much time and effort and wasted energy it's going to take for you to get gas. You either have to call Chip A and wait, you have to

Get out the car and walk back to the gas station. So many things that could have been avoided if you had just stopped at the gas station and filled your tank. Think about that. So when you're tired and feeling depleted, it's not necessarily a sign that you need to try harder. You may need to rest. And here's something I'm learning. When fatigue

Enters the picture. Faith walks out. When we are depleted, we don't have the capacity, the potency to think about believing for better, believing that everything will be taken care of if we take a moment to rest. And a lot of times when we have a long to-do list, we might say, Well, yeah, if I finish, if I clean up the kitchen, then I could take.

five minutes break or if the laundry is done then I could take a break. If if the kids are they're washed and they're ready for bed or I tuck them in bed, then maybe I could get some rest. But given our long list of to-dos and responsibility, rest seldom enters the picture because we are never finished. When is everything ever finished in a household with children?

In a household where only one person bears the responsibility of that household, when is everything ever finished? So ask yourself that. The next thing I want to say is that rest isn't laziness, it's responsibility. We owe it to ourselves, we owe it to our existence, we owe it to our family to rest. Rest is part part of taking care of ourselves so.

We can be there for our children. We can show up in every possible way, mentally, physically, and yes, spiritually. Cause remember, when we're depleted, we deprive ourselves of something essential to existence. Depletion affects and diminishes our potency as a parent. Remember that. Lots of stress, I know. Lots of pressure here, right? The pressure for us to rest. So how do we get rest?

while still maintaining our our responsibilities as a solo mother. Priority. In the middle of chaos, we can stop for a moment and make decisions regarding our daily activities. I find that when I'm overwhelmed with life, when when things get overwhelming, I I often stop and make myself a list. I empty my brain of everything that I'm thinking about.

And I write it down and make a list of all the things. Go to the store, call this person, fix the washing machine, cook dinner, all the things that are swimming around my head. Sign the note from my kid from school. Whatever it is that I need to do that's swimming, that's just taking up space, taking up brain matter, I write down.

All those things. Not only the things the list that to do, but also one of the things I do a lot is if I think about a lot of things that I need to buy, whether it's for myself or the kids or the household, I make a list of those things. And I write down the price. Because sometimes I'm thinking about all the things that needs to be bought.

And it overwhelms me thinking about it, especially if I don't have unlimited funds, which I don't. And usually solo mothers don't have unlimited funds. So what I find help is to write make a list of those things right next to them, how much they cost. And then from there you could pursue how to get those things, how to purchase those things, how to afford those things. But right now we're trying to.

Give you rest. Because resting is so much more profound than putting your head down on a pillow and going to sleep. Right? So here's a here's a little bit of a exercise, if you will. Create two lists. Get a sheet of paper, make a list. Heading one, what depletes me or drains me? So you're gonna make a list of those things. And in heading two,

What makes you feel rejuvenated? And this this these could be tasks, it could be responsibilities, they could could be chores, it could be thought process. What depletes you are what drains you. And that's your starting point. Now the other thing that we want to do, I I'd encourage you to do, is to make a list of your

Daily chores. And I know it sounds like I'm giving you a lot of things to do, a lot of lists to write, but he is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose. That's a quote from Jim Elliott. While you're making your list, think about that quote. Your weekly chores. One list is your daily chores, and one list is your weekly chores. And on that list,

I'm going to ask you to next to each list, each item is to say this is urgent. So in the brackets you. Important. And on on the next one, if it applies, can do later. So mark that with an L.

Later. So what that gives you is a perspective on your daily chores and your weekly, your weekly activities. Now I have a fourth letter for you. And that delegate. This is one of those things that we often don't want to do. We don't want to ask for help. We don't want, we don't even want the kids to help.

And this is this is a problem in so many ways. But we're not gonna talk about that now. Well what I'm going to ask you to do is your fourth letter is D delegate. So on that list, you're gonna write in bracket, is it urgent? Is it important? Is it if it's urgent, you will we'll put a U next to it.

If it's important, we put a I next to it. And of course it's a if it's a combination of both do both letters. And the next one is we could do that later. It doesn't have to be done now is an L. And then could someone else do this? Then we're gonna do D for delegate, whether it's can can Johnny take the trash out or just tie it up or just pull trash from different location and pile it up in the trash can. Can Johnny do that?

Delegate. So what I'm asking you to do is to take the time to give your brain some rest. Get it out of your head. Looks like work and yes it is, but this is work so you can rest, right? The next thing I wanna talk about, how is rest how can rest look for us while still taking care of our responsibilities, while still maintaining a household.

How does rest look for us? And and this is gonna look different for each of us. Rest could be, I have a profound thought in this. By resting, you allow yourself to become stronger, to become whole, to become potent as a person. Because rest is essential to your well-being.

It's essential to your family's well-being. Rest is one of those things that interrupts the chaos, especially the chaos in our minds. So I'm going to ask you to figure out ways that you could rest, that you could take time away from the, you know, the everyday grind. And it could be that you go to bed an hour earlier. It could be that.

while the kids sleep instead of doing laundry, that you kick back on the sofa, the chair, and put your feet up and gaze through the window, read a book, write down your list, but but step away from all that action and reaction. I know this is difficult and and I can't even I can't even do this episode and just leave it at that. I will have to follow up on this because

It it's unpacking so much and each time I think about it, I'm thinking of something else. Because as a divorced mom with raise who raised children for twenty years, twenty plus years, I understand that I understand the fear that comes with if I stop, everything will fall apart. And this is where we we zero in on this scripture.

Matthew 11, 28 to 30. Come to me. So you're weary and burdened. Go to God. Talk to Him. In that moment, children are sleeping. You get home, you get home from work. Like, for example, you get home from work. You're tired. But dinner needs to be cooked. Cook the dinner. Get the children eating.

Maybe you eat too, but a lot of us we don't eat as well. We're hungry, but we don't eat. We kinda let the kids eat and then we go off to do something else. Sit down with your children. Have meal with your children. Even though you're actively doing something, eating, that brings in some rest. Some rested it's called it's rested exercise. You're sitting down with your children, you're having a meal with them.

Whether you're just listening to them or asking them about their day and let them ask you about yours. And this is a different take on rest. And I want you to understand that when I'm talking about rest in this concept, I'm not saying go sleep your day away. Although sometimes that's necessary. When I was working and going through the chaos, sometimes I'd take a day off work and I'll just stay in bed all day.

I would sleep sometime and sometime I couldn't sleep because of all the thoughts running through my head. But my body was resting. So rest in this context takes different form. This is one of those things that you come home tired from work and you make dinner or you prepare dinner and it's on the table and the kids are eating. Don't run off and do something else.

Down with the children once or twice a week, connect with them, communicate with them, let them hear about your day and let and hear about theirs. And this becomes a moment that you could relax in. So that's one example. So it's okay to say rest, you know, take some time to rest, but how do you do that? How does that fit into the life, the chaotic life of a solo mom?

And these are ways you could do that. I don't always think watching TV is rest. But if that works for you, do it. Read a book. And I would encourage you to read the scriptures. Take a moment to breathe. You need to be in the bathroom. One of the things I've learned to do is shower fast.

And the only reason I shower fast isn't because I have somewhere to go, but i it I trained my mind when I was a thing when I was when my kids were younger to not stay in the bathroom too long. So I would shower fast. So it was all about what they were doing and making sure I keep an eye on them. Total chaos. Total chaotic thinking because I never took the time to enjoy a shower.

Because I was too busy thinking about making sure they're okay. Right? So it's things like that. And so I just wanted to encourage you today to whatever, however it looks for you, that you would try to incorporate some rest in your in your schedule, in your daily activities. And don't be afraid to ask for help.

I often say that if you have somebody who could help you, if your kids are younger and they need supervision, and you have someone who you could ask, who you trust, to watch them for a couple of hours while you just relax, whether it's taking a bath or reading a book or sleeping. You know, when you're exhausted, maybe you just want to sleep.

I'm not a sleeper, so I would probably end up reading a book in a situation like that. But one thing I wanna leave with you. If you don't rest, if you don't take the time to rest, you could end up like that car that ran out of gas on the road in the middle of nowhere. You will be forced to rest. You want to stay around long enough for your children. You wanna be strong and healthy for your children.

And strong doesn't mean hustle, hustle, hustle, and try to do it all yourself. You can tell that that's not what I mean from this episode. Depend on God. Ask for help from those who are trustworthy. Delegate to your children. Delegate to a professional if necessary. And devise ways, find ways to get rest. Thank you for listening to Solomon's Talk. I'm J. Rosemarie Francis.

I'm at jen at jrosemary.com. You can always drop me an email or leave a comment below where where possible. Thank you.