Are You in Control? Weekend Challenge!

 

 

As a wife, as a mother (if you are one), or as a daughter, aunt, sibling or friend ... as a person, are you in control?

Do you feel yourself barking orders, cracking an invisible whip, raising your voice ... or none of these, but you feel incredibly stressed while getting everything and everybody in order to carry out plans?  Your plans?

Do you allow life to move along, or do you want to direct it and put energy into making it "just right"?

Do you feel anxious when the schedule for the day seems like a suggestion to everyone else, while you take it seriously?
Do you have a list planned for today?
Does your list include specific times, like a television viewer's guide?
Do you want to get things done the right way?
Do you feel at odds with your husband or family because they don't keep up with the plan?
Do you feel that if you don't do it, no one else will?
If your plans don't execute or end as you hoped, do you feel discouraged, mortified, angry, or that you want to go at it again to get it right?

If you answer "yes" to any of these, you may have an itsy-bitsy control issue.  If you ask your husband, he may think it's larger than that.  Your kids, if they're young, probably don't have opinions because they have lived with the constant scheduling or reminders all their lives.

A chasm of difference exists between wanting to make sure all the laundry is collected and clean all at once without stray socks under the couch, and demanding, commanding, shouting or volcanically erupting over the misplaced socks.

A pit of anger bubbles just under the surface when you plan an afternoon for your husband or family and interruptions happen and you begin to boil from the inside and can't contain it without seething a bit, frowning, gritting your teeth or just feeling manipulated by circumstances out of your control.

It's the "out of your control" part that should tip you off to a greater issue.

I've been a control freak.  A moderate, let me say, but a control freak, nonetheless.  I liked things to run smoothly and for everyone to smile and have a wonderful time learning and bonding.  When we hit bumps, I began braced for more and added stress to the situation.  When smiles faded due to children being tired or because of misunderstandings, I tried to shuttle everyone back into the line of a smile.  When the learning became a chore, I attempted to continue, to carry out the plan and made the learning more excruciating.  When bonding felt like a forced march connected by heavy chains, I encouraged and tried to explain away the situation.

Been there, done with that.

I've learned to let life happen.  My children are a little older, and they survived my need to not mix the colors when dyeing Easter eggs, as well as my desire to take breathtakingly sweet photos of them with their arms around each other (siblings don't like this, usually).  My husband is a little older, too, and he has enjoyed plenty of control features of his own, and has learned to relax along with me -- we didn't plan it, it just happened that way.

This weekend, take off your foreman's hat in your marriage and family.  Let life happen.  Have some plans, but don't bet the farm on them, don't make them integral to the enjoyment of the next few days.  If it's too cold to sled or build a snow fort, snuggle up inside and watch a DVD you haven't seen in a while, complete with the hot cocoa you would have enjoyed after that sledding.

Let your husband sit back a while and do nothing.  Don't think of a bulb that needs changing, or a project you could start.  Don't plan an exciting event when he has had a busy week already.  Talk to him.  Find out if he'd like to have a plan or just hang out in the comfort of home.

Make home comfortable this weekend.  Obligations happen, but don't make them into mountains when they really don't rise higher than mole hills.

Let go.  Don't ride the herd or blow the whistle.  Put down the whip and pick up a mixer ... bake some cookies, play a board game, watch home videos.  Better yet, ask what everyone else would like to do and let them make it happen.  You can help, but you can't control.

Do it for you and you will want to do it for them more often.  Just let it go ... little by little, let it go.

Better a patient person than a warrior, those with self-control than those who take a city.  ~~Proverbs 16:32

What does that mean to you?