Once my younger child's feet climbed onto the school bus steps, I found myself fielding questions that sounded a lot more like, "Now that you have nothing to do, how will you fill your time?" In other words, am I going to get a job?
Six years past the first votes on "What Amy Should Do Now" (as if my at-homeness was up for referendum), I have entertained a few comments about my "not going to work" life with this question: "Does my not working outside my home bother you somehow? Is it wrong?" This causes silence and awkward glances at wristwatches.
One fair weather friend has even gone so far as to point me in the direction she thinks I should go for employment. Since her last attempt at pushing me toward her view of right, she has stopped making eye contact at public events and does not speak to me if she can help it. I approach her to inquire about her family, as her children share classrooms at school with mine. My behavior makes her uncomfortable. I can see it in the downcast eyes and the turned-away body language. I have disappointed her and she has tired of trying to help me.
Since when is my worth wrapped up in my wallet? (Tweet if you will.)
Therefore, I have decided that a woman not gainfully employed in these modern-day United States is the equivalent of a leper in Bible times. Hear ye, hear ye, step away from this woman.
I don't shout "unclean", I simply voice, "I don't hold a paying job." People look at me sympathetically, unsure of what to say.
In the eyes of many, I am unworthy ... unclean. Hurry past me, I might infect you.
I might inflict my ways on other women as they pass me. They might accidentally walk away with raging desire to:
- cook and bake from scratch
- clean, shop and do laundry during the weekday, not on evenings or weekends
- maintain the lawn and landscaping without aid of outside services
- maintain diplomacy among family members
- set the tone of the household
- travel with husband for business when possible (rare, but worthwhile to the millionth power)
- provide counseling at all times of day for children and husband
- be the listening ear
- represent a constant in the home
- guide children through peer influence issues, social situations and in understanding the world
- pray throughout the day for children and husband
- focus on family
- teach skills in negotiation, chivalry, modesty, sibling relations, charity, and reliance on God
- be taken for granted because I am present before school, after school, during school
- have an open heart, mind and physical presence for my husband
- be the one, primary care-taker of the family
- work at the role of help-meet to my husband as my first employment
- be mentally, physically, spiritually and emotionally available voluntarily and by request
- not divide my time or attention between work and family
Clearly, these skills, attentions, and offerings can sit on any woman's list, whether she works in the world or in the home. But in the HOW, they differ greatly. In the available time and attention to detail, they do not equate. They cannot equate. Fact.
The woman working in the world finds herself attentive to the needs of managers, coworkers, customers, mail clerks, secretaries, and delivery people for a large percentage of her day. Conversely, a woman in the home finds herself attentive to the needs of her husband, children, household (form and function) for a large percentage of her day.
Understand, I do not offer or imply judgement here. Don't forget that, please.
I can't deny that I would like to "infect" more women with this concept: devoting time to family, rather than to devoting it toward wealth for the enjoyment of the family can fulfill a person differently and can fulfill a family differently (I fully realize that many women MUST hold jobs).
Please don't hear me saying, "Go out and DO THIS." Please don't hear, "Staying at home is better." I'm not. This is not a direction or a suggestion, it is a perspective. I promote raising a family as a life's ambition and work because it is an ambition and work, not a petty desire or a waste of time. It represents great and inspiring work. To decide to raise a child makes an awesome and often difficult responsibility, not one to take lightly. Work exists to allow provision for a person or family. How you get that provision comes down to you and God's hand in your life.
The question is, where is He directing you?
I felt awed at this new wrinkle on the "feminist" cloth in this article in New York Magazine about some Feminist moms/wives who had me cheering for some of the applications of and admissions regarding nurturing, care-taking, and all the "feminine" aspects of womanhood -- stereotypical, but for a reason. Many women are returning home amid successful careers -- to take on motherhood and wife roles and have discovered them ultimately fulfilling and detrimental to their family's future in every aspect.
It takes work, this staying at home. Staying home means not always knowing the breaking news, not being up with the latest fads or fashions, not having worldly perspective. It also means imprinting yourself on your children; teaching them your values, your morals, your ethics, your way of doing all the things that make a family hum along. You make mistakes and apologize for them. They see that. You stand guard for them. They feel that. You focus on your relationship. They internalize that.
Mark 8:36 says this,
And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?
What, really, is the impetus for working women either in the home or outside it? No single answer exists. Every one of us feels and sees the situation differently. It's between God and you -- if you give Him the reins in that area of your life, rather than taking on work as something you feel you are supposed to do because of some set of societal rules imposed upon women in today's world.
Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and
perfect will.
Romans 12:2
If you take marriage, family and home as your life's work, do it for God.
If you work outside the home and also manage marriage, family, and home, do it for God.
In either situation, do what you do by God's direction. Seek His will for you, and when you discover it, do it with all your might.
I firmly believe "my way" is best for me, and I also believe it can work for multitudes of other women who are out there wondering why they struggle so hard -- not to make ends meet, but to keep the ends from overlapping and strangling the life out of their families.
Whether you work each day within your home or at a workplace outside home, remember to look to God for guidance and be ready to listen to what he has in store for you. Keep your eyes and heart set on him and allow the world's ways to remain in the world, for they will fade and fail in time. You take the Heaven road. It has a far better view.
Following God's plan for your self, marriage, and family will give you a constant, unchanging model to follow, and the light that shines from you can dazzle those around you.
Let your light shine wherever you spend your days.
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