Tonight one of my boys made a great play in flag football. His coach gave him the play and I heard people I didn’t even know cheering my son on. I could barely see what he did from my vantage point, but I knew it was good!
That’s the goal of parenting–not that I continue coaching or even cheering for my kids–but that I send them onto the field.
I was the one who made sure he was dressed to play. I give him the opportunity to practice, too. But in the end, he is playing the game and I’m on the sidelines. As Wonder Women, let’s dress our Incredible Kids, give them lots of opportunity to practice greatness, and then let’s pray that the Super Power would bring the right coaches and cheerleaders alongside our kids that will have them winning in the game of life.
Today I have been decluttering my email inboxes. Somehow I have allowed myself to accummulate 20,000 emails. Not kidding! I’ve read the majority of them, but hadn’t dispensed with them after the fact. In the process of buying lots of things inexpensively via Anjie’s list, I’ve been subscribed to many, many, MANY email newsletters. I took the time to unsubscribe myself from the emails today and made sure to delete and sort them according to the excellent strategy described on the Getting Things Done blog.
As I did so, I started to see similarities between dealing with emails and dealing with life.
1) Sometimes we have no idea how we’ve been “subscribed” to something.
Years ago, I somehow ended up being the treasurer and all-around bookkeeper for my investment club. I cannot even tell you how much stress I experienced as a result. I have never even balanced a checkbook! For those of you who are wondering, my Superman pays the bills. Like me, you may end up doing things that you have no business doing.
2) We have to intentionally unsubscribe.
I have been putting up with voluminous emails and just letting them sit or deleting them. Why? I suppose I thought they would catch the hint and stop showing up. They didn’t! The people and tasks in our lives that are not part of our mission are also unlikely to catch the hint. Mrs. Church will continue to call and ask you to make meals for the funeral luncheons even though you hate to cook and you’re constantly on the go. In order to stop the unwanteds, the unnecessaries, and the uninspiring from coming into our lives, we have to deliberately say “Sorry, but no thank you.”
3) We have to stay strong as we unsubscribe.
Almost every newsletter I unsubbed from today (I lost count several hours ago) wanted to make really, really sure I wanted to unsubscribe. Some of them really turned up the guilt. “We will miss you so terribly. If you change your mind, we’ll be here pining away for you.” On the other hand, most of my unsubscriptions were easier than I thought they would be. Pretty standard procedure–not emotional at all. When we say “no thank you” without justifying ourselves and apologizing several times, unsubscribing from the unwanteds in our lives is fairly easy. I once unsubbed from a newsletter and the woman who wrote it immediately contacted me demanding an explanation. That was uncomfortable! Sometimes we have to deal with discomfort, but most of the time, only a few clicks are required.
4) Unsubscribing from something good allows you to subscribe to what is best.
There were many newsletters that I unsubbed from that I actually like. But I don’t have time to read them. As I deleted and unsubbed like crazy, I found myself really reading the ones that are most meaningful to me. When I didn’t have so much email clutter, I could focus in on the keepers. What have you been missing out on in life because you’ve been so distracted by the so-so?
5) Re-subscribing is almost always an option.
Some newsletters have been harder than others for me to unsub from–just as some items I own are harder to declutter and some tasks harder to give up. What helps is remembering that I can easily resubscribe! If you give away a book you need, you can repurchase it. If you give up a volunteer job and you miss it, my guess is they’ll let you come back!
I now use SaneBox to manage my inbox so I don’t have to unsubscribe from newsletters. But I can still apply this advice to my life. I hope you can regain your time by unsubscribing.
If you’re looking for help in the kitchen and you can’t afford a chef, you’ll love these new websites. My friend, Shari, gave me the link to www.menus4moms.com. I haven’t used her service yet, but here’s what I like. #1 – It’s free! And it’s a system based on the practices I teach in my workshop, "You Can Make Meaningful Meals in Minutes (for Not Much Money)." The only drawback to the menus is they aren’t based on sales in your area and they aren’t diet-specific. If you’re looking for low-carb, for example, you won’t find it there.
A fee-based service ($1.25/week) plans diet-specific meals based on sales at your local grocery: www.e-mealz.com. I don’t shop at the stores listed by e-mealz, but I did find a site that offers meal plans based on my local grocery store’s sales. Do a web search on meal planning in your area and you may find a similar service.
These services are additional helps for figuring out what to make your family. The most important step is to have a plan! If you don’t know what’s for dinner next week, why don’t you look in your cupboards? A quick search of www.allrecipes.com or your recipe software can tell you what you could make with those ingredients. You can automatically add any other necessary ingredients to your shopping list. If you plan well ahead of time, you can buy ingredients at the very best price. For now, let’s just figure out what to eat this week!
Melanie has a real problem with library fines–always has. In graduate school, she racked up hundreds of dollars worth of fines. The only thing that saved her was the university’s policy of forgiving the fines as soon as the books were returned.
Last year, Melanie kept putting off returning her library books and racked up a substantial fine. She wasn’t too happy when the librarian who took her fine payment turned out to be someone she knew–from Bible study no less!
I had determined to help poor Melanie. I wanted her to be a better steward of her money by not paying library fines. I planned to send her email reminders myself. But today I received an email from my homeschooling support group about a service that will do the reminding for me automatically! If your library is served by www.libraryelf.com, you can ask the free service to remind you of your holds, future overdues, and past dues when you need them. I set mine up to remind me DAILY that I have overdue items. Isn’t that a fine thing?
This summer I attended our local homeschoolers’ conference and found out about Institute for Excellence in Writing. I’ll be posting about this excellent curriculum in the future. For now, I mention it because the IEW catalog is how I learned of the book, A Thomas Jefferson Education. I ordered it and was so impressed with it that I have completely reorganized my approach to home education.
However, even if you are not a homeschooler or not a parent at all, this book is worth a read! The exciting concept espoused in this book is:
All education is self-education. If we want to teach our children, we have to inspire them to learn rather than require them to learn. What would you have studied if you had the time? When I was a kid, I was crazy about medical books. I read the medical encyclopedia we had at home for fun! It’s entirely possible that had I been given more time to pursue my fascination with medicine, I would have become a doctor. Unfortunately, we treat learning as if it were such drudgery that we have to bribe students (or ourselves!) to do it. Learning is the most fun and exciting thing we can do! Sadly, Oliver DeMille points out that we tell students to learn what they want to learn "on their own time." As you know, few students have time to call their own between school and extracurricular activities. As a result, we miss out on the natural momentum that each child has.
Even if you have students in public or private school, you can greatly increase your child’s love of learning. You can also advocate that teachers and principals use the Thomas Jefferson education principles at school. If you have no children, you should also read this book and be inspired to begin the process of re-educating yourself. I have been thrilled as I’ve picked up classic books and begun to read. Mr. DeMille contends that the reading of such books not only entertains and teaches, but literally changes us. I couldn’t agree more! If you’re a Wonder Woman wannabe, you owe it to yourself to read this excellent book.
If you are a homeschooler wanting to learn how to implement these teaching principles, I highly recommend you purchase the George Wythe College Packages A & B here: www.writing-edu.com/order.
I’d like to briefly summarize how this approach has changed our schooling. First, it’s given me permission to continue to learn. In this philosophy, your own continuing education is equally as important as your children’s BECAUSE you are the one who will inspire your children to learn. For example, if you read a classic book that you love, you will rave about it and your children are more likely to want to read and discuss it with you.
Second, TJEd has given me permission to teach what I am interested in teaching. I no longer have to conform to the "conveyor belt" form of education. If I want to teach my children how to do photo editing because I love it, I can! If I want to take time to teach them how to make breakfast, I can do that, too! Rather than have my children spend an hour on workbooks, I now take that hour to teach what I want to teach.
Third, TJEd has given me permission to assist my children in learning what they want to learn. I talked with both of my older boys (in what TJEd calls the Love of Learning phase) about what they are interested in learning. My oldest was interested in learning about inventors and in music history. Who’da thunk? So I obtained books and curriculum on these subjects. He devoured the inventor books and the music history curriculum is so good the whole family is enjoying it (It’s called Listen to Learn by the way. I will do a separate post on this in the future). My oldest says that this year of school is "the best ever." He has spontaneously written two reports, complete with pictures, one of which he delivered as a speech because he wanted to! My second son has asked for permission to do MORE writing!
Fourth, TJEd has given me a completely different perspective on math. I browsed through the discussion boards at www.tjed.org and found the inspiring website www.livingmath.net. The resources I ordered via this website have turned math from something to be endured to something to be enjoyed. The kids are happy not doing pages of boring, repetitive problems and I’m happy because math is really, really fun! I now think of it as solving puzzles. We all think of it as a means of gaining respect and even money! I’ll post more about the resources I’ve found in the future.
I’m a Christian psychologist turned homeschooling mother of six. My life can be a little crazy, so I look for sanity-saving ideas to use and share. I hope you’ll read my About page to learn more.
