How simple summers can teach us family values
Summer is coming to a close and my heart is breaking for the loss of simple, unscheduled days. It wasn’t always like this. For most of the years that my kids have been in school, I have been the mom who says “ I can’t wait for school to start”. But this summer it was different.
This summer I stepped back from some commitments and was living in a space that over the past couple years I have decluttered, simplified and minimalized. This summer there was no hurry. There were no endless tasks of things that had to get done. There was a kitchen remodel. There were beach days. There were summer camps, VBS and pool days.
How was your summer? Were your days spent in frantic chaos and endless task lists or did you find the ability to carve out quiet time. Bonfires? Smores? Did you do more chores than usual because your house was fuller than usual? Did it leave you feeling tired and irritated?
If so, you are not alone. Girl, I have so been there. But it doesn’t have to look like that. There is another option and I want you to know all about it. It’s called Intentional Simplicity and it means that you get to get out from under that clutter and commitment, simplify your days and get back to living a life you were called to love.
Intentional Simplicity
It looks like understanding your family and personal values and eliminating as much as you can that doesn’t sync with those values.
It’s learning to say no, even when you’re not already booked, so that you leave white space on your calendar to just be with your family, with yourself or friends.
It’s being okay with stepping away from things you’ve “always” done if they don’t fulfill you. Of course, not every task in our day is something we want to do, that is not realistic, but we can curate our days and months better when we get intentional about what really matters.
While on a camping trip this week I asked my husband what his top values are. Family and our marriage made the top to spots for him. When I think about mine, it’s also those items along with my faith and my health and my friendships. I found my faith later in life and my health journey is only about a year or so in and I value it so much.
I didn’t find my closest friends until my mid-thirties and I find special importance in making sure to nurture those relationships. They sustain me in a way that other relationships don’t. And lastly, personal development is a big value of mine. I believe that we are meant to be the best version of ourselves so that we can be a light in this world. That means time spent learning new things, new ways to communicate, parent or do business.
Are we in alignment?
So, when we step back and look at that list of values, we need to ask ourselves if our day to day lives align with them?
If family and personal relationships are the most important value I have and yet it’s who I invest the least time in, what changes do I need to make?
If my health is a top priority but I rarely workout or make good food choices, what needs to be different to truly align with the words I speak?
If I talk of my faith and yet rarely spend time in God’s word or in community with others who share my beliefs, do I really value it as much as I might want to?
The Consequences
You see, what happens when we don’t align our lives with our values is that we start to drift, and things start to feel jumbled. Out of control. It may be weeks or months or even years that you are living in this ‘unsettled’ feeling. Not sure what’s wrong but knowing things aren’t really right. It’s in this moment you may look up and realized that you’ve busied yourself with commitments you aren’t really happy about doing. Or you’ve tried to fill that void with material items and now you live in a home that is cluttered and costing you hours of your days organizing, cleaning and moving stuff around.
Just like you can never truly organize your home without decluttering, you can’t declutter your mind our your heart without organizing and prioritizing your values and making changes to live in alignment with them.
So how do we do it?
- Take some time to think about and write down your top 3-5 values. Don’t write down what you think they should be, write down what you truly want them to be. You can also download this free PDF guide to walk you through this process.
- Write down your daily routine – when do you wake, what do you eat, where do you go, who is with you? How much time do you spend working, cleaning, as a family, alone or with friends? Try the post in note method I talked about in an older post.
- Now, look at your values list and your ‘day to day’ routine. Do they align or do they look like two different people wrote them?
If they align but you are still feeling unsettled, look at the items on your routine and mark off what you want to do less of. Is it cleaning? Is it a certain commitment? What can you change to eliminate more of that?
If they are completely out of alignment, it’s time for an overhaul. Get with your spouse or a friend you trust and talk through these lists. There is a line I heard once that asked, “what needs to be true today that isn’t”. Meaning, what if we want to live a life in alignment with our values, free of clutter and commitments we don’t enjoy? What must stop being true and what needs to change instead?
Intentional Simplicity is not living a life free of doing ‘required’ tasks, but it does mean a life with more free time to do the things we love. It’s us living at our fullest protentional.
It’s holding on to a promise that we are all intended for a beautiful life and letting go of all the distractions that keep us from living it.
It’s not easy. You will stumble. You’ll find yourself in downward spirals. But when you do, you re-visit your values and take a moment to breathe, re-align and make the adjustments you need to simplify again.
Now, go make the most of these last days of summer.
