What a Derailed Morning Taught Me About Rhythms — Frozen Meat and All

Yesterday started out a bit rough. Jeremy had an early appointment, the little ones squabbled more than usual, babies were fussy, the dog just got neutered (and was also fussy), and things just went haywire from multiple different angles.

I use this example a lot in videos when I teach on habits and rhythms in the home, so if you’ve been here any length of time you know this (sorry for being a broken record, haha). To get dinner on the table without the 5:30 scramble, I usually break it down throughout the day. Meat out of the freezer before or after breakfast, prep ingredients after lunch, assemble with plenty of buffer time before dinner. This is what works for me in this season with littles. But on this day, it was close to lunch time before I even thought about getting our meat out for dinner. Oops.

Since my typical rhythm was “disrupted”, for a fleeting moment I felt like I was behind. The morning kept moving. Kids needed things. Life didn't stop for my little system. BUT, it ended up being fine. Since there was a rhythm to the day thatwasmy typical, I knew exactly what to do at some point that morning to ensure we would have dinner that evening. In the fog of an abnormally chaotic morning, I knew that all I needed to do was to take care of that one little task atsomepoint before lunch if possible–and it’d be fine.

Sure, I pulled the meat out later than usual, which meant that it wasn’t totally thawed by dinnertime–but we had it. Veggies got prepped as I was assembling dinner in the early evening. And you know what? It was fine. We all still ate.

Nothing about that morning looked like my normal rhythm. But the rhythm still gave me something to come back to, even on a day when my plans got knocked sideways. The start of the day felt like a fog, but I had pegs in the morning that helped me feed my family.

This Week's Takeaway

That derailed morning is exactly what I mean when I say your rhythms are meant to serve you, not the other way around.

It's easy to let a time block or a list subliminally turn into a standard that you measure yourself against. I've fallen into that trap myself. When a rhythm becomes something it ought to not be, it can add an unnecessary burden.

There is a subtle, though important, mindset shift when thinking about using rhythms effectively in the home (without falling into the aforementioned trap).Instead of looking at them as a checklist to get through, treat your rhythm as a guide that you can lean into–knowing that you were thoughtful as you built it. You decided what mattered ahead of time, with a clear head, not in the scramble of the moment.

So when the day starts to feel a little absurd, rhythms allow you to have some semblance of clarity about what the next best step is. And the beauty here is, you don't have to figure out those priorities in that moment. You've already decided that ahead of time, and so when the time comes to execute, you simply move forward and lean into the rhythm.

That is what it looks like to let your rhythms and plans serve you. And then trusting God with how He establishes your steps.

Here's to a week of abiding in Christ and trusting Him with the fruit. May God bless your home, your hands, and your heart as you walk in the good works that He's given you to do.