Be Still

I'm having a "Be still and know that I am God" moment right now. Literally. The other day I wrote about how my elbow was hurting me. Yesterday (Sunday) my friend, Jennifer, who works for an orthopedist told me that I have tennis elbow, or tendinitis in my elbow. Recovery involves anti-inflammatory creme, a brace, not lifting anything over 5 pounds, and only lifting with my palm up. It can take quite a while to recover. 4-6 weeks for "immediate" results and as long as 12 or 18 months for full recovery. And tendinitis is a chronic condition so it can come back if I overwork the tendon again.

Yesterday morning I also woke up feeling dizzy and off balance. I have chronic bouts of benign positional vertigo and it seems like it was back again. The best thing to do it sit (or lay) without moving your head too much. It can take several days to go away and, like tendinitis, is chronic so it comes back from time to time.

As I drove to church all I could think was that God was trying to get my attention for some reason. I generally operate my life on 2 speeds: 150 miles per hour or off. The only way I usually slow down is if I'm sick or hurt. And even then I'm usually limping along. I can count on one hand the number of times I've taken a sick day in the past 10 years. I once told my former co-teacher, Cliff, that if I called out sick to work then he should probably notify the authorities because I was likely dying or dead. When I'm sick or hurt I think it's because, sometimes, it's the only way for God to get my attention. But I wasn't sure why God wanted me to pull back. Saturday I cleaned a bit and tried to get ahead on some stuff but my to-do list is always growing. I thought maybe I needed to spend a little time working on the nonprofit...setting up an account system for this coming year, logging donations, updating the webpage...I figured that would be low impact. All that was put to a stop however when I went to get my computer and stepped in a puddle of cat saliva. So maybe that isn't what God was trying to tell me. Instead of trying to do anything else I went to sleep.

I still feel like there is some reason I need to slow down and look up. Figure out what's going on around me and what I'm supposed to be learning from it all. Or maybe I just need to stop trying to do *so much* at such a break neck speed. I'm forever learning the art of balancing my life. I know there are naturally times where things get busier and slower but I try to cram slow moments with things to do. Maybe I need to learn to relax. Stop and smell the roses. Enjoy down time (kind of makes me twitchy just to type the words down time).

We're scheduled to have "winter weather" again for a few days so maybe I'll have time to practice relaxing then.

"He says, 'Be still and know that I am God...'"-Psalm 46:10