Harmony
📖Daily Reading
Joshua 15-17
🎥 Video
Join me on my morning walk as we rise and shine together by walking through the Bible daily and learn a practical applicable coaching nugget from the ultimate life coach - our creator (whatever that means to you). No judgement zone here, all are welcome, we are all on a spiritual journey because we are after all spiritual beings having a human experience.
📝 Reflection
Joshua 15:12
The western boundary was the shoreline of the Mediterranean Sea. These are the boundaries for the clans of the tribes of Judah.
The verse referenced above is one of several that are almost identical or similar in the book of Joshua that is outlining and describing the allotment of parcels of the new land and how it will be divided and owned by the various clans and tribes of Israel. I have personally been coaching on and studying the subject of boundaries recently and what they mean and why they are so important to living in harmony. To be in harmony things (notes, instruments, people etc…) need to work together in combination and simultaneously to produce a pleasing whole.
I think we all have an innate sense of what harmony is and what it feels like. When dissected though you can see it can be a fairly complex. In order for there to be harmony; healthy, clearly defined and understood boundaries are essential. We all need to know where we end and others begin, where our yards end and your neighbors begin. Your roles and responsibilities in your various areas of life only go well when they are clearly defined and understood. Harmony also creates a sense of peace and well being for the individual and ripples out to the community. For the individual to live in a healthy and harmonious way, it begins with good internal boundaries and a sense of self. Then we can relate in healthy ways with others and on out..which creates a healthy and harmonious community as a whole.
Many of us though have not really take the time and effort to think about our personal boundaries much less define them or uphold them and live according to them. Just like the laws and judicial system that were laid out by God through Moses created order overall harmony among the people, the boundaries outlined by God through Joshua also create order. In order to have harmony we need order, for order we need boundaries. Laws are boundaries, property lines are boundaries, our skin is a boundary. When it comes to more nebulous things like our mental and emotional lives it gets a little more tricky - it is up to us to define the boundaries and uphold them.
I am a poster child for what can happen to someone when they don’t take the time to think about such things. I was someone with no boundaries, no real sense of self. My identity was in a nutshell “If you are happy then I am happy” or at least I am going to pretend to be. The quintessential ‘good girl’. Said yes to my clients every whim, my kids, my family, volunteering at church and school etc.. This led to a feeling of overwhelm and exhaustion, which in turn led to trying to self soothe in the evening with yummy food, Netflix and wine- after all I ‘deserved’ it and our culture also encourages it. That was my time to finally say ‘yes’ to myself, I truly thought this was self-care. This was NOT self care, it was destructive and toxic and un-healthy in the bigger picture and definitely did not create a harmonious life. Although I was able to delude and deceive myself into thinking it was what I was supposed to do, with the encouragement of marketing and messaging in our modern ‘mommy wine culture’ that is pervasive now. I was undoing all of the good things I was trying to do for myself and my family during the day, all the walking, healthy food and over ‘yes-sing’ left me too tired to be there in a healthy way for myself and my family in the evenings, which hung-over into the following day with less energy etc.. I was so over connected to others and invested in ‘people pleasing’ during the day I was wanting to completely disconnect from myself and my husband and kids in the evenings and on weekends.
I am getting exhausted just remembering and recounting this. All thanks be to God and listening to His call, I finally decided I needed to take the time to evaluate things and push the pause button and do ‘the work’ of bringing my life back into harmony that He has designed and I believe He desires for each and all of us. This can seem like very selfish work at first and it may even seem that way to others. But this is necessary work- before we can be selfless we first have to know what and who that self is. So I had begin with myself which has rippled out in ways I couldn’t have even imagined and didn’t know was even possible. My life is starting to feel harmonious now. Make no mistake this is hard work that can get messy before it gets better. But it is so worth it! If you have ever done a big organizing project you can understand this. Can you imagine if Joshua had not taken the time to go through this long and arduous process of creating boundaries and dividing the land? It would have created confusion and chaos.
I have woken up to the truth that every time I say yes to something, I am conversely saying no to something. I am learning to pause and use phrases like ‘thanks for thinking of me’, ‘let me check my calendar and get back to you’ and ‘thanks for asking, let me think about it’. Maybe your automatic is to say no and you have found yourself disconnected from yourself and others this way. Either extreme does not lead to harmony.
✍🏼Daily Journal Prompt
How can you take this concept of harmony and pause and take a look at your life - does it feel harmonious? Where can you start? Where in your life do you need to re-evaluate and re-define your boundaries?
📖Tomorrows Reading
Joshua 18 - 21
Coaching Opportunity
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