New Normal

Last Wednesday night, while still in Baltimore, I received an email reminding me of a conference call I was supposed to be on the next morning . This conference call was scheduled to take place at exactly the same time I was supposed to be leading "closing prayer" at the training time I was attending in Baltimore! To make matters worse, it dawned on me that the last time I'd been on a conference call with this same group, I'd been standing in the security line at the airport, getting ready to fly to Vancouver (for a board meeting for a non-profit).

Welcome to my "new normal"! During this season in my life, it seems that God has me in a place where I have many part-time responsibilities that are only vaguely connected. For awhile, I tried to make a "regular" schedule out of all this ("on Mondays, I'll deal with district responsibilities, on Tuesdays, I'll focus on The Loop, on Wednesdays..."). Ha. That lasted about a day! As much as I'd like to have a "regular" schedule, with a predictable work week, or a predictable day off, it simply is not to be. Instead, I find myself looking at my calendar finding chunks of time for various pieces, and working to be flexible in the midst. In some ways, I'm living more "tightly" to my calendar than I ever have before because there is no set pattern. In other ways, I feel like my schedule is a rapid river I'm riding down, and my job is to simply steer and hold on! (Maybe my calendar is the raft!!).

In any case, I find myself wondering if my "new normal" is here to stay. It seems to fit with what God is doing in and with The Loop...