During this month of December, Talk at the Table is publishing a post each day with a focus on slowing down during Advent.
Here’s the opening post:
Browse through the days by visiting the main site and scrolling down, reading backwards through the journey.
Another place you may want to swing by to experience a contemplative Christmas thought or two is Holy Experience. Ann Voskamp offers numerous Advent thoughts, including 4 Ways to Celebrate Christ in Christmas.
Finally, do visit the Christmas Change blog. Take a few minutes to enjoy the devotional posts that are contributed by a wide range of bloggers. Ponder the inspiring thoughts and stories.
They may change the way you view Christmas.
They may change you.
Star image by Talk at the Table.
Get ready … Mega Memory Month returns January 2010!
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Get to know Ann Kroeker better at annkroeker.com
I’ve enjoyed following Aimee’s insights and inspiration as she shares her intentional choices to live a gentler, slower, simpler life day after day at Living, Learning and Loving Simply.
Aimee graciously granted permission for me to include THIS post in Not So Fast for the “Live from the Slow Zone” section.
Readers really respond to Aimee’s words. One time I was visiting a book club that chose to read Not So Fast, and one of the members of the group read out loud a few lines from that page in the book because Aimee’s words had impacted her.
Today, however, I wanted to share from a different post. It’s entitled “I’m Dreaming of a Slow Christmas.”
Aimee wrote:
I had to remind myself of these principles of slow living as I approached the Christmas season. About a week and a half ago I was feeling the anxiety, the pressure, the temptations towards unrealistic expectations (“everything must be handmade!”), and tears were coming and welling up way too often. I took a big breather and thought about what are the most important things to me at Christmas and then toss the rest.
It’s important to me to make my Christmas cards, play Christmas music excessively, bake lots of cookies, read my children great Christmas stories, and do our daily advent readings. But parties, full schedules, school work, running around town, homemade pajamas for my kids, patchwork Christmas pillows and handmade gifts for all who are important to me had to all get tossed from “the list”. Those things can be good things, but if they come between me and my relationship with the Lord, Mike, and my children, then…….
Read the entire post HERE…
(You may be interested to know that Aimee’s husband and brother-in-law were on the plane that landed on the Hudson River in January 2009. You can read some of her thoughts HERE and HERE).
Image by: Mike Chaput-Branson. “Cocoa w/Marshmallow,” 7 Dec. 2007. Flickr. Web. 11 Dec. 2009. <http://www.flickr.com/photos/427/2142255029/> (All sizes of this photo are available for download under a Creative Commons license.)
Get ready … Mega Memory Month returns January 2010!
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Get to know Ann Kroeker better at annkroeker.com
I posed a simple question at my author-blog:
This Christmas, as schedules grow more hectic and shopping threatens to consume …
What do you want to be sure not to miss?
It turns out there is a lot that people want to be sure they don’t miss.
As a result, people are simplifying and slowing down some aspect of their Christmas celebrations:
- An Uncomplicated Holiday: Three Most Important Things
- ‘Tis the season to … slow down?
- The season to take time … really all year.
- I’m Dreaming of a Slow Christmas
- 3 Simple Practices for a Peaceful Advent
- The Best Things to Make This Christmas
- Building Roadblocks
- It’s all in the decisions
Are you seeking a simpler, slower Christmas this year?
Have you blogged about it?
Share links in the comments to your slow-down stories and solutions.
And savor the season….
Peace ornament a gift from the group. Photo by Ann Kroeker.
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Get to know Ann Kroeker better at annkroeker.com
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty,
who was, and is, and is to come
(Revelation 4:8)
Sunday we pull out our Advent wreath and begin the season of anticipation, praying, pondering and worshiping the Lord Jesus, who was, and is, and is to come.
I bought an Advent wreath years ago and decorated it simply without realizing the fake plastic berries and cheap gold beading would be with us for years.
But that’s how traditions sometimes tumble into our lives:
We try something out.
And it sticks.
Here’s a picture I snapped last year:
It’s simple and humble, but it’s an integral part of our Christmas traditions.
We tried it, and it stuck.
Traditions … wow, traditions are so wonderful.
Over at my personal blog, I encourage readers to slow down and give thanks—not only this week or this Thursday, but regularly … all through the year.
The habit of giving thanks is a slow-down solution that can change our lives.
Thank you for joining me in seeking a slower lifestyle.
My hope is that this site becomes a place where you can keep up with research, studies, books, blogs and articles pertaining to slowing down.
More than anything, I hope we can learn to rest in the Lord, trusting in Him at all times.
Giving thanks to our Father through Christ Jesus is a way to grow in our understanding of who He is and how He works in the world and our lives. It’s a way to be in relationship with Him.
This week, as we try to slow down with family and friends to share a meal together, I hope we can all find ways to give thanks.
Give thanks to the LORD for he is good;
his love endures forever (Psalm 107:1)
Image by: Gisela Giardino. “Giving Thanks,” 23 Nov. 2006. Flickr. Web. 23 Nov. 2009. <http://www.flickr.com/photos/gi/304120801/> (All sizes of this photo are available for download under a Creative Commons license.)
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Get to know Ann Kroeker better at annkroeker.com
In case you haven’t already seen this popular post at Time, pay a visit to Nancy Gibbs’ article “Can These Parents Be Saved: The Growing Backlash Against Overparenting.”
Overparenting goes by other names, like hyperparenting and helicopter parenting. It boils down to being overinvolved in our children’s lives—perhaps to the point of holding them back.
Kids growing up with parents who take these approaches end up smothered, overwhelmed, overprotected, and ill-prepared for their transition to adulthood.
To give you a taste, here are some excerpts and memorable lines taken directly from the article (with bold from me):
- We were so obsessed with our kids’ success that parenting turned into a form of product development.
Matt Dickerson wrote a great “slow-down” article at The High Calling (a resource for people seeking the high calling of their work and daily life) entitled “God’s Prescription for Workaholics.”
He begins:
We are a society addicted to work. Our culture worships a god of productivity, or more accurately a god of frenzied activity.
For some light humor about the high-paced lifestyle, visit this link:
Here are two that come to mind (updated to clarify that I made up the first example, but am probably guilty of at least thinking the second):
• You’re living too fast if … the drive-through employee knows your order by heart.
• You’re living too fast if … the dentist asks you why you don’t floss every day and you reply, “I just don’t have the time!”
How about you? Leave your own “you’re living too fast” scenarios in the comments!
High-speed motorcycle photo by Rob Owen-Wahl from stock.xchng.
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Get to know Ann Kroeker better at annkroeker.com
This year, once a week, I’m leading discussions on American literature for a group of high school students.
To prepare for the class, I’m studying the material in depth.
It slows me down.
I’m getting more out of each book and hoping the students will, too.
As I learn to read carefully, utilizing resources I’ve pulled together for the students, I’ve learned to appreciate at a much greater depth the material, style, themes, conflict, characters, history, and context.
By slowing, I am gaining much more—and retaining more, as well.
The first book we tackled as a class was The Scarlet Letter.
An article in The New York Times stood out to me at the end of September: Driven to Distraction–multi-tasking in the car is risky business.
Our high-speed culture seems compelled to get as much done as possible in every moment, multi-tasking in motion, even if it puts us and others at risk. The article focused on the dangers of attempting office work while zooming along at 60 mph.
The story began with a man named Paul Dekok, who used to talk on his cell phone regularly while on the road.
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