May is what you make it

You have heard it said, "May is the new December."
But I say unto you, "You choose how you live."

You have heard it called, "May Madness."
But I say unto you, "May Is What You Make It."

This time of the year has become particularly busy for parents of young children. It is time to pay the piper - or should we say, celebrate with the piper - in every single activity that has crossed your calendar in the past nine months. Like a pregnancy blooming to fruition, May explodes into endings and beginnings.

I think we need to be purposeful about changing this thinking. May can be a time of intentional self care and renewal, rather than an experience of trying with all your might to just slide into home plate. After all, this is a time to celebrate. We are saying good bye to a whole year of school, activities, and - well, winter. We are saying hello to a time of rest, vacation, self preservation.

You don't have to have a kid in school to feel the ebb and flow of this season. The church marks this still as the season of Easter, and conveniently for our May theme, this season ends with Pentecost on May 31. The season of Easter is marked as a time to celebrate resurrection - not just Jesus' but OURS. It isn't supposed to be a time of wearing yourself out, but a time of great joy and celebration.

So, how, pray tell, do we change our mindsets? How might we even begin to change our schedules? After all, there are things that really must be done, whether we like it or not.

We start by changing our minds.

We create our calendars, and there is nothing that says we have to attend every function. Maybe it feels like more of a celebration to cross out an entire day for ourselves before May ends. Or, maybe just a few hours, if that is really all our anxious souls and datebooks can stand. We could play catch up on work and feel accomplished. We could sit down and have a meaningful conversation with a friend. We could sit outside and read a book. The point is, we have a choice. Every day is a possibility, every minute good fortune. Let's concentrate on resurrection, on resurrecting our spirits - rather than crushing them. What will it take for you to have a few minutes, a few hours, a few days of relief? What might require your "no" in May?

May is what you make it. It is up to you to take charge of your sanity. You can choose stress or you can choose celebration. Resurrection is not just a little theological buzzword about Jesus a couple of thousand years ago... it is a noun, a verb, an adjective, all giving meaning to our everyday lives. Amen.

In Wisdom,
Brandi Calhoun Diamond