October into December are some of my very favorite months of the year. Myriad seasonal changes in all their glory, the traditions that come with some of our most cherished holidays, the invitation to cozy up indoors with blankets and books and family all speak to my heart.
These months can also be full of tension: extra events adding into already busy schedules, gift giving and the mental currency we expend when making those decisions, the financial and emotional impact of the holidays, especially if we have strained relationships or a tight budget. It’s during times like this when the systems I wrote about last time can become strained and need some extra maintenance. If you missed the previous posts in this series, you can read click to read Part 1 and Part 2.
My family has a lot of traditions to celebrate in the coming months. We recently received a box full of McIntosh apples, which means my annual applesauce and apple pie and dried apple making tradition will continue. (More on that in this month’s newsletter: be sure to sign up here so you don’t miss it). Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and then we are full into the Christmas season. For a church planting family, it’s a busy season.
Simplification is preventive maintenance.
When it comes to life systems, the rhythms of our lives, and the traditions we celebrate, it can sometimes become easy to focus on keeping those systems maintained. As I wrote last time, systems don’t work by themselves; they have to be maintained and used in order to work. But there is also danger in focusing too much on the systems themselves. During certain seasons of life, it’s sometimes necessary to simplify your current systems to focus on what’s really important.
If you are someone who, like me, has spent a lot of time curating life systems and rhythms to keep things running smoothly, you’ve probably found that it’s easy to dive deep into system maintenance. I’ve spent hours hunting down new and interesting recipes for my family to try, or researching the latest interval running workouts. I can get bogged down in the maintenance of a system that’s already working well.
But I’ve also learned that in the busy-ness of the holiday season, finding ways to simplify is often the best form of preventive maintenance. Leaning on tried-and-true recipes, maintaining existing workout schedules instead of implementing fresh ones, preparing well for upcoming celebrations and then letting those plans take shape and play out, looking toward big picture events rather than micromanaging my life rhythms and routines are all ways I’ve learned to simplify my systems so they don’t become overtaxed during the holiday season.
The point of having systems is to support the living that happens along the way, not to dominate it.
A couple of weeks ago, we were able to hit the water for one final paddle on our boards. The weather was gorgeous; the river was calm and slow. Our boards were inflated and under the correct amount of tension. When we pushed out onto the river, I could have spent my time focusing on the board, worrying about whether it would stay inflated (it will). Or, I could have looked inward, and spent my time thinking about engaging my core, or if I was using correct paddling technique. And while these aren’t bad things to concern myself with, they weren’t necessary. I was traveling on an already well-built and maintained system that I knew I could trust.
If I’d focused on the minutiae, I’d have missed the amazing views as we paddled up and down the river. Let’s build our systems, let’s maintain them, and then, let’s enjoy the view.
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