Linda Stoll: On the Porch * Design Your Own Unique Nurturing Checklist

Welcome back to On the Porch ... occasional end of the week conversations with you and me chatting about whatever ends up on the table.

Think open house + small group + your BFF + book club + your therapist + TGIF all coming together to join forces!

This week I'm sharing my own personal Nurturing Checklist, hastily pulled together out of necessity a few days ago. This is not an exhaustive list nor is it a guideline for others. I simply offer this as a helpful tool, a gentle prompt to consider crafting your own unique Nurturing Checklist to get you through the holidays ... and maybe beyond.

In this season of constant giving, high expectations, numerous invitations, and frantic activity, we're faced with this question - How can we live out Jesus' command in Matthew 22:39 where He clearly tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves?

This verse implies that we can't love others well until we're loving ourselves first. We best reach out to others when we know what healthy love looks like and we're living it out, our own spiritual / emotional wells full to overflowing with plenty of life-giving sustenance to share with those God puts on our paths.

Or this, putting on our own oxygen mask before we reach out to help a fellow sojourner.

Sometimes we make these kind of lists because we're in way over our heads and we're treading water and trying to keep from going completely under.

But isn't it true that the best way to do life in the holiday fast lane is to plan ahead of time? Make smart choices, make space, make lists, make room. Establish common sense boundaries that breathe life. Lend ourselves heaping portions of lovingkindness and grace. Purpose in our hearts to let our 'yes be yes' and our 'no be no' {Matthew 5:37}.

Stuff like that.

So much that's swirling around us is completely out of our control. But we do have control over how we spend our rather limited time and where we invest our oft' waning energy.

Question: What breathes life into me right now?

My Nurturing Checklist

✓ journaling prayers

✓ biblical advent readings

✓ less grazing in the kitchen

✓ getting to bed earlier

✓ getting outside

✓ less mindless screen time {TV, phone, game-playing}

✓ quiet reflective Christmas music

✓ blogging

✓ a to-do list

✓ light reading

✓ solitude but not isolation

✓ enthusiastic 'yes, pleases' and thoughtful 'no, thank yous'

Your Unique Nurturing Checklist