Renewal: First Quarter Thoughts

Since I picked my word, I’ve had lots of thoughts about renewal, but most are floating around willy-nilly in my head. I think I need to wrangle them into written form to really pin them down, which I WILL do. In the meantime, I thought I’d jot down a few thoughts on how it’s been going and what I’ve been thinking about, but first, I want to give a bit more detail about the reason why renewal is a good fit for this year.

We all know the pandemic disrupted people’s lives—here in Melbourne, we had six lockdowns totalling 262 days over the course of 2020 and 2021. 151 of those days, we had to stay within 5 km of our home, churches were closed for 295 days, and community sports were closed for a total of 358 days. Also, during those pandemic years, I finished my M. Div in June 2020 after nine years of taking one subject a semester. I also finished up my two-day-per-week staff role at our church after the campus where I was working closed down. I took on and finished extra work in our business, transferring our inventory system from our server to a cloud-based solution. My youngest graduated from high school, and my oldest graduated from university. We’ve moved across town to a new house and a new church. And I’m at that age where my body doesn’t react to food, stress or exercise quite like it used to, but does like to overreact to allergens and whatever is triggering my vertigo. No wonder I feel like I’m on a white-water river raft without a paddle … it’s a very scenic river … but I’d like a paddle, thank you!

It has been exciting to move to a new area so close to the beach, to meet new people, to explore what it’s like to be a mum with adult children and be able to travel whenever we want to, but I feel like it’s time to work out what a routine looks like now. I need to deal with some of the issues I’ve had and settle into the practices that will serve me well, now and in the future. As a follower of Jesus, the foundation that shapes my life is my faith. For this reason, spiritual practices and service will be a strong focus this year. Prior to the pandemic, I found that my years of study, as well as service in various volunteer and staff, helped to grow my faith and keep my eyes on Jesus. That was all disrupted, not completely, but in large part, so I want to find ways to reintroduce more of that this year. I love to get nerdy with the bible and do some deep dives, and I know this is one of the main ways I connect to God, but I’d like to explore some spiritual practices that are new to me and challenge me to new experiences of God. Interestingly, when I started to think about renewal, I realised that two of my favourite verses feature renewal:

But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

Isaiah 40:31

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.

Romans 12:2

Maybe I’m bringing to the surface an old fixation?

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And now: the dot point summary of some of what’s been happening so far …

• I’ve finally found a good time and place to do my daily Bible reading (first thing when I wake up before I get out of bed). Sometimes, I journal, and I almost always pray then as well.
• I’m still avoiding coffee and restricting my chocolate and dairy intake. I’ve had eczema off and on, mainly around times when we are away, most likely because I often have more dairy than usual and use different soaps. I’ve had maybe five to six episodes of vertigo/migraines. I’ve been keeping a diary of possible triggers for vertigo, and my appointment with the neurologist is this week—finally!
• We started our mainly music group (a ministry to pre-school families on Mondays) first term, and G and I are on the ministry leadership team.
• I’m working on increasing my protein intake, mainly concentrating on breakfast and lunch. It would be much easier if I could eat Greek yoghurt, but I’ve got a few go-to breakfasts now with 30g of protein. My weight stabilised, and I’ve lost a few kilos. I joked that I would know when I was getting closer to race weight when I didn’t need to use glide on my thighs and my muffin top was gone. Well, I no longer have an issue with my thighs, so that’s a bonus because I’m awful about remembering to put glide on.
• On the running front, so far, I’ve managed to get up to a 26 km long run and over 50 km per week on my marathon training. I need to manage this so I don’t get too fatigued; otherwise, it will result in the opposite of renewal. I’m managing an injured foot at the moment, but I hope it won’t derail everything.
• We hiked the Three Capes Track in March. I’ll have more to say about that, but it was a refreshing and renewing break. On a walk like that, when all you need to do is eat, walk and sleep while taking in the beautiful scenery, you can’t help but experience some renewal.
• Our time in Tasmania and the frequent trips to my parent’s place have really brought home to me the renewing power of the quantity of time spent with people. In Tasmania, we spent extended time with two couples (separately), and while we did things, we also had a lot of time to sit and chat. The same thing with my family over the Labour Day long weekend and Easter weekend. That time was so precious, and I’m so thankful that we had those opportunities. I’ve also been doing a few of my long runs with a friend from the running club, which means a lot of time to chat. Doing puzzles has also been a big drawcard for the girls to spend many extra hours at our place. I found another 3000-piece puzzle at the op shop today, so we will be all good for a while.
• I’ve set up our worm farm, and it is going OK. It needs a few months to get up to full capacity. We nearly lost our citrus trees because the watering system for the building didn’t switch across from tanks to mains when the tank ran dry. Luckily, we arrived home and saw everything wilting and watered manually. The tree that I thought we might lose has a bunch of new leaves—PHEW!

And some more possibilities for the coming months:

• Work through The First Spiritual Exercises. Watch the videos from the prayer course that I missed. Join the ladies at my church who meet on Thursday for contemplative prayer.
• Get better sleep. Foam roll. Do my calf exercises. Work out what’s going on with my foot.
• I’ve made plans for my school friends to come over in May, so I just need to see that through. Use the phone more to catch up. Organise to see Jess and to walk with S.
• Clear out and replant the veggie beds. Move some plants around in the main beds. Tidy everything up.