My New Found Quiet

This week the kids started back to school. Even little Benson started kindergarten. 
While I have been looking forward to this day for years, it didn't take me long to recognize an absence in my life. Not a physical absence, but a spiritual one. 

Every day for as long as I have been a mom, I have have been rushing around. I am always trying to get 101 things done in the shortest amounts of time. I have always felt like I didn't have enough time and therefore things got pushed to the back burner. 

It wasn't until my kids started school and my time was my own that I realized the mistake I had made. 
I had pushed my Father in Heaven to the back burner. I had not made our relationship a priority and it had suffered. It took my house being quiet for me to realize, the spirit was quiet. 

I hadn't been making an effort to pray personally every day.  I prayed with my family and I prayed over our meals, but that was it. I hadn't been taking the time to study my scriptures. Again, I would read a verse or two with my kids before bed but I wasn't putting in much effort. At the time it honestly felt like that was all I had the energy for. I was doing good just to read a few verses and have one of my kids mumbled a prayer. I would check that parenting responsibility off my list and call it a success. 

It wasn't until my house was quiet that I realized it was too quiet. I had become like the ancient Israelites. I was making sacrifices into rituals and habits. I was going through the motions without any heart. My heart was too tired to try to feel and the less my heart sought the spirit the less I felt it. 

It wasn't until I sat down to pray with real sincere intent that I realized I didn't feel anything. This broke my heart. I felt the loss of the relationship fiercely. 

I know my Heavenly Father is there. I'm not having a crisis of faith and I have thought about this really hard. Like any relationship that isn't given time and attention, my relationship with my Father in Heaven has suffered. 

The trust we had built has diminished. The closeness we once felt has lessened. But it wasn't God who pushed me away. I pushed him, however unwittingly, out of my life. 

So as I prayed, asking what I can do to feel His love again, the thought came to me: 
Purify my life. Get rid of the things that are a distraction or that don't invite the spirit. Spend more time in the things that matter and turn to him more. I don't need to do everything on my own. I often try and it makes me miserable. I don't need to carry all the burden. He wants to help if I ask. 
But first, I must put for the effort and the faith to show him that I want him in my life. I have to nurture the relationship again. 

So this year, in my new found quiet, I will be focusing on my relationship with God. I will be spending my new found freedom on things that matter eternally. Yes, I will be going to the gym and taking care of my house- but I will also be taking care of my spirit. 

Light calls to light and I need more of that in the dark world that surrounds us.