Hurry!
Dear Sisters,
Many times I also know that "rushed" feeling when I am in another woman's presence. I feel that I am taking up her time and must quickly say what I need to say and then let her go. For she is in a terrible hurry. She is always in a terrible hurry! And when I walk away from her my heart is "rushed" as if someone just got done telling me to "Hurry up!" I then know what my kids must feel when I actually say the words.
Today I would like to share with you some wisdom from Laura Ingalls Wilder. She wrote this article in March of 1916. It seems that women back then had a habit of being rushed as well. Isn't that interesting? But let me let Laura share in her own words:
"Eliminate--To thrust out." Did you ever hear of the science of elimination? Didn't know there was such a science? Well, just try to eliminate, or to thrust out from your everyday life the unnecessary, hindering things: and if you do not decide that it takes a great deal of knowledge to do so successfully, then I will admit that it was my mistake.
The spring rush is almost upon us. The little chickens, the garden, the spring sewing and house-cleaning will be on our hands soon, and the worst of it is, they will all come together unless we have been very wise in our planning.
It almost makes one feel like the farmer's wife who called up the stairs to awaken the hired girl on a Monday morning. "Liza Jane," she called, "come hurry and get up and get the breakfast. This is wash day, and here it is almost 6 o'clock and the washing not done yet. Tomorrow is ironing day and the ironing not touched; next day is churning day and it's not begun, and here the week is half gone and nothing done yet."
You'd hardly believe it, but it's true. And it's funny, of course, but one can just feel the worry and strain under which the woman was suffering. All without reason, too, as the greater parts of our worry usually are.
It seems to me that the first things that should be "thrust out" from our household arrangements is that same worry and feeling of hurry. I do not mean to eliminate haste, for sometimes, usually in fact, that is necessary; but there is a wide difference between haste and hurry. We may make haste with our hands and feet and still keep our minds unhurried. If our minds are cool and collected, our "heads" will be able to "save our heels" a great deal.
An engineer friend once remarked of the housekeeping of a capable woman, "There is no lost motion there." She never worried over her work. She appeared to have no feeling of hurry. Her mind, calm and quiet, directed the work of her hands and there was no bungling, no fruitless running here and there. Every motion and every step counted so that there was "no lost motion." Household help is so very hard to get, especially on the farm, that with the housekeeper it has become a question of what to leave undone or cut out altogether from her scheme of things as well as how to do in an easier manner what must be done." *****************************************************************
Ah, I needed those words today. How I pray to walk at His pace, in His peace, doing His priorities in my day. There is nothing like a day when I've done that and not felt rushed once the whole time. Nor let the words "Hurry up!" escape from my lips. Instead I have enjoyed what He has put in my hands to do, or in my heart to say to someone along the way. All at a very pleasant pace
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