My name is Brooke, I am a recovering night owl. For the past two years I have developed better sleeping patterns than what had been in place for the previous 15, but lately I’ve been throwing that practice to the wild dogs. A few months ago Kyle said, “you just enjoy being engaged with the world.” With life, with thoughts, with my body, with dreams, with to-do lists, with people (sometimes and in some ways).
Since writing about drinking that cup of coffee a while back, I have not updated you. (For all of you who missed it, here’s the recap. I rarely drink coffee [or caffeine of any sort]. When I do, it’s normally around 9:00 or 10:00 in the evening). Being that my tolerance level is quite low, it doesn’t take much to turn me into the I’m-So-Excited-Jessie-Spano.
That night I went to bed at 5:00 am. A week later, I felt so engaged with the world and in the middle of a project that I decided to binge; 2 cups of coffee in the same month! At 5:00 a.m. I heard a few birds start chirping and decided it would be wise to call it quits for the “night” and go to sleep.
The lack of sleep was obviously unwise, but a past post from the @thedailyrest brought it to my attention that there is a difference between wasting my time wisely (@theydailyrest) and wasting my time sillily.
I’m a fan of the word lavish. It’s how I view so much of what God gives. 1 John 3:1, “See what great love the Father has lavished on us…; Ephesians 1:8-23: “…the riches of God’s grace which He lavished upon us. It shouts goodness to me.”
Lavish is defined as spent or given in abundance. Do I lavish my kids with time and attention? Do I lavish time reading the Bible? Sometimes I’m over here lavishing precious moments on work. On writing. On North Sea ship sinkings. Recently, I’ve been lavishing intentionality on a project I’ve been working on for a couple of years. So close to the finish line that it’s consumed me lately. Yet, it doesn’t feel like a bad time waster. It feels as though I’m wasting time wisely. I’m lavishing time on this project so much so that I was up until 5:00 a.m. totally laser focused.
(Guys, let’s be real. I love the word lavish and what it means about God’s goodness, but I have never used this word in a sentence outside of God lavishing His things upon us, so there’s no telling if it was even used properly here. Also, I always second guess myself when spelling vacuum. Thanks, Spell Check, for clearing that one up just now.)
Wasting Time Sillily List
- North Sea Facebook and Instagram reels
- Shark videos
- Boats in the North Sea
- Storms in the North Sea
- Videos of ships and boats sinking.
- Cleaning seems a bit futile
- Watching pottery videos. (Okay, but this one could be not a waste if I ever buy Haddi a pottery wheel, call Sterling Smith, and ask her to be her pottery coach.)
- Looking into using other presets for photo editing. I’ve lost count of all the presets I’ve purchased and NEVER used because I always return home to my favorite.
- Sadly…watching S.W.A.T. (also [spoiler alert], never have I cried as much as I did during any show/movie as I did when Dominique Luca retired. Sheesh!)
- Watching soldiers returning home and surprising their family members.
- Once, ask Kyle, I spent 6 hours sitting outside in the middle of summer constructing a bamboo (“cane”) couch out of the stalks that were overtaking my alley and a ball of twine. Apparently that stuck with him because he still brings it up 3 years later questioning my motives for this project.
Wasting Time Wisely List
- Turning on Shane & Shane music and reading the Word in the mornings
- Watching chickens hatch
- Writing my thoughts to determine how I think about and feel with life
- Playing James Cobb with the kids
- Playing Trash with J
- Folding laundry (and yes, I pair this with S.W.A.T. to make S.W.A.T. feel less of a Wasting Time Sillily item).
- Sitting in the bathtub.
- Running while listening to books, the Bible Recap, and/or teach-me-Spanish podcasts.
- Listening to Nate Bargatze
- Begging Kyle to do his impersonations of people.
- Lately, I have lavished some time sewing a couple quilts (and, no, this is not me offering to sew your ripped jeans).
- Making soup in the fall/winter
- Driving around town looking at Christmas lights
- Sitting by a fire. (In the past, Kyle and I had friends who would fire-sit with us at least a few nights a week. They broke our hearts when they took off for the mountains. If you’re good with really spur of the moment supper invites (like hi – hi – I’m coming over in 2 minutes – okay, come on – on our way – bring a Tony’s pizza because you won’t like what I made type of conversation), some fairly normalish level messy house/backyard and kids, I’m here for it. Just show up, walk in, and set in my mess, okay?
- Breathing. Sitting and breathing.
- Pretty much anything that does not involve having a phone in my hand.
- Facetime with my buddy
- Marco Poloing Kelli and anyone else who has this app. Okay PAUSE. Do you have Marco Polo? If not, this is probably one of my favorites. I spend so much time texting clients whom I’ve not yet met so it’s always nice to finally put a face to their name, see their voice, their mannerisms, and avoid talking with my thumbs. Highly recommend it. Send me a message and I’ll become your forever Marco Polo friend.
Intentional time has been lavished here and I need to return to folding socks so I will conclude. Once a week I receive a notification of how much time I’ve spent on my phone. It’s stupid really. Someone just return me to landline days please!! I waste a lot of time, but I recognized recently that when I waste time wisely, life tends to make more sense. When I’m present, I’m more grateful for life and the little things. When I’m engaged, life is so much more enjoyable. When I’m intentional, life is full of beauty.
Waste time wisely, friends. Also, if you feel so unable to call some of your things a waste, just figure out how to use the word lavish properly and go with that. Give abundant time to the things that matter.
How do you waste time wisely or waste time sillily? Not rhetorical! I would actually love to know what snags your attention for extensive amounts of time! The good and the bad!
Bye friends! 🙂
P.S. Kyle if you read this. Check out this photo I found! The one in the front looks almost identical to the necklace you bought me when we were dating. Pretty sure it was lost in motherhood, but I’d be fine if Santa found me another.