A Grown Up Tantrum

The other day I asked my girls to fold a load of their own laundry.  A smallish load.  I dumped the hamper in the middle of the living room and told them to get it done before lunch, a half an hour away.  I walked away.  But not far enough away that I couldn't hear the ensuing conversation.

"Joy, you need to fold your clothes."

"I'm not going to fold them until you start folding yours."

"Well, I'm waiting for you."

Girls, just fold your clothes already!

"But mom, folding laundry is my least favorite chore."  As if Joy's position on laundry would sway this laundry-loathing mom.

I don't care.  Fold it anyway.

The tears, the drama, the whining and complaining!  Twenty minutes of insisting she just could not fold her own clothes.  Complete with a pile of kleenex next to her on the floor used to dry up her buckets of tears.

Finally I told her I was going to throw her clothes away since she didn't care enough about them to take care of them.  I scooped up the pile and walked to the trash.  Blood. Curdling. Screams.

"No, Mommy!  No!!!!"

"Joy, you have two choices: I can take care of your clothes by throwing them away.  Or you can take care of your clothes by folding them minus the tears."

Thankfully she went with choice number two.  She sat down and proceeded to fold her pile in five minutes.  When she was done, she cheerfully proclaimed,

"If I had just folded my laundry without all the crying, I would have been done a long time ago."  Ugh.

Today I handed Joy another pile of clothes to fold, to which she said, "I know it will go a lot faster if I do it without crying."

I went to post this on my facebook page.  Which is when it hit me--this is a critical life lesson that we all need to be reminded of.  Life goes a whole lot better when we do things without all the tears and drama.

A few weeks ago the reality of homeschooling my kids another year hit.  As in I did not want to do this even a little bit.  I pursued every option other than schooling my kids myself.  I had this dread consuming me--I cannot do this.  I cannot teach my kids this year.  I don't have it in me.

An old picture of me I found last week that about
sums up how I felt about homeschooling this year

I wrestled and prayed.  I just kept hearing God say, I know you want to have your kids do a virtual charter school or go to school, and I will permit it.  But my perfect will is for you to school them yourself.  This is where the bigger blessings will be found.

Me, who has been working so hard on listening and obeying right away, on jumping off the cliff and taking risks, doing anything the Lord asks me to do--I was kicking and screaming.  Crying.  Telling God I did not like this plan and just was not going to do it.  Even if I knew He wanted me to.  Even if my Hubby had prayed about it as well and felt strongly we should home school another year.  Didn't matter.  I prayed for the money to fall from the sky so we could send our kids to private school.  I prayed that an online school would actually work for us.  Anything that would let me off the hook.  Full blown tantrum.

Hubby came into our bedroom a few days ago and saw me flopped out on the bed, probably looking completely pathetic.  He asked me what was wrong.  Brave man.

"How sure are you that we're really supposed to do this home school thing again this year?"

"Very sure."  Darn it.

"Straight home school or do you think online school would be okay?"

"Straight home school."  Because clearly Hubby hates me.  Hmph.  "Lisa, how about I pray for you."

"I think you need to do some spiritual warfare while you're at it."  Because even in the midst of a full blown tantrum, I knew that this dread and helpless feeling wasn't me.  Hubby prayed over me and I swear that when I lifted my head up when he was done, all of the weight was gone.  Just gone.

Dread of another year.  Gone.  Feeling completely incapable of educating my children well.  Gone.  Desperate search for any other solution than me teaching my own kids.  Gone.  All of it.

The next day I was praying about it, "What the heck was that God?"  And God just laid it out there--Whenever you are at the start of a really important journey, the resistance from the evil one is always the strongest.  Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

Oh.

So I fully expect this upcoming school year to be the best year ever based on the amount of resistance I experienced of just getting here.  Maybe the devil doesn't like that I felt inspired to have us read through the Bible this year.  Cover to cover.  Every single life giving Word.  That probably had something to do with it.

Life is a whole lot easier when we just get on with it without all the tears and drama.  So bring on the new school year.  I'm ready.