Give me comfort.

Where do we turn when we’re gaining no new traction, when we’re running in circles around ourselves, the mess, the uncertainty of it all?

We turn to our comforts.

Yet, how often do I turn to things that don’t bring me comfort? I’ll tell you: more often than I should. (I’m looking at you, social media.)

How much time am I spending on things that don’t help me feel whole?

My desk is full of books and bound paper and packs of note cards for writing, because these things help me feel comfort. With these tools, I can digest life and deepen relationships.

If I can pull back for a moment and re-focus, if I can give myself permission to make u-turns, I instantly feel lighter.

And this works every time.

This season, where mothering is all consuming, as it very well should be, I need to feel light, feel comfort.

Years of baby wearing and nursing and little one holding has tensed my shoulders up towards my ears. You should see the crookedness of my terrible posture, and so to feel “light” feels like great comfort. When my shoulders sit symmetrical, that feels like great comfort.

We are in a time where it feels almost expected to watch and watch and WATCH others, instead of acting and accomplishing (or even, pulling back and just enjoying) — it’s no wonder we feel un-certain and un-whole and un-focused and un-light.

This is why I “write it down”. (And for the umpteenth time, Maggie, just get started. There’s no need to search for a magical unicorn solution, you already know the solution! Get started, lady!)

Where are the days of offering genuine encouragement and dinner table nourishment and worn book pages and finding paint smeared on the underside of the bathroom sink?

Where are the days of rolling up our sleeves and emptying the dustpan at the end of the day?

Where are the days of a faith-focused routine and deep belly laughs and working to solve the world’s problems, if only to remind ourselves the world’s problems are in fact solved when we slow down and act and do our best to truly accomplish, so that we know what our priorities are (and the WHY behind the task at hand) — where are those days?

Give me those days of comfort.

Two days ago I moved a white planter box to a different table. Any time I do a little home-focused re-arranging, my spirit ends up re-arranged, too. This is also my comfort food.

Let’s go back to my rhythm of comfort, where we turn towards what’s good. Nourishing what we know to be important in our life, in life in general.

Very slowly, I’ve been sharing about my experiences with postpartum depression. When we rally together and pursue genuine encouragement, and nod our heads together over the worn book pages, the paint smeared on the bathroom sink, we quietly say to one another, “We are in this together.”

When we share our comforts, we begin to feel whole again.