Mind Movies and Capacity

building sustainable rhythms

One of my dearest friends sent me a TikTok video which ended up startling both of us. It asked the viewer to picture a red star and then showed the various images a brain might be able to conjure up—or not. Hers is a “or not.” Imagine-when someone said “picture in your mind,” she thought they were just making a joke. She doesn’t picture things in her mind. When people advise counting sheep to fall asleep, she can’t picture a sheep in her head. I was in shock because I can make the sheep wear tutus and dance on a fence. There is a running movie, usually a cartoon, in my brain at all times. These are opposite ends of a spectrum.

I hold a paradox in my mind about humans. I believe we are far more alike than we are different. I think there is one universal calling for believers and that’s to become like Christ. I think Jesus, in His particular incarnation, became “like” humanity and that particularity is sufficient to redeem each one of us. I also don’t believe any of those truths erases our differences and I believe those differences are good: whether it is male/female difference, neurodivergent/neurotypical differences, the many shades of the enneagram, or any other way we learn to understand ourselves. 

Because I am an exceptionally visual person and someone who loves language, I asked God to give me a picture or a thought that I can work from for the rest of seminary: some idea or metaphor or image deep enough to be delved for the next year and broad enough to contain the many facets of my life. If you’re suddenly very uncomfortable with what I’m saying, hang in there. I do believe God speaks to us, and I think God speaks to us through all aspects of the world that He made. There are ways to believe that and live that without suddenly becoming the neighborhood kook.

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I expected something intense or rich, something full of beauty and delight. Instead, a few days later, I realized it was the orange measuring cup from my kitchen. That was a little bit of a letdown, I’m not going to lie. 

I came home one night this week and was making dinner with my husband when he said, “You’ve been around too many people, haven’t you?” He wasn’t wrong and I hadn’t realized it until that exact moment. I need silence. I need to be alone. I need time that is unscheduled. I need plenty of sleep. Unless I make an extraordinary effort to plan that into my weeks, I don’t have it. I have limited amounts of energy and seminary uses a lot of it. My four children need a lot of it. My job, because it is mostly around people, takes a lot of it. I don’t have much left to spend other places but I tend to forget that.

God, in this season, is reminding me that that orange measuring cup represents my capacity. I only have so much and if I try to pour more of it once it’s empty, nothing comes out. In fact, my husband will ask, “You’ve been around too many people, haven’t you?” As I age, I’m accepting my capacity more and more. Before, I’ve always believed that if I wanted to badly enough, I could do it. I could knock down walls with sheer willpower. I now know that doesn’t steward my life—one of God’s gifts—well. 

Self-awareness is good. If you lead something, self-awareness is even more important. And you are your first leader, so I’m talking to you. You may be able to pour out far more about because seminary isn’t using a good chunk of your time and energy. Or you may have less because you have two tiny children. Or…Or…Or… You’re the one that has to pay attention to your life and what God is doing in order to know. I can’t tell you. Someone else can’t tell me.

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Part of the way I steward my life involves building sustainable and sustaining rhythms. Last fall, a younger married couple who was preparing to have their first baby asked me what I did for fun. I couldn’t say “parse Hebrew verbs”

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and I really struggled with listing “things” that I did solely for fun, like I would have been able to do in a different season of life. That lack of an answer bothered me and, after some contemplation, I realized that I’ve built nourishing and delightful rhythms into my days. These rhythms are based on things that fill me up, that fill me with wonder, that I love. Only rarely is it a specific “thing” that I do only for the purpose of fun.

I take the trail to school some days. Even a brief traipse through the forest helps me breath deeper. I make and eat delicious food. Sometimes I even take pictures of it. I read because I love reading. I make time to write and post on the blog along with these Substack posts. I play games with my kids and watch a special show with my husband. I have and care for my house plants. I get outside almost every day. I enjoy all my special drinks, starting with my cold brew almost as soon as I wake up. I honor a sabbath once a week. These are sustainable ways for me to have fun, to experience delight and wonder. It’s not one weekend every six months, though those are nice and, if I can, I go for that. However, I find three or four weeks later, they aren’t as sustaining as something small and near-daily. These are wonders and delights that fill my day every day. And they are rhythms that I can continue doing until they no longer serve me and I need something else. 

This week reminded me that I need to be intentionally thinking about this. There’s more I could do to honor my capacity. I can plan times when I don’t plan things; I need to protect that blank space more. I can go to bed earlier and get more sleep. I can sit outside by myself. I can lie on the couch and stare at the ceiling.

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Sustaining and sustainable rhythms for you might not look anything like mine. And that’s because with all our similarities, we are very different people, from the images we can see in our brains to what is truly rest for us to what our capacity is in our season. This is a place where we can’t copy someone’s answer because the tests aren’t the same.

Do you know what’s sustainable for you? What’s a sustaining rhythm that you have in your life? 

1. Also, God has done this for me before so I felt safe asking.

2. Though others can point out when we’ve overstepped our own boundaries.

3. We’ve got one more week of Hebrew and finals and, right now, parsing verbs is especially not fun.

4. My friends joke about how often I say I want to do this.