Distracted

I am so distracted these days. When I was young, I managed to run a smooth household as a practically single mom to 4 kids (since Andy was out of town nearly every single week). I kept the house clean and organized, assigned the kids chores, and homeschooled all of them. I planned meals, I planned lessons, I shopped, I read, I exercised, I participated in homeschool co-op groups, I sat down on the floor and played with them. I even got up at the crack of dawn before they were awake so I could have a time of quiet prayer and Scripture reading. I made hot breakfasts every morning and hot lunches every afternoon between teaching. When I converted to Catholicism, I started attending daily mass on top of all that. Honestly, I don't know how I did it. 

My "prayer closet"

Now I barely get my old sleepy self out of bed by 6:00 AM to grab some coffee, read, and pray, but I find myself doing 47 different things the first hour without even cracking open the devotion book I intended to read. 

It goes something like this: I head to the kitchen to get my coffee, go to my guest room (which is my "prayer closet" when we don't have guests), and pull out my devotion book and prayer journal. Then my phone catches my eye and I wonder what my sleep score is (I use a Fitbit), so I check it. Then I decide I'll play the daily puzzle on WordScapes, which will "only" take a minute. I finish the puzzle and remind myself that I need to have my reading and prayer time now, but that triggers me to remember Facebook and how I should really check to see if any of my friends have posted any prayer requests overnight. Thirty minutes later, I realize I've been consumed by Facebook, so I close it and finally pick up my devotion book I am reading that day, which causes me to gaze at my delicious collection of spiritual books I have on my desk, each one with a lovely Saint bookmark somewhere in the middle because I can't seem to finish a book these days. So, of course, I pick one up to see where I left off...

When I finally get the self-discipline to open my devotional, I realize my coffee cup is empty and well, I need coffee when I read, right? Before I know it a couple of hours have flown by and I have not accomplished much at all. I feel I should be a better, more focused, more mature person at my age, but sometimes I feel like I have made no progress at all in the last 10 or 15 years. Time is marching on. I am not getting any younger, and what am I going to say to my Lord God after I die and He confronts me with the question of how I spent my time on this earth?

I lack self-discipline. I can blame it on distraction, but I make a choice to be distracted. This is something I need to pray about and work on. With God's grace, I know I can overcome it. 

Holy Spirit, come and dwell in me. Give me self-discipline to do the right thing and spend my time wisely.