Dear Mom Who Got Nothing Done Today

Hey mama,

You had big plans for what you hoped to accomplish today, didn't you?
Maybe you carefully planned the agenda and got up a little early. You were so optimistic about the day.
But the other people in your family weren't really interested in your agenda and your plans were thwarted at every turn.

The kids were whining and arguing. Your normally smoothly running routine was just not working today.

You're frustrated right now as you look around and see that nothing…NOTHING! has been accomplished.

In fact, the house is messier than when you started, supper ended up being cold cereal, and you just want to crawl in bed and pretend this day didn't happen.

You know what, Mama?
A lot more than you realize had been accomplished today.

Your success as a mother cannot be measured by how clean the house was at the end of the day or what you served for supper.

Here's what you accomplished today in spite of leaving your to-do list completely untouched:

• You taught whining children how to control their emotions.
• You taught unkind children how to put others first.
• You taught disobedient children how to do what's right even when they don't feel like it.
• You taught lazy children how to be diligent in all that they do.

You loved when it was hard to love.
You reinforced lessons that your children need to learn.
You put food in little bellies.
You showed your children how to choose joy, patience and forgiveness.

And if perchance you blew it and lost your cool, you apologized and showed your children that you sometimes make the wrong choices too. And in doing so you also showed them how not to wallow in their mistakes, but to be thankful for grace, forgive themselves and move on.

And if you haven't done that yet, the good news is that it's never too late!

This day is not a loss!

You've added more building blocks to the crucial foundation that your children need for a successful adult life.

You probably don't feel like the wall has gotten any higher today. Progress in child training is painfully slow and you won't see any immediate results.

But sometime in the future this very day will be a part of who your children are.

And by God's grace they will be adults who have seen in your life and heard from your lips that a life worth living is one that follows hard after God.

I'd say teaching your children those lessons is a far cry from “getting nothing done.”

Don't despair, mama. You've done more today than you realize.

(I posted this on my Facebook page a couple days ago, and it seemed appropriate for this post:)