What will you make of your freedom?

Written December 9

I’ve deleted instagram from my phone again.

You know those people in those on-again-off-again relationships— every time you see them they’ve broken up or gotten back together for the 5th time that year?

That’s me and Instagram.

I’ve written about this in one of my most popular posts— I’m a better mum without Instagram.

This piece will be a follow up of sorts. Except, it’ll ask a much more gut-punchy question towards the end.

I feel so much better when I’m not on IG. Immediately upon removing the app from my phone I feel more energy, a less chaotic mind, more joyful. I feel more space in my days. I have more time. I’m not mentally in two places at once— trying to be here but also trying to take a photo of it for there.

It’s not just the obvious issues like the fact we’re trying to metabolise unruly amounts of information everyday.

It’s not just about how our brains start to funnel all of our precious creativity into 90 second snippets and hooky carousels.

It’s not just about how, if we’re not careful we will start to live as if social media is real life, and our real life an annoying distraction.

It’s not just about ever growing screen time and what that does to our brains, our eyes, our nervous systems….

It’s about who we are when we put the phones down.

It’s how our mental energy has been used up by reading and watching things that do nothing for our lives.

We become less patient. Less energised. More cranky.

It’s the restlessness, because we’ve become accustomed to relentless stimulation.

It’s our growing inability to be bored.

It’s about the way we cram the ‘boring’ moments of the days with ‘just gonna have a quick look on Instagram’.

We complain that these days with our kids are going too fast but it’s us that’s doing it.

We are the ones that are too fast.

We don’t let anything be slow.

We don’t leave any space to take a deep breath and remind ourselves that these are the golden days.

This is the life that many of us once prayed for guys. And social media will trick you into thinking it sucks and staring into the screen and longing for another person’s life is better. You know?!

A poem I wrote the other day:

I wonder if you’re living your dream right now,

but not letting yourself really live it, you know?

I wonder if you’re so busy digging for a new dream

while everything you ever wished for is right here under your nose

because every time you log on you’re being sold a better one

and because no one in our generation knows contentment anymore

I wonder if 10 years will go by and the kids are grown

how many of us will look back and realise

with a sharp ache

and nauseating regret

that these were the best days of our lives

and all we did was dream.

I long for a greater sense of contentment. I know, more than I know anything, that I am living days right now that I used to dream about. If little me could see my life now, she would be flawed, overjoyed, and so utterly grateful that she wouldn’t wish for anything else.

And yet here she is, aged 37, so grateful but always a little restless.

Some times, in ordinary moments of the days or at bedtime, or after the kids go to sleep, I will feel so overwhelmed with how blessed I am… that it makes me anxious.

Rather than enjoy it, all I want to do is protect it.

What should be a state of joy and gratitude can so quickly become anxiety and worry.

I am working with God on this. I am learning to quickly capture thoughts that are not mine and reject them.

Sometimes, in a moment of pure joy, when a worry will creep in, I’ll say “lies.”

I used to think worry was protective, diligent. Now I know that a lot of it is from the mighty effort that is not from God.

It’s come to steal.

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

~John 10:10

I read last night something about discontentment being where the devil sneaks in. You can imagine it can’t you? “Here here, she’s constantly searching for more, let’s give her a thousand new things her life could be and make her believe her current life is terrible.”

Don’t get me wrong. For some, it’s time to really change your life. Some people need to escape a situation, move on, make some big moves.

For others? It’s time to enjoy it. You know what I mean?

What I really care about is that we are walking lock step with God and not being constantly derailed by sneaky, lying ideas fed to us by an algorithm that doesn’t care at all for our lives— all it wants is for us to stare at the screen longer.

It’s wild.

We have to get a grip. If you’ve already got a grip, ignore me by the way,

I have often said that one of the tragedies of our generation will be that our kids looked up at us and saw us engulfed in some of the most stupid content ever created online. The tragedy however is that parents are becoming unreachable. Annoyed at being disturbed from their dopamine addictive scroll, they shoo their kids away, feeling entitled to the ‘me time’.

But scrolling isn’t rest. It isn’t restorative. At least not when it happens all throughout the day.

I am always alarmed at those calculators which show you how much time you’ll spend on your phone over the next 10 or 30 years if you maintain your current screen time. It’s alarming.

If someone spends ~5 hours/day for a full year, that’s ~1,825 hours — roughly 2 full months spent staring at a screen.

Over 6 years, that’s an entire year spent on the phone.

Now, if that’s spent entirely on fruitful work, that’s one thing. I get it. We live in a digital world now and some of us unfortunately are not amish.

But so much of modern day screen time is mindless. It’s about numbing, stimulating, and honestly? It’s mind warfare. We know it.

As a fresh year rolls around though, I feel really inspired to do even better.

So, I’ve been feeling a little burned out. Not ‘laying in bed and can’t move’ burned out, but mentally burned out.

I am a curious person and love to learn and to create and sometimes I just do it non stop (in the crevices of my days, no less).

I notice myself get snappy, short, and tired it’s not because I am over working or under nourishing or over training or over caffeinating or anything we typically think of when it comes to basic women stress. (I train 3 x a week and I eat plenty. Including carbs at every single meal ok?).

It’s my minddddd. You know? It’s my mind. I do not have a stressful life, praise be to God. But I sure can create a stressful mind if I don’t become very disciplined.

My youngest babe Figgy just turned 2. We’re still feeding in the night and day. I am trying to reduce the feeds but am also aware we have an international flight coming up and I’d love to hold on until then. I always love the comfort and extra nutrition the boob gives to travelling babes. I’m still making plenty of milk, that’s no issue.

My daughters friend’s mum made lactation cookies for someone recently, and gave me some as a nice thoughtful gift. I said to Erik— I will never say no to a cookie, unless it’s a lactation cookie. I have 99 issues but producing milk is not one of them and I do not want to encourage anymore. She’s over 2 and i’m still in breast pads. Thank you God for the abundance and also, keeps those lactation cookies away from meeeee!

Anyway.

Two recent doses of mastitis woke me up to some areas of my life where I need to come into greater integrity.

Mastitis always does that for me. It always delivers me the sharp wisdom I need.

I have done all the German New Medicine. The homeopathy. Every natural thing that is on the list. I am an encyclopaedia when it comes to natural remedies for mastitis.

But mastitis is a much more intimate thing for me than just applying a topical cream or taking raw garlic and high vitamin C.

I get mastitis when I need it.

Every single time.

It is always short, I move through it quickly, and in the tenderness of it, I am always delivered a message that I couldn’t hear when I was go-go-going.

One of these last times I was sitting in the bath curled over myself praying. My son was with me and he said ‘mum can I take a photo of you? You look so cute.’

As I was sitting in the bath I was praying to God as I always do when I’ve got it (Sometimes I also put on a trashy dumb show and ride it out— Erik takes the kids ) and I knew what He was trying to say.

I wasn’t leaving enough space to hear God. It was true. I was filling the gaps in my days with something— either scrolling, or researching something non important, and even my evenings after the kids sleep were me reading a very deep book— lately, on Orthodoxy. Often though even my evenings I’m filling myself mentally, more than spiritually. I lie there with the red light on and my legs up the wall and i’m reading something beautiful like ‘The Ethics Of Beauty’ and feeling in awe of God but also… my mind is just chomping.

I become tired or tender when I need to, when I can’t hear God.

I can almost sense God saying:

When you are tired and tender, you can hear me.

And it’s true. I can. With crystal clear clarity. There is something about the state of mastitis. It is so very tender. Painful. And all encompassing. It is RAW. I mean, if you know you know.

This might sound nuts, but I am so grateful for what mastitis has shown me— about myself, about my mothering, about where I am out of alignment in real time.

This last time I just got the message so clearly. It was this:

Stop using your precious time on dumb stuff.

I had been getting way too caught up in scrolling. It was sneaking up on me. You know how that happens?

In the brief moments of time I had help with the kids to write or create or do whatever I needed or wanted to do really, I was often unknowingly wasting some of this time on dumb, non fruitful things. This was such a conflict in my psyche, that when I resolved it, voila! I got mastitis.

I often make a promise to God in these tender moments. This time, I promised God that I would make better use of my freedom.

I would recognise the gift that my life is, and I would stop using it on things that did not make my life, or the lives of those around me better.

I realised how worn out I’d let my mind become.

I realised how soft I’d let my internet boundaries become.

I realised how much this was affecting me mentally and emotionally.

I realised that I was not being who God made me to be.

This sounds dramatic, and it really wasn’t as dramatic as it seems on the outside. But inside me, it was a big deal. I’m a deep person and a stickler for standards and integrity and when my own drop, I cannot STAND it. I hold others to high expectations because I hold myself to high expectations. Maybe too much. Eldest daughter tings.

My husband has actually encouraged me to get off IG. He sees that my overly excitable mind can get drawn into the plethora of interesting information and find it hard to shut it off. He sees how my algorithm dishes me ads about bomb shelters and watches how I will go from being perfectly joyful to anxious because the algorithm has started telling me there will be a famine next year. He’s watched me second guess our life decisions because now I’ve got 5 new compelling pieces of information in my head to contemplate.

Confusion is the work of the devil.

I respect what my husband says. He wants what is best for me. He wants my joy. He wants my peace. He wants this more than he wants anything else on earth. And you know what? I want to give that to him.

I want to give him my joy, my peace and my serenity.

I want to give this to my kids too.

To be clear, I am mostly joyful (especially right now at Christmas time where I really come alive).

I am an active, energised mum. I have my finger on the pulse. I am present.

But this last couple of months I haven’t quite been feeling myself. And you know what? I’m glad. Because it showed me where to realign. And I did.

I’ve realised that the little things I’ve been promising myself I will do, are actually the big things and that I need to follow through on them.

Like the 6am walk.

Sure, my youngest is still feeding in the night and I could use an extra 30 mins of sleep but the morning sun and that moment of quiet with God in the morning does more for me than the extra sleep will. I cannot tell you the difference in my day when I start it like this — nature, the 389043 benefits of morning sunlight, and quiet prayer with God.

Sometimes we need a kick up the bum to realise where we are wanting one thing, but our habits and choices aren’t matching.

Discipline is the ultimate flex in todays world where we have dopamine drugs at our fingertips.

So. The reason I came to write to you today is this.

There is a big question I am asking myself ahead of the new year and I want to ask it to you too.

In this world where you can become an internet slob and people will applause because ‘self care mumma!’….

In this world where you can have dopamine on tap in the palm of your hand…

In this world where discipline seems boring and culture is degrading…

In this world where parents are giving more of their joy to strangers on the internet than to their own kids…

In this world where it takes intention to get quiet and to hear God….

What will you make of your freedom?

What will you do with it?

The fact that you can do anything with your time, your days, your creative energy, and yes, your thoughts. What will you do?

I’m not asking you what you’ll do with your life. I’m asking you what you’ll do with your freedom.

I’m asking this very intentionally because many people forget they have freedom.

No, you don’t need to be on Instagram if you don’t want to.

Yes, you can put your phone away and muster the discipline to not check it again.

Yes, you can create the cafe, or the book, or the real in person thing and not a digital product.

Yes, you can get up at 5:30 and spend time in the quiet outside, walking, with God.

Yes, you can decide to vitality max and hire a coach and eat more and change your body into the vibrant toned thing you want it to be.

Yes, you can cut down your kids screen time, or create more order, or create that discipline you’ve been a little lazy in establishing.

Yes, you can clear out all the junk in your house that you look at every day, clogging your mind and shortening your breaths.

Yes, you can make every thought that is not life giving, bow to Christ in your mind.

Yes, you can reject the thoughts that are taking life from you. You can tell them to rack off, and stop believing the lies. You can take your mind back and make it a flourishing garden.

No, you don’t need Christmas to be ultra stressful.

Yes, you can say what you really mean.

Yes, you can start a business or stop one.

Yes, you can be a stay at home mum and do nothing else if you can afford to.

Yes, you can be honest if you wanna grow a bigger audience.

Yes, you can live a life that doesn’t need to be on display.

Yes, you can look hot and not post it.

Yes, you can become the woman you know God made you to be and you can do it now.

Yes, you can make a huge batch of Christmas cookies and deliver them around the neighbourhood and have the most fun ever doing it.

Everyone tells you that it goes so fast. It does. The birthdays roll by fast and each year you go through your camera roll and think ‘where did the time go and how can I slow it down?’. You can’t. But what you can do is put your phone away. You can stop filling the gaps in the day with scrolling- those gaps are where you stop, soak it in and say under your breath- these are the golden days.

We are given this life, we are given this day, we are given this time, we are given this freedom.

One day I believe we will answer for what we have done with the freedom we’ve been given.

This for me is the most compelling nudge of all. What will I say I have done with my freedom?

It is this question that inspired me to write this guide to creative integrity. It is this deep urge to refine, upgrade and purge and have my head hit the pillow each night with peace knowing that I used my freedom well.

Tell me your thoughts in the comments, and make sure you’re subscribed to stay in touch.

Also, I’m wrapping up my show after season 1, with no current dates set for season 2. We’ve got a big family time coming up and I don’t want to be engulfed with planning episodes and filming during that time. There are 18 episodes available for your viewing. I am SO grateful for all of the beautiful messages I’ve received from so many about the pod. I’m so glad I did it. I may return for season 2, or I may turn towards my dream of having a countryside bookstore full of luxury, wholesome books instead. We’ll see ;)

I am in Christmas Rom-Com, Christmas carols, Christmas cookies, 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle, non-stop swimming with the kids, family time, hosting, busy mode. Yesterday I was talking to myself out loud like I always do and mentioned that I had to stop and pick up some Christmas choccies for my kids swimming teacher on the way to our final lesson. My husband, recognising that I was in go go go mode relating to Christmas things said ‘do you need to though?’. I think I said ‘Of course I do!’ before he even finished his sentence.

I told him how growing up my mum would take us for a full day at both Christmas and Easter dropping chocolates to everyone we had anything to do with — even the owner of the local pharmacy. It would be 35 degrees celcius and we’d bop around to houses, sometimes the person we were visiting was one of my nanna’s cousins and on an oxygen tank. They’d offer us longlife milk from the fridge as we sat there watching mum carry a long convo. Mum has always been so good at making effort with people like that.

My youngest babe was asked to be the sheep in the church nativity but she’s 2 and I’m wondering if she’ll go up without me or if i’ll be standing there behind the kids like a big dork. You know?

I do want to write a piece on the warm Australian Christmas for you. I know it’s a strange thing for my northern hemisphere folks. My husband is still adjusting to it after several of them. A reader asked me if we watch the same Christmas movies, listen to the same Christmas songs. I told her yes, we do. We even have our own special Aussie Christmas traditions that I’d like to share about.

I may write again before Christmas, or I may not. In the case I don’t, I want to wish you the most merry Christmas. I pray that you and your family have a beautiful, restorative time together.

Just one glance in the direction of Christ is enough to make me want to do well with my freedom. God’s beauty dissolves all distraction. May we seek it out now and always.

Joy to the world, the Lord is come.

Let Earth, receive, her King!

Let every heart, prepare Him room

And heaven and nature sing

And heaven and nature sing

And heaven, and heaven nature sing.

Love Pk

XXX

Photo below of my youngest babe— who loves to stop and look at every decoration yelling ‘yook mum yook!! Deco-yations!!’. These are the golden days.