TFR Part One Thoughts 2017

This is my third summer to read Teaching from Rest: A Homeschooler’s Guide to Unshakable Peace (affiliate link - I might get a few pennies from your purchase using this link). Each time I ponder this book, I find new wisdom and a unique focus to guide me in planning for our next homeschool year. Over the past several weeks, I have had the opportunity to discuss the first part of this book with various friends and colleagues, in real life and online.

As a result of those discussions and my own reading, listening, and journaling, these are the key points I will take from part one this year:

1. Over and over I have been reminded that the voices in my head that discourage me and cause me to question my daily decisions in mothering and homeschooling need to be replaced. In fact, the entire first section of this book reminded me that much of teaching from rest is to simply change my attitude. That is easier said than done, of course. 
2. And to replace those voices, I need to constantly remind myself that God is present and watching. As Sarah says, “God showing up is not the miracle.” I am sure that if I can remember to let God be God, His still, quiet voice will guide me, especially as I spend precious time praying with His Word in the Scriptures, one of my favorite ways to pray.
3. Thanks to the wise words of dear friends, I am also pondering anew how we can find God in the true, the good, and the beautiful. I can find Him there, and I can lead my children to Him there. Surely, this is the best way to capture the hearts of my children.
4. Sarah also reminds us to always “choose the child” and focus on “loving him through” whatever is to be done. I have long believed that my highest priority is my relationship with each of my children, and I now renew my desire to live that more intentionally. To be faithful, to share joy, to be diligent…these all take intentional living.
5. But to accomplish any of the above, I will need to learn better to accept the existing conditions the Lord has allowed and acknowledge my own weaknesses. He created each of my children, my husband, and me to be exactly the way He wants us to be. All I can offer is my best, trust that God will fill the gaps, and hope that Mary will, as one of my favorite prayers says, "supply in [her] all-wise motherhood for my poor human deficiencies."

These are my thoughts! Here are Sarah's thoughts in a recording of her excellent online book club. I am sure, if you have read Part One of Teaching from Rest, you have other thoughts to ponder. Please share them! I want to hear what words have touched you.