How to Balance the Chaos of Life with Daily Inspiration

Today, as I was writing what I wanted to share with you, I realized that you're getting an inside look at my house, at me and some of the chaos that goes on within my life. I hope you're seeing that I'm like everybody else. I've got stuff to work out too. I hope that you will give yourself a little bit of gentleness too, if you're feeling you're a little bit chaotic in your life as well. You're not the only one. I'm there with you. I have been trying to schedule time to clean my desk. It's not stacks and stacks like it's been in the past. It won’t be long before it is if I keep going like I am. What I've noticed is, I won’t get done with something, so I shift it aside the next day.  The next day, I have my new Daily GPS Inspired Shortcut that is the most important thing, so I don’t go back to the thing I didn’t finish yesterday. I have this little pile over here on the corner of my desk that gets added to when something is in my way because it didn’t get done. Right now it's only, maybe a half inch tall, but if I continue this way, it's going to keep getting bigger and bigger and bigger. There have been times when my desk has two or three stacks that are about 3 inches tall. They start land-sliding off and mixing with the other piles. I’m not like some people who know where everything is in their piles. For me, when it’s that big, it's overwhelming. I don’t know how I will ever get to the piles. When that happens, I shove it all in a box so I can focus on today’s action steps again.

Like I said, every day there are new inspirations, new inspired shortcuts. My new Daily GPS for the new day gives me new insights into what is important for me to create, what I want to share with you, every day there's something new. So the old stuff from yesterday, two weeks ago, two months ago isn't getting done. There are some to-do’s that we know in our lives, in our homes, in our businesses and our families, in general that continually are there. Housework is one of those things. We can't just schedule a day to get caught up then check it off when we're done. We  know we need to continue maintaining. Those things that are for maintenance, we can't let those pile up because there's more maintenance tomorrow…and the next day…and the next week…it's  going to be continuous maintenance. Even our bodies, of course we need to shower quite often. 

I started doing foot zoning. I was doing it once a month. I'm now doing it twice a month. I feel  it's a really good way to release the toxic energy that builds up. I want to be as clear as possible and for me, foot zoning has helped with that. I do yoga every morning. That helps me to keep my flexibility to maintain the mind-body connection. These are things that can get us outta whack if we don’t address them regularly. We can get off track, out of balance if we don't have a schedule or a system, something that helps us to keep our bodies maintained. My dad had a favorite saying that was an unfavorite for my mom. “I need to get caught up. Let me get caught up then I can worry about that. Give me some time and I'll get caught up.” Getting caught up was his answer for everything. I've heard myself saying that too. The thing is that we never get caught up. I know, in your life you've probably experienced that same thing. We want to get caught up. If we can get on top of this, then we’ll be okay. But these things we are trying to get caught up on are almost always things that are maintenance, that are continually going to be there. It's not doing the laundry, reading email, going through the mail, cleaning out the closet.  We are saying, “For sure on Saturday I'll get caught up.” In the meantime, we run out of clothes or we miss an important deadline or we notice a funny smell from the closet. Waiting until we can get caught up creates chaos if we can't maintain those simple things. The mail, oh my gosh, I used to let the mail stack up to the point, it would take hours to get through it. There would be late bills and even a missed family party one time!  It created chaos and stress in my life.

I have learned my lesson on the mail at least. Now, every once in a while I miss a day, then I've  got two days worth of mail to do instead of two weeks worth of mail like before. Now, I plan on going through the mail every day. I give myself about an hour. I open it, bring it in my office and take care of it. I give myself the time to take care of it right there. I only have to touch it once.  Dishes, I used to let the dishes pile up, then when there were enough dishes to fill up the dishwasher, I would finally wash the dishes. I hate cooking in a messy kitchen! So now, I do them after we're done eating. And I clean all the dishes…the ones for preparing the food and for eating the food…whether it goes in the dishwasher or if it's hand washed, I take care of it right there and then. It used to create chaos for me by not doing all the dishes every time. When it was time to start the next meal there wouldn't be space on the counter to be able to do that. Then I had to do the dishes before I could start the next meal. And, it created stress. Chaos slowed me down.. 

There are a few things that are really important for us to easily partner with God. When we are in chaos, we feel stressed and distracted. It throws us out of spiritual balance, peace, that place of contentment, a state of being present where we can most easily hear God’s voice. We can hear inspiration from God and partner with him best when we clear our lives of chaos. 

Now, we can't always get rid of all the stress or all the chaos, but we need to clear our lives of the predictable things that can create chaos…not maintaining creates chaos. That's what I want to focus on today. This is not going to be an exercise in making a huge list of things to change…creating 50 million habits. I remember doing that one time. I was writing things that would be good for me to change, and by the end I thought, “Wow! If I did this every day, I would have to get up before I ever go to bed.” There are way more good things that we can do in our lives then there's time or energy to do. Some things get to be delegated.Some things get to go by the wayside. Maybe there are some things that we're trying to maintain that we really shouldn't. 

What do you love? That’s what you really want to give your time to. I love to garden. I maintain a garden. It takes some time, but that's something that I'm willing to put my time, money and energy into. I love it. But if you are trying to grow a garden because everybody said during Covid, “you should probably have your own garden in case there's no food in the grocery store.” it may not be something you should maintain. Yes, a garden is good if there is no food. Well, right now there is food in the grocery store right now. Maybe it’s not as abundant as it used to be before Covid, but you can basically get everything that you need to maintain your life. So you probably don't need to grow a garden right now if that’s not your love. 

As we go into our exercise today, be open to know what are some things that you have been maintaining that aren't serving you, that are busy work, that are taking up the time that you could be giving to something that you're best at and really want to maintain…things that will create a lot of peace in your life by doing them. Then what are some of those things that we can't really choose to not maintain…things like brushing your teeth…unless you don't want to have teeth. What are some things that you've maybe been letting go by the wayside that should be maintained? Maybe you're not flossing every day. At some point letting things go by the wayside that should be maintained could create chaos, some stress in your life later. 

Let’s go into a meditative state for this so we can hear God’s voice. Close your eyes. Take a deep breath, filling up the whole core of your body with air, focusing on the breath, letting go of the thoughts that are swirling around in your mind…that can be chaotic too. Clear your mind of thoughts that your conscious mind would tell you need to be maintained. Instead, let God show you. Get in a place of peace right now. Even if there are 50 million things that are waiting for you after this, let yourself get in that place, that present place of peace. This is where you can partner with God. You can listen. Ask and listen for Him to tell you what are the most important things for you to be maintaining.

There are two different categories of maintenance that we're going to be looking at today. The first category is what you are maintaining:

The first question is, what are you maintaining? What are you trying to keep maintained that is really not that important to you, that maybe somebody else could maintain instead of you? Or maybe this is something that you need to let go of altogether because it's not your genius. I'll tell you one that came to my mind. I've been trying to maintain my social media. I finally hired a social media manager. This is not mine. I'm not good at this. I don't want to be good at this. I don't want to give my time to it. I know it needs to be maintained, but I'm sharing it with someone who loves it. I'm sharing that abundance of wonderful inspired messages that come to me and I want to share with the world, with someone else. 

Again, what is something that you personally have been trying to maintain that is causing more chaos in your life by trying to maintain it? Let God, as you're partnering with Him, show you the one thing. Maybe there's two. But for sure the one thing that you need to let go of, that you need to stop maintaining. If it really does need to be maintained, delegate it to somebody else. Maybe it's something that you don't even need to maintain anymore. 

The second category is what you have not been maintaining:

The next question to ask God to show you, is what have you not been maintaining that is really important for you personally to create a system, schedule a time to get it done. We know this is a maintenance thing. What is something that you have not been maintaining that creates chaos in your life. You know it is yours and you haven't been maintaining it. When it catches up to you,   you get in a traffic jam. It becomes this chaotic mess because you haven't been maintaining it. 

Review…the first thing was, what have you been maintaining that you need to let go? And the second thing is what have you not been maintaining, but you need to create a system to avoid future chaos?

I encourage you to take some action on this today. You now have just two things that you can change in your life. They are the things God feels you are most ready to change and that will make the biggest impact for you. Take some action on them today. Either delegate or dump that thing that you've been maintaining that is no longer necessary. And for the thing that you do need to maintain to avoid chaos, but haven’t been, schedule it in your life, somehow create a habit. For example, I now look at my mail every day, I have some time in the morning that I do that every day now instead of letting it pile up. 

Create peace in your life. Allow yourself to be present and not distracted by the chaos that happens when we're not maintaining the things that are important in our lives. A resource that goes deeper into this subject is my masterclass The Law of Convenience https://mentoring.wylenebenson.com/the-law-of-convenience-masterclass-registration