When you are juggling family and work responsibilities at full capacity, is there still room for giving back to your community?

Once a month, on a Sunday afternoon, we head out to our ‘connect group’ as part of our church.

Connect Group is a group of families that meet together to hang out, talk about life, pray for each other and be a support to each other during a busy season of life.

For me, it’s a stretch to go on a Sunday afternoon. I’ve made it a habit that all Sunday afternoons are my time for rest — where I will nap, catch up on some reading or Netflix and just Chill — you can read that as you will.

But the kids LOVE when connect group is on because they get to play with their friends. And when I arrive, I love it too, because they are fabulous friends who just get the season of life we are in.

Full Capacity

Last Sunday afternoon, we headed to our connect group. Our host leaders opened a discussion on a recent message at church about working at capacity and being content with the life season we are in.

Each of the couples — or one half of each couple would share about how their own capacity has been stretched since having children and what they got from the message.

After everyone had shared, it was my turn. And I smiled at the ceiling and tried not to cry as I said I was at capacity. Totally, 100% at capacity. Life is full and busy, and there have been problems I wish I could get a handle on.

Life this year — possibly the last 12 months — has been hard. There have been great moments — but there have also been trying and testing times as well. And in the frustrations, I have sometimes felt a seed of negativity enter my heart and I’ve seen it has affected my usual positive, go-with-the-flow nature.

Room for More

I can’t for the life of me remember what else I had to share, but as I blurted out how I had been feeling, Jacob smiled at me as he was sitting adjacent to me. It was a proud, but knowing smile and I wondered exactly what he was smiling about.

And then I fell in love with him all over again as he shared with the group that despite how I felt, he was amazed with my level of capacity to see others and help them with their various needs.

He shared with the group how I took time to make and deliver meals, catch up with friends and encourage others when they were struggling. Even though I was going through my own issues, he had noticed my heart and how my capacity had enlarged this year. Rather than feel like a failure of a person, I thought, maybe I’m not doing so bad after all.

Faith

When I look at myself, I see chaos. A mum who is a bit scared of what the future holds. I had hoped that after going through uncertain times, I would have learned to lean on my faith. But I’m still learning and growing and trusting.

No matter how busy life gets, I do believe we can expand our capacity. But it can only happen when we trust God and ask Him to show us who and what we should be doing each and every day.

I just wonder if I’d have half my inner battles, if I listened more and became more attentive to God’s plan rather than my own.

For me, I didn’t even think about the people I had helped, when I was sharing about how I was at capacity in my life. I was thinking about the kids, my work, my husband and other commitments that take time and energy. I didn’t see helping people as draining my energy or adding to my workload.

You see, everyone is riding the same boat. We are all busy. Our schedules are crazy. But I really believe our capacity grows when we look beyond ourselves and know we are helping someone else.

Kindness never grows old, and I think we can all increase our capacity to be kind to others.

Do you feel like you’re living at capacity? Do you allow room in your life to help others, or do you do it as you see the need?

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Originally published at The Plumbette. Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels.