A Day of Rhythm

It has been a while since I posted.  I had to mull over and think about what the Lord has taught me thus far.  And it has been good time.   I have worked on creating rhythm rather than schedules.  I LOVE it!!!  We now have a rhythm and are not stressing out about the clock, what time it is, or how many hours we have/need.  While we work on keeping appointments (I hate to be late) and realize that appointments are part of life, the appointments no longer rule us.  We work our rhythm around them.  Let me explain.

Take, for example, a typical school day with one appointment or field trip.  We wake up with the sun, take the time to do our chores and eat a good, healthy breakfast.  This may take an hour (on a perfect day) or up to 3 hours on a really bad day.  In fact, there are days all we do is chores and behavioral development.  But it no longer stresses me out.  With my LD and ADHD child, a day with an appointment can quite often turn into a behavioral challenge day.  In that case, we concentrate on rhythm and not school work.  Let's take what just happened today.

We got up this morning a little late because we watched "A.D." on TV and stayed up past our bedtime. After all, it was a holiday weekend (Easter) Since "A.D." counted for school, I had anticipated and allowed extra sleep.  But from the minute we got up I could tell it was going to be a "behaviorally challenged" day.  The arguments from my son started almost immediately.  He was crabby with me and crabby with the animals.  Chores were not only getting done incorrectly, but there was one disaster due to directly disobeying a rule.  He felt rotten, I felt rotten and things were headed out of control.

Remembering that the most important goal I set for now was "rhythm", I decided that bad behavior has to be worked through.  We sat and came up with a plan to deal with the issue of the disobedience and resulting problems, then tried once again to start school.  After 5 minutes of arguing and not listening, I understood school was not going to happen.  By this time it was already noon.

To throw a problem into the mix, we had a doctor appointment and had to leave the house at 3:30.  We had lunch and did our noon chores (back into rhythm), and then spent some quiet time separate from each other in our rooms.  We needed to be quiet to find the strength to finish our day.  By that time it was 3 and we got ready to leave.  We grabbed a book, left about 15 minutes early, went to our appointment and spent the extra time (from leaving early) quietly reading our books.

By the time we got home it was chores, supper and 1 hour to be on our computers before bed (more quiet time).

Not a very productive day by most standards, but here is what I saw:

1) My boy learned a BIG lesson on why we do what we are told and why a nine year old does not make the rules.

2) We came up with an alternative plan of goal-setting and accountability for the responsibilities he both chooses and has to do.  Great life skills that, if properly learned, will help him his entire life!

3) We had quiet time during a day of strife.  Time to think, time to plan, and time just to rest after a busy weekend.

4) We made our appointment and it went well for both of us.

5) We kept our rhythm in regards to the overall schedule of our day.

6) During the quiet times I was able to accomplish much for our homeschooling group and toward my goal planning for the soon to start new homeschool year. I also used this time to read the next chapter for my book club.

7)  We are going to bed feeling good.

As I write I see that even though we didn't get one curriculum lesson in all day, there was a huge amount of learning going on, and I was able to accomplish quite a bit of my extra work as well!

So what God has shown me definitely is working for me.  I am very excited to see direct results from concentrating on God's rhythm.