As I sat looking fixedly at my spring and summer calendar, I felt the perennial question that torments parents surfacing in my mind, “Is it enough?”
Is it enough time to get from the piano lesson to the basketball skate party? Is there enough time to get a First Communion dress if I order it next month? Are there enough vacation days for a family trip? Do we have enough money, time, energy or capacity to multitask for every relationship, need, desire and expectation?
That insidious word – enough – can torture us in our emotional life, as well. Am I engaging enough to still fascinate my spouse? Am I available enough to meet my child’s need for a late night chat? Is my knowledge enough to problem solve a medical concern with my doctor? Tied to the humdrum routines of my life, am I interesting enough to keep the attention of a new friend? Do I have enough time for myself to recharge? And, am I enough to somehow earn the love and care of God?
The reality is that this intangible standard of enough cannot be met in our fallen world. Our restless desire for perfection points to the longing we all have for heaven. Feeling that tension and imperfection in our lives is a prompting to turn toward God to help us find balance, order, confidence and peace.
Contrary to that prompting, the devil would prefer us to be consumed by the countless and constant demands for our attention. He hopes this insatiable clamor will make us question our sense of self and shatter our confidence in our identity as loved children of God. He seeks to make us slaves of an over-packed schedule, trying to fulfill a list of expectations for our career advancement or for a child’s ideal resume. Or we try to make everyone happy by volunteering and helping everywhere at the expense of our own family time and care for our homes and households. He may overwhelm us with sufferings, like Job in the Bible. After expending our resources to the last drop, we can cower in self-doubt and guilt if we hear a critique saying we did it all wrong after all. Of course, God wants us to live and grow intentionally. But our efforts will not bear lasting fruit and joy if they stem from a place of fear. St. Augustine’s long search for success shifted dramatically when he realized, “You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in You.”
When I face an avalanche of worry, it helps me to recall that all my imaginings usually fail to include one essential element: grace. God’s dynamic grace, weaving itself in and through the fabric of my life, is often creative in ways I have no possible way of predicting. An unforeseen check, the perfectly timed help from a stranger, an unexpected healing or even a week of warm sunshine during a rainy spell – these seemingly fortuitous moments can eliminate the fear of enough like an overhead light chasing darkness from an enclosed room. Other times, I discover much later that God’s grace has mysteriously mended parts of my life that I thought were left threadbare or torn because of my inability to do it all during that season.
God doesn’t need us to be enough for Him; He wants us to realize He is enough for us.
While I may never “be enough” to tackle every obstacle in life with wisdom, equanimity and skill, I am certain that God is enough to make up for my lack. This is why we have the sacraments, to open our hearts to His grace acting in our lives.
Biblical wisdom and the loving voice of the Church in her many reflections on the family help us to reorient our standards from the standards of the world. Nowhere does Jesus give a sermon telling us success in life is measured by health, wealth, position, intelligence or the ability to replicate the Valentine’s Day cupcakes you saw on Pinterest. Instead, His standard of perfection is Himself. Christ demonstrated through His life, death and resurrection that life is about self-sacrificing love.
If the real goal is holiness and heaven, we do have enough of the essential things. There are enough opportunities in daily family life for kindness and acts of mercy. There are enough moments in a day (or night) to lift our hearts to God in prayer and thanksgiving. There are enough times to mourn, to hunger for righteousness, to be merciful, to be a peacemaker and to live out the Beatitudes that Christ says will bring us close to His Heart. And God will give us enough grace to bring us through even the hardest moments.
As the pressure builds to commit your calendar to all the activities and events of the next few months and you begin to feel overwhelmed, I encourage you to put each opportunity at the feet of Christ. Ask why you must do it or if you would like to do it and at what cost. Ask, “What is this in the light of eternity?” – especially if it taxes your family to the point where the life of holiness becomes strained or overshadowed by external pressures. After all, it’s much better to be a saint who happens to be a soccer mom, than to be a soccer mom who never accepted the invitation to become a saint.
When we focus on the world’s ever-moving ideals of perfection, our vision is narrowed and our capacity to love is underdeveloped. May we pray to God with St. Augustine, “The house of my soul is too small for You to come to it. May it be enlarged by You.” Only then will we know the satisfaction of enough, because there is only One who has the ability to fill a bottomless desire.
Kelly Henson is a Catholic writer and speaker who explores the art of integrating faith into daily life. She and her family are parishioners of Our Lady of Grace Parish in Greensboro. She blogs at www.kellyjhenson.com.