Breakups + Busy

Baking is a favorite of mine.  Something about creating flakey pastry mixed with sweet flavors, sprinkled with sugar or drizzled in chocolate, brings a part of me alive.  Pair that with a cup of coffee and some good conversation and I am like a giddy middle school girl 🙂

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving is pie day.  

It’s the day where – for as long as I can remember – Momma rolls Grandma’s pie crust recipe onto flour dusted countertops.  Balls of crust are then pressed into pie dishes, a dolloped crust being my momma’s favorite design.  We always nibble as we press and the nibbling only stops when it’s time for the fillings to be made.  

Pineapple and pecan are always the first to be created.  

These pies have never left our family’s Thanksgiving menu- even when other dishes have been asked to be made.  Pineapple and Pecan are momma’s favorites.  They stay.  

As I got older, the other empty pie shells became my responsibility.  

First, we tried apple.  All sorts of apple recipes have filled our pie crusts over the years.  We finally settled on one that leaves the crust flakey and buttery, and the apples tender and tangy.  It pairs perfectly with Breyer’s Vanilla bean ice cream.

Then, we tried sweet potato.   For a few years, Grandpa would buy a pre-made pumpkin pie from the grocery store, and bring it with him for dinner.  We let him.  When he had his first piece of sweet potato pie he dubbed it the best pumpkin pie he had ever tasted.

We didn’t have the heart to tell him…

This year we decided to try Chocolate Chess.  But, a part of me just couldn’t look forward to pie day.

I just had so much to do.

I don’t know if you’ve ever been there.  Drowning in things that are clawing for your attention, and you’re just longing for a little more time or a  little more flexibility– and THEN things will be fine.  

You’re your own worst enemy because the things to do keep adding up, but you’ve convinced yourself that doing things is what you’re good at.

But, who have you become?

See.  That’s what we need to ask each other.  We need to remind each other of this simple truth: What we do will never matter as much as who we allow ourselves to become.

I only say that because I’m caught up in the middle of it.  My to do list is longer than it’s ever been.  Somehow, in the midst of the crazy, I convinced myself that doing things meant I was worth something….that being busy meant I was more purposed.

Oh my friend, lean in on this secret:  You can be busy and feel purposed, but are you productive in the things that matter?

On today, the day of Thanksgiving, I am convinced now, more than ever, that we need to stop DOING and start BECOMING.  I see it in my own life, and in the lives of those I love most.  We’re so busy filling our life to the brim, that we aren’t becoming the people we were intentionally crafted to be.

We simply don’t have TIME to ENJOY life, and we’ve convinced ourselves that that’s how it has to be.

But, it’s not.

So, let’s break up with busy.  Let’s enjoy a quiet car ride, or a slow conversation with someone over dinner.  Let’s make a space for God to fill and not be afraid if he fills it with peace.  Let’s enjoy pie day and decide that our only task is to BE where our feet ARE.  Let’s curate lives that abound in love and overflow with grace.

Because, no one ever changed the world by doing things on their to do list, they changed the world by becoming what it needed.

Wishing you the happiest breakup your heart has ever had– and an even happier Thanksgiving,

xo

AnnaFilly