Tonight my seven year old daughter prayed. Wednesdays and Sundays are her days of the week to pray. The nightly ritual for us is to gather the children in our bedroom, and one of them prays for the whole group – each with assigned days. This is a tradition we’ve been doing for years, despite my own personal spiritual journey that has often muted my prayers. But the children pray. The tradition is well-established.
As I listened to Alayah pray tonight, I thought about her world.
I was gone for the last two days at a conference in Atlanta (BlogWell). My mind has been on everything I need to do OTHER than spend time with Alayah. As she prayed, I realized that the time I thought I HAD been spending with her today didn’t produce the results of really spending time with her. I had heard her talk about earning points for her good behavior in school to attend this coveted popcorn party on Friday, and I had observed her laying on my bed next to me, reading and re-reading the invitation to Jayla’s birthday party
and then calling her friend and talking incessantly about both parties – all while I was working on the computer. My body was with her, but my mind was not. I was multitasking.
The thing about multitasking is that something is always the primary focus, while everything else is not. As I listened to Alayah pray, it hit me: even though I had observed and heard these things that were the highlights of the week for her, I hadn’t processed these things. The file was downloaded but never opened. I didn’t stop what I was doing and think about what it was like to be her. I just kept on typing or clicking on my computer as my daughter was revealing in front of my eyes the thrill and excitement of what was to come in her little world in just two more days.
Tonight, with a mind full of thoughts, stories and insightful material for blog posts, I realized I needed to stop my busy mind from all of the things that have distracted me from the joy that is Alayah (her middle name is actually Joy, and she couldn’t have been more appropriately named). What could be more important than being still and focusing solely on those we cherish most in our lives? By putting ourselves in the shoes of the people we love, we see the world through their eyes, not ours. It seems to me, that’s one of the most significant ways we show love to each other. And it seems to me, I don’t do it often enough.
