Lessons.

I am learning, and have been learning-in my 7 month hiatus from my crazy, breaths-allowed-only-to-inhale-cups-of-coffee life… is how to love my husband. Not just how to give him a hug when he comes home from work or visit his office for kisses, but how to unconditionally love him. This is a love that involves picking up his sweaty balled-up socks from all corners of the apartment (gross, I know) without complaint, making dinner AND cleaning up afterwards because he is just too tired, and smiling (not nagging) when I remind him that the trash has been full for about 2 days now and would he please take it out already.

If our whole lives are about practicing for heaven, then loving and serving is what it’s all about. I’ve been quite caught up lately in my dreams, and plans, my goals, my soul-shaking purpose in life. Well, guess what?

Love has everything to do with my purpose in life… and over the past 7 months, that has hit me like a ton of bricks.

As I’ve been strategizing about how I’m going to teach children in China and change the face of international educational development, while simultaneously raising a family, keeping a neat (and perfectly decorated) house, making gourmet dinners every night, with time left over for stops at Anthropologie and the occasional yoga class (WHEW!) … I’ve neglected the little tasks I’ve been entrusted with and have been forgetting lately that “acts of service” is one of my primary love languages.

Putting away the laundry and bleaching the kitchen sink seems so mundane compared to what I could be doing. Which is changing the world, obviously. I so often miss the point that my entire life is an act of worship. That means every single thing I do, even the little things. And there are so many lessons in the little things: stewardship, resource/talent optimization (can’t seem to shake economics from my system… whoopsies!), gratefulness, but the biggest lesson for me lately: love.

Love is absolutely foundational (I Corinthians 13). I’m reminded to love my life, to love and honor God by engaging in the day he has given me and all that that entails (more about that here), and to love my husband unconditionally because that is one step closer to loving everyone else.

I know this isn’t always the easiest task, and I will probably never win the best wife ever award, but there’s always room for improvement. And that begins with joyfully being of service, working on my selfishness selflessness, and loving through the little things that are not as fun to do (anyone care to join me in a vacuuming party? I didn’t think so). I’m learning what it means to really love, and seeing how that affects my future is changing my life.