My God Box

Not long ago, I was taking a walk with two of my daughters, and we were looking at the pretty yards with their flowers and well manicured lawns.  I joked that if my yard looked that pretty, I'd be a skinny woman.  It takes a lot of physical labor to get a yard to look like that, unless you're able to hire someone to do the work, and even then, SOMEONE is getting skinny!

This year I've been trying  to get back into shape.  Over the last five years, I've let myself go just a teeny tiny bit.  Life has a way of interrupting some of our best work, and I've been on a five year hiatus from all things resembling progress, both spiritually and physically.

I have an internet group of friends that have come together for the purpose of encouraging each other to move our bodies and get or stay healthy and strong.  A couple of them have been talking about their gardening, and I mentioned that I was thinking of tackling my yard and creating a garden as a means of getting into shape.  With the size of my yard, and the amount of work needing done, I'd have months of workouts lined up!

"DO IT! DO IT!" they said, and I decided I would.

Meanwhile, I've been reading a book by Tosha Silver called Outrageous Openness: Letting the Divine Take the Lead.  Through funny and sweet stories, Tosha encourages the reader to put their lives in the hands of the Divine and let God lead the way.  It's not a new concept for me, but it's a practice I had discontinued, part of that five-year hiatus, I guess.  One night I was reading, while simultaneously trying to figure out where to start with my yard, when I realized that it was time to put all of this stuff in God's hands.  By, "stuff," I mean my yard, my weight, my house, my finances, ALL of it!

I've tried to do that before, but I've never really given it to God.  I pray about it, ask for help, and then go right on worrying about what I'm going to do about the whole thing.  Somehow a switch has been flipped in my brain, though, and I'm getting the inkling of a idea about how to receive help and not fret so much.

Enter the God box.  In one of the chapters of the book, Tosha writes about a practice she has adopted.  You write down whatever is bothering you and put it in the box.  Then whenever you start to worry about that problem or agonize about what to do, you remind yourself, "It's in the Box. It's done."

The box can be any kind of container.  I chose a box that belonged to my grandfather.  After he died, my mom and dad brought home a few things that belonged to him for each of us to have as remembrances, and one of the things I received was a box.  When I read about the God box, I thought of it right away.

So, when I worry about my yard, my health, or anything else, I remember that I've given this problem to God, and he will take care of it one way or another.  "It's in the box."