Self-Care: Take a Break

Another way among 30 ways to practice self-care is to take a break. Try this week to step away from your normal routine, your work, your daily grind, and simply take a break from doing. Step away from stressful activities, and do something you love to do.

Every Sunday, I arrive at the Church Building around 7:45AM to help set-up for Sunday morning worship, including caring for musicians, media tech volunteers, hospitality team, arranging last-minute details for each of the two different worship services we have: 9AM~Contemporary Worship; 11AM~Classic Worship. Before and after each service, I love to connect with the people who have come for worship, as I engage in a variety of conversations with people, some whom I’ve known for years, others whom I’ve just met that day.

Yesterday, on Mother’s Day, after Sunday worship, on my way home, I took a break. I stepped away from my normal routine and dropped in at the Cannon Beach Chamber Building to enjoy a Children’s Art Show hosted by one of our local businesses, Child’s Play. The room was full of fun music and 55 different pieces of art created by our local children, art splashed with beauty, bright colors, imagination, and playfulness.

I sat down to visit with the co-owner of Child’s Play, Jenn Whyman, who co-owns this wonderful store in downtown Cannon Beach with her daughter Erica. I had the most uplifting, encouraging conversation with Jenn, spent some time praying together with her for God’s blessings upon all the children and their families who had submitted artwork for this amazing Children’s Art Show.

Then, I went around to each piece of art to enjoy the creative wonders of a child’s imagination: paintings of Haystack Rock at sunset, Faerie Houses with flower sundeck, magical forest paintings, drawings of dragons, lego worlds, a TP roll tree, a painting of a Truffula Tree from Dr. Seuss’ famous book The Lorax. My heart was brought to a wonderland of imagination, color, delight and play by witnessing children’s art. I knelt to look up close into a Faerie House, a painting of our amazing Haystack Rock, or a Lego World.

Before I left the Children’s Art Show, Jenn offered to put a playful tattoo art on the back of my hand, selecting out a cartoon Kiwi bird with a heart and a half Kiwi fruit . I wore that fun image on my hand days later as a sweet memory of that brief 30 minutes when I took a break yesterday.

I came away from that brief break renewed, rejuvenated, literally made like a child again. That is the meaning of rejuvenate, to be made young again.

That is what happens when we simply take time to take a break, to step away from stressful activities, and do something you love to do.

What is it that you love to do most? Take time this week. Take a break this week. Honor God by becoming like a child this week. Plunge your fingers into paint and try finger painting like you did back in kindergarten. Dig your fingers into the dirt and plant some flowers. Climb a nearby tree and see what the birds see. Pause outdoors to look up to the sky and wonder and the marvel of clouds. Come to our little coastal village and pay a visit to one of my favorite shops, Child’s Play.