I've had a gift certificate for a pedicure for a year now. I got it as a Christmas gift last year. I just had to throw it away - unused - because in the past year, never once did I take the time to go and get some pampering. I carried it around in my wallet for the whole year. It was all tattered and torn. And a few times I would think - "Oh, I should go get a pedicure after I go…." to the gym or the grocery or to have lunch with the boys at school or whatever else I put ahead of a little pampering. It would be inconvenient to walk around in those throw-away flip flops afterwards, the polish would get wrecked if I put my shoes back on, I don't have any cash for a tip... I'd come up with a million excuses and would always end up giving myself a late-night pedicure at home. In this season in life, pampering myself seems to be my last priority. I have so many others to take care of that I skimp on myself. But I am pleased to see that as the year draws to a close, that I'm about to fill up another journal for the year. That in those moments when I had a spare moment to breathe and I had a choice of how to spend my fleeting free time, instead of going to the walk-in pedicure place, I would spend some time filling another journal page. And I feel a sense of accomplishment as I flip through the pages of my fifth visual journal… Sometimes I draw a picture of a place I've been or something related to a quote from a sermon or a movie or a Bible verse, other times I cut out pictures from magazines and glue them into my blank book. I doodle, draw, write over pictures, quote lines from my favorite Jesus Calling devotional or scribble out thoughts and prayers and pour out what's on my heart. It's like a treasure map of my soul. It shows me where I've been, what God's been teaching me, and helps me articulate thoughts I didn't know I was thinking and feelings I didn't know I had until I took the time to write them down. As I reflect on the year and flip through the pages of my journal - I feel that I have "chosen what was better". I'd rather spend those precious few moments pampering my soul than pampering my soles. My resolution for 2015 is to spend more time at the Soul Spa. Care to join me?
