Bowling

Today I had a realisation. 

I am not good at bowling. 

I had always thought I was pretty alright - There wasn't a bowling alley in Aberystwyth so I never played my uni friends. I only really go bowling with my family, who are good...but out of the 5 I would mostly come in the top 3. 

This evening was the second of our team socials. So 6/8 of us headed down to 1st bowl in Lewisham. It's a classy joint (not). I don't think more than 3 of the 20 lanes were ever in use for the 2 hours we were there. We played 2 games for a fiver (bargain!) and I lost BOTH times. 

Booo. 

Today has been very humbling.  

So much

I know my last post gave you an incentive to come back because you all want to find out why I went to Buckingham Palace...however, it turns out I'm not allowed to post about why I was there...I can tell you in person, but I'm not allowed to publish on social media the reason for my visit or what it entailed...so if you really want to know either facebook message me or comment below and I'll work out a way to tell you.

That had kind of been putting me off blogging for the last week because I didn't know what to say about the above event...or how to say it without saying it...if you get me.

I don't know about you but I really feel like time is getting away from me - like how is it the end of November ALREADY?! I feel like I blink and it's been a week. I also feel like I'm holding loads of things in my head. Like to-do lists. Do you ever do that? I have found I generally need to write things down otherwise I forget something important. 

This last week has been quite busy planning, youth-workering, and managing. There have been a couple of incidents at our projects this week that have meant I have needed to spend some time thinking about how to move forward, how to resolve and how to make sure we are working in the best ways possible. As well as that I was leading youth at Church today and also had the privilege of baptising 2 of the youth in a freezing cold paddling pool.

All week I have been stressing about learning some words off by heart for the baptisms and thinking that needs to be on my to-do list, but time and again I forgot to put it on and it got to last night and I was like "PANTS! I need to learn these words" Turns out it was like 2 sentences and really wasn't very hard. But I had turned it into this big deal in my head, and I think I do it quite a lot when I have lots on my plate. I seem to lose perspective and turn quite small tasks into huge things, which in turn makes me put them off and so they grow until they are huge in my head, but then they are always fine and I wonder why I wasted so much energy worrying.

Having lots on at the moment means I need to:

• Pray more - you might think surely if you pray more that's wasting time...and yes I can see where you're coming from. But genuinely there are days when I have no idea how I will fit everything in/have enough energy to do everything. Those days I need God to be strong in my weakness. That's pretty much every day.
• Be organised - (Rachel Maynard please come run my life!!) so I know what I have to do and when
• Prioritise - so I am able to get the important things done
• Be balanced - so I don't just work all the time and get frustrated about missing out on fun. Use fun as the reward :)

This time of year is always busy and I don't want to spend the next 4 weeks being stressed out because of my work load/schedule. I need to listen to my own advice...and any other advice...leave comments if you have any!