Reconnecting With Reality

Reality. Usually when someone loses touch with reality it's because they're getting in touch with a fantasy that seems a lot more enticing than real life. We live in a world that sends us thousands of invitations to disconnect from unpleasant realities.

I have a habit of disconnecting. Usually I detach myself from my present life because I'm trying to make it better. Looking for ways to buy stuff online so I don't have to venture into real shops with my three very real children who like to touch and try and taste all the real stuff on the real shelves. Searching for other homeschoolers close to me so I don't have to travel so far to social events. Looking for new craft and sewing ideas. Looking for the perfect curriculum so I can spend less time planning and thinking and more time doing with the girls. The theoretical goal is to have more time and energy to invest in relationships.

The thing is, real relationships happen in the real world and disconnecting from the people I love doesn't exactly foster those relationships. The natural drive for many human beings is to make things better. That is good. As long as we choose the right kind of better. So often I don't. The perfect curriculum is an utter failure if the search for it robs my children of our relationship. The perfect educational opportunity is worse than lost if by the time it eventuates my girls are traumatized by Mummy's traffic temper. The end doesn't justify the means if the means destroys the end.

The right kind of better is better understanding of each other. Better focus on the needs of others. Better ways of investing energy into the character development of my children. By the way, right now one is asleep and the other two are out at Bunnings with Daddy, so I'm not detaching myself from my family to write this!

If I'm honest with myself, I'm trying to fill myself up with my searches for better things and better ways to do things. I'm trying to fill up a great, gaping, bottomless hole with more emptiness. There's nothing wrong with shopping online or looking for people of like mind or admiring other people's handiwork or looking for better ways of teaching - not of and by themselves. There is something seriously wrong with unconsciously looking to those things for a sense of fullfillment.

So... it's time for me to reconnect with reality. Time to get back into the mucky world of actual human interaction. Time to invest myself in the relationships that won't disappear when the power fails.