Seasons and Turning North

It's a little less than desirable out today.  My kid actually cried when she woke up and saw the rainy mess. Winter has always been my favorite season, with it's wonderland-like quality, hot cocoa and snuggles.  But this year, I felt it in my bones long before the Christmas season was over.  I am ready for something new.  

It's an odd feeling- this restlessness with nature, unsettled in my environmental season and the season of life I'm in.  I've even resented that term. Season.  Heard in phrases, clips of advice, supposed encouragement.  It's just the season of life you're in. Seasons can last a wicked long time, you know? Like this endless winter we're in...... what do I do in the interim? How do I ride out this "season" with grace?  

This season in our family is an interesting one.  I've needed to go back to work.  Rich has worked overtime.  I am trying to be the present Mama for our little one in the morning hours but find juggling the pieces of myself exhausting at times.  And then there is the wife-me, who wants to be available and engaged and the friend-me who wants to maintain relationships, and the professional-me who wants to do a good job and the creative-me and the intellect-me and the physical-me who are screaming out with neglect.  This is just a season.  But who knows how long a season will last? People have given up on hope during their seasons and have wandered for 40 years in the desert.  I don't want to wander.  I want to make this season count.

Deuteronomy 2:3 has popped up all over my life the last two weeks.  In my quiet time, in time spent with friends, on my newsfeed.  "You have circled this mountain long enough.  Now, turn North."

Like I don't have enough mountains in my life.  Which one was He talking about? Which aspect of my life is He calling me to leave behind, to seek out something new? Could it be a command to leave something behind? 

It wasn't at all what I had hoped it would be.  I longed to hear from God about a specific direction, a lead one way or the other. What is the mountain?????

Me.

I am the mountain.

All of my thoughts, all of my struggles, all of my stress.  I've made this season all about me.  Even in writing, it's plain.  I've used the word me more than anything else.  If I am constantly focused on myself, I keep walking in circles.  I miss Him entirely.  But, if I turn North.....

It may be just a season.  It doesn't really matter.  I'm leaving it behind and turning North.  I'm fixing my eyes on the heavens.  I'm going to stop walking in circles and trust that He knows better.