Why We Practice Sabbath

I get asked a lot why we practice sabbath. I feel like this word “Sabbath” has interesting connotations. I remember when someone first challenged me to try this ancient practice, I had a million excuses to why it wasn’t possible for our family.

We are busy.

We have too many kids to rest.

Our Schedules would never allow it.

I like doing “things”. I don’t want to give that all up.

And this list goes on. A few years ago, My husband and I hit a breaking point. Our schedules were full, but we felt empty. We were overcrowded and over bombarded with to do’s. Our schedule left very little room for rest or fun with family. I want our kids to remember family time, but family time is not crowding around the tv at night. Family time is intentional and it takes work and wiggle room. We had none of that.

So what is sabbath for us?

Sabbath is one day a week that we picked, that we would protect and leave room for the rest and fun. That means no cooking, no cleaning, no work, and if possible, not appointments or errands either. Again, this takes intentionality. We have to make a choice to protect this time. When our kids didn’t have school, we would sleep in, play in the morning, go out for lunch in the afternoon, and maybe do a fun activity in the evening. Now that they are in school its a bit trickier. We still feel like we have to run around a bit int the morning getting everyone to and from school, but we make intentional decisions, even in the morning with our time. We get bagels every Friday morning after we do drop off. Then we choose to do things through the day that bring us joy. Some days we do Disney, and sometimes we do a park days or the movies, and other days we do nothing. We come home and play play play. We even take family naps. WHHHHAATTTT?

Again, intentionality is key. You have to budget to eat out these days, or meal prep so little work is involved. It means saying no to some things so you can say YES to the right things.  You can check out my post about home organization and how we schedule are week here. 

The hardest part was cutting out a day in the week to protect.

We leave wiggle room to just be. This is a rarity these days. I know for many people finding that one day a week is the hardest. For me the hardest part is not picking up after everyone. And believe me, by Saturday I have quite the mess to clean up, but I wouldn’t give up our day for anything. Its made our family closer. Its taught my boys the joy of rest and fun. It’s given them something special to look forward to and overall its been one of the best decisions we’ve ever made.

If you have any specific questions about how we do this, I’d love to chat! Find me on Instagram.

Be sure to Pin the image below so you can refer back to this post.