We want the home we offer to our children to feel safe, ordinary, and loving. But our first day as solo parents, that home was suddenly perched on the edge of a cliff. There was no room for carefree movement. One step this way or that—a slight breeze or wobble—and you’d all come crashing down.

Here’s the funny thing about life. Every single person you see is also living on the edge of a cliff. Nobody has control. But not everyone knows it. Good fortune—an intact marriage, a healthy bank account, a calm mind, or a strong body—doesn’t situate us any more safely. Good fortune only gives us the illusion we’re in control. It lets us bumble along, oblivious to gravity.

In her Parable of the Sower, author Octavia Butler contemplates this illusion and our reaction to losing it:

When apparent stability disintegrates,
As it must—
God is Change—
People tend to give in
To fear and depression,
To need and greed.
They remember old hates and generate new ones,
They create chaos and nurture it
Until they are exhausted and destroyed,
Until they are conquered.

We’re here because we know that chaos. Something happened that blew us out of obliviousness. Finally, we could see the cliff. We had to acknowledge and accept what we can’t control. We’re raising our kids alone.

That’s not to say we can’t control anything. We can control ourselves. Our own hearts, and our own minds. Our own reactions. No kid wants to be raised in an environment where their parent spends most days shrieking, WE’RE ON THE EDGE OF A CLIFF! They need predictability, and they need peace. They need life to be ordinary and regular, no matter how extraordinary a turn it may have taken for you. To give them that, we’ve got to focus not on what we can’t control, but on what we can.

In his book on time management, Richie Norton wrote, “Instability is the repetition of tactics without a strategy.”

Let that sink in. Instability is the repetition of tactics without a strategy.

Tactics are making it to your ten-year-old’s dance recital after an overtime shift. Tactics are carpools, birthday cakes, and baseball semi-finals. You can tread water with tactics. You can keep from sinking. But eventually, you’ll run out of breath.

Strategy is the shore we swim to. It’s how—and why—we direct our strength. It’s staying focused on what matters most: what you want your kids to remember. Strategy is making the conscious choice to model grace and dignity through conflict. Strategy is getting past your own frustration and disappointment to treat your ex with the respect and good faith that helps your shared children feel safe. Strategy is leading with forgiveness, and letting your children witness its effects on your state of mind.

For believers, God is our buoyancy and the air in our lungs. The shore is our future selves, restored and renewed. The shore is our cheerful and confident children.. Deuteronomy 31:8 says, “The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; He will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” (NIV)

And so choose your direction, and swim.

The Buoyancy of Prayer

Matthew 6:31-34 contrasts tactics with strategy: “So don’t worry about these things, saying, ‘What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear?’ These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your Heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and He will give you everything you need. So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.” (NLT)

Live righteously. What does that mean? What is “doing your best” when life seems stacked against you? How can we “live righteously” in the face of an unexpected dental bill that shatters the whole month? Here’s how the seed of a righteous path germinates: make a little time every day to open yourself up to conversation with God, even if you don’t know what to say. Especially then.

Mahatma Gandhi was born a Hindu, but his interpretation was his own. Gandhi integrated universal principles from other religions, especially Christian doctrines—as he inspired movements for civil rights and freedom in India and around the world, he wanted to assimilate good wherever he found it.

“Prayer is not asking,” he wrote. “It is a longing of the soul. It is daily admission of one’s weakness. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than words without a heart.”

Hindus believe each person is intrinsically divine and the purpose of life is to seek and realize the divinity within all of us, much as Christians seek conversation with God in the quiet space of our inner core. And as Gandhi believed, we need not wait to seek divinity only if we’re perfectly reconciled, serene, or devout.

God is perfectly familiar with the mess of change. The pain, the anguish. Bring it all with you. He will not flinch. He will not hold it against you for lacking grace, because prayer is the act of seeking grace when
we need it most.

Prayer is rest. Take it.