Sometimes You Just Have to Ask

Image by Dean Moriarty from Pixabay 

If you're a mom, you've probably been there. In public, with your newly potty trained child...

who just happens to be dancing the potty dance. 

You get to the bathroom and the line stretches for miles, or so it seems in your current predicament.

Excuse me, ma'am, would you mind if we go in front of you? I don't think he's going to be able to hold it much longer. 

If the women in front of you have a shred of decency, they'll allow you to skip line. But that's your kid. It's so much easier to ask for help for their benefit. (Well, indirectly it's for your benefit too, since you probably don't want to clean up the aftermath.)

But what about for you, mama?

After having children, and adding, ahem, a few years beyond that, the flood gates don't work as well as they used to. 

Did you know there's actually physical therapy for that?

I was standing in line with my eyeballs floating.

Did I ask to skip line?

Nope.

Did I soon come to regret it?

You betcha.

Self-care is always vital, but now, in this time of pandemic, we need it more than ever. Our lives have taken turns we could never have imagined, and each of us has different circumstances and differing abilities to cope. Many of us are caregivers who continuously put ourselves, and our needs, last. 

Often we get to a point where we stop asking for what we need. 

I encourage you to come out of that place today, to give voice to your needs. 

We are created to be in community with one another, to lift each other up. How can we help each other if we aren't aware of one other's needs? 

In scripture, Jesus tells us, "whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours" Mark 11:24 (NIV). When we ask for our needs in prayer, God's Holy Spirit will often guide us to where we can safely voice it out loud to others. When this happens, we can experience the beauty of His body of people coming together in support of one another. 

Believing we will receive often means opening our hearts to hear where He is leading us for the help we need. So often we pray for help, forgetting that God blesses us through His people. We are His hands and feet here on earth. But it's difficult to help each other if we aren't aware of the needs.

As my wise neighbor says, don't steal someone's blessing of being able to help you in a time of need. 

Give voice to your needs. Ask. 

Jesus also tells us "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened" (Matthew 7:7-8 NIV). Our neighbors cannot bless us if they don't know what we need.

Please, ask.

Do you need your spouse to watch the kids so you can take an uninterrupted hot shower? 

Do you need time to talk with a friend? Like actually talk on the phone - what a novel idea!

Do you have a practical need? Like asking your neighbor, who is already going to the store, to pick up a gallon of milk for you, so you don't have to make the extra trip with little ones at home.  

Are your kids old enough to be asked to do some chores to give you a little extra help around the house?

Or maybe you need to ask to jump the line before the floodgates fail!

Can we stop the assumptions we make about other people being too busy to help? If someone in your life is your true friend, neighbor, or spouse (or a decent woman in front of you in the line to the bathroom), they're going to make time for you, and they won't consider it an inconvenience. 

Don't steal their blessing.

Oh, and when the pandemic has passed and there are bathroom lines again, please be the person who upon seeing a child, or even another woman, doing the potty dance, offers to let her skip ahead if she hasn't already asked! 

What need do you have today that you can put to words so others can bless you with support and encouragement? 

Or, on the flip side...

What need do you see a friend, neighbor or family member not expressing that you might be able to meet?