Summer isn't over
or Carpe end of August. (and a book recommendation)
Yesterday I was wondering where the summer went. Then I decided it was still here.
Yes, kids are going back to school (in some parts of the country) and college kids are returning to campus and the sun is rising later. But it’s still August and I’m not letting go of summer quite yet.
When I wonder where summer went, I have to remember back to less than a month ago when I did the math and realized of the last 35 days I had traveled 24 of them. 22 nights not in my own bed. That’s where the summer went.
Last night we were talking to friends and one of them asked how I did everything I did on top of my full-time job. I hadn’t even told them everything I did.
On the average week, you can spend Tuesdays with me (Theology in 3), Thursdays with me (Letters from Home), and Fridays with me (Integrated Catholic Life). Some weeks, you can spend another day if I’m hosting Joan’s Take on the Chosen live (or you can listen to it later as a podcast). Members of my online Scripture community hang out with me once a month for a live bible study (and heck, they can binge 30+ past ones, too).
And in a few months, you can hang out with me through the pages of my very first published book, courtesy of Ave Maria Press.
Oh, and if you head over to the St. Paul Center’s Emmaus Academy, you can catch the Women of Scripture series I did for them. I’ll have another series with them, this one on the parables, coming out in the near future, too.
But that’s not where the summer went, because that’s all year for me, haha. The summer went to an amazing pilgrimage to the Marian Shrines of France, Spain, and Portugal (Torreciudad deserves a Substack post all to itself!), the Eucharistic Congress, a Theology on Tap talk to 200+ lovely young adults, a talk to the Indianapolis Catholic school principals… and a few days at the beach with family.
But summer isn’t over. In fact, until Notre Dame opens their season against Texas A&M (couldn’t we have started with someone like Western Kentucky?), I refuse to give into fall. Not because I don’t love fall. But because I love it so much, it’s worth waiting for…. (that’s the topic of my favorite Advent talk I give. Need an Advent mission speaker? I’m still booking December…)
Carpe diem. That can be hard to think when I want to look back at the last few months and be… tired. It’s easy to get overwhelmed when we either look at our to-do list OR when we look back and everything we’ve done/everywhere we’ve been. But the Lord simply asks us to be present now and to do what is in front of us now. That doesn’t mean we don’t plan (the aforementioned projects would never get done without the Full Focus System from Michael Hyatt) but it means we don’t waste time worrying, regretting, or being anxious. Just be in the present moment.
If that’s hard for you, I’d highly recommend The Mindful Catholic: Finding God One Moment at a Time. It was recommended to me by a friend, and to be honest, it took me a few tries to read it. Not because it wasn’t good, but because it required something of me. It’s not a book you can just sit down and read straight through. It requires you to examine your life and practice what it preaches before you move on. But it’s so incredibly worth it.
I know mindfulness is in vogue right now, but this is not a bunch of woo woo stuff to be skeptical of. It’s based on the saints and what God made us for. And it has not only been an important examination of conscience for me, it has helped me be a more virtuous person, trust God more, and simply be happier.
Carpe diem. Today. Not tomorrow. Carpe end of August. Maybe for you, summer is over. But that’s okay. Maybe there’s a lot to be done and you’re already tired. That’s okay too. God’s here, in the present moment. And he’s only asking you to live today to the best.