Luke's New Journal

This is a private post, so if your name isn't Luke Juras then please don't read on. I don't put in a ton of time leading worship each week. On a regular week, when I'm playing all by myself, I go on Sunday from 4:45 to 6:00, so just over an hour. I also spend at the very least half an hour picking music and getting it ready for worship. That means choosing 3-4 songs and what order to sing them in, maybe picking which verses to do for longer hymns, and then creating a document with all of the lyrics on one page for performance. I used to print copies for the congregation too, but now I communicate the songs with the pastor and tech guy, and it gets put up on the screen. That's bare minimum. Some weeks it is more difficult to pick songs and it takes me an hour just to get the right ones in the right order. Sometimes I have a request and/or decide to learn a new song. So then I'm spending an hour or two picking the music, plus an hour on Sundays performing, so ...

Boy, what a schedule. I sat down yesterday and planned out my weekly schedule for at least this first semester. Basically, if I show up at 7:30 and work until 5:00, I will have about 30 minutes of free time for finishing my to-dos. That's not a lot! I also have a lot of good habits that I want to get into (and a couple that I want to get out of, which this post is about) including playing piano, practicing yoga, going outside, playing with the kids, and helping with the bedtime routine - and going to bed earlier. But when I write out the time requirements of each day, I find that there are several days where I have zero time for myself. I'm not used to that! I'm used to sitting at the computer every day  and zoning out on Minecraft or posting on Reddit or Facebook. So Mondays, for example, I will be waking up at 5:30 to do Andrew's medicine, then practice yoga and piano, take a shower, make and eat breakfast, and spend about 30 minutes with Megan before leaving for scho...