I meet a lot of women who feel overwhelmed by their lives.
The daily responsibilities and challenges feed insecurity and doubt.
They love their kids, but feel the pull of career and the craving for adult conversation.
When I was a young mother I comforted myself with the thought that soon the little ones would be potty trained.
Soon they’d be in school.
Soon they’d be self-sufficient.
But each new age brought with it its own unique set of challenges.

I remember being at the kitchen sink one day next to my Grandmother.
We were peeling potatoes.
A vivid picture of her hands still comes to my mind.
And I remember wondering how many potatoes those hands had peeled.
How many loads of wash had they hung on a clothesline.
How many babies diapers had they changed.
She’d raised 8 children on a farm during the Great Depression.
Sometimes when I hear people debating about ‘working women’, I think, “haven’t women always worked?”
My Grandmothers both worked hard.
You could see it in their hands.

Women will often talk as though their lives really BEGAN when they married.
Maybe it has to do with the leaving and cleaving part.
Or the independence from our parents, but for whatever reason its is marked in our thinking as a significant beginning.

The second defining event in our lives as women is becoming a mother.
We are forever changed.
We will always be mothers.

We’re looking at the life of the Proverbs 31 Woman.
She’s married and she’s a mother.
And if we were to read through Proverbs 31:13-27 we’d see a very long list of the things this woman does.

She’s All That
That was my response when I read through the passage and decided this is what I wanted to spend 31 days writing about.
I’m glad she’s not my neighbor.
I’m sure she was a wonderful woman, but who needs all that right under their nose?
She kind of freaks me out.
And definitely intimidates me.

But, I know that wasn’t ever God’s intention.
I think he put her there as a cheerleader for us.
I think she’s suppose to inspire us to see the end.
See it right at the beginning.
And draw strength from the knowing.

Homemaking, nesting, cooking, gardening, crafts, and entrepreneurship are all in vogue right now.
Women who deferred marriage, or at least having babies, are crossing those things off the TO DO LIST app on their phones.

They’re making jam and selling it at the Farmers’ Market or making jewelry and selling it on Etsy.com.
They’re on Pinterest collecting recipes and DIY Projects for their homes.
They’re going Organic, Green, & Local.
They’ve traded in Martha Stewart for Alice Waters.
They’re Leaning In at work.
They’re stepping out to form whole new Industries like Blogging.

They are saying, “We want it all”.

This woman from Proverbs 31 seems to have had it all, done it all, and been it all.

But all at the same time?
Or are we possibly looking here at a timeline of her entire life?
Is this a life’s work represented in 17 verses?
As we make our way through the truth from her life we have to keep asking, “How would this look in my life?”.
We have to tease out the principles asking God to give us the wisdom to translate her truth so that it becomes our truth.

We have plenty of time.