How a Smaller Life Expanded my Faith and Creativity

A reflection on my first year of motherhood

Sep 30, 2024

After the first few months of having an adorable sleepy snuggly newborn we transitioned my son to a more traditional sleep schedule. Thankfully, he takes after us and loves his sleep so he naturally picked up a bedtime routine and easily falls asleep most nights around 7pm. One Friday night, my husband and I put him in his crib and then sat on the couch together. We started talking about how we wanted to spend our weekend.

We had a few friends we hoped to connect with, a few chores we wanted to do, an errand to run, a movie that we wanted to watch, and we wanted to work out at our respective gyms. But we both agreed we should start with going out for a fun dessert.

We got up to put on our shoes and grab our stuff to go out and then realized—we have a baby.

We looked at each other and started the “so should you go pick up food or should I?” conversation as the reality hit us that we would be spending most nights at home after bedtime. If we wanted something that wasn’t at home one of us was running out while the other stayed behind to watch the baby monitor.

My world has gotten a lot smaller in the last year.

Most of our date nights are at home. We get takeout more than we eat out. I’m always calculating how long I can be away from my baby based on the feeding schedule.

I’m cramming working on a creative project, writing my newsletter, reading a book, keeping up with my friends, cleaning the house, doing the dishes, meal planning and cooking during nap schedules and after my baby’s early bedtimes—and that’s on a good day.

I try to get out with my son during the day but most of our outings are quick drive thru Dunkin runs, grocery pick ups, and squeezing in my workouts during one of his longer wake windows. While my daily rhythms have shifted to more time at home for the sake of my son’s schedule I’ve noticed something.

In the midst of a seemingly smaller and more confined season of life I’ve discovered abundance in my shrinking world.

I was outside one day writing a list of things I’m proud of in my son’s first year of life. Nursing is a big one for me after the challenges of birth and pregnancy—I’m proud of my body for that. Thoughtfully pursuing a secure attachment with my son is another. One that spilled out onto that list and surprised me was some of the boundaries I’ve set so that I have tighter circle.

It sounds odd—who wants less friends?

Part of this for me was deleting social media. There were a lot of reasons I deleted all my apps. My mental health was struggling. Comparison was stealing my joy. I felt my mood drop every time I checked an app. Nap time would pass me by while I doom scrolled.

But I was also really tired of people treating me like a friend online but not actually feeling known by them in my real life. One friend was quick to reply to all my Instagram stories but had been blowing me off for months to come meet my son. It just wasn’t working for me anymore.

I felt my world shrink.

In some ways it hurt. I missed some of those connections. I miss going to Pure Barre in the middle of the day. I miss the friendly DMs I’d pass back and forth throughout the day with people I’ve never met but feel like I know. I missed being able to always say “yes” to last minute plans or having to come up with an excuse to not go. (Now I don’t need an excuse…I simply have a baby that doubles as one.) I missed some of the busyness of a packed schedule and I missed feeling like I had the freedom to do whatever, whenever.

Here’s what I’ve realized: in the quiet moments at home, my capacity to know myself and know God has grown.

Finding time to write uninterrupted is a thing of the past unless I pay a babysitter or it’s the weekend. It turns out nap time is the best time for genius level ideas to pop into my head to write about—the trouble is trying to stay awake myself to actually write them down.

I’ve leaned heavily on my favorite iced coffee and voice messages on walks over the last year. It feels safer to stay close to home in case of meltdowns or blowouts.

In the small moments, I’ve seen that God works in the smallest spaces too.

I used to be the girl on TikTok shouting from the rooftops to make that Bible time a priority! But in the last year I’ve seen God in the tiniest little glimmers. So tiny you’d miss them if you weren’t looking for them. And maybe that’s the whole point.

The Bible tells us to seek and we will find. I think God is always within our reach. But we have to be paying attention to find him.

“The first act of love is always the giving of attention.” -Dallas Willard

Both in motherhood and my creative life—I’ve found the most incredible moments happen in mundane, routine, “small” moments.

I’ve always joked my most creative ideas come to me in the shower. The reason for that is because there are no distractions. It’s so mundane creativity can actually run wild.

Elizabeth Gilbert wrote, “The universe buries strange jewels deep within us all, and then stands back to see if we can find them.”

Creativity and faith have that in common I think. God is there if we are looking. He is speaking if we make space to listen. The ideas are there if we are still enough to let them come land on us like a butterfly looking to perch on your finger.

A smaller life used to scare me.

Being off of social media scared me. What if I was lonely?

I’ve actually talked to my friends more. If I want them to see something I have to text them a picture. Then, we have a real one-on-one conversation. If I have a question, I have to ask. I can’t just check their feed. If we need to catch up, I have to send a voice message or FaceTime or even hang out in person. We have more to talk about because I don't know what was on their story earlier that day.

It feels like my little plot of land has shrunk and shrunk. From the outside looking in, maybe it’s just this tiny little place just barely big enough for me to stand. From my point of view, I can look down and see I’ve dug an incredibly deep well.

The beauty of this season is the “smallness” has made it incredibly large.

Creativity and God both find me—while I’m walking pushing a stroller, while I’m driving to a grocery pick up, while I’m nursing a baby in the middle of the night.

There are a bunch of tiny limitations that have come with adjusting to my role as a mom.

I don’t have large blocks of time to devote to creative work. I don’t sit down for an hour each day with my Bible at 5 a.m. (Sorry, 22 year old Christian influencers everywhere, not sorry.) I say no to big commitments. I can’t plan very far in advance. I like to be at home for baby nap times. I like keeping the weekends free for time as a family. I’m usually running late and the last year has been sponsored by dry shampoo and iced coffee.

And maybe some people would look my way and roll their eyes thinking I’m missing out.

Those people would be very, very wrong.