As a stay-at-home mom, my job description mentioned cooking, cleaning, and making sure the kids didn't kill themselves or each other. Sounds easy enough, right? I ran into a serious problem, though. Okay, so that's a little dramatic... My problem wasn't the problem; my problem was me.
You see, I had a family farm. It was beautiful. The picket fence was painted white in stereotypical fashion, with the expected 2-story farmhouse and acres of surrounding farm land. I had pigs, chickens, cows, goats and even a couple llamas. I was an expert, producing award-winning crops and baked goods for the county fair. My neighbors were friendly and helpful, and I reciprocated their generosity at every opportunity. We had ourselves a 1950's Mayberry right in the 21st century. I loved it.
My success at the farm even granted opportunities to travel and help others farms. I assisted in establishing successful farming, as well as fishing, locations in Hawaii and Japan, restored a lighthouse in New England, and even farmed Her Majesty's countryside of England. I've gone down un-dah, mate (Australia), and I have an invitation to the Mediterranean Riviera. You'll never believe this, but I've even been to the North Pole and Atlantis.
And this is where you know my tall tale has to end. Joke's over.
I'm talking about FarmVille. I can't (and don't want to) tell you how many hours I wasted on that game. It's geared to hook you into coming back for more. Your crops ripen at varying times, some 4 hours while others grow at 12 or even 24 hours, and you achieve more crops, animals, and even other farm locations by mastering levels. You can't master levels without performing tasks on your farm.
I set timers on my phone to tell me when to harvest my crops, and I even planted certain crops based on when I would be available to come back and harvest them. I was one of the first to download the app when it was published in the app store. It was an addiction. And what's sad is that my addiction was mild. Check out these pictures of others' farms. I shudder to think of the hours spent strategically placing hay bales into portraits of The Joker, someone's wedding photo and even the Mona Lisa. *sigh*
Meanwhile, the laundry piled up, the sink was full of dirty dishes and I just "didn't have time" to do it all. My farm, on the other hand, was spotless, the animals well-fed, and never did a crop go to ruin. There was a serious problem in my priorities.
My success at the farm even granted opportunities to travel and help others farms. I assisted in establishing successful farming, as well as fishing, locations in Hawaii and Japan, restored a lighthouse in New England, and even farmed Her Majesty's countryside of England. I've gone down un-dah, mate (Australia), and I have an invitation to the Mediterranean Riviera. You'll never believe this, but I've even been to the North Pole and Atlantis.
And this is where you know my tall tale has to end. Joke's over.
I'm talking about FarmVille. I can't (and don't want to) tell you how many hours I wasted on that game. It's geared to hook you into coming back for more. Your crops ripen at varying times, some 4 hours while others grow at 12 or even 24 hours, and you achieve more crops, animals, and even other farm locations by mastering levels. You can't master levels without performing tasks on your farm.
I set timers on my phone to tell me when to harvest my crops, and I even planted certain crops based on when I would be available to come back and harvest them. I was one of the first to download the app when it was published in the app store. It was an addiction. And what's sad is that my addiction was mild. Check out these pictures of others' farms. I shudder to think of the hours spent strategically placing hay bales into portraits of The Joker, someone's wedding photo and even the Mona Lisa. *sigh*
Meanwhile, the laundry piled up, the sink was full of dirty dishes and I just "didn't have time" to do it all. My farm, on the other hand, was spotless, the animals well-fed, and never did a crop go to ruin. There was a serious problem in my priorities.
The basis of this blog is about being a virtuous woman and finding what being a virtuous woman means in the 21st century. If we look at the verses about her, we see that she is up before dawn, stays busy spinning wool that eventually makes the clothing for her household and also to sell, buying land and planting vineyards, tending to the needy and, after all that, she stays up late at night to do more. She tends to real fields while I'm busy pretending in a game. Shame on me.
I came to this realization quite a while ago during one of my evening glasses of whine (spelling intentional). "God, I just don't know what to do. There just doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day and I'm so tired of the disorganization. What should I do, God? What am I doing wrong?". When the answer didn't come immediately, I picked up my phone and opened the game app. "That." What? "How much time do you spend on that game? Don't play for 3 days and see what happens."
I'm sure you know what happened. My husband came home from work on the first day and asked who had come over to help me because there was so much done. After 3 days, I was so pleased with the progress I had made and the peace I felt that I realized I didn't even miss it.
Fast forward to nearly a year later. I felt the Lord nudging me about writing this blog post, but I ignored it. Through the course of events in our life, I had found a new game, Village Life, and was falling into the same rut. How can you be preaching responsibility on your blog but not taking care of the responsibilities in your own life? The guilt sunk in deep.
If you are disciplined enough to set a limit on your game time and still accomplish your every day responsibilities, more power to you honey! I know I can't. I get sucked in and "5 minutes later" it's really been 45 minutes. Don't let a "5 minute" stress reliever take precedent over the priorities. Keep all things in moderation, and see if you can't put that 5 minutes to a better use. Maybe that stress reliever is really just a way to procrastinate? Think about it... And speaking of 5 minutes, listen to this song. It's one of my favorite reminders, and I hope it makes you think, too.
Until next time...
Cassie
Cassie
