Hello, lovelies!!  Thursday is upon us, once more and its time for some more Summer of Growth posting.

Today I wanted to talk about planning yourself a little quiet time.  A spiritual time you set aside for yourself each day.  Time for thought, study, prayer, meditation or what ever you may choose to do with that special time.

When choosing to start a quiet time for yourself, you need to start out by planning a certain time to do it.  Try to set aside about 10-15 minutes.  Choose a time that works best for you.  A time you will be able to stick with regularly.  Choosing a specific time, rather than whenever’s convenient, will help you to stick with it.

Choose the right place.  Your thoughts, feelings and moods can be greatly influenced by your atmosphere.  Be sure to choose a place you feel comfortable and calm in.  A place you feel at peace, rather than distracted.

When going into your quiet time, have a pen and paper for taking notes.  You may want to write down some of your thoughts or findings during that time.  You will be amazed to go back and read these years later.

Also, pick a passage to focus on during each session.  Nothing too large, because you don’t want to overwhelm yourself.  Make sure its short enough to read at a comfortable pace and still have plenty of time to sit in thought and recollect what you have read.  Try following a reading plan.

Finally, possibly most importantly, go into your quiet time with the proper attitude.  I’m a strong believer in ‘attitude is everything.’  It can make or break your experience.  If you go in frustrated or distracted by everything you have to do that day, you will not so likely benefit from your time at peace.  Try to clear your mind and leave everything behind.  I know its hard, but its only for 15 minutes, and I promise you’ll only benefit from it.

I hope these tips help.  I’m still struggling with getting the set time down.  Not having a set time causes me to get distracted by other things and then forget to do it all together.  I need to make it part of my daily routine.  An automatic thing. A must.  Just like my morning coffee.  Can’t start the day {properly} without it.

Do you keep a quiet time scheduled for yourself?  Where?  What types of surroundings do you prefer?  In what ways have you seen having a quiet time benefit you elsewhere in life?