"Oh, how I love your law!  I meditate on it all day long"

Psalm 119:97 NIV

I truly love God's word!  I have gained so much perspective over the years from reading the Bible.  But I will have to admit that though my goal is to read the Bible everyday, that's not always what happens.  Life happens...I get busy...I get tired...Sometimes I just don't want to do it if I'm totally honest! As I have grown as a Christian, I've realized that spending time with God doesn't have to look a certain way and it's most definitely personal.  I've acquired habits that work for me and keep me consistent.  I like to think of it as seating down with God at a table and having a conversation with him, just like you do with a friend.  Once I think of it like that, it allows for me to be more free and organic with my quiet time.

Here recently, I have switched up my way of studying God's word.  I typically do this occasionally to bust up the the monotony of it all and to keep me motivated.  I actually got this idea from a Christian Instagramer that I follow,

Amy Hale

.  She suggested doing a brain dump of your thoughts and then a list of things that you are thankful for.  I've been doing this for about a week and a half and I can really tell a difference in my prayer & study time!  So here's a more in depth look at my current study flow with my daily Quiet Time:

1.

Brain Dump list

--for those not familiar with this, a brain dump is where you write down any and every thing on your mind.  For me this has been golden because my mind runs a mile a minute and often time when I am praying or reading, my mind drifts off and I start rambling in my prayers or I have to re-read passages because my mind is on something else.  This allows me to empty those things out of my mind so there are no distractions.

2.

Gratitude list

--I found a small gratitude journal at Marshall's randomly and use that for this part.  I list what I am grateful for in that moment...key phrase IN THE MOMENT!  I emphasize this because if you list everything that you are grateful, it could take a minute.  At that moment, I think of exactly what I'm grateful for and this also allows for variety which prevents redundancy and going through the motions.

3.

PRAY

--now for some, this should've happened first and honestly that's what I've been doing.  But like I said, I'm shaking it up.  Also like I stated earlier, at this point my mind is cleared to be able to truly focus on the prayer AND now I have two lists to pray over (brain dump & gratitude).  I find that most of the items on these lists are what I need to pray over anyway and there's not much more that I need to add.

4.

Read the Bible

--pretty straight to the point, right?  The only thing that I want to point our here that I am pleased with is I don't allow myself to get stuck on one passage of scripture.  If I find that I've been reading something that is not keeping me engaged, I go and read something else.  Now here is where the Holy Spirit gets to working...by the time I get to reading scripture, I have emptied my mind  of any distracting or heavy thoughts (brain dump list), thought about what I am thankful for (gratitude list), and prayed.  At this point, I typically have a scripture or passage I want to meditate over after all of that because it's made obvious through these previous things.

Extra Personal Habits:

-My best time for a quiet time is first thing in the morning.  I am NOT a morning person, I repeat, I AM NOT A MORNING PERSON, but I am my clearest and refreshed in the morning

-I have multiple bibles in different translations to cross reference words.  I'm currently reading NLT but I also have NIV, ESV, and NCV.

-GOOGLE is your BEST FRIEND! Look things up!

-I journal...again, I'm not a journaling person but it actually is effective.  I get my thoughts out and it allows me to go back and look at my growth and answered prayers.

-Though there are tons of devotionals, books, and resources out there...nothing can replace the word of God!

So there you have it!  I'm curious to hear about what you guys do.  Let's keep the conversation going!!!