proverbs31-woman.com

Proverbs 31:10 A wife of noble character who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.

Mothers Day is just weeks away, did you know that?  The days and hours are ticking away…

Last year I published a book based on this famous Proverbs 31 verse “She is Worth More Than Rubies” because it spoke of the value of a wife and mother in the home.  Not just a wife and a mother, but a work at home mum and business woman.

With the demands we have in life, jobs, interests, needs, family, friends, etc it is sometimes very hard to focus on our near and dear, those who really have need of us. The Proverbs 31 woman gives us the perfect example of a business mum and work at home mother, there for her family, running everything perfectly and contributing to the household income.

Now, I’m not expecting any of us to be running our households perfectly – there’s just no way we can do that, but we can learn a lot from this perfect role model.

Nearly 15 years ago I went through a real struggle, trying to cope with a corporate job and managing a household which consisted of a husband and 5 young daughters. I thought I was going to go crazy and if it weren’t for something that happened in 1993, I probably would have.

Have you noticed that when you are desperate and leaning towards a particular thought, that other things around you seem to congregate together to reinforce and confirm that thing? Both for the good and the bad?

This has been known as a number of things – I like to think of it as the RAS or the reticular activation system – what you think about you are drawn towards. Today many talk of The Secret or the Law of Attraction – it’s the same thing. But this is also a biblical principal as I mentioned in a post at my blog Workplace-Ministry.com “The Law of Attraction – a Christian View”.

For me, it was simple. I desperately wanted to be at home for my family. I needed to earn an income. I had good skills and needed to find a way I could use them and earn money at home.  Can you relate to this? I’m sure many of you can.

I won a wonderful prize in my city – Secretary of the Year in 1993 for the state of Victoria (Australia) and this was sponsored by Microsoft. Amongst my prize package was the full MS Office suite of that time.

We didn’t have a PC at home in those days but I said to my husband if we did, I could work at home. So we set about shopping for a PC for home – funny but not many people had computers at home in those days. I already had an Atari I used for music and simple databases and typing of stories but now I was moving into the ‘big stuff’. From that moment on a seed was sown in my head and within 6 months I’d left my safe, secure, government job and was setting up business at home.  Can you imagine doing that? Leaving the security of your job?  Or perhaps your job isn’t that secure these days?

I have not looked back – I love being home, I love that I have been here for our daughters as they grew up. They’re all now in their 20s but have very little recollection of a mum who worked in a job – my ‘job’ was at home where I belonged.

Going back to Mothers Day. The book I mentioned would make a wonderful gift for anyone you know who has the same hankering, the same passion, desire, call it what you will. I do believe that “Worth More Than Rubies” will not only confirm for the reader of their true worth but will also set them on the path to discovering what they can do to return home to work. I researched a number of businesses that could be run from home and list 64 different roles at the back of the book so that anyone reading it can see they have the same opportunities I did.

Now, wouldn’t that make a wonderful Mothers Day gift?

I’ve had some interesting discussions with many people recently in relation to the recent publishing of my new book “Worth More Than Rubies” which grew out of this blog. And I’ve also read several blog posts about the same subject.

So many see the role of a Proverbs 31 Woman as daunting and impossible to reach, and perhaps in some ways it is. But many overlook verse 15 which states, “She gets up whilst it is still dark; she provides food for her family and portions for her servant girls.”

When there are others involved in assisting with anything at all, the load is lightened. We don’t have ‘servant girls’ these days for the most part, but we do have family members and friends and in a day and age of very busy lives, it is good to pull the family together to share in household chores and activities. It is not harmful for the children to learn at a young age to help around the household or even when you’re out somewhere else. To do simple things like picking up after themselves at home and elsewhere, help carry things to and fro the car or house, and to ask you if you need help when they see you are busy.

If there are no other family members and simply a couple, then sharing the load between the two as much as possible should definitely help. But there are other things you can do that might assist and I share some of them here.

I run a fulltime business at home and whilst the girls were growing up I didn’t have time to do everything around the house. But I was able to engage help and this was something my husband and I discussed and agreed upon. For as long as I can remember I’ve had someone come and pick up the ironing fortnightly and drop it back off again a couple of days later. I have another lady come on the alternate weeks and clean the house. We pick up everything and put things away (the girls had to throw everything on their beds when they were home, so the floors were clear) and the cleaner washes, wipes and vaccums. It is really nice to walk through our home after she’s gone and just smell the freshness and cleanness throughout the house. Once a month I have a man come and mow the lawns and do other odds and ends for us as needed.

Both my husband and I feel that investing the money to pay these three people a worthwhile thing to do – it gives me peace of mind and allows me to concentrate on what I do well without worrying about the house and garden, and it also assists three people to run their own businesses and contribute to their household incomes. In doing that, I am actually helping to provide ‘portions for my helpers’ as well as provide for my family.

Proverbs 31 woman, Proverbs 31:15, help around the home

There are lots of discussions these days about women working at home vs working in a job away from home. I strongly believe that the Proverbs 31 Woman was a Work At Home Mum – by today’s standards. If you look into the past, beyond our grandparents’ time and before the industrial revolution, women worked on the land and in their homes, contributing to the household needs and income, with their children by their side, on their backs, or in tow in some way or another. Children also learnt to help as soon as they were able to – because that was the way of life back then.

Whilst I am not advocating we should be taking advantage of our children and getting them to work at an early age, I am saying that if the mother (or father) is working on the home premises, the children benefit from watching and learning. They see exhibited before them a work ethic, planning, preparation, how the money is used and how it is earnt. Also how skills can be learnt, established and used for the benefit of the family – not just one person.

I’ve been working from home now for over 13 years and our daughters have grown up watching me at work and play. They have all developed skills and abilities because of what we had available in the household to them and they also had the benefit of work experience in their teens without having to leave their home and go to another business, if they chose.

The Rev Brian Abshire touches on this aspect amongst others in his lengthy post about the Proverbs 31 Woman. I never abandoned my career plans – my plan and dream had always been to be home for my family. However I wanted more than that – I wanted to apply myself, use my skills (not put them aside) and continue enjoying my life, and not putting it on hold.

I’ve read about and talked to some women who feel they put their career aside to have a family, some feel that they missed the boat. Other women (on the other side of the equasion) feel they’ve missed the [family] boat by putting their career first. I believe you can have both – if your desire is to have a family and a career.

Not all women are cut out to work at home. Depression and isolation can set in.  And it’s often not easy to keep disciplined and motivated and sometimes it can seem a thankless task if clients (and employees) are not appreciative of your efforts. You have to become your own PR person, marketer, salesperson and so much more but I can truly say, in looking back, that my decision to work at/from home and raise our girls in our home was the best decision I’ve made (outside of accepting Christ as my Saviour and marrying my husband 🙂 ).  And I believe our girls have truly benefitted and are different people to what they might have been had their peers been the main daily influences in their lives, instead of having a parent to come home to every day after school.

If you have skills and abilities (which are God-given, don’t forget) that can be applied in the home to help bring income into the household, then I encourage you to consider this option and start exploring how it can be achieved. You might have noticed mention of the book ‘Worth More Than Rubies: The Value of a Work At Home Mum’ on this blog. The book covers the challenges and the benefits of working at home and even gives a list of different jobs/businesses that can be carried out at home – genuine roles using your existing skills.

Crystal on her post about the Proverbs 31 Woman and entrepreuneurialism raises some interesting points too, about Return on Investment into our families. Like me, she is encouraging women to return home to their families and consider how they can apply their skills in their home for the benefit of their family whilst remaining a shining light to their communities.

My Great Uncle Fred was a lovely man who was very proud of his family, particularly his wife, his daughter, his nieces, his grand nieces and any other relative who was female. He would constantly tell us when we were children that little girls grow up to be mothers and that’s the most important role in the world.

I could tell by the way he talked that he had loved his mother very much and also his dear departed wife. He held them in high esteem and was one of the most wonderful gentlemen I’ve ever known.

As I grew up, got married and had my own family he would always make sure he rang on birthdays to say hello and give us birthday wishes over the phone. And as my own daughters grew up he took delight in getting to know them too – his great, grand nieces. He always had wonderful stories to tell and was a keen gardener as well. I learnt a lot from my great uncle, not the least being how a man should treat his wife.

One day long ago I received a letter from him. He was always interested in my activities – I’ve always been someone doing something and rarely get bored. Anyway, I had to laugh when I read the opening line of the letter. It was addressed to “Dear Mrs Perpetual Motion”.

That was many years ago, the letter has turned yellow now and I’ve kept it as a keepsake of my adorable uncle. I never did get to talk to him about my faith and my belief but if he were alive today I do believe that the Proverbs 31 Woman is one he would have been very interested in and I can’t help thinking that perhaps my great aunt may have been a P31 woman. He was definitely a man very proud of his wife and showed the confidence in her that we read about in verse 11 and he always praised her as in verse 28. It is good to have examples like that in our childhood as it helps shape our values and belief in ourselves.

Twelve years have passed since I received that letter and I’m still in perpetual motion but I do try spending some quiet time regularly so I can read, write, think and just relax. It is important that we’re not ‘on the go’ all the time and should allow time to read God’s Word, to hear Him speak to us and most of all, for us to hear. A time for rest and reflection allows us to get refreshed and regain our strength to continue on with our daily activities as wives, mothers, and business women. These quiet times should not be mistaken for the ‘bread of idleness’. KMT