The problem with Pinterest

In my heart there is a treason
One that poisons all my love

-Sovereign Grace Music, "In My Heart"

We own the new lot.


We have a terrific builder.


We've looked at every available plan there is in our square-footage range.


We found one that might work.  We made some tweaks.  It got better and better.  There were only a few awkward problems left.  Our commitment to the floor plan grew.  We were engaged to be married to it.


Then Jason flexed his considerable genius and started creating a floor plan from scratch--an endeavor that is much more difficult than it sounds.  And when he showed it to me, the other plan got dumped.  


We haven't spoken to it since.


Next steps include having the lot surveyed and having blueprints drawn up from Jason's plan.


And obsessively browsing Pinterest for house set-up ideas.


Pinterest has great organizational ideas.  It's much better than ripping pages out of magazines.  It's easier to show Jason a pin than to try to explain what I want.


However.


Aside from being an addictive time suck, and the fact that many recipes and crafty ideas become colossal failures in the homes of real people, I have a problem with Pinterest.


Some people have more time on their hands than I do.  So I view pictures of their kid's birthday party and now I feel inadequate because I didn't make my whole house into a fairy dreamland when they turned 2.  I can always find something better than what I have or what I do.  Plus, there are so many brilliantly organized pantries that even if my pantry were one of them, it's never all of them.


Pinterest shows a limited view of reality:  a corner, not the whole room; one successful craft, not the weeks of flops; the playroom 10 seconds before the kids actually enter it.  Scrolling through page after page of loveliness lulls me into believing that's how everyone actually is all the time.  Quite a shock to close the computer and look at my real world.


The real problem of Pinterest is that it tempts me to think happiness is out there.  Just as soon as my closets and spice drawers and window treatments look like that, I'll be satisfied.


In other words, it tempts me to discontent ("Restless aspiration for improvement" is how Merriam-Webster defines discontent.  If that doesn't just describe me rabidly scrolling through pins.).


In other words, the problem with Pinterest is that there's a problem with me.


God, let me rejoice in order and beauty but not worship it.


This only serves to confirm my suspicions
That I'm still a man in need of a Savior

-DC Talk, "In the Light"