I don’t know what I want. Or I don’t know what I want that I can actually get as a gift.
I’ll settle for chocolate.
What do you want? How do you celebrate Mother’s Day?
Photo by Annette Pedrosian
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Category: Fulfillment
Motherhood shouldn’t just be a drudgery. Find fulfillment in your most important calling–mother.
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Brats on a plane
The movie may be slightly less compelling than the serpentine version, but this is my personal nightmare. Literally.
A couple weeks ago, I had a dream about traveling through an airport. I think I was pregnant, but I didn’t have Hayden and Rebecca with me. (Ryan was with me.) As we walked through the airport, for no apparent reason, I stuck my foot out maybe two inches to try to trip a little boy, about 7 years old.
The boy didn’t trip—but boy, did he notice. Even though he’d been walking in the opposite direction, he started to follow us. (Hello, parents?) He was yelling and trying to attack me. I managed to push him away before we reached our plane.
Our plane was HUGE. For some reason, we ended up in a back section of leather bank seats. They were pretty much awesome. You know you’re traveling in style when you get the whole can of Sprite 😉 .
Until the little boy found me. He proceeded to verbally attack to me, mess with my straw while I was trying to drink, poke me, prod me, and kick me.
I tried to push him away, I tried to look for his parents, I tried to tell Ryan or the flight attendant—but no one else could see how the child was harassing me. I was trapped—can’t exactly get off a plane midflight—and under attack and invisible.
I woke up in a sweat.
And the first thing I wondered was, Is that an allegory for how I feel about my life?
And right now, as I sit here with Hayden in the throes of a 20-minute (so far) tantrum (at least he’s in his room), no end in sight, knowing that I can hardly handle what I already have on my plate, and wanting to add so much more for my own sake, knowing the only things that can give way right now are the only things keeping me sane, knowing that my family is thousands of miles away and that simply will not change any time soon (except for the quick visit coming up this week—and despite my work all last week, the house is still half-wrecked), knowing that my friends and neighbors around me are already overloaded, and knowing that by just admitting how I feel, people will judge me less and tell me I’ve obviously made the wrong life choices . . . yes. Sometimes, it is.
What do you do when you feel trapped?
Photo by Jack
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A good woman
Think about a good woman you know—your mother, a friend, a neighbor. What does she do that makes her so good?
For me, it’s not so much what the good women that I know do, it’s 
how much. As Proverbs says, a virtuous woman “looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.” I’m always impressed by the women around me who take the time (because they don’t just find it!) to care for their families, and for others around them; women who seem to always be thinking of others and providing for them; women who still worry they’re not doing enough.
These women have busy, full lives—and perhaps surprisingly, they always end up worrying they’ve neglected something or forgotten someone, or that they need to cram more into their lives of service.
Last week at the LDS General Conference, General Relief Society President Julie B. Beck agreed that good women simply have more to do than their lives can fit:
A good woman knows that she does not have enough time, energy, or opportunity to take care of all of the people or do all of the worthy things her heart yearns to do. Life is not calm for most women, and each day seems to require the accomplishment of a million things, most of which are important.
I definitely have that part down 😉 . It’s Sister Beck’s next point that I’ve been struggling with a lot lately:
A good woman must constantly resist alluring and deceptive messages from many sources telling her that she is entitled to more time away from her responsibilities and that she deserves a life of greater ease and independence.
Sometimes, the more I fret over whether I’m doing enough, inside my home and out, the more I shut down and try to escape from even the most basic of my responsibilities. (Usually by wasting time online—and I don’t mean something even as productive as blogging. I mean the kind of time suck where after two hours, you can’t really remember what you’ve been doing.)
Sister Beck points out that the best way we can be a good woman isn’t to try to accomplish everything, and it’s especially not to focus only on ourselves. While we definitely need to remember to make time for ourselves (or there won’t be anything for us to give!), we have to focus on our responsibilities and prioritize as well.
So what do you think you can let go of? Can you tell the difference when you focus more on yourself—or too much on yourself?
(In case you’re wondering, Sister Beck says that the best way to prioritize is through personal revelation from God about what is most important and best for us and our families.)
Photo by Tom Goskar
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Tomorrow is another day
Procrastinating = stress. It’s true. But sometimes, procrastination isn’t about putting something off that you really need to do right now—sometimes what we really need is to prioritize.
Right now I have probably a couple dozen things I want or need to finish in the next month or two—but not nearly enough time to do them all. Having all these tasks and deadlines hanging over me was really, really stressing me out. I was convinced I was going to forget something important, and we’d end up without a car or I’d fall behind on things like . . . I don’t know, this blog. (No comment.)
Finally, I started writing the things down—and I realized I don’t have to even think about some of these things for weeks. I’m just worrying myself crazy (as opposed to sick) over things that really, truly, I don’t have any need of thinking about right now.
Yes, I’m planning a vacation in two months—I’ve mapped a basic route and the details can probably wait at least a month or two until I finish the writing course I’m taking. Yes, the library books are due in three weeks—I don’t have to stress about them for two. (Or I can toss them in the car and return them the next time I drive by.) Yes, we need to buy a new car, but not tomorrow.
So I made a list of those things and the other tasks that I feel compelled to finish—and I will assign myself a time to worry about them. Later. Yeah, there’s a chance I won’t have any more time later—but it’s really not something I have to worry about today.
How do you reduce stress in your life?
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Anxiously engaged
So last week, I received a spiritual impression that I need to try to be more engaged with my children. I knew it was the truth—I’d let myself get so caught up in what I want to do, and what I want to accomplish. When I get overwhelmed with my children—or my goals—I tend to retreat (usually into the computer).
Which doesn’t help anything.
After a really rough start to the week, I think I’m finally starting to do better. Yeah, the television was still on a lot of the morning, but this time I was sitting next to them or holding them and interacting with them. We finally turned off the television and went to look for the barking dog (out the window). And I didn’t touch the computer once from the time we came home from preschool to the time the kids went down for quiet time.
No, it hasn’t been a perfect day—there has still been some yelling and whining and man, how do you get them to stop hitting one another?!, but it’s still been the best day of the week.
About time I took my own advice 😉 .
How do you make an effort to be “engaged” with your children?
I like to fill up my to-do list every day. Lately, I’ve been trying to keep the tasks manageable, and assigning time periods (this will take 15 minutes during quiet time; I’ll do this for an hour after the kids go to bed). Sticking to the plan can be a challenge, of course, but even just making the plan can help me focus and be more “productive.”
Yesterday, about 45 minutes into quiet time, I came back to the computer after the third time Hayden had called me back to his room for something. I hadn’t yet begun on my to do list (1 MamaBlogga post, 2 posts for my writing blog series on tension and suspense, finishing the book I’m reading), and I was ready to get down to business—but the second I sat down there was a knock at the door.
Sighing, I got up from my chair. I vowed that if this person was a salesman or a neighbor I could talk to later, I’d either not answer or extricate myself as quickly as possible.
But it wasn’t—it was my aunt and two of my cousins. They were in town for the day (they live 4 hours away, and I don’t get to see them nearly as often as I should). Of course I let them in. I could let a couple things go until tonight, right?
And then I decided to be flexible. I don’t see them that often (though they’ll be back in a few weeks), and neither does Hayden. I went and got Hayden from his room. He was so excited to see them that he talked constantly for the next hour. After all, they had to go shopping and head home; it wouldn’t be that long of a visit, and I could probably finish most of those things after they left or after bedtime.
Then I decided to be really flexible—nothing on my list had to be done today. We joined my aunt on her first excursion to Ikea (about 30 minutes away). Hayden got to play in the play place while we shopped, and a grand time was had by all (and we even found some useful stuff! I thought I’d be waiting months to get lingonberry jam to try a new recipe).
Sometimes I (and I think most of use) get so caught up in all that we want to do—with our days, with our week, with our lives—that it’s easy to overlook the opportunities to spend time together—to be a mom or a family. Yesterday I decided I wouldn’t do that. Yeah, I didn’t “achieve” anything, but sometimes it’s more important to connect than to accomplish.
Moms learn quickly that we have to be flexible—but sometimes, even within that flexibility, it’s easy to get very rigid. Structure is a fantastic thing—it helps us all know what to expect and can help us be happier together. But sometimes, we have to look beyond structure and bend a little further than we’re used to to find something even better. If we don’t bend every once in a while, something may come along that will push us too far—and then we’ll break.
What do you think? How has being flexible helped you be happier as a person and a mother?
Photo by dancer Dallagio