Category: Fulfillment

Motherhood shouldn’t just be a drudgery. Find fulfillment in your most important calling–mother.

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Fulfillment

Happy New Year!

Update: speaking of looking back of the last year, Esther Elizabeth’s Saturday Evening Blog Post is asking for your favorite post of your own for 2009. I chose my post on how to choose happiness. What’s yours?

I honestly don’t think I’ve ever cared less about New Year’s Eve and Day. Ever. My husband spent the evening patrolling the parking lot at a local youth dance (10,000 youth were expected to attend and the organizers solicited several hundred chaperons) so I didn’t even get a kiss.

I’m also so over resolutions 😉 . But I suppose I can still take a look at my resolutions from last year and assess how I’ve done.

  • Better prayer and scripture study (specifically a 30 minute scripture study/prayer time first thing in the morning). Eh, not really. I did do pretty well at making at least a page a day. Mid-year, in line with our local (stake) goal, I decided to read the whole Doctrine and Covenants by the end of the year and finished it in about 3-4 months reading 2 pages a day. I only missed a couple days and I completed the goal, so that was good.
  • Run a 5K. I’m kind of shocked that I actually did this (along with my sister Jaime). I liked being in shape, but apparently not enough to maintain it. I think I’ll do another 5K this year (again, I must be insane), but probably not until September at the earliest.
  • Eat more fruits and vegetables. I neglected this for a while mid-year, but in the fall I had some health issues come up and I had to start eating more veggies again. I wish we could eat a greater variety of vegetables . . . but we already eat almost everything we like. Maybe we’ll have to get more adventurous this year.
  • Do more around the house. Yeah—no.
  • Write tons a reasonable amount (specifically, finished the first draft of my latest MS at the time, get through the first drafts of two more MS and finish revisions on the two 2007 MS). Well, I finished almost all of this—I finished the first draft and revisions on the aforementioned manuscript and also drafted two more in 2009. I never did go back to the first MS from 2008; if I ever do, it will require heavy re-conceptualizing. I actually went even further than the goal—I submitted that one manuscript for publication. Also, I want to revise the resolution: three manuscripts in 365 days (nearly 250,000 words) is more than a reasonable amount for me.

And my most important resolution: I will choose happiness. That, of course, is ongoing, but something I both did well (since I focused on it), and continued to struggle with (especially with the ongoing health issue).

So several of those are things I’ll want to continue to work on this year (maybe). But most importantly, I want to work on the habit of choosing happiness—doing more to foster that attitude on a daily basis.

Resolutions are hard to keep because they’re not the same thing as goals. So this year, this is my attempt to start channeling my most important resolution(s?) into goals. (For a blast from the past, here’s my post on setting goals, specifically for your blog; I’ll have another one on my writing blog on Monday.) One of the things I need is to work on breaking down the amorphous “choose happiness” into more specific, concrete things I can do to remind myself of and strive toward that attitude.

What do you think? How can choosing happiness become a habit?

Photo by Neal (Visiting this local attraction was the fulfillment of one of his resolutions)

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Fulfillment

How to choose happiness (part two)

This year I’ve thought a lot about choosing happiness. I named it as my big resolution for the year and used it as the theme for a group writing project. Back in October, several pieces fell into place as I figured out how to choose happiness and why choosing it can seem so hard.

One more piece fell into place this week.

So back in October, I pointed out that

Choosing to be happy does not mean that we will automatically be happy all the time. It doesn’t mean we always choose whatever might make us happy right this second.

Choosing happiness means we choose the things we know are most important for our long term happiness. . . .

Choosing happiness means doing what I may not want to do most right now—it means choosing the thing that I know is right for me, what’s important in the long run.

The rest of my realization might not seem like much of an epiphany, but I think the last piece fell into place this week. I had my first true “White Christmas” this year—but it’s really not exciting. Yeah, I know I live in Utah, but I am already tired of the snow. It seems like it came to stay a lot earlier than normal (and I can’t ski this year, so there doesn’t seem to be an upside, either).

For Christmas Eve, however, I decided that one fun family thing we could do was to play in the snow (and the snow has been here basically all month, but we’ve never played in it, unless shoveling counts). So bundling up is a hassle, and you get cold and wet pretty fast, but I thought this would be a fun thing for all of us.

Of course, Ryan came down with a cold and Rebecca needed a nap, so it ended up just being me and Hayden tromping through the backyard, digging in the partially-refrozen snow, and throwing snowballs. (My very first one hit Hayden in the forehead and burst. He didn’t know what hit him!)

After about half an hour, I decided I’d had enough and brought us back in. After stripping out of our wet winter gear, I had Hayden help me put the cookie dough onto cookie sheets.

Sounds pretty idyllic, doesn’t it? For the most part, it was—there were fewer fits and screaming and begging and yelling during those hours than most of the ones of the previous week—the hours I spent worrying about getting shopping and packing and work done, and the time I spent on the computer procrastinating dealing with those things. It was a time I could spend enjoying him and enjoying being his mom.

The realization that hit me? Choosing happiness means choosing my children. It doesn’t mean that I am completely subjugated or I have to ignore all my own needs—but when I take the time to really work at being a mom, the whole family is happier—including me.

What do you think? What does choosing happiness mean for you?

Photo by Grant MacDonald

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Kids/Parenting Fulfillment

Happy Thanksgiving

I’m thankful to be a mother because of my children. I love seeing their personalities emerge. I love seeing them discover new things and put together the pieces. I love helping them learn and grow. I love their hugs and kisses and the way their eyes light up when they see me.

Why are you thankful to be a mother?

Photo by Br Lawrence Lew, O.P.

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Fulfillment

If wanting ever taught you anything

How much of our time do we spend thinking about what it would take to make us happy? If we just had a little more money, if we just had more time off, if the kids would just go take a nap, if I could just accomplish this far-off goal . . .

Of course, I wouldn’t argue that we don’t need at least some of each of these things—but sometimes, as an OK Go song says, “If wanting ever taught you anything, it’s wanting more, (and more and more and more!)”

Agented author Natalie Whipple, whose blog I read, posted about this same phenomenon. On the one hand, she’s reached a major milestone in publishing—she’s gotten an agent. On the other hand, she has to still work on her writing and revisions and still has a long way to go to get published—and even then, the work will continue. She’s enjoying a modicum of success now, but it’s still so easy to fixate on what she wants out of the future (emphasis added).

But here’s the thing—my friends’ successes have not changed how they act or feel. Getting an agent didn’t transform them all into happy, perfect writers. Getting book deals didn’t stop them from worrying about the quality of their work. In fact, in some ways there is even more pressure to deliver perfection. . . .

Of course we’ve all had our low points and struggles—hard times are unavoidable. But it’s all about your attitude. If you aren’t happy now, getting an agent or book deal or whatever isn’t going to change that in the long run. You’ll just Want something else and withhold your happiness until you get that.

So for now, while I could always use a little more money, a little more free time, and a future goal to work toward, I think what I’m going to try to want most is to be content and grateful for what I have.

And that seems like an appropriate thing this week, don’t you think?

How do you focus on being happy with what you have instead of always wanting more?

Photo by James Jordan

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Fulfillment

What ever happened to hard work?

Once upon a time, there was a mystique to working one’s own land. Owning a farm was considered by a large part of society to be the pinnacle of achievement—you’d “arrived” once you obtained acreage. Hard work was a virtue, and an aspiration.

I doubt that I have to tell you that isn’t the mentality today. Most of us have learned to work just enough to get by. Even in motherhood, sometimes it’s easy to let the “okay” (PBS) supplant the “good” (playing with your kids).

There’s no way around it: motherhood—maintaining the home, providing meals, rearing children to become productive adults, sometimes even providing income for the family—is hard work. Even if we do just enough to get by, sometimes the work of motherhood is emotionally and physically exhausting.

So sometimes motherhood gets a bad rap. But you know what? I think we had it right centuries ago—though it’s often not fun or even interesting, hard work is good for us. It makes us grow and makes us stronger.

And, honestly, I have to hope that anything that requires this much effort can only be worth every ounce of myself that I put into it.

What do you think? What have you learned from the hard work of motherhood? How have you grown as a mother?

Photo by Sasha Wolff

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Kids/Parenting Fulfillment

Loving ourselves

One of the keys to finding fulfillment, no matter what our station in life, is to love ourselves. To accept ourselves. To recognize that we’re not perfect, but we’re not terrible. We’re trying, and that says a lot—and most of all, we’re people of value.

I think this is especially important because really, valuing motherhood begins with mothers valuing themselves. We have to set the precedent for our families. Yes, we serve them and we break our backs to keep them happy and healthy—but at the same time, we teach them to respect others, respect themselves, respect us—and respect motherhood.

We must value ourselves as mothers. We must recognize and embrace this high and holy calling, and then help our families and those around us to learn to value us as individuals and as mothers, and to value motherhood and the things we’ve done for them.

Of course, some of us have an easier time of loving ourselves:

Kids Sept-Oct 2009 008small

But, then, I think this shows us what a key time childhood is. If we work to instill this value for motherhood in our children now—if we show them that we love them and serve them, but we also value ourselves as individuals, and if we teach them to value themselves—we can get a jumpstart on the negative messages that are sure to come.

What do you think? How do you show your children that you value motherhood, and yourself? How do you teach your children to value you as their mother?