As I pondered a title for this post, I thought I should come up with a definition of nobility—and the first thing that popped into my head was that nobility is the opposite of playing the martyr.
I think if any of us had to draw a picture of nobility, we would show someone with their head held high. We think of knights and soldiers in acts of bravery; we think of true martyrs who sacrificed all that they had, even their lives, for their faith; we think of true saints who dedicated their living hours to those around them.
We don’t think of mothers. (Remember? Most moms are the bad kind of martyrs.)
This is especially interesting in light of the quotation that inspired this post:
The noblest calling in the world is motherhood. True motherhood is the most beautiful of all arts, the greatest of all professions. She who can paint a masterpiece, or who can write a book that will influence millions, deserves the admiration and plaudits of mankind; but she who rears successfully a family of healthy, beautiful sons and daughters, whose immortal souls will exert an influence throughout the ages long after paintings shall have faded, and books and statues shall have decayed or have been destroyed, deserves the highest honor that man can give, and the choicest blessings of God.
—David O. McKay in Pathways to Happiness
Being a mother is the most important thing we can do. On this note, I do want to note that most of us are doing well at the most beautiful of all arts, the greatest of all professions. This doesn’t mean we have our families on home-grown organic raw-food vegetarian diets that we spend six hours a day planning, preparing and tending (the garden). It doesn’t mean we have our children in every single conceivable extracurricular from archery to zoobotany club. It doesn’t mean we subjugate our every desire to every whim of our children’s.
It means, as Jane put it so well today, that:
being a good mother takes two things: 1) the desire to be a good mother. . . . And 2) the will to do those things that she determines to be important for the well-being of her children. Even those that require sacrifice, change of habit, or a lot of w-o-r-k.
And that work—as deeply challenging as it sometimes feels—is a beautiful art that, no matter what else I write or do or say, will be my magnum opus.
What do you think? Will your profession as a mother be your magnum opus? How do you strive to perfect your motherly art? Are you a “good” mother?
Photo by salssa
As children of mothers, naturally, just about everyone hates these characters. Yeah, we laugh, but it’s a knowing laugh. We’ve seen mothers or perhaps even had our own mothers act that way—woe is me, I reared you, it was hard and you’re ungrateful.