Every day I'm convinced that I am failing either in my parenting
or in my professional life, sometimes both. Either I yelled too much that day or I didn't
get all my work done, something always goes wrong in my mind. I've decided that
perhaps that's not a bad thing.
You see when I bake cookies I don't worry about how they'll turn
out. I read the list of ingredients and make sure I have everything to make
them. I follow the directions exactly and hope for the best. Sometimes they
don't turn out great but I don't really care. They're just cookie. No big
deal.
My kids didn't come with directions. And how they turn out is a
big deal. The most important job I have is raising my kids. That's why I worry
when I make a mistake. The stakes are high.
My professional life is fun and difficult at the same time. It's
difficult finding work as a freelancer. Not to mention time consuming and
defeating when you hear no too many times in a row. Thankfully I love it and my
skin is getting thicker every week.
Being a mother is hard. It's the most intense on the job training
you'll ever go through. People talk about the mommy wars and they are real and
ridiculous in my opinion.
But the most tragic mommy war is the one that we have with our
self. When we spend too much time focusing on the fact that we are failing we are at war with our self.
I yell too much, I'm failing at having patience.
I'm failing at getting my oldest to eat a variety of foods, what
if she never eats meat that isn't processed?
This weekend I took my kids to a book fair, epic failure they went
in three directions and we ended up leaving shortly after arriving.
I was turned down by a magazine for a free lance
piece...again.
I didn't get that blogging opportunity I wanted.
My laundry is so backed up that Molly was out of clean jeans today
and Mark is wearing his sister’s socks.
On and on the list goes. Do those failure diminish my value as a person or mother? Or are they just signs of my imperfection?
It's OK that we feel bad when we mess up. Feeling bad shows how
much we care and that we want to do better. I try many things with my kids and
some are gigantic
failures. I'm constantly going after something professionally that doesn't
go through. Hearing someone say no to hire me is a regular occurrence in my life.
Failing doesn't make us bad mothers or women. Failing shows our
courage, the courage to try something new and dare that our lives could be
better.
Failure leads us to look at the problem from another angle and try
again. Failure is how we find success.
Success will never come if we aren't brave enough to put ourselves
in the position to fail.
Be brave. Make mistakes. Fail. Learn. And then try again. End the mommy
war with yourself.
We know it's worth it.

I so get this. I always feel like I should be doing something better.
ReplyDeleteMe too. I wonder why we think that way?
Deletethank you for this post. Needed it for more than just motherhood!
ReplyDeleteAgree, it applies to more areas of motherhood.
DeleteOh I so get this! I keep feeling like a failure because I'm not patient enough or I yelled .
ReplyDelete