"My boys no longer share a tub, not ever. Now Henry showers alone, and Jack washes his own hair. And so the door has swung shut on the fantasy world they created in the bathtub, and on the long hours they splashed and played there together, emerging at last with pruney fingers and toes, to be wrapped in towels and bundled off to warm beds. Our morning cuddles are rare now, too. Jack is sleeping later, and Henry likes to be the first one dressed and downstairs. He puts on his own music, sets the table for breakfast, and basks in his newfound sense of independence. So my husband and I find ourselves alone again, arms wrapped around each other instead of around children. Both boys head off to play outside alone these days, full of their own plans and no longer in need of adult supervision or interference. Henry jumps on his bike and rides around the block; Jack walks to the pool with an older friend.
"And so my role is changing, too; I am called to be less of a playmate now and more and more simply a witness to my children's own breathtaking processes of growth and inner awakening. It is with some pang of sadness that I acknowledge our endings. My days of cradling a small, soapy head in my hands; of rocking a son to sleep; of carrying a tired boy on my back; of reading...and talking with teddy bears are over. And I miss them already, miss being needed that much, miss the confidence of knowing so surely where I should be and what I should be doing from one moment to the next.
"Just when I figure out how to mother a kindergartner, it seems, I have a first-grader standing before me instead. I have just learned how to love and live with a nine-year-old when the nine-year-old vanishes, leaving a preadolescent in his place. They don't stay still long enough for me to have my fill of them ever, at any stage. 'Stop!' I want to shout. 'Let's just do it this way for a while, let's stay right here.'...Little did I know that the yearning to seize life in a freeze-frame would never really go away, or that my desire to hold on to whatever we had and whatever we were at any given moment would always be in conflict with my sons' own natural instincts: to grow up, to live, to fulfill their own destinies on this earth. Sometimes, it seems, there are discernible changes overnight. The boy who meets my gaze at the breakfast table is not the same one whose cheek I kissed the night before. And even as I marvel at the latest incarnation, I grieve for yesterday's child, already a memory. To love them is always to let them go, bit by bit, day after day."And I know these things so deep in my heart because I feel the same way. To think of my little boys and girl growing up so fast, and Tate turning 5 yesterday just gives me such a deep, deep pain in my heart. But along with the pain, I feel such a sweet relishing of the moment. It's such a bittersweet feeling, this simultaneous holding on and letting go of motherhood.
"More and more...I felt that motherhood itself was becoming my real vocation. It seemed that the more consciousness I was willing to bring to it, the more meaningful this role became. Shaping and protecting our family space, celebrating birthdays and holidays, setting a mood around the dinner table, cultivating an atmosphere in our home, painting and baking and storytelling with my sons, simply attending to the details of our lives together--these and countless other activities both large and small came to represent opportunities for deeper attention, work, and growth. Over and over I found myself both humbled and challenged by the magnitude of my task as a mother in contemporary society. Could I find a way to bring beauty and meaning to an empty afternoon, while the rest of the world spun on at a different pace?...Did I possess the self-discipline I needed to effectively discipline two boys? Did I have the inner strength to resist the values of corporate, materialistic America--and to shape a different set of traditions and ideals? Could I summon enough humor, patience, flexibility, and love to meet their needs from one day to the next? Was I conscious enough of my own needs to articulate them, and meet them, too? Could I let one identity fall away and begin to forge a new one out of such reflections [and] lessons...?
"In any case, our focus has shifted. We have been pulled back to our own hearths, our own families, our own inner lives."
"Ordinary middle-class women elevated the pursuit of domestic bliss to an extraordinary art form, from white-linen Sunday dinner to blue-checked-gingham Independence Day picnics. Women approached the domestic arts--cooking, decorating, gardening, handicrafts, and entertaining--not as burdens but as a form of personal expression and a means of persuasion. Traditions that celebrated the joys of home and family life acted as the mystical mortar that held bodies and souls together in a tumultuous society that was changing at the speed of light.
"The time has come for us to look deep within. Reconsider how caring for our homes can be an expression of our authenticity. We may not know how to bleach linen,...cure ham, or bottle gooseberries. But it's not too late for us to rediscover the sacred soul craft of homecaring. Creating a comfortable, beautiful, well-run home can be among our most satisfying accomplishments as well as an illuminating spiritual experience. Like sweat equity, channeling your time and creative energy closer to home will produce a big emotional return for yourself and those you love."
"Like Thoreau, I love 'a board margin to my life'--the less packed into a day, the better. Sitting still, I am able to appreciate my life simply because I am taking the time to experience it. But even a few moments of tranquility can be hard won. It seems that idleness is suspect; we are supposed to be on the go. Perhaps that is why I am always so grateful for the small clearings that can suddenly appear even in the midst of a busy day. These accidental, hallowed scraps of time offer us a break from the outside world, at least for a few moments. Arriving ten minutes early for a piano lesson, the boys flop down outside on a patch of fresh powder, waving arms and legs to etch a row of ragged angels into the snow. Informed that our pediatrician is running an hour behind schedule, we dash back out to the car, crawl into the back, and tell a story while rain pounds on the roof...
"Having reaped the blessings of these accidental moments of grace, I am learning to leave some space around the edges of our days. There is no peace to be found in our culture. So I try to build the margins in, to keep our days from being inscribed too densely. Some days seem to offer their own quality of space and ease. Other times I have to switch gears midway through--postponing the errands, canceling a playdate, ordering pizza for dinner, skipping an evening meeting--so that I can pull my children out of the swift current of a day and guide them into a calm pool instead.
"When I come to a stop myself, when I draw a circle of stillness around me, my children are drawn into that peaceful place. They visibly relax, as if my very calmness nourishes them. The impact of just a few minutes of quiet attention can be profound, changing the mood of an entire day, restoring equilibrium to a distressed child, and to a frazzled mother as well.
"We might sit side by side and draw, or gather up a stack of favorite old picture books and read them, make strange creatures out of clay, or just cuddle on the couch and listen to music as darkness falls. These are the moments when my children reveal themselves to me, when conversation spirals up and out, from the here and now into the realm of spirit and imagination. There, in that place Tennyson calls the 'quiet limit of the world,' we connect with one another at a very deep soul level. My children know then that they have my full attention and, even more important, that there's no other place I'd rather be at that moment."
"Pulling me out to the tent the other night, my sons reminded me once again that even our familiar backyards can surprise us. In fact, children and adults alike can discover the same place over and over again, simply by taking a closer look. We don't need to climb mountains or sail over seas to meet nature; we need only join our children, down on our hands and knees, and watch the intimate movements of a small creature going about its business.
"It is so easy in our culture to lose touch with the natural world altogether. We believe we don't have time for nature, and so we ignore our own primal hunger for earth and water and sky. Modern life calls us away from nature's rhythms, away from the kind of obersavation and interaction with the natural world that can quiet a troubled mind, restore a sense of well-being, and renew our connections with all life. We spend our days inside instead, yoked to some other rhythm, bathed in artificial light, breathing recycled air, surrounded by man-made materials--concrete, glass, and plastic....It is not enough, then, to teach our children about nature; we must allow our children to grow up in nature."
"Taking care of the invisible means paying attention to my own physical and spiritual health, to the inner workings of my marriage, to the emotional security of my children, to our need for fun and play, to the quality of our relationships. I remind myself that the slow, open-ended hours I spend with my sons are not without purpose; they are, in fact, a precious gift, islands of repose in the midst of life's onrushing stream. The secret, I think, is this: When we take care of the invisible, we find ourselves cared for in return. Supported and refreshed, we find the strength and forbearance to take care of the rest, too...When I take care of the invisible, I find myself cared for in return."
"Whenever I find myself in conversation with other mothers, we always ask one another the same question: 'What's your schedule?' We want to know how other women manage, what they fight to protect, what they've decided to let go, where they draw the lines. The stories we hear may not tell us how to rearrange our own lives, how to raise our own children, how to find fulfillment. But they remind us that we do each have choices. And they may even inspire us to examine the choices we have made. Ultimately, we each have to decide where the balance lies--between work and family, between doing and being, between acquiring more and accepting what we have, between simplifying and taking on, between the world beyond our walls and the lives that we create within them. And, at some point, we may begin to ask ourselves: Just whose standards am I living by anyway? Only when we stop long enough to figure out what we really care about, and begin to make choices accordingly, can we create lives that are authentic expressions of our inner selves."I remember conversations with friends and family asking these very questions, and at the end of it all, I finally learned that I can never be something that I'm not. But I can make a pretty good me. I knew deep down, that all these years I had been trying to live up to other people's standards for what my life should look like and how I should raise my family. Not that these standards were forced upon me, but rather, I enforced them upon myself. I thought if I was to be a good mother, I must do everything that good mothers around me were doing or had done. It led to many years of discontent and discouragement. But Spring brought this new mothering heart for me and a longing to live authentically. I knew that I will never be perfect, but someday, I hoped I could reach authenticity.
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| {My two little boys playing in the snow} |
"We build deep and loving family relationships by doing simple things together, like family dinner and family home evening and by just having fun together. In family relationships love is really spelled t-i-m-e, time. Taking time for each other is the key for harmony at home. We talk with, rather than about, each other. We learn from each other, and we appreciate our differences as well as our commonalities. We establish a divine bond with each other as we approach God together through family prayer, gospel study, and Sunday worship."
"There is real value in simply being present, for our children.
"I discovered just what it is that they need more than anything else: me. My full attention. My face in front of their faces, making eye contact. My unfailing belief in their best selves. My joy in their existence. My nurturing."
"My children are most at ease when I am at ease myself, when our days are not too busy, our activities not too ambitious. They are happy when we are simply together, moment by moment, engaged with each other.
"So I have come to think of this loving attention as my special province...This is the divine work we mothers do; perhaps, for a time, it is our vocation--taking care of the invisible.
"When we commit ourselves to nurturing, suddenly it seems that those fleeting moments of togetherness that we do have with our children become infused with love and meaning. We become more conscious of the mood we create when we are with them, whether we're bestowing a goody-bye kiss at the door, driving them to school, eating dinner together, or tucking them into bed. All of these mundane activities can be enriched; all offer opportunities for connection."
"Many of us assume that we can continue to get along just by 'winging it' indefinitely. We can't. We need an antidote for the hurried and harried lives that threaten to tear us apart. Follow the advice of Anne Morrow Lindbergh and make carving out a small portion of each day for yourself a personal priority. 'Quiet time alone, contemplation, prayer, music, a centering line of thought or reading, of study or work. It can be physical or intellectual or artistic, any creative life proceeding from oneself. It need not be an enormous project or a great work. But it should be something of one's own. Arranging a bowl of flowers in the morning can give a sense of quiet in a crowded day...What matters is that one be for a time inwardly attentive.'"I also love the words of President Uchtdorf:
"It may seem odd to think of having a relationship with ourselves, but we do. Some people can't get along with themselves. They criticize and belittle themselves all day long until they begin to hate themselves. May I suggest that you reduce the rush and take a little extra time to get to know yourself better. Walk in nature, watch a sunrise, enjoy God's creations, ponder the truths of the restored gospel, and find out what they mean for you personally. Learn to see yourself as Heavenly Father sees you--as His precious daughter or son with divine potential."
"We improve our relationship with our Heavenly Father by learning of Him, by communing with Him, by repenting of our sins, and by actively following Jesus Christ...To strengthen our relationship with God, we need some meaningful time alone with Him. Quietly focusing on daily personal prayer and scripture study, always aiming to be worthy of a current temple recommend--these will be some wise investments of our time and efforts to draw closer to our Heavenly Father. Let us heed the invitation in Psalms: 'Be still, and know that I am God.'"
