November 2018 – The Imperfect Moments

Hurry! Come on! I said “let’s go” 3 times already!

Think for a moment. Have you said some version of this today? If not, did you say it yesterday, or even the day before on Thanksgiving perhaps? Did you need to usher your child(ren) quickly out of the bathroom, into their clothes, out of the door, into or out of the car, from one house to another? Any of those…or maybe all of those?

Please tell me it wasn’t just me!

I gave myself an exercise recently (not the kind to benefit my body – I need to get back to that, really), a kind of mental exercise. I took notice of how often I was rushing my children…literally PUSHING them through life. Recently, we were frantically scurrying out of the house, loading all 4 kids into the car to go to 3 different schools, all by 8am so that I could make that 8:30 conference call for work. I had honestly probably said some version of “hurry” no less than 10 times that morning, and more than half of those times was likely in a voice filled with frustration, discouragement, discontentment…possibly desperation.

As I helped his tiny body up into the car, fussing for him to “hurry up and buckle your belt”, my four year old stopped me in my tracks.

He has a most precious voice. He looked at me with one of his quirky, curious faces that everyone who knows him can picture, and he said “Why? Why do we have to hurry, hurry, hurry every day?“.

He was right. Why? Why do we feel such a constant pressure to seemingly rush our tiny humans through every aspect of every single day? If you are like me, maybe you make a conscious effort not to do this, only to realize at night, (when I am sure you replay the imperfect moments of the day in your mind, wondering and praying about how to do better tomorrow – how to be better tomorrow) – that you actually still said HURRY many more times than you meant to or realized in the moment.

We live in such a rushed world, don’t we? Not only is life so heavy for you momma (see previous post), but it is often moving at a speed that we can barely keep up with. Are we overscheduling our little ones, in hopes of preparing them for life? More sports practices to make them faster/better, more tutoring lessons in reading or math to make them smarter, more camps to make them more whatever-er?

What if we changed it up? What if we wrote in our beautiful Erin Condren’s or Passion Planners appointments for REST. What if the Google Calendar app on our phone reminded us about appointments for PLAY? Appointments for FAMILY TIME? Can you imagine? Would our kids really be less successful in life – or would they be more balanced, happy…less anxious (future post coming soon on this one, friends!)? How could we benefit?

What I do know is this. I still say “hurry up”. I haven’t found any secret to removing this from my vocabulary. I say it more than I want to, probably still much more than I should. But, when I do, I try to take a mental note about the situation and think about how we can avoid having to say it tomorrow in the same scenario. Do I need to wake up a bit earlier, be a bit more organized, be a lot less overscheduled? I think about the following verse that really speaks to me in this season of life:
Desire without knowledge is not good, and whoever makes haste with his feet misses his way. Proverbs 19:2

So, I take the mental note and try to live in that imperfect moment, the best I can…even if I am doing my make-up at the red light and grabbing breakfast from a drive through, in a hurry.

Can you relate?

Hey, you! Yes, you…the weary momma. No, not her, don’t look around. Don’t imagine that mom-friend in the school drop off line in her jammies and messy bun, looking disheveled. We know her, we feel her. Maybe some days we are her.

You. I want to talk to you.

Pause. In silence. Block out the noise in the background. Block out the stack of mail you have yet to sort, the dinner you have yet to cook, or clean up from.

Do you feel that? No?

Stop for just a second, and close your eyes. I know, this seems crazy, but stay with me for just a bit. Now, close your eyes again. Where are your shoulders? Did you take notice of how high you have your shoulders pulled, maybe even up near your ears? Can you take a slow breath…the kind that is intentional…the kind you FORCE yourself to take after you realize you’ve possibly spent hours – or days – breathing those quick shallow breathes that are a true identifier of your anxiety, your stress….your BURDEN?

Push them down…your shoulders. Take just a second and drive them toward the ground while you breathe in the air you need so desperately. In this moment, you won’t feel like you are drowning. Do you ever feel like you are drowning, or is that just me?

So, do you feel that now? My goodness momma, it is HEAVY. Life is so heavy for you. The responsibilities, the exhaustion, the fear (no, not of spiders or creepy crawlers. That’s legit, but I mean something else here). The responsibilities to your family, friends, clubs, churches, etc. The exhaustion – are you sleeping well, full nights? I know most of us don’t. But I bet you still get up in the morning drink your coffee or other caffeine of choice and give 150% of your energy to them. The fear of letting someone down, of not living up to the expectations that the world has laid on you, that you have laid on yourself? Maybe heavy isn’t a big enough word…

Heavy, huh? No wonder we carry our shoulders by our ears…the weight is almost unbearable somedays. But you have grown accustomed to it, right? Somedays, you are moving at such a pace you don’t even notice it until your head hits the pillow, because it is your normal now. Tell me, is it your normal?

I am you. I am in this with you…and I wanted to connect with you. NO – scratch that. I NEEDED to write this and I NEEDED to connect with you. Don’t you think we need a community of acceptance, sans judgement? A place where the weight of trying to lead a filter-filled (and PS. I still need to learn how to use a filter…surely that will cover a few of these fine lines, right?) Pinterest worthy life can be lifted, discussed, and Lord willing – dismissed? Maybe a way to communicate with other mommas who are in the same season of life, or with those who made it through and can share some of their wisdom? Maybe we could send a few warnings to those just starting this journey – help them learn from us? Yes/No?

If nothing else, this is my outlet. A time for me to push my shoulders down…to breathe deep and to feel normal.

The vision of “The Imperfect Moments” blossomed out of my own struggles, successes, and stalemates. Through our dedication and ambitions to be THE PERFECT MOM, we often fail to recognize the beauty in THE IMPERFECT MOMENTS…see that play on the words? Friends, literally. The phrase “the perfect mom” is actually embedded within “the imperfect moments“. Our perfection complexes (and don’t lie, do you have this too?) keep us from realizing how completely impossible, how completely broken we can become in striving for it.

I have a goal. Maybe it’s more of a hope. Maybe, just maybe, it is a plea of desperation.

Can we agree to embrace our brokeness, endure this season together, and empower ourselves and each other to leave behind perfection and live with acceptance IN our IMPERFECT MOMENTS?

I have so many of those moments – I bet you do too, and maybe sharing them with you here, in this medium, will help you feel like you are normal and not alone. Please engage and share back with me…I know you have something to teach me.