How full is your bucket?

Imagine you move to an alternate planet.  Upon arrival, you are given the responsibility of always ensuring everyone’s cup is full of water at the beginning of each day.  Without a full cup of water each day, your fellow plant-people will evaporate into the atmosphere.  You have a bucket to use to deliver the water to each cup, but if the water level of your bucket gets below 25% full, cement blocks encompass your feet and slow your progress to fulfill your stewardship.  How hard would you work to keep your bucket full knowing that the very existence of your fellow plant-people depends on your work?

Back to planet earth.

We are the mothers of wonderful teens to whom we’ve taught correct principles and now they’re governing themselves.  We want to show up for this next phase of parenting in the best way possible, but honestly, we’re exhausted.  Our buckets are bone dry.  BUT we want to begin re-filling our buckets, even if we’re not sure how.

Maybe you need to take a long bath.  Maybe you need an extra hour of sleep each night.  Maybe you need a haircut.  Maybe you want to get your creative juices flowing.  Maybe you want to put a puzzle together.  Maybe you want to catch up with an old friend.  Maybe you need to get outside and let the sun hit your face.  Maybe you want to dance to your favorite song.

While there’s not just one RIGHT way to fill your bucket, remember ~ once you really start taking care of yourself, you have so much more to give to those you love.  What would fill your bucket?

Thoughts on Feelings from a non-feeler ;)

I’m not an overtly emotional person, definitely not one to wear my emotions on my sleeve, and I’m really good at working hard and getting things done no matter what is going on.  BUT, this does not mean I don’t get angry when things go wrong, or feel sad when my loved ones are hurting, or get excited when someone I know has accomplished something amazing.  Just because you might not see it doesn’t mean I don’t feel joy and heartache and confusion.

But really ~ I don’t know that I so much “feel” joy and heartache and confusion, but rather think about them.  For some reason, I’ve spent most of my life avoiding feelings.  Honestly, feelings kind of scare me and, well, have always seemed a bit useless.  So, imagine my surprise when I read these words:  “How we feel determines what we do and what we don’t do.”  (Self Coaching 101 by Brooke Castillo, 71)  Since I was embarking on wanting to learn how to really feel something, I thought this might be worth checking out.

This is what I learned:  there’s a difference between feeling a feeling and acting out a feeling (and it turns out it’s the “acting out a feeling” that I’ve always avoided).  A feeling is just a vibration you feel in your body and you can feel it just sitting in a chair, or while you’re folding clothes, or when you’re driving down the road.

Even though I’m still very much a thinker, learning to notice and acknowledge my feelings ~ good and bad ~ is making for a much fuller life.  And what I’ve found is that feelings even play a role in my life whether I realize it or not (do you know how many times I’ve neglected reaching out to a stranger because I was afraid I would say the wrong thing?!?).

I can show you that a feeling is simply a vibration ~ and therefore, nothing to avoid.  If you’d like me to take you through an exercise ~ no strings attached ~ just email kelly@findpeaceinparenting.com and tell me you’re interested in the “Feeling” exercise (or put your email in a comment below and I’ll contact you!).

What if…

What if everything was exactly how it should be?

I heard this question today and it got me to wondering.  What if this is how it was supposed to be?  What if I believed that this isn’t all a big mistake? 

If I believed everything was exactly as it should be I would be looking for what *I* am supposed to learn from this experience (instead of trying to find ways to convince the other person of what he should be doing).

If I knew with certainty that this was just how it was supposed to be I would let go of some control and allow a little bit more flexibility in my plans and not be quite so adamant that my way is always the best way.

If I trusted this wasn’t really all a big mistake I would see the blessings of this experience, how I will be stronger because of it (rather than worn down by it), that it’s an opportunity to learn lessons I didn’t even know I needed to learn.

Wow ~ a question can really open up a whole new way of thinking about a problem.  What if your son not serving a mission was always the plan (His, not ours!)?  How would you show up differently?

Are you a “starter” or a “finisher”?

Generally people fall into one of these two categories:  starters or finishers.  Either you’re great at starting things but have a hard time seeing them all the way through to the end, or you tend to drag your feet getting started but once you do there’s no question that you will complete the task.  I am a finisher.

As each of my boys were born I had in mind the things I, as a mom, needed to teach them before they became full-fledged adults, things like:  how to talk with people, old or young; to serve those in need without expecting something in return; how to iron and clean bathrooms; and how to manage their money.  Also on the list was preparing them to serve LDS missions.

So, what happens when a “finisher” can’t finish the job?!?  Am I doomed to perpetually feeling “undone” since whether or not my son serves a mission is really out of my control?  Is it possible that this “finisher” can ever feel peace without everything packaged nicely and tied up with a pretty bow?

The ability to let go of the things you don't have control over (like the decisions other people get to make) is a gift you can give yourself.  It's not about white-knuckling your way with positive thinking; rather, it's about taking a step back and evaluating what it is you believe and finding out if it's really true.  Believing my son had to serve a mission in order for me to "finish" my mothering (before he became an adult) didn't serve me very well.  I came to understand that giving my best efforts is enough even if the results aren't what I had hoped for.  This allows me to love my son with my whole heart instead of feeling gypped because things didn't work out the way I always thought they would.

If you're not quite sure how to bring peace into your own life, the first step is to take a moment to find out what you believe about your situation, and then ask yourself, "Is this really true?"  Then think about how you react when you believe that.  Who would you be with that thought or belief?  Once you've pondered these questions, your mind will be open to some other possibilities.  Take some time to consider them.

There really can be peace ~ even for finishers ~ when life doesn’t continue unfolding the way you had planned.  Truly, there is.  

“Good” is enough

Do you ever find yourself accepting the faults and weaknesses of others as human but can only expect perfection from yourself?  That was me for so many years (and, to be honest, I find myself back there occasionally) until one day…

I was studying the “creation” in Genesis, and I began noticing that God called everything from the dry land and seas to man, “good” (see Genesis 1:10, 12, 18, 21, 25, 31).  I suddenly became curious:  Why didn’t God call His creations “marvelous,” “beautiful” or even “perfect”?  After all, these are His creations; doesn’t that mean they should be better than “good”?  This was actually blowing my mind a little.

As I continued to study, I turned to my Webster’s 1828 dictionary (my favorite when looking up words in scripture) and found this definition for “good”:  sufficiently perfect.  What?!

I actually felt a burden lifted off my back and shoulders.  If “sufficiently perfect” was good enough for God then surely it was good enough for me.  I mean, who am I to argue with Him?!

Parenting is a tough job.  We have successes; we have failures.  But what really matters the most is our efforts ~ and even in this realm “sufficiently perfect” truly is good enough.

The good, the bad, and the ugly

This morning I read something interesting.  A grandchild asked, “Grandma, you’ve lived more than 80 years now.  What changes have you noticed?”  The Grandma’s reply, “People never said, ‘Have a nice day’ until the 1970’s.  We didn’t expect to have a nice day.  We knew it would be hard.  Our life was hard.  Our friends’ lives were hard.  It had always been hard for us, and we figured it would always be hard.  But we were all in it together, and so it was all right.  Then in the ‘70’s everyone started saying, ‘Have a nice day.’  And then people felt gypped if they weren’t having a ‘nice day’ kind of life.” (Divine Signatures, Gerald N. Lund, 79-80)

I’ve often taught my boys that life will be full of the good, the bad, and the ugly ~ and that they could probably expect it in those proportions.  Yet somehow I still often find myself disappointed or disillusioned by that reality, believing that something is wrong when things aren’t mostly “good.”  I can’t get these Grandma’s words out of my head; I think I just had a huge paradigm shift.

Life is ugly sometimes.  Life can be bad.  But life is also good.  We’ve got to learn how to handle the things we don’t particularly like but fall into our laps anyway.  You’re not alone if having a “‘nice day’ kind of life” isn’t your normal.  But, remember, we are all in this together.

Shower Epiphany

My husband sometimes tells me my showers are too long and too hot.  He’s right.  But a lot of my most powerful pondering happens when I’m showering (maybe because I’m quiet?) and I tell him my shower epiphanies are worth a slightly higher water bill ;)

Today’s shower epiphany almost knocked me over (and not just because showers can be slippery!).  It’s been four years since my son told me he wasn’t going to serve a mission and that he had questions about the church and his testimony.  Since that time his younger brother has followed the same path.

I have spent the last four years trying to figure out how to make this situation better, how to really turn it over to the Lord.  This morning, in the shower, it dawned on me that my big road block in knowing my part in all of this is a lack of believing that I really could have done everything in my power to do and it could still turn out this way; a lack of willingness to really let go of my own plans and expectations; essentially, a lack of really trusting the Lord.

Where do our beliefs come from?  The things we think over and over.  What do you believe about your own situation?