mother earthly......

my head has been chock full these last 24 hours/ always about thoughts on this thing called the motherhood. if you are one, you know what i'm talking about. these intense feelings of love and connection deeper and more real than you knew existed. and this constant struggle to find a contented balance for your family. in a culture that thinks there are black and white answers to all questions, we live in a constant gray area as mothers. the real juggling act i do is not running the errands and taking the kids to activities and doctors and all of that worldly stuff, it is the other side. the earthly side that keeps the balls constantly in the air. by worldly i mean the list of to-do's, the intellectual side of running a family. the working out of equations in our head as if our kids or families are math problems to solve. i was never good at math. by earthly i mean the bigger picture. the core essential truth that all of the to-dos don't amount to much. the details of the day that inundate us and perplex us are not the core of what we are grappling with. as mothers we grapple, whether aware or not, with much bigger issues. the juggling and balancing act i do is one of planets. we are a "four family" to quote georgia, and as the mother it is my job to gently wrap these four planets in my earthly understanding of what we all need and want and create a sense of unity and whole balance where all of our highest goods are being served. no pressure. it becomes the most scary and tricky and beautiful and awe-inspiring when one of our four planets orbits away from the established balance. at this point it becomes my duty to first recognize the shift and imbalance. evaluate and acknowledge what is and is not working for this planet and our solar system as a whole. and to gently either realign the outward orbiting planet back to the solar system, or recognize that the planet is not the one off balance, and lovingly shift the solar system to regain balance as a whole. no biggie. :-) these sorts of shifts can come a few times a year, or a few times a day. a mother must always have her eyes and heart open and aware to the fact that our worldly decisions will never stand up against our families earthly truths, even when we think they should.

i didn't come to this awareness of motherhood right off the bat, although i'd love to pretend i did. it is an ongoing evolution of figuring out what has worked and what has not. usually what has not. what does not. i am the queen of looking at the big and small pictures and problem solving my way through a difficult time. managing time, daily tasks, and the people around me. tending to details and making sure all is where it "should" be. one annoying and invaluable lesson the motherhood has given me is the understanding that sometimes all of the pieces are in place, all of the details are tended to, and everyone has what they "should" need. and it still doesn't work. i can't make it work. that really sucks. i've always been a strong and wise woman that could tap into my worldly and earthly sides and find a solution to each problem. ...until i became a mother. i find more and more that to get to our solar systems highest good i have to shut out the white noise, let the worldly fall away, and focus on the earthly balance. when i have allowed myself to do this my family has benefited immeasurably. the more i see this and feel this the easier it becomes to tap into those core truths and keep us in planetary alignment. i'm sure that by the time i have it down, they will be ready to fly the solar system and find their own planets to orbit with. i take comfort in knowing that this four family will always share a universe.