Ever have one of those day, or weeks, or years even that are just "lemons?" As moms, we have so many responsibilities. We are supposed to be strong women that are able to play the role of wife, mother, sister, daughter and friend. With these roles, come all sorts of responsibilities. Sometimes they can be overwhelming, and sometimes we feel like we can never measure up. The problem is that we always try to measure up to the "mom at church that walks in 10 min early, 6 kids dressed to the 'T,' they all stay quiet with no bribery snacks or toys, they are the first one to show up with a casserole when needed, the first one to volunteer for the community bake sale..." I could go on and on. What we don't see are behind the scenes. We do not know what her weaknesses are. We just see all of her strengths. This same woman that we envy may just be looking at us the same way. We may have a strength or a talent that she wishes she could have. We are comparing our weaknesses to someone else's strengths, and that is not fair to our self-esteem.
So, I want to know how you all make lemonade out of the lemons you are dealt in life.
How do you keep your sanity?
How do you relax?
How do you convince yourself you are a beautiful daughter of God with the most divine role in this life?
What do you do for fun when you have time alone?
The Six "Be's"- Gordon B. Hinckley
Saturday, June 27, 2009
How to Make Lemonade out of Lemons
Posted by Alisa at 12:43 PM
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Good questions Alisa! I am interested to see what other people say. I could talk forever about this, but here are two most important ways for me to keep my sanity:
1. HIRE someone to clean your house every once in awhile. It is worth sacrificing going out to eat or wherever you spend your extra $$. Then you can focus on what is more important: teaching and playing with your kids, quality time with your husband, and quality time to yourself! And it makes my home feel more like a sanctuary from the chaos of the world.
One thing I've done that is cheaper is hire a babysitter to watch my kids while I clean! Not as fun, but it works.
2. have regular date nights with my husband and time with my girlfriends (no kids). Then I come back to my kids refreshed and ready to face whatever they throw at me (you know like applesauce, green beans, and tantrums). I have also left my kids with my parents or in-laws overnight before and it was SO rejuvenating. When I came back I was a much more patient mom. I highly recommend it. :) If both sets of grandparents didn't live in different countries, I would do it more often.
Really great post Alisa!
First thing I thought about was an example a sister in the RS presidency gave during one of my recent lessons. It was right after the RS stake conference (some of us remember how sad and what a big downer the friday night session was...) Well that next Sunday I don't remeber the topic but it was along these lines of seeing the perfect mom, wife, ect... and trying to measure up. This sister shared with us that another sister in our stake had before the conference started seen this beautiful young wife, dreesed to the 'T' and pregnant. She thought to her self how she wished she looked like her any day, let alone a day while pregnant. This sister compared herself to this young, beautiful sister. Envious, seeing only her strengths...then this young sister was introduced to speak about her grief and loss of her small daughter (around 18months old) who had drowned the previous summer. That's when this sister had a realization of what a scewed perscpective she could have. One moment being envious and wishing to change places with another sister to only find out she would NEVER want to walk in her shoes. Even if they were the best looking shoes in the room.
How do we convince ourselves and really not convince ourselves but KNOW that we are each beautiful and endowed, powerful, invaluable daughters of God?
I don't know if I can give the answer but I think the best I have found for myself is trying to keep a perspective of my own strengths. For example (I am sorry this is a really lame example!) The other day while at the gym taking a class I was looking at these girls and thinking to myself..."Gosh she is so fit!" "Man, I want her legs!!" "I can't believe she has a 6-pack!! WOW!" Then I stopped and I thought..."Hmmmm... maybe they are think the same about me?" Not that I have a 6 pack or anything ;)but that maybe digging deaper they see some other strength of mine and think to themselves "Geez, look at her!" My point...by stopping and remembering I have some strength too I was no longer envious or comparing myself. Change your prescpective. Refocus on strength instead of weakness.
As for sanity, relaxation, and time alone....Time outside the home WITHOUT kids is always great! Just like Natalie said! I do have to addmit after this crazy week...and I have thought a lot about this the last few months but it is just impossible for each of us to DO, HAVE, or BE IT ALL! And that is life and you know what that's the way it should be. It's okay too. I need to remember that more often! I try to do too many things...
I love the thoughts that all of you have shared! It's so nice to know that we aren't alone. It's too easy to compare ourselves to each other, not realizing what's really going on "behind the scenes". I heard a talk once (can't remember who or where) about how, if we had a choice, we would never trade our own trials for those of someone else. No matter how bad we think what we are going through is, if Heavenly Father came to us and said "Okay, well if you don't like Trial "A" then here's Trial "B". Would you like that one instead?" We would all say no, because the alternative really wouldn't be any better. It seems like our individual situations/trials really are tailor-made to help us grow as daughters of God and if we chose a different situation we wouldn't learn what we are supposed to from our journey here on earth. Of course, that doesn't make it any easier when we realize that. It just makes it seem a bit more worth it.
As far as relaxing, I enjoy spending time with my husband without our kids and also taking my parents up on their offers to babysit for us. We live further away now so the opportunities aren't as frequent, but I really feel refreshed afterwards. I also love to read, so escaping into a novel really helps me step away from my own life for a bit and relax. I belong to a book club and I love getting together with the other moms to discuss our monthly book that we've all read. It also helps me keep my brain from turning into mush. LOL
I've noticed too that when I make a habit of saying my prayers daily and reading from the scriptures each day I feel more relaxed about difficulties that arise. I'm not good about doing this consistently though and I really can tell a difference when I forget.
It's hard to do, but I also try to remind myself that Heavenly Father blessed me with my particular children and that in spite of my weaknesses, He felt that I was the best person to be their mother. Telling myself that helps me to keep things in perspective.
Post a Comment