Who I Am, Not What I Do

We, as human beings (and especially woman) put so much pressure on ourselves. We judge ourselves relentlessly. We would never say the things we say to ourselves to our friends, or family. But yet, we do it to ourselves.

I have a running to do list on my phone and it is overflowing with things to do. I have each item listed into a category "Home" "My doTERRA business" "My Mentoring Business" "Primary President". Sometimes I crawl into bed at night and look over my list and find myself gaging my day on how many things I checked off. If all the boxes are checked then I am one hot mama, if there are still some left, I grudgingly move their to-do date to the next day and chalk it up to I am just not good enough.

I am beginning to realize that while I mistakenly wait for perfection from each day I am missing the little nuggets of cuteness and happiness. The older I get (did you hear that hair just turn grey??) the more I realize that happiness in life should never be judged by what we DO, but what we ARE and what we are fighting each day to become. The more I let life play out how it will and take the lessons I am suppose to learn from it, the happier I am. The more joy I am able to experience and the more memories I will create to draw upon when my children are grown and gone (Kylee only has 5 years left before she could move out (((gasp)))))))!!

Sometimes I forget that I chose each one of these jobs I do (well, I thought about saying no to the Primary President thing but my Mama taught me better than that). I choose each one, to have a family, to work at something I am passionate about because I know it is right. I know that if I can be connected to things that are bigger than me that I can find JOY and purpose. I need to be better at filtering through the stuff I have to DO and look deeper at the person that I AM, and the people my children are becoming. Each day is riddled with imperfection...but that is why it is so amazing.

Wanna know some of my nuggets of JOY????

This picture will bring a smile to my face every time, first of all because how happy my Tyler looks and how fancy free the dogs look as the cool, spring air blows through their hair. The imperfections that you can't see is that the dogs have needed hair cuts for a month now and I am too cheap to pay for it, but keep forgetting to do it.

I think the reason why Charlie (Gandolf the Grey) loved his head out the window was because the wind blew his overgrown hair out of his eyes and he could see the world. AND Dalin was right behind me in his car seat with a full bag of licorice, chowing down. He had taken a late nap and was sooooo grumpy and screaming at me the whole way to pick Tyler up from a party. He stopped crying as soon as I threw gently placed the bag of licorice in his lap. And that was licorice I wasn't even suppose to have cause I was trying to not eat sugar Mon-Friday's. But all of that melted away when I opened this picture up when we got home.

This little nugget was priceless. I was trying to give the house a quick clean before I went for a jog this morning but Dalin begged me to take pictures of him, so we sat down on the stairs together and took silly pictures and videos.

If I had brushed this little curtain-climber off for the sake of a clean house (clean for 5 minutes before he destroyed it again) I would have forgotten that he will be 4 in August and in a few short months I will never have a 3 year old in my house again. He will start pronouncing words correctly and my ears will never get the pleasure of hearing words like "cycle bus" for motorcycle and "wick-wiss" for licorice (which, by the way he ate half the bag...oi).

Where do I begin with this atrocity beautiful little nugget of a photo? (don't ask what I am doing here, I don't know.) Sometimes the pressure and heavy load of being a mother paralyzes me with fear. This is becoming more and more of a reality as my Kylee outgrows me (her shoe size is already bigger than mine).  How am I suppose to help this beauty grow into a virtuous, responsible young woman? She reminds me all the time how hard it is to be the "guinea pig" of the family, as the oldest and to be the one that we make all the mistakes on.  But 75% of the pictures on my phone are like this, us being goofy together. She tells me about her day and what the boy she liked said to her. She tells me when she is in a fight with her BFF or when she got a bad grade. She knows I get her, that I respect her and trust her. The paralysis easily melts away when she grabs my shoulder to take another goofy pic. She likes me! I wouldn't go as far as saying she thinks I am cool, cause when I drop awesome, modern phrases on her like "I am totes jelly!" (google it if that looks like a foreign language) I get some pretty good eye rolls! There is a line you just can't cross.

And then there is this one! My girls are always trying to pull new funny faces, and then begging me, while they have their fingers stuffed up their noses to take a picture.

I was sitting on the couch the other day, trying to catch my breath between dinner clean up and night time jobs. I was tired and counting down the minutes to bed time when I looked up to these monsters...How do you not laugh at this? It immediately pulled me out of my bad mood and I of course had to pull the face myself...I have a picture to prove it, but you will never, ever see that picture because it would give you nightmares.

Oh- and the highlight of my day today was when my hubby let me go see a movie (Divergent)- BY MYSELF! Yes, I am the weirdo you see in the theatre sitting alone and you wonder if their date is just out getting popcorn or if they really are that pathetic. If you have never gone to a movie alone, I highly recommend it- it's fabulous...and you don't have to share you popcorn =)