WHAT COMES AFTER THE HAPPILY EVER AFTER
WHEN YOU HAVE IT ALL AND WANT MORE?
“When something is missing in your life, it usually turns out to be someone.” Robert Brault
I’m not sure when I started to slip away, when I started to fade from my own life like the Kodachrome in an old photograph, but slip away I did. Perhaps it wasn’t motherhood that stole my existence. Perhaps I never really knew myself at all. I I didn’t see it then, we can’t really. I didn’t know my life wasn’t my own. I didn’t know with every step towards the life I thought I wanted, I became more of who the world expected me to be and less of who I actually was.
I was happy. But was I? Life was good. But was it? I was thankful, profoundly thankful for my beautiful family, for my beautiful life, but it wasn’t enough. I wanted more, I craved so much more. More what I didn’t know, I just knew that something was missing. I was unfinished.
I see it now, all the pieces of a “good woman” spread out on the table. Giver. Selfless. Generous. Serving. Silent. Invisible. Supportive. I arranged them like a puzzle, fitting good mother, next to doting daughter. Snapping fitness and faith, homemade Christmas cookies, and natural births next to clean countertops and well mannered children. Everything came together to create a beautiful picture of a beautiful life, and yet, right there, in the middle of it all was a gaping hole, a piece missing in a nearly completed puzzle. The picture didn’t feel complete because it wasn’t.
I was the missing piece..
Me, the heroine of my own tale had faded into the background. I become a supporting character instead of the lead, a chorus member instead of the star.
The world tells us good mothers are selfless, and so I became selfless, and lost myself.
The world tells us good wives are dependable, and so I became dependable, and lost my wild abandon.
The world tell us good women are silent, and so I became silent, and lost my voice.
We cannot assemble a beautiful life without all the pieces. We cannot write a thrilling life story without the main character.
"We cannot become the mothers we want to be while denying the women we are."
You can try, but you will fail, because you cannot create a whole life with half a heart.
I’ve spent the last 5 years writing myself back into the narrative. The more real, honest, and original I become, the better the story gets. I write a new, exciting chapter with every dragon I slay, every desire I chase, and every moment I allow myself to outgrow the one dimensional character I thought I had to be.
It turns out the more I was craving was more ME in my own life.
More honesty about who I really am.
More alignment with what I want.
More time and energy for what lights me up.
More nourishing my soul, more feeding my spirit, more space to just be.
Less doing, more being.
Less serving, more celebrating.
Less perfect, more honest.
I love my kids and I love motherhood. But now, I love me too. I don’t want to show my daughter that her worth lies in disappearing. I don’t want to teach my sons a woman’s only role is to serve and submit.
I am made for more than motherhood because I am more than mom. I am more than any role I fill. Today, I know the best gift I can give my family is my WHOLE self. Part mom, part woman, part me, a total picture.
Today I become the woman I want them to be.
Today I’ll know the more I give to myself, the more I overflow into my family.
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