Guilt

Guilt. The endless weight of guilt and regret. Should have, could have. Why did I? Why didn't I? How could I? Self-rejection and mental beatings, reaching, reaching, reaching for...for the impossible? For the vague but brightly illuminated expectations held ever in front of my mind's eye. All I should be and do. All I want to say and accomplish. Willing me toward more, toward better, toward a sleepless night of never enoughs. Marinating, even while I rest, in the heaviness of guilt.  

Lately, I find myself falling asleep in pools of guilt, finally slowing my mind enough to realize something about my day didn't quite align with my desires just as my head hits the pillow. Finally realizing that, yet again, I have fallen short of many of my expectations. I say to myself as I drift to sleep, "Tomorrow. Tomorrow I'll do better."  Parent better. Clean better. Multi-task better. Play better. Breathe better. Be better.

I plan on rising early to meditate and read, to focus my mind and heart on truth and love before the busyness of toddler-rearing and working-from-home begins. Some days I get that head start, but most days something goes wrong and I fall short before the sun even rises. My heart is racing and my muscles are tense even as I welcome just awakened little ones, the weight of all that pressure, all those expectations, all that guilt already burdening me. 

I yell too many times during the day. Sometimes I scream and cause tears and the most heart-wrenching frowny faces, that I want to rip my own tongue out. I grab wrists too tightly and I turn the TV on too often. I apologize for what seems like the thirtieth time in an hour, a constant model to my children of failing and I'm sorry's. I hear sweet, accepting, I forgive you's, but know deep down that I am not able to forgive myself. Not yet. Not now, in all this mess.

They say sociopaths don't experience guilt, that they are incapable of the moral compassing of shoulds and coulds that guide much of society. In this sense, I am thankful for my guilt. I am thankful for a built-in cue, signaling a misalignment between my actions or words and my values. I am thankful for awareness and empathy and a desire to match my life with what I believe to be truth. 

But what happens when our values are distorted? When our "truth" gets skewed into a variety of off-kilter expectations and endless quests for more, more, more? Self-imposed standards that, when dissected and exposed, are nothing short of impossible? No more sociopath talk here - nothing that extreme or obvious or menacingly wrong. Perhaps just as dangerous, yes, but much, much more subtle. Masked as goodness, as growth; masked as a desire to love more, listen more, do more, be more. Masked as our own inner drive toward wholeness, or rather, perhaps, toward perfection.

Some days feel like a broken record...

I'm sorry, Kyler.
I forgive you, mama. 
I'm sorry, Havyn.
I forgive you, mama.

But sorry is never enough, because the weight of the guilt just keeps piling and piling and causing me to crack again. Causing me to fall under the weight of it all, so that endlessly I am messing up, endlessly I am feeling guilty, endlessly I am exhausted by the never enoughs...and endlessly I am messing up again. I cannot break free long enough to feel cured, whole, forgiven. The more I mess up, the guiltier I feel. The more flaws in a day, the more self-mutilating I become. 

It is so cyclical, that I cannot help but wonder if it is the guilt that is partially responsible for the emotional mess I find myself in so many days. Sure, I need to be more patient and more attentive and more kind and more gentle and a million and one other mores. Yes I should pray more and trust more and...it all just becomes another list of mores. What about when I'm not more? What about right now? Could it be that the feeling of not enough is actually causing the most damage? Could it be that the weight of guilt from never quite living up to all these standards is the ultimate roadblock, the anchor tying me down to fatigue and failure?

I dream of life without regret, without the nightly ritual of falling to sleep with guilt and disappointment from another day of falling short. I wonder, what would life be like if I really and truly lived this word: Enough. What would it feel like to be content with my parenting and my home and my business and my faith? What would it feel like to live a whole day, not trying to accomplish or to improve, but just marinating in enough? 

For far too long, that has seemed like a distant dream. And perhaps I am being naive to think this, but it also seems like a lovely dream. It seems like a place of deep breaths and long embraces and full hearts. Where we try and fail, of course, but where failing is not followed by the noose of regret, but by the rope of hope. Where second chances are welcomed with open arms and somehow our souls are slippery enough that the guilt never sticks for long. Where freedom from not meeting our own expectations liberates us to a place of greater fulfillment and alignment with those very desires and dreams. Where we sleep deep, embrace our flawed selves and soar.

Today, may we find courage to whisper to the skies the boldest of all four letter words: "Help!". May we find wings to rise from all the expectations, finding freedom, finally, from the exhausting weight of guilt. 

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Mint, Blue & Purple Owl Birthday Party

Hard to believe we're already over halfway through 2014. What the heck!?  It's amazing how slowly an individual morning can go when I'm dealing with two fussy, defiant toddlers, trying to check a million to do's off my list, cook, clean...but then I blink, and six months have passed! And I would give anything to freeze some of those mornings in time, to capture them and live in them forever. 

You may be wondering why all the nostalgia or time-talk. Well, I'm about to share pictures from my kiddos' second and third birthday party...which happened back in March! I'm not sure how I left this on the to do list for so long since I'm normally anal about getting those crazy squares checked off as quickly as possible. Somehow it slipped, but was a special enough event that I couldn't let it go forever.

We had a low-key celebration this year, compared to years passed. Less friends, less decor and a much lower budget. We weren't even sure whether or not to do a party initially, thinking maybe it was better to cut the logistics and expense altogether for a year. But, in the end, I realized celebrations are in my nature and these are my babies who will only turn two and three once. So, party it was!!

I did vow early on not to make any new purchases for the party decor, which I faithfully stuck to. I looted my craft room and put together a theme based on cute little birthday owls in mint greens, blues and purples. I happened to have a ton of sheer mint green fabric left over from my daughter's nursery, so we were able to do a beautiful fabric bunting draping into a balloon chandelier. 

Cupcakes are a must for me because they are a great way to tie in a party's theme, and because I could eat cupcakes all day long! I made owl toppers and heart toppers, all with extra paper I had laying around the house. 

Since I was trying to keep costs low, I made my own cakepops! I kept them simple with white chocolate coating and mint polka dots. Our favors were a hodgepodge of leftover party favors from previous events, clearance halloween favors I had in storage and one bag of new candy. I loved being able to destash my party supply closet, while saving money!

I wrapped little juice boxes in the same coordinating owl paper, stamped owls on blue paper bags and embellished the water pitcher with ribbon and a mint heart. No new supplies were purchased in the making of these pieces (catching a theme?!).

 One of my favorite pieces was the mantle display, which included handmade pieces of art by the kids themselves! 

I always like to display the kids' scrapbooks at their birthday parties. This time around I made a simple "GROWING" banner and strung it between two bottles where their scrapbooks were. 

Happy Birthday, Kyler & Havyn! What a blessing it is to be your mama!

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Middle Places

Last weekend I was at a birthday lunch where I got into a conversation with extended family I had not seen for a while. The couple began asking me about our adoption journey, something they had heard about briefly from another family member. I have not advertised much about our recent walk back into the adoption world, guarding the facts in a very tender place of uncertainty and hope. 

So, a bit unpracticed, I began to share details of where we are currently in the process. I spoke about all the paperwork and finger printing and delays in translation. I told them about our referral, his age and name and what all the paperwork says about how he became an orphan. I showed them pictures of his sweet little face. Then I emphasized how tenuous international adoptions are, how quickly things can change in his country and thus, how loosely we are holding this specific referral. 

The conversation lasted twenty minutes or so, full of logistics and caveats and administrative details. Early the next morning, as I sat in stillness, the conversation played back through my mind and I felt myself watching the whole interaction as if I were a third party. I sensed my own guardedness, all the lack of emotion, and watched the flat routine of words coming from my lips. I was deeply struck with this distinct thought, “What would your words be if you were mindful of spirit?”

I saw in that moment how disconnected my words were from my heart; how often disconnected I am from spirit. I grimaced at the appearance of more facades, more formalities, more living from the surface. Despite all the becoming, all the spirituality, all the writing and creating and talking of depth, I saw how often my life is lived in the wading of shallow waters. How routinely I stick to routine, checking off my lists, thoughtlessly encountering each moment. 

This mantra began to resonate within me, “Mind your spirit.” I sat with it and felt the weight of knowing, the longing to undo so many days, so many words, so much life that continually slips through my fingers as I exist in a half-awake state. Greeting a friend, but forgetting the embrace, forgetting to stop and really see her. Smiling at the cashier, but only out of habit, distracted by kicking legs and yelling lips and long lists and what Jane is doing at cash register five. Looking up from the computer when husband gets home, but only for a moment - not nearly long enough for all his effort, all his support, all his love. 

My mind jumps from one missed opportunity to the next and at first I slip into a downward spiral of self-loathing. I anticipate the regret, the guilt, the burden of not doing more, saying more, being more. I fight the current of thoughts and feelings, willing myself back to steady ground. But, then I remind myself that the guilt alone is not the enemy. That, in fact, girded with self-love, regret and guilt can guide me back to what I value most. That if I listen, calmed by self-acceptance, they will be my flags home, highlighting a part of my soul that needs my attention, my love - not my dismay or disgust. 

So, this time, instead of running or wallowing, I listen to the message. I write on my arm for the day, “Mind your spirit.” My son, Kyler, notices it first and reprimands me for drawing on myself. I acknowledge the discrepancy, pleading adult know-how as my excuse. Moments later, he comes back with full sleeves drawn up both arms in blue and green and black marker, “notes like mama.” He says, his message reads, “Vacation was nice.” 

Even with my new ink, I struggle to remain aware of my spirit throughout the day, to stay awake to soul in the mundane moments of making lunch and straightening house and wiping bottoms. I try to listen more fully, look more intently. I struggle and most often, I fail. By the end of the day, my penned message has smudged and faded, much like my will.

I tell myself not to despair. I will pen messages on my arms for years to come and end many of those days with faded ink and faded will. I relate to author Anne Lamott’s words from her book, Stitches:
                    "We try to be more present and less petty. Some days go better than others.                 
                     We look for solace in nature and art and maybe, if we are lucky, the quiet 
                     satisfaction of our home.” 

I know it’s not in me to give up, and yet I get so discouraged and so stuck sometimes. I get so lost in the hum-drum of life, the lists, the routines, the empty smiles and shallow greetings. I will for more than failed attempts and missed opportunities.

In the days that follow, I retrace my temporary tattoo multiple times so that it remains legible, an ever-present reminder: Mind your spirit. I oscillate between optimistic effort and frustrated encounters, between hopeful thinking and discouraged being. The past continues to carry regret, so that only in looking ahead can I remain completely positive. I will the ink, the words and their meaning, to sink into my veins and become a part of me. To take on a life of their own and animate my being. I want to be better at all of this now - fully engaged every moment, complete, whole, authentic - now. I want to love better today. 

I am reminded of one of my favorite author’s, Sue Monk Kidd, who penned an entire book about her own journey of rushing spirituality. In, When the Heart Waits, she writes: 
                      "A lot of us have spent our lives in shortcut religion. We haven’t been willing 
                       to face the fact that while the spiritual journey is joyous and full, it’s also long 
                       and hard. It asks much - too much sometimes.” 
Her words continue to resonate inside of me, reminding me both to look to my fellow travelers, to know that I am not alone, and to honor the lifelong process of becoming. 

Later in the same book, Kidd writes:

                     "We seem to have focused so much on exuberant beginnings and victorious 
                      endings that we’ve forgotten about the slow, sometimes tortuous, unraveling 
                      of God’s grace that takes place in the “middle places”.” 
So much of life for me has been a “middle place” - a place of waiting, of groaning, of becoming and growing. Much less glory and exuberance than in my dreams. Perhaps that is, in fact, life for all of us. But, oh, how I have wrestled and writhed and struggled with all that I am to run to the end or dive into another beginning. How I have hated the “middle places”, despised the slow and steady processes of becoming.  

Today, I can look at my day and make another list full of things to regret and imperfections to perfect. Words spoken too harshly, embraces let go too soon, majoring on all the minors and the mundane, checking lists off rather than checking in with spirit. I can see my shortcomings well and feel the longing within for more. But, feebly, failingly, ferociously, I trust in the “middle place”. I remind myself, over and over and over again, that the process is life. That the middle is where I belong, where I most want to be.

Tomorrow, I’ll be minding my spirit, failing, forgetting, trying again the next day, for endless tomorrows. There’s no glory in the messing up, I know. No fireworks or rounds of applause. No fairy tale endings and neatly wrapped boxes. No grand entrances or encore performances. Just a slow and steady unraveling of God’s grace. 

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