Tag: guilt

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Finding Joy

It’s been a week since I started this challenge of vulnerability.  My therapist says that I have vulnerability issues.  I laughed when she said that.  I laughed because it was one of those moments when your life is completely shaken by one simple observation.  One simple observation that explains a thousand moments of stress and regret.  I have a hard time being vulnerable.  But then again, who doesn’t?

We are living in front of screens and not people.  We are texting and not talking.  We are listening to podcasts and not to people.  And everything we consume appears perfect.  Perfectly dressed, perfectly posed, perfectly lit, perfectly photo-shopped and perfectly captioned with the perfect #Hashtag.   And I’m guilty.  I’ve tried so hard to keep up.  To fit in online.  To get more likes or comments.

The night my therapist told me I have vulnerability issues I went on a walk.  I decided to listen to a podcast during my walk and absolutely by chance clicked on a podcast conversation between Oprah and Brene Brown.  Just so happens Brene Brown was talking to Oprah about vulnerability.  It was a God moment for me.  How could the conversation with my therapist and my random choice of podcast be a coincidence?  I had something to learn and I could have walked for hours listening to the knowledge of this woman who also struggles with vulnerability.  And here’s what I learned.  Without vulnerability we have no authenticity, no creativity and make it explicitly difficult to ever really truly feel joy.

What does vulnerability have to do with joy you ask?  Well, if I build-up my walls to avoid feeling bad feelings (shame, guilt, fear, disappointment, regret etc.) how do good feelings make it through the walls?  It makes fundamental sense that you can’t isolate out the bad and only feel the good.  If I’m not willing to lean-in to the bad, I can’t lean-in to the good.  And I can admit that I don’t often feel joy.  Because I’m not sure how to lean-in to those moments.

Long-story short it came down practicing creativity creates comfort-ability with vulnerability, which in turn will lead to a more authentic state of self.  That’s where I’m headed.  So I’m writing, using my creativity and putting it out there.  Opening myself up and being vulnerable in the search for true, genuine and pro-longed moments of joy.

 

 

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Finding Forward

Finding Forward is a little snip-it from a sermon I recently listened to.  Long-story short, it was a one-liner that I really like and stuck with me.  Who am I?  Where am I going?  What is God calling me towards? How do I want to be remembered? Those questions are so heavy and day-to-day feel impossible to answer.

Since adopting my 3 kids and having a really insane identity crisis I have been trying to find my forward.  I’m still searching.  I re-pierced my nose and bought some Adidas sneakers.  I lost a bunch of weight….I re-gained a bunch of weight.  Ok, not a bunch but some.  It’s still up for debate as to how much weight has or hasn’t been re-gained.  I started intentionally dating friends, got 2 3 guinea pigs, bought 1 really expensive champagne glass, started taking voice lessons, and I’m clipping my toe nails more frequently than ever before.

Part of my crisis after becoming an instant mother of 3 was feeling like who I was as an individual had been completely lost.  I wasn’t cool anymore, I was just a mom and being a mom isn’t sexy.  Us moms drive minivans filled with literal garbage.  It’s sad …… and quite frankly, disgusting.  The other part of my crisis was the guilt I had over motherhood not being enough for me.  It’s just not, and I thought I was the only one.  I thought it was because I had adopted instead of having shot babies out from between my thighs that I was missing that beautiful euphoria a mother shares with her children.  But that theory is crap.  Motherhood is lonely, for everyone.

I see a lot of you out there and just like me you’re trying to find your sexy.  It’s why we are all taking weird selfies of ourselves.  Why we’ve succumbed to wearing skinny jeans that uncomfortably hug all of our imperfections.  We are essentially in adult-onset puberty.  Doing really weird things that we will look back on in 20 years and feel creeped out by.

Welcome to being a woman.  Who also happens to be a mom.  In a man’s world.  Where you drive around in garbage.