Do you feel the constant pressure to be “Mom of the Year?” I’ve wrestled with this expectation. An expectation that I have always thought others placed on me, but recently realized it is something that I place on myself.
Part of it is the mommy guilt, and I need to remind myself that no person can be everything to everyone every second of every day. I recently heard a speaker that said there are three things that we should never place our own thoughts of self on: the fickle opinions of others, faulty comparisons of selves, and the fragile choices of our kids. Yet, a lot of us place our opinions on these items regularly. To deal with guilt, you need to think about whether they come from unrealistic expectations of ourselves, or if we might be able to make changes that can make the situation better. When our expectations are unreasonable we need to let them go.
A good way to stay grounded is by having some “me” time. It helps to maintain the balance and not lose yourself in the running of your family, I recently got a lot of “me” time to think about how my life is balanced. As part of this, I realized I like to go overboard sometimes. I volunteer at school four days a week, work from home, give extravagant parties, and more.
During my time off I learned that I need to let go. Part of letting go means that I need to scale some stuff back. In my instance, I learned that a simple birthday comes off the same to my son as an elaborate one. I think this applies to a lot of things I do. I am learning to take a step back and look at how and why I do things.
The biggest lesson of mine is that I am “Mom of the Year” to my kids and truly that is all that matters!
How do you go overboard?
Kim Ross also writes at A Little Bit of This and That ~ The Adventures of a Stay at Home Mom.
