All the Tools
We have been given all the tools.
Print by Molly Costello
Learning to use them is the work of a lifetime. And it's a choice, every day.
Sometimes, this looks like sitting on the couch or at the kitchen table at night, unexpected conversations arising, conversations you could only have hoped to have with your daughter who came through you but is fully her own person and always has been.
It looks like listening and sitting for stretches of silence, so often not knowing what to say yet having a head and heart full of thoughts and non-thoughts.
It looks like knowing that it's not about having the right thing to say, knowing that there is no beautifully written script and if only you knew the lines, somehow you'd be a better mother.
It looks like letting go of being better and instead being as honest and true and present as possible, unafraid to acknowledge the places you wish you'd done things differently without succumbing to the temptation of self-criticism.
It looks like naming the hurt places and letting this be part of the healing.
It looks like having all of your feelings, the sweet, the bittersweet, the bitter, too.
It looks like change. It looks like growth. It looks like love in real time, always unfolding and becoming and transforming and evolving.
So often, I feel like I'm missing some essential tools. I wonder where is the manual, where is that wisdom I'm supposed to have by now?
But then I remember that it was never my job to make sure they are happy. It was my job to make sure they are kind, self-aware, thoughtful, conscientious, caring, and creative in their own unique ways.
The best tool I have for teaching these things is to do my own work. To model what I can, to admit what I don't know, to apologize for my mistakes, and to encourage them to become their best selves, with all of the grace that requires.
”We have been given all the tools” doesn't mean we are familiar with all of them yet. Keep reaching in and reaching out and letting yourself receive as much as you give.