Who Would You Be If You Weren’t This Mother and This Wife?
As a middle age mother, you’ve navigated the baby stages of one or multiple kids and even survived the toddler years, although with a mind and body feeling a bit worse for wear.
Just when you start to glimpse the light at the end of the tunnel, you hear that nagging voice inside your brain telling you that you were made for something more in life than folding laundry and shuttling kids around.
Do you ever feel that something is missing in your life?
Do you sense that you have more potential to share with the world?
Do you feel that perhaps you are living your life reactively, without listening to what it’s trying to tell you, simply because it’s easier and safer that way?
Deep down, you know you’ve got more to offer. You just don’t know what it is and how to go about it.
Well, welcome to the club, sister!
Hence the question:
Who would you be if you weren’t this mother and this wife?
And, I am not saying a mother or a wife. I am saying this specific mother and wife that you are, which is different from any other mother and wife.
Is this an easy answer for you, or is it a million-dollar question that requires a sabbatical retreat in a Tibetan monastery?
What would your life look like if you weren’t a wife, a mother, and were free from all the societal influences and expectations?
If you were to ask me this question last year, I would have panicked.
I’ve been trying to figure this out for the last six years with little success.
Why six years, you may ask?
Because that’s when I quit my career as an Interior Designer in the corporate world to put myself at my family’s service.
While I was still working, I never asked myself who would I be if I weren’t this mother and this wife. I didn’t have time to think about it. Or perhaps, I felt that I was fulfilled and that I was living the dream…Perfect family, dream job.
Until everything fell apart.
And that was my mind. That perfect lifestyle our society portrays for women is a lie (at least for most of us).
As they say, life is a journey.
I’ve been on a six-years journey to unravel the false believes and constructs of a lifetime.
Therapy is wonderful, but not that effective if you don’t put in a lot of hard work yourself.
I am lucky that I love to read, and I was able to pore over many books (some audible ones during commutes and long weekend drives) that have tremendously helped me grow personally, and understand more about myself.
Trust me, they were not all boring personal growth books. I’ve read some amazing fiction imbued with some incredible wisdom I absolutely loved, and brought me to tears. I cried not because the plot was sad, but because I recognized myself in the words of the author.
[If you are interested in a book club for middle aged mothers, clink the link below. I have some interesting and inspiring reads to share and discuss with you!]
You may think that contemplating what a woman could be if she weren’t solely defined by her roles as a mother and a wife is a luxury not every woman can afford, especially when some are stretched thin trying to make ends meet and caring for their family. True.
It’s truly remarkable what mothers do for their families.
Describing it without resorting to a mere list of tasks is challenging.
In addition to holding down a full time job, (whether that’s employment outside the home, working from home, or managing a personal business for 40-60 hours a week), there is the role of Family Goddess. This entails utilizing one’s full mental capacity to coordinate myriad activities: managing the household, overseeing children’s education, arranging extra-curricular activities, maintaining both kids’ and one’s social lives, planning vacations, caring for pets (including whatever other emotional support animal your kids convinced you to adopt), handling children’s emotional crisis, addressing aging parents’ needs, managing personal health concerns, maintaining a personal healthy lifestyle so you don’t loose it on everyone else, and nurturing a positive and spicy relationship with one’s spouse, and the list goes on…
Post and quote credit: @thepurdywoman
This is just the scheduling aspects mothers deals with on a daily basis.
Hold on a second!
I think one of the biggest challenges for mothers and wives is that they become so accustomed to putting everyone else’s needs first that they become desensitized to receiving thanks for all they do.
Before we even begin to ponder what might be missing in our lives, we should first ask ourselves: Does my family even notice and appreciate everything I do??? Never mind what else might be missing! How about a simple “Thank You”?
Look, I am not claiming to have the answer to the question many middle aged-mothers ask themselves: “I gave my all to my family, but something still feels missing. What is it?”
What I’m here to convey is that you’re not alone. Like you, many women don’t feel fully accomplished or satisfied. But there’s time to figure it out. The most important thing is to recognize that something is missing and that you want to find it. It may take a while to uncover it, but the journey is often more exciting than the destination itself.
I give it to you, this is one of the hardest questions one can ask to mothers.
It’s almost impossible to find the answer without living different lives.
But we only have one.
Perhaps we need to start by acknowledging that instead of always having to feel #grateful and #blessed, (enough with the toxic positivity, already!), we need that gratitude directed towards us for everything we always do unconditionally.
Even though you might have all the resolve in the world to figure out what would fulfill that missing void in your life, as a mother, especially middle mother, you are constantly pulled away from your focus because of the many needs you respond to.
Your role seems to be prioritizing others, sacrificing yourself and your needs, let alone figuring out what’s missing in your life.
But I beg you, don’t ignore that voice inside.
The answer might be simpler than you think. It could be as easy as to receive appreciation for what you do on a daily basis that makes you realize that you really love what you do, and that there is purpose in what you are doing.
I can’t tell you how to figure out who would you be if you weren’t this mother and this wife.
No one can.
Only you can figure it out.
And it is going to take time and hard work.
The hardest part is to have enough will to put the work in to figure it out.
If you have that will, you will create that time to do it.
Start by giving yourself time alone in silence to think. That’s hard enough, trust me!
Whether I’ve truly figured it out or not, the most important thing is that I have an answer to the question that satisfies me. But mostly, I don’t feel the need to even ask that question anymore.
I no longer sense the void in my life I was feeling before embarking on the journey to discover what was missing.
I know that because I see it in the things that make me happy on a daily basis.
I am going to leave you with this quote from the book “The Whispers” by Ashley Audrain.
It’s a fantastic book that has inspired me on so many levels.
I often wish that I were older to have the wisdom to discern what truly matters and to cherish and treasure those things in life.
"But these mothers are all busy, she knows. Too much going on and yet nothing going on at all, creating urgency where there is none, rushing their lives away. They don't know how to just be. They make no time to think about what's right there in front of them"
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❤️ Just breathe and love deeply – your family, your friends AND YOURSELF ❤️ Accept thanks, accept help and accept compliments ❤️ Oh . . . and keep planting/gardening ❤️ I am personally so glad our paths have crossed xo