In Cheryl Richardson’s recent newsletter she wrote that you know you are doing a good job mothering yourself when:
- You stop making excuses for doing what you want to do. You let your desire be enough.
- You choose to disappoint someone else now and then instead of disappointing yourself.
- You tell yourself, “I love you,” on a regular basis so that you start to believe it deep in your bones.
- You feed yourself.
- You ask for what you want directly rather than beat around the bush.
- You stop pretending everything’s okay when it’s not. You tell the truth.
- You speak up when you have something to say even if you might not say it well.
- You no longer defend, debate, or over explain your decisions. You trust your choices and you let your inner guidance run the show.
I sort of sigh a deep Amen to all the above. I am trying to do at least one thing for me each week which really honors the Jennifer I am and have always been. Last week it was making time to see my friend Caroline one night. We talked for 3 hours, and it still wasn’t enough! This weekend I am meeting my friend Laurel for iced tea near her weekend home. I got tickets for Pippin, the Broadway musical I saw in the first grade. Way too racy for me then, but I loved it, and the score, and I really just want to re-experience it. Fotis saw how into the revival I am and is going along, even if he really, very much, does not like Broadway musicals — at all.
I want to go to China, if only for the longest weekend that ever was. See Beijing, Shanghai, and the Great Wall. The tickets are the same cost as going to Paris or to Rome. So, why not? I want to honor the urges as much as possible. To be alive. To speak up. To exist. To, as hokey as it sounds, do the bucket list as it’s in formation. Even if it changes, to keep on being aware of what it even is.
Diane Conway wrote a book called What Would You Do If You Had No Fear? I am dipping in. I like how provocative she is, really pulling at you to dare to ask.
What would you do?
