March 13, 2014

Mind & Heart

My apologies for my absence. I am dealing with some private family issues, juggling a busy work schedule, and entertaining a blossoming baby, so finding time to write has hit the back burner. Life is always filled with these funny challenges sprinkled with lessons to be learned only in a future date. I love the challenge of being busy at work, especially with the projects I have been diving into. My creative mind is very much stimulated there. No one loves a family drama but they are inevitable and where some of life's greatest lessons can arise. It will pass they always do, thankfully.

Everyday I am thankful that I have such a beautiful nuclear family. Robert and I are in love with this wiggly scooting babbling clapping chewing monster of giggles and fun. We have created a little fish who LOVES swim class, music, and always laughs when she sees her daddy laugh. As I was hand washing dishes today (our dishwasher has quit) I meditated with soapy hands about how different my life is now that I am a mother. How different my passions, my fears, my strengths, my weaknesses are now. I have described motherhood as the most mentally challenging experience I have had, but what came to me through the bubbles today was how as a mother my mind has grown significantly stronger, yet my heart has gotten so much weaker. I have always worn my heart relatively on my sleeve. I have always felt compassion for others. I have always wept during a really good episode of Parenthood, but it is different now. I feel great pain when I hear of injustices done to children, an aching heart wrenching pain that makes me near sick. I question my ability and authority to be eating things such as veal and lamb (I am making a lamb stew for St. Patty's day and it is kind of haunting me). I sob during Parenthood now, I also sob through songs, the news, simple conversations, and books, both happy and sad tears. I am more sensitive about little things and find it is harder to shrug off certain shared words. I am more afraid than I ever was before. Constantly locking the door, my heart flutters when I pass a stranger in a remote location, and I often wake from nightmares. I find myself avoiding activities like hiking alone, that I used to do all the time. My mother says it is because now I have something to lose, and she is right I do.

I wonder if this is some sort of natural instinct? Do Mothers need a strong mind and a weak heart to be there for their children? Is my heart really weaker or am I just more in tuned with my emotions than before? Better yet am I just sleep deprived and all of this is a delusion? Have any of you had this same experience? Please share them with me.






As I proof read this I realized how unfair I am about assuming that the heart has become "weaker", as if sensitivity is a sure sign of weakness. My heart has grown softer, but my levels of compassion have grown stronger, my emotions are stronger, my ability to love is stronger. Therefore I should say that as a result of becoming a mother my heart has grown stronger, not weaker. Thank you beautiful daughter for sharing these gifts with me.