I haven’t blogged in a couple of weeks and when my husband asked me why I despondently said, “Because I don’t feel like I’ve made any progress.” My career-oriented mind tells me that it’s all about where I’m going and my success is measured by my progress; and progress should be swift and distinguishable. In the work world my goal was to constantly advance my department and set it apart with a competitive edge—that’s how I measured success and that’s how my success was evaluated. In my new world success and progress are on two different planes, they don’t seem to go hand in hand, and they don’t seem to measure my performance and there is no competitive edge I’m claiming stake to. Retraining my brain has proved itself a worthy opponent.
When I first began blogging about the unpredicted struggles I’ve encountered within the transition from breadwinner to bread maker—my vision for blogging was to illustrate my progress and eventually end up in a place called “success”. Blogging was an opportunity for me to express my internal struggle, hopefully help someone else along the way, and when I got to success I would have this stay at home wife and mom thing all figured out. I expected it to be swift and distinguishable—just like in my previous world.
But this journey to re-identify, give meaning, accept my value, and find my purpose as a stay at home wife and mother has been quite the challenge and the exact opposite of swift and distinguishable. Many of my friends have encouraged me by saying that over time I will find the natural rhythm of staying home. I (without foundation) disregarded their wisdom, and being the type A personality I am, decided I didn’t want to just wait it out; I wanted to aggressively and forcefully find success as a stay at homer. In case you’re wondering, the fact I haven’t blogged in a couple of weeks is proof that audaciously seeking it out has not worked how I intended! However, I have noticed some slight and subtle changes lately.
Previously I felt that if I wasn’t advancing, I was losing. If every day wasn’t gradually getting better than the previous, I was not moving towards success. In work world if you aren’t advancing, you will be replaced by someone who is—there is no grace. So in my new world, I imparted no grace to myself and when I couldn’t quantify daily achievement, I gave myself an F for that day. After months of failing grades, I was wallowing in self pity. As recent as the last week I have noticed that I am allowing God’s grace to be sufficient and I am grasping the concept that every day is not going to be better than the previous. Although I haven’t completely abandoned the fallacious mind set from my work world, I am enjoying the freshness of leniency that I’ve recently permitted. It’s ok and, might I dare say normal, if today isn’t as good as yesterday; if it feels like two steps forward and three steps backwards. Life in the home world is measured on a different scale than work world—I still don’t know exactly how it is measured, but I know it’s not calculated the same as Corporate America. Perhaps it’s measured by the small and succinct growth of my children. I felt incredibly proud of my preschooler this morning when I witnessed him sneeze, pick a tissue from the box off the coffee table, and discard his tissue in the trash—all without a peep from me. And perhaps my wise friends were right—it will come; the natural rhythm of staying at home will come—and the process of getting there is just as important as the getting there.
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