Dear Children: This Life is Messy

Dear Children,

 

Yes, this life is messy.

 

One moment you’re getting a gold star for helping your teacher, the next your heart is breaking because your only friend chose someone else for their birthday ring.

 

Yes, crap is hard. I know.

 

And, I know that the books tell you how the hard moments are supposed to make you stronger but gosh, that doesn’t make the pain easier to bear. Right? I know.

 

The little things ARE the big things. They leave a dent, a mark, a stain that you have to live with long after the fall. Right? I know.

 

But, here’s the thing:

I’ll tell you what my own mother taught (not told) me: this life IS indeed messy but it is in that exact messiness that you will find your own unique talents, gifts, strengths. Those moments will reveal to you a survival kit of wisdom that you did not even know came standard with your model.

 

So yes, the “grown ups” around you may not have all the answers you seek, but you do happen to have front row seats to the messiness that is their lives and I assure you, you will learn simply by watching.
Aluta Continua, as they say. This life is indeed messy, but that’s how the rainbows reveal themselves. And rainbows are all around. I know. 

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2017  Full copyright and all media rights reserved.

 

(And “grown ups”, we ALL need reminding now and then that we cannot (unfortunately) teach our children that which we are not living every day. Those little eyes and ears are learning everything about this life from watching us. Horror! But yes, that’s a story for another day…The only thing we can do is live honestly, authentically, transparently however “messy” that happens to be)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reflections on Mama Karma through 3 generations

 

My daughter is beginning to get embarrassed by me. Not by anything I do/say/wear or how I use my hands to eat. Just ME. The whole package. Even when I am silent and using a knife and fork to eat pizza.

 

There’s a blush beginning to develop. A very faint pink flush but it’s there all right. It’s there and I know it well.

 

From experience.

 

It really brings into focus my relationship with my own mother, who was a non-conformist of note. And while I can be a real people-pleaser, never wanting to cause any waves, she was very much the opposite.  

 

She would embarrass me constantly too. Not by anything she did/said/wore (well sometimes the Converse trainers and expletives were a bit much) or how she smoked with the young girls while her peers drank tea in a circle saying the rosary. No, just by being herself. 

 

And history will judge us both.

 

Me for being me, slightly too teacher’s pet, always wondering how I can change/ tone down/conform.

 

And her for daring to stand out.

 

As for my daughter, the blush still needs to mature to a deep red, I’m afraid. I mean, what’s a childhood if not filled with cringe worthy moments unwittingly created by our parents? That’s karma right?

 

Hopefully by the time my sweet girl becomes an adult, her reflections and experience of the “blush”, will guide her to a place where she too can just BE. You know, just be herself, with the full appreciation that we are all different, all the same….and that’s wonderful.

 

Now shhhh, don’t tell her this BUT if she leans a little more towards the nature of her rebel of a gran, then that means my work is done.

 

That will be karma too. A fate I will gladly accept.

 

 

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

One person for a lifetime OR …

Someone asked me if I believe that we are supposed to be with ONE PERSON FOR A LIFETIME.  I responded frankly. I said that I was “not Oprah” so could not offer a Soul Sunday sort of answer.  But, my belief was that we did need to be with ONE PERSON AT A TIME. He called me “quite a deep serial monogamist”. I had to laugh! It had quite a nice ring to it.

 

As far as my statement went. I must say. it was one of those moments when something profound comes out of your mouth and you are left wondering where exactly it sprouted. Did you read it? Did you dream it? Did some romcom plant it?  I said “one person at a time” and it did sound rather Oprah afterall.

 

So there I sat, finishing my cocktail and contemplating fidelity with a feeling that the issue wanted me to sit with it a while. Reflecting and dissecting.  And that’s what I did in my morning meditation.

 

I came to the conclusion that relationships are funny things and that monogamy is indeed a choice. Not an everyday sort of choice, like pizza/no pizza.   It’s a call you have to make again and again and, because we’re ever changing spiritual beings living in blood & energy bodies, shit is changing all the time. We are changing all the time.  Our partners are changing all the time.  Variables are changing and life is throwing us a million little plots and subplots, each with its own peaks and dips. So, who are we to say that our “choices” will always reflect that exact perfect tune which we set out to dance to, when we first commit to being with just one person?

 

For me, the answer lies in holding to the fantasy. The dream. That vision of ONE person. A shared life. One common plot. Plugging into a central system wired so intricately, that the magnet automatically pulls you both back in when you need it most. (And yes, that last sentence is another such moment when I wonder where on earth those words came from!?)

 

Today, I am grateful for the inspired thoughts.

 

Alow me to wish you well on your journey.  May you always be guided to make the choices that honour the highest version of you.

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2016

COPYRIGHT:

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do YOU Over Promise and Under Deliver?

I believe in under-promising and over-delivering.

But, if truth be told, I never really feel like I am on top of my game as a parent.

There is always a sock with a hole, a teacher’s birthday I forget or a tooth fairy duty that nearly slips my mind.

As I stood at my kitchen counter, I stared at the half-eaten chicken pie that no one said thank you for. I looked around at the yoghurt smears on my curtains. I read the note in my daughter’s diary, reminding me of an outstanding indemnity form and I thought: Gosh girl!….are you sure you are qualified for this gig?

I couldn’t dwell on the thought because I needed to give my kids a bath. They had jumped into the mud, right after I told them to stay clean.  We were on our way to a dentist appointment.

I snuck in a quick photo (who doesn’t love a muddy face?) before I turned on the bath tap.  There was no water. Our cleaner reminded me that if I had read the letter on the fridge, I would have, and damn right should have, known. Boom!

It was a rough day at Mom HQ.

As I walked into the dentist with the two kids from Mudville, the nurse and I got talking straight away. She was a lovely old woman with a round back — an observation pointed out to me by Miss Mudville herself.

The old lady had lost her daughter 50 years ago. She had been standing on a pavement, minding her own business, when she was knocked by a car. She died instantly. She was just a young girl.

I asked her how she ever found the strength to live and she said “The memories! The memories are all we have in the end!”  She pulled out a small album and shared her most prized possession with me. Her pictures of special family milestones.  I saw muddy faces, spilled drinks, and grazed knees. The other thing I noticed was smiles. Smiles and kisses, hugs and laughter.

I drove home, observing the fighting and moaning coming from the back, and thought: “Of course I am qualified for this gig. The giver of life chose ME by name! Remember?”

We stopped off at the ice cream store and my daughter said, “I thought you said NO ice-cream because we are muddy?”

Now, how do you explain the under-promise and over-deliver concept to a child?…

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and http://www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.

Trust Issues

I walked into the room and I could tell that they had been talking about me.

The tension told me that it was not good things.

One of the girls was my friend. The rest of the people I hardly knew.  Someone said “So, how was your weekend?”

The spotlight was on me. 

I saw a few shoes shuffling, heard a few throats being cleared.  The anticipation of my response was causing shifts in the room’s energy.

I said “It was relaxed. I did a bit of reading.” 

The next day, my friend called me up and told me that she was “concerned”.

She had been hearing rumours. Over tea, my friend began to unpack her concerns.  She started with my account of my weekend.  The truth is, I had donated some money to a charity and they had published a picture of me in the local newsletter. I did not know this.  She did and the fact that I did not see it fit to tell a group of strangers how charitable and wonderful I was, was a clear red flag for her.  She ended off by sharing with me that she had spent “some more” time counselling my boyfriend. They were near a breakthrough and hopefully he would “change”.

 

I was stunned. 

Firstly, I believed in my right to privacy, especially around philanthropy. I also knew nothing of my friend and boyfriend’s Dr Phil meetings and I most certainly knew nothing of MY hand in “pushing him over the edge”.

I was seriously stunned.

Fortunately for me, that chapter ended many years ago and I was both friendless and boyfriendless at the end of it, by no proactive choice of my own.

But who knew that in my middle-aged days of nappies and botox considerations that I would have to revisit the story.

You see, last week I sat in a room where everyone was talking about someone else’s husband and she walked in.

Someone asked her a leading question. The spotlight shone brightly. The energy in the room became greyish brown. There was shuffling and throat clearing. The tension made me start peeling the gel off my nails.

I was stunned.

Although they were all complete strangers to me and I was merely an observer sitting at the next table, I was seriously stunned.

So I closed and eyes and said “Thank you” for every weed that removed itself from my garden.  And then I continued to watch the dear woman proceed to answer to her audience.

© A Heart Full of Stories, 2015. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Lee-Ann Mayimele and http://www.aheartfullofstories.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.