Name the Hard

 "The miracles hadn't looked like I thought they would. They never crashed like ocean waves. They had been small quiet rivers."

This week Peanut, Xman and I went for a walk. In the rain. Peanut wants to save every worm every time it rains. She finds them on the road and painstakingly relocates them to the grass. Every. Single. One.

Xman wanted to finish our walk and get back home and rushed her.

It hurt her feelings.

She got stuck in this sad state. She wanted Xman to apologize. To make her feel better.

Xman did not apologize.

Peanut and I had a hard conversation. We can't make other people "be sorry."

We can't own their feelings.

But we can own are our own.

We can say "I deserve to be spoken to more kindly."

We can say "Your tone hurt my feelings."

And then we can say "I forgive you."

We can set boundaries. We can say "I do not want to go on walks with you because I like to linger."

We continued on our day and Peanut continued to be super grumpy.

I said "Peanut, let's CHOOSE joy."

To which she said to me, "Mommy - do you want me to lie to myself? I don't feel joyful. If I act joyful, I"m just going to be lying to myself. Don't you want me to be true to myself?"

Sigh. Parenting is tough. I gave up coffee for Lent. I'll leave it at that.

I told Peanut that every day there is joy and there are hard things. Both exist. Every single day.

We always have to choose to set our mind on that which is good.

We can acknowledge that hard thing we feel. That sadness. That hurt. That anger. That grief.

But we can't let it be in charge.

It can't color the good.

Hard feelings definitely deserve space. Deserve to be acknowledged. Deserved to be felt.

There will always be hard.

If we don't set a limit for the amount of space hard can take up, we'll never choose joy.

Mama Warriors, I'm a deeply feeling person in a very messy world.

Raising another deeply feeling person in a very messy world.

Let's make space for our kids to feel the messy. Let's rise above the "suck it up" or "get it over it" parenting and let them process.

BUT let's also teach them to name the feeling, feel it, and then give it its own space.

Let's be parents that teach the "glad game" and raise kids who can name the hard, but also can find the good.

Let's be people who can name the hard, but can also find the good.

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