Two monks were arguing about a flag. "The flag is flapping," said one. "No," said the other, "the wind is flapping." The argument went back and forth. The Master happened to be passing by. He told them: "Not the wind, not the flag; your minds are flapping."
"Let me hold the baby for you while you do your homework.". I looked up from reading this little metaphor in my textbook. My mom was standing over me, hands outstretched. "Sure. Thanks!"
I said as she was already lifting a smiley Brody off my lap. It was more of a statement than a question anyway. Gosh that question. I had first heard it 16 years ago, when I was finishing high school with a new baby. "Let me hold the baby for you while you do your homework." My mom had said it many times. It made me smile to hear it again at 34.
I've been getting burn-out on motherhood lately. Not my own, just everyone else's. Sometimes I just want to lock myself in my house, turn off all the social media, and relish in the crazy natural survival-ness that is my family. There is too much over-analyzing and second guessing and just pure agonizing out there. A little bit of this is good and natural I think. It keeps you on your toes in your vocation as Mother or Parent. It's kind of Adlerian - Alfred Adler, one of the most important psychodynamic theorists of our time believed that humans were motivated by inferiority. He would have a field day with mothers today! But when it get's out of hand, it's just exhausting for you... and for me and I don't have time to be any extra exhausted. I have survival exhaustion and I don't need any neurotic exhaustion.
There is also a lot of extremism out there and with it comes a lot of anger and depression. A lot of words like this.... must, best, preferred. A lot of people standing around with different opinions of what makes the flag flap or what way to make it flap best. Or even just people wrestling with their own opinion and keeping up with it. I actually had to take a break from some FB groups like this.
Now some of this comes from perspective that I have and I will share with you. I have four flag poles in my front yard with 4 lovely, different and richly colored flags flapping at different speeds and with varying levels of ferocity. The first pole was set up when I was 17 and James was born. At that young age I hoisted his flag. It was plainer than it is now and closer to the ground on the pole. I could only hoist it so far and as time went on the flag went higher and became more colorful. Now there's only a little bit of line for me to hoist before it's all the way to the top. But God is that flag colorful and flapping proudly and I often revel in it's beauty.
I can't believe how beautiful it is in fact! How could that be? I didn't spend a lot of time analyzing what was making the flag flap... I couldn't! My parent's had barely finished hoisting my own flag and yet there I was with a new flag of my own. I was very much in survival mode when James was born and I had a young, care-free mind. I did the best I could at being a mother and a lot of that time was spent surviving and laughing. Somehow this kid grew quite excellently in both body and mind. I didn't stress much about what he ate, what he was learning, what he was watching, what his grades were. I just didn't. It wasn't because I didn't care. I cared very much, but I was so young that I didn't know what little things to care about. I didn't know to stand there and wonder what was making the flag flap, it just was. You know the old saying, "ignorance is bliss"? It's true. I was offered the ability through my youth and ignorance to just experience how much flags color and flap on their own. All I had to do was be there to hoist it and marvel at it.
Now that I'm a "normal" aged mother, I do pay more attention to more things because I know more. But when I mess up, or life get's too busy to care about raw milk that week or washing cloth diapers, I just don't beat myself up about it. Sometimes I may give the wrong explanation for something to a child or spend too much time on my phone that day, sometimes I let me kids eat birthday cake for breakfast and micro-waved chicken nuggets for lunch. Their rooms get messier than they should be and when I watch them play sports it's all taken with a grain of salt. But I care about everyone of these things. I know it's not healthy to eat cake in the morning or pink sludge for lunch. I know it's good for kids to keep their space organized.
It's just that, if I'm off on any of this and more, I know it will be ok. Theses flags are more amazing than we give them credit for. I might be having a bad day, week, month, year.... I might stop caring about organic food in 2015 and care again 2016. One kid might be in his crib at 4 months and then next might be co-sleeping to 4 years. James was only breastfeed to 6 months, while Warren was allowed the opportunity to nurse until he was tugging on my shirt in the supermarket asking for "milky time". A lot of the time I think about that first flag and tell myself, "It's ok. You did it when you were 17 and knew nothing about what makes flags flap and at the end of the day, this one will be flapping too."
I was walking with a friend the other day. She asked me, "How did you make the decision to go back to school with four kids?". I answered, "I don't know. I just did it. I've always been that way, ever since James. When I was young and pregnant I said to myself, 'Ok. You are just going to do this.' and that's been my perspective for any major decisions. I don't spend a lot of time analyzing and that probably drives my husband a little nuts, but if I stand there too long my mind will start flapping.".
Don't spend too much time wondering what's making your flags flap or your mind will start flapping. Don't wonder if your flag is flapping fast enough or if it seems too fast. Make sure your worries and decisions are back dropped by a dose of wonder about the naturalness of flapping flags and let it BE a wonder. You aren't supposed to be everything, know everything, decide everything, perfect everything, and try everything. Marvel at the colors your flags become, let your heart beat to the natural rhythmic tempo of their flapping, and be waiting calmly, sometimes excitedly, sometimes with a drop reminiscent sadness, to hoist when needed.
When you pull up on that last little bit of line, and walk a little distance away you will want it to be a piece of living art, flapping organically, and you will want to say, "That is so cool. I just love how it flaps."
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