Let's talk about finding your zen...

This week. Just wow. I feel like my heart has been opened wide by the events playing out around our world. It is so hard to stay present and live in the moment when you know that there are so many people suffering in countless ways. I choose gratitude and I choose love. 

I am so incredibly grateful for this life that I live, with all of its challenges and quirks. The people that are in my life. The fact that I have the honor of being a mom and walking side by side with another human being. I want my son to grow up with a heart that is full of love and gratitude. I want so much for him, and at times this world is so incredibly scary. Scary to think about my child growing up in times, but even more reason for us to choose to stand on the side of love. 

When I started writing this post, it was going to be a story about how my son is reminding me to find my own zen. To be a stone in the river and let stuff flow past. Can I tell you how many times I feel like I have to fight with him to sit in his carseat? I was becoming a version of myself that I didn't like- so instead of arguing and pleading and fighting, I simply closed his door, went around to my side, sat in the drivers seat and just waited. I told him that we could go once he was sitting in his seat. Do you know what? He was in his seat so fast! He was arguing with my husband about dinner. Once we stepped away and just did our thing, he took himself out to the table and sat down and ate. Fighting us about bedtime- we both went into our office and he came in and got large sheets of paper to color on and fell asleep on the floor within five minutes. Be the stone, my friends-- don't get sucked into the battles. Let if flow. Clearly he is working through something right now and needs to feel like he has more control, so the less we try to control him, the better it is all the way around. Are there non-negotiables? Of course, but it no longer feels like a daily struggle. 

That is how life is. I will stand up for my beliefs and for justice and love and acceptance, but I am not going to get sucked into the comment sections on Facebook and other outlets. I tried it. It is such a drain. People are going to believe what they want to believe, and behind the anonymity of a computer screen, people can be very nasty. So again, I choose love. Love and respect for myself to know that I don't need that. Our kids don't need that. Turn off the t.v., get outside and be together as a family. Spend time in your front yard talking with your neighbors. Build your community on a local level and the ripple spreads. Be love.