Hello Mamas!

I hope you’ve all enjoyed the mischief of Mercury (planet of communications and celestial Trickster) in its retrograde (backwards) phase. Its almost over – the planet is ‘stationing’ to begin its forward motion again today.  For those of you who hold no stock in astrology consider this – Mercury is a great big ball of metal – in fact its an enormous magnet.

If the moon, which is basically just dust, influences the tides, then imagine the havoc Mercury can wreak.  Technical glitches (yes, all those computer & telephone problems you’ve been having these past few weeks), car problems and bingles, errors in general communications (yes, like that email you sent to the wrong person, or that parcel sent to the wrong address) and all kinds of mental meanderings.

I like to keep things simple during Mercury retrogrades, but I find my mind occupied with ideas and words I’m too busy doing other things to put on a page (Well. I’ve got multiple scraps of paper with obscure scribblings on them alongside lists of things to do).  But they do say Mercury retrograde is a good time to go back over old ground.  Revise, revisit, return.

So here I am – in the nick of time.

Lately people have spoken to me about their parenting issues (something that doesn’t happen often) which reminds me of the ‘bigger picture’ that I can see now that my oldest child has grown up to be the person SHE wants to be and not the person I thought she would be. All the effort and investment and  gentle guidance is not exactly wasted, but not really worth tying myself up in knots for either.

Rewind 17 years to when someone told me I could never make life perfect for my kids and to just minimise negative influences and trust them.   Moment of revelation – sometimes advice is useful.

Occasionally I indulge in imagining how things would be now for my children and I had I done things differently – made other/better choices.

These imaginings always lead me to the same conclusion;  I couldn’t have done anything differently. Things are in fact perfect the way they are.  Even if there are things that I’d like to change, things I struggle with daily, mistakes I wish I hadn’t made.

We Mamas (and Papas) wake up every day and do the best we can for our families.  Sometimes that best isn’t very good at all.  Sometimes its brilliant.  The magic is in accepting all of it in its richness and depth and variation.

Kids will all have problems, just as we parents have problems.

Chances are, if you’re reading this, that you’re a Mama who sets herself a high standard and may just as often feel good about getting things right as feel disappointed about failing to.  And, chances are, that you’re able to tell yourself that its OK to mess up, that mess makes life interesting and its great to have such high standards in the first place.  Right?

Because in doing so, we show our children that we aren’t perfect and that its OK for them not to be perfect either.  In being wrong and in knowing so; in being emotional or over stressed, or over-tired or just over it – and saying so – we allow our children to accept these things in themselves.

These are all things I’ve written before.  Acceptance is the old ground to keep revisiting – because acceptance is the opposite of judgement, and judgement won’t teach us anything about ourselves as Mamas or as people.

Until next time, Mamas xxx

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