Lift Happens/It Feels So Real

I had a flare up of cruel and unusual inner dialog this week: “You’re disgusting. Get on the meds and lose that meno belly. You’re a waste, go make more money. Your wardrobe sucks. Get out of those leggings ya hag! Your trajectory for your kid’s Summer is costing him his future as a titan of industry. What are you doing? Drive Harder!”

My brain immediately clings to the list of externals that explain the flare up — a perfect storm of end of school year celebration/anticipation of summer anxiety, some truly foul overcast weather, plans for travel, and ongoing post-divorce acclimation.

I know that for me de-stabilizing externals — changes — trigger unrelated money panic, body image panic, parenting panic, and generalized not-good-enough-itis.

So I have choices — I could chase the externals to alleviate the feeling that everything and everyone including me is not quite optimal and/or is horrifyingly unacceptable. I could take those meds, I could get that job, I could buy a blouse, I could fill my child’s summer with stuff he doesn’t want to do but my fear feeds say he Should do.

Another choice is I could say to myself, “Self, get a grip, at the start of summer every year you get a compare/despair opportunity as all the moms announce all their kids’ plans and you wonder if the plans for Ax should have included ice fishing or AI camp or that Mandarin intensive or how to breed llamas after all. You look at families that camp in nature and families that go to Europe and families that have lake houses and families that enjoy playing board games together and every single family seems somehow better than the home you provide.

“And yet somewhere, deep, you know, you can see, that your child is okay. More than okay, amazing. He is not you. He has enough, he does enough, he is more than enough. He is finding his way in the world even with you as his mother. Every Summer you fight not-good-enough-itis on your life choices and every Summer all has been well.

To which Evie says: “And what about this meno-belly and saggy and the fact that I can’t actually afford to send him to wherever to breed llamas and if I were a better mother I’d maximize my earning potential rather than obsessing about being there for pick up and drop off and bandying about taking care of drunks and strays and treating myself like some delicate flower of emotional wellness? “Wouldn’t you be happier, wouldn’t everyone be happier, —“ Evie says with her smooth, reasonable voice, “if you just let go of this trying to live some idealistic joy-first life and got busier being more productive?”

And it feels so real, that voice, that mean voice, that logical voice, that cutting voice, the voice that tells me in so many ways that I’m not okay, that I’m not a good enough mother, and my life isn’t okay as it is.

But the answer to that voice is NO! I wouldn’t be happier with different and I am a fine mother for my child — I’m the best mother he’s gonna get. Feeling sad is not an indication that I need to overhaul anything. It’s a feeling. And for me lift happens with very little intervention on my part most of the time. A sandwich. A nap. A few deep breaths and I remember: My life is this way and I am this way because I’ve made choices. If I wanted different I could make different choices.

But real me doesn’t want different, Evie does. She always does.

This Summer I’m gonna - I get to - revel in my choices. I get to relax into the reality I’ve created which is way better than Good Enough. It suits me. It suits my family. It works. And I get to enjoy it or listen to Evie and loathe it. Spend the precious life I have chasing a different one. So I notice that craving for more, better, different and I choose enjoying what is instead. I breathe into that and think, “This sofa works nicely here,” or even, “I love sitting on this sofa.” I’m gonna keep going.