Moral of the Day Monday

Floundering here in a sea of confusion lately. I've been questioning my parenting skills. Scrutinizing them, really. Feeling sub par. And looking for answers.

There are times when I feel so on top of my game. And then there is now. The opportunity to improve my mothering skills staring me boldly in the face. A challenge I warily accept, but one that I know will make me stronger.

How much of your wisdom do you attribute to being a mother? For me, all of it. Who knows how many of life's lessons I'd have learned had I not had children. Or how different I'd be. I am borrowing a quote that one of MOF's shared recently to help explain:

"There was something so valuable about what happened when one became a mother. For me it was the most liberating thing that ever happened. . . . Liberating because the demands that children make are not the demands of a normal 'other.' The children's demands on me were things that nobody else ever asked me to do. To be a good manager. To have a sense of humor. To deliver something that somebody else could use. And they were not interested in all the things that other people were interested in, like what I was wearing or if I were sensual. Somehow all of the baggage that I had accumulated as a person about what was valuable just fell away. I could not only be me--whatever that was--but somebody actually needed me to be that." -- Toni Morrison

When I consider what my life was before children, I do find motherhood liberating. Exhausting, but liberating. Nothing else in my life has made me stronger. And with strength comes confidence and freedom - from worry, from the fears that may immobilize us when our child hurts, suffers or when we don't know how to help them overcome something.

What are your thoughts? How do these words apply to you?