Perfecting Chaos

We Fear Rejection, prize attention, crave affection and dream of perfection. – Ms Mr, Salty Sweet

I started this blog three years ago today.  It was an experiment in writing, in putting myself out there, in overall basic communication. – Something I’m not the best at verbally.  It was  started the same time I started my LLC for marketing collateral design and I decided I needed practice writing and putting personal work out there for all to judge and see.  Nothing’s more personal than basically publishing your inner monologue.   If I could do that and become OK with it, then I could handle the rest of the rejection, criticism, corrections and re-do’s that were sure to come as I changed careers and stumbled along the way.  It was a way for me to work on practicing and perfecting skill sets I knew needed work. I’m not a perfectionist – but perfection was always the goal in that. I had no idea that it would evolve into periodic  posts that would develop a small following and be a place I document thoughts, moments, family history and life lessons that would become not only therapy for me, but would strike personal conversations between friends,  colleagues and neighbors.  It has become an ice breaker for intimate discussion with people I otherwise would have shared nothing but pleasantries.

This forum evolved for me from a positive, up-beat “here’s how I see life” space to a place I can complete a thought and share a few different aspects of life — from motherhood, to random stories, and mental health.  It has gotten me through the birth of my first child, learning to become a mom, a complete career change, two jobs and being diagnosed as BiPolar 2 after a year of postpartum depression.   It has taught me how to organize and process and find meaning and purpose in life’s hiccups, changes and momentous events.  — All too often, we go through life one day at a time and don’t take time to notice what has just happened.  And when something big happens – good or bad – we tend to get through it and simply move on, never realizing how it has just changed us.  This has provided a place to put it all, read, re-read and share with those that care to read.

The posts that get the most vocal and generally the most ’likes’, ‘hits’  and ‘shares’ are the ones about Sawyer’s childhood.  They are happy and comical, something most people can relate to.  People like to share in others joy.  People like to remember that we can and should be learning from the innocence of our children.  They like to be reminded that the small, temperamental people in our lives are who we all wish we still were  – easily amused and not afraid to say what we want in life, because at 2 you’re biggest want is generally a cookie.  These posts also don’t make anyone uncomfortable.

The heavier posts, the ones about mental health, depression and lifes harder lessons; those don’t seem to get shared often.  They get a few silent ‘likes’ and any thoughts on them are shared with me privately, as most people aren’t overly comfortable talking about things like that. – And that’s why I do.

In today’s world of social media we have the ability to share every happy moment of life publicly. It has created a stigma that if you’re not thrilled with your career, your life ever has an upset, you can’t afford bi-annual vacations, or your kids aren’t perfectly dressed and behaved for that perfect family photo – you’re doing it wrong.  I don’t subscribe to that anymore.  I don’t even strive for it.  Perfect doesn’t interest me.  Honestly, it bores me.  And I don’t think it makes you happy.  I think it makes you really good at faking happy, because your life is perfect – you have nothing to bitch about.  So, you take to facebook and post perfect pictures of your perfect children and bitch about silly things like Targets lack of your favorite brand of paper towels, because you want people to think that THAT’S you’re biggest problem.  If it is, I am happy and sad for you all at once.

But here’s my reality…

My child isn’t perfect.  He’s loud.  He’s sassy, he’s stubborn and infuriating.  He’s also full of personality for 2 years old.  I often wish he would settle down and just be content looking at books and not jumping on my couch or coloring on my cabinets, and I feel like a bad mom when I can’t control him.   But I also know that I won’t ever have to worry about him being scared to raise his hand in class. I already know that he will be the kid that welcomes ALL the kids to come play, because he just wants to be friends with everyone.  He will be the one that not only sells lemonade, but develops a marketing plan and promotes it a week in advance, door-to-door.   He will be the kid turning a summer job cutting grass into a landscaping company purely because he’s bored.  At 22, he will be the motivated intern that will talk to anyone that will listen to his ideas, and won’t think twice when offered the opportunity to study abroad or travel the world for a year.  He has too much energy and personality to be content with status quo.  Boredom won’t ever be an option for him. So, I grapple daily with the fact that for now, he’s messy and destructive and exhausting, I struggle with the fact that he’s always the one on the play date getting into trouble and running off, but that I wouldn’t really want him any other way, because his fearlessness will pay off.  This is what makes him great.  This is what makes him perfect.

My mental state waxes and wanes.  I am not always happy, but I’m never bored.   I don’t always know why and I don’t always react the way everyone else thinks I should or wants me to.  And though some days I would give my left arm to have life just be easy, I try to remember that there’s purpose to this: I can read a room full of people in less than 5 minutes, I can tell when someone is upset within one word – text or verbal, and I can figure out most people within 2 meetings.   If I went through life like everyone else, I wouldn’t have developed this.  I wouldn’t be able to be the voice of reason when my best friend comes to me panicking or my husband overreacts.   I wouldn’t get away with calling things as they are and challenging the bullshit in life and still have friends and be liked by coworkers.  I wouldn’t be the one playing ‘Switzerland’ in inter-office debates or be the friend people talk to.  My occasional arrogance wouldn’t be warranted or welcomed.  At this point, it’s been earned and was worth it to be able to be these things for the people I love.

I can’t afford fancy vacations and a huge house in some well-off neighborhood, but as a result of doing my best to give what I can for my family; I have found myself in a neighborhood with people who are in the same boat.  We watch out for each other.  I’m in a spot where the neighborhood kids come in and out of my house like they live there and my kid can go outside and play and I know the bigger kids will watch out for him.  If I need a Saturday morning sitter for an hour, I can walk outside in the summer and anyone out there will be happy to watch him while I run an errand, and they know that I would do the same.   These people know that if they come into my house, they will find me folding the explosion of laundry on my couch in my PJ’s and dishes in my sink.    I’m in a place where these people have become friends and we all help each other out because we are all working full-time and making ends meet and have a little bit of chaos in our lives.  We all need help; we know it and we don’t judge.  Sometimes the concept of a little privacy is nice, but I would take things the way I have them over an acre lot, not knowing my neighbors and worrying about the lady across the way judging my landscaping, any day of the week.   It’s real. It’s human.  It isn’t a life of pleasantries and keeping up.  It’s a life of down-to-earth love and genuine care for other people.  Its takes a village, and I have one.  And there isn’t a vacation on the planet that could be better for Sawyer than that.

Sometimes it takes stepping back to remember what you’re grateful for in life.  This blog has allowed me to do that.  It has forced me to write things out, and rewrite them until I get into words exactly what matters in life.  It has created conversations with people who let me know I’ve stirred something or touched someone or had an effect.  It gives it all a bigger purpose.  Sometimes that’s the best thing that can come out of daily grievances and major life events.  They aren’t situations; they aren’t simple events that are just ‘over’ when you’ve survived it.  Not if you don’t allow them to be. Not if you find a way to give it purpose.

Thank you to all that have commented, shared, liked, read and engaged in conversation with me throughout this odd experiment I call a blog.  It’s made a difference.  Here’s to three more years of finding the enjoyment and purpose in this chaos I call life.

 “You were put on this earth to achieve your greatest self, to live out your purpose, and to do it courageously.”
― Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free