Last week I was on vacation. It was the first time in the four years since I went back to work after staying home with my kids for 13 years that I took a week off. I turned down work. I didn’t do anything around my house to make it look pretty. I didn’t do anything with myself to make me look pretty. Guess what? Nothing fell apart like I was afraid it would.
There was a time when I was newly divorced, where I was revved up with the power of a thousand women. I wanted it all. I wanted to take my career to places I never imagined. I wanted to learn how to build built-in shelves in my bedroom. I wanted hot sex. I wanted to be the best mom in the world. I wanted to be in the best shape of my life. I wanted to be well read and well traveled. I wanted to read gobs of books and always have fresh-baked cookies in the house. I believed it was the key — my key — to happiness.
It’s easy to look at other people and think they have it all as you scroll down their highlight reel on social media. It’s also really easy to want those things. You think if they can have it (and make it look so easy), it shouldn't be hard for you to do the same.
I quickly found out that if I attempted to do these things and live that very exhausting unrealistic life, I wouldn’t be happy. I worked myself into the ground, rarely taking a day off. I ran every single day. My high heels got a workout a few times a week. I was always running from getting my hair done to working full-time to baking cakes and pies to chipping away at the novel I gave myself a year to write. I hardly said no to my three kids, because I wanted to make up for all the pain the divorce caused them. I had to keep it all together so I wouldn’t fall apart.
I started falling apart really fast living that way.
I know now that being happy trumps the whole having it all BS. And I’m not happy when I try to have it all.
Right now, the laundry is backed up, my kids are all asleep in their very messy rooms, my hair is in a messy bun, I’m sans makeup, and I’m exhausted.
I don’t have the energy to learn how to build a damn thing. I will not be the best mom today — I can already feel it. It’s raining, and my patience is already running low and the day has just begun.
When I’m done with work, I’m not going to reach for a book or clean my house. I will lie on the sofa with my unshaved legs and catch up on my latest show and heat up leftovers for dinner. All of my pinned recipes will still be there tomorrow. The books sitting on my bedside table can wait. The hot sex isn’t going to happen, and the book I’ve been working on for two years won’t get attention today.
I have days when I’m motivated and I do feel like cooking or painting or going an extra mile.
But having it all doesn’t mean doing so much that you are grumpy.
Having it all doesn’t mean you push yourself to your limit all the time and beat yourself up if you fall short.
Having it all doesn’t mean running around like your hair's on fire, trying to squeeze in things so your kids will always be happy and you never have split ends.
To me, having it all means getting through the day and feeling pretty good about it.
It means forgiving yourself if you don’t get to something and not coveting some Instagram profile.
I don’t have to conquer anything. Once I realized that and was able to get off my own back, that’s when I realized how much trying to have it all was screwing with my inner peace. It feels good to have it back again.
