I Wish I Knew

Tomorrow I leave on a wedding road trip.  My oldest son will be married by this time next week. After a day of "doing around", I'm finally getting a chance to settle down and realize.... The time has come. Oddly enough, my mind isn't focused on his life changing decision, it's focused on hers. I married at 18 and although I felt like I knew everything.... I knew nothing. What do I know now, that I wished I'd known then? For One, I didn't know that women aren't very honest people. Not only are we not honest with others, we aren't honest with ourselves.  Women are taught at a very early age, to hide our flaws because it's not okay to be imperfect. I honestly don't think men have the same pressure to be perfect like women do; that's why they scratch, belch and fart without shame... Because it's okay.  The Bloggess is one of my favorite writers for a variety of reasons. The main reason I love to read her stuff, is because she has taken her warped flaws, embraced them and put them out there for the world to see. In return, women have embraced her and all of her flaws because it makes them feel more normal. Women have a deep need, to know it's okay to be imperfect. Sometimes when I'm sitting with a group of women chatting about everyday normal stuff like housework, child rearing, money management, hygeine or whatever the hot topic of the day is... I'll think to myself.... "Gosh! I'm just a failure on every level!" I'm constently letting my housework slide because I'm into a good book, or a nap just sounds way more fun than mopping the floor. My most steadfast parenting rule is "Don't bring company home without warning". I'll blow a whole months budget on a really cute outfit and not even feel entirely bad about it, and yeah, at this very moment I'm comptemplating skipping giving myself a pedicure because I'm just so dang tired. I'm a mess! 100%, 79 shades of imperfect and only once in a while do I really feel terrible about being so. So, if I could give my daughter-in-law advice I wish I'd had when I was young it would be this.... Embrace yourself including the flaws and save the mask for Halloween. People around you need to know who you are, not who you wish you were. When the women in your life see you embracing the warped part of yourself, it makes them feel more normal. Sure, they will still judge you, talk about you when you're not around, and totally compare how their flaws aren't as bad as your flaws, but that's just because they aren't being honest with themselves, and because it's so dang hard to see looking through a mask that doesn't  fit them very well.  Be gentle with yourself, my son isn't marrying you because he thinks you are a perfect person.... He is marrying you because he knows you are the perfect person for him. Looking back on a life of trying to keep up with the perfect perception of who I should be, is a sham and something I wish I had known way back in the day. Now when I'm tempted to compare myself to the masks of others, I have to stop myself because, now I know they just haven't learned to embrace the flaws they hide behind their masks.... I wish all women knew the freedom of not living up to something that isn't really there to begin with. Our lives would be so much more enjoyable if we could simply have permission... To be.

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

I lay in my bed (feeling pretty proud of myself) and wanted to share my good news with a good friend. So I sent her a text with the latest JackieWorld news bulletin, knowing she would be both tickled pink and thrilled to death. Shock of shock, horror of all horrors, she was neither... "You are so spoiled!" the text read. Well Duh!!! Is that suppose to be headlining news? Geeze! I like to sugar coat it with the title of "blessed" but spoiled works too. Who says I can't stand it when people are real (chuckle, chuckle) with me. I was neither shocked, mad, insulted, or hurt that she dared to speak the truth (she added an LOL at the end so that made it easier to swallow) because you know what??? I already knew the truth. I also know people that know me know the truth too. still it never hurts to have people tell you what you already know, in fact some times it's just plain good for you. There is nothing like someone grabbing you by the chin and having you take a good close look at yourself... "Mirror mirror on the wall" Trust me there have been plenty of times I've given her a good (but loving) look in the mirror too... Like when she tells me she wants Botox. I have no problem telling her that is the most asinine thing I've ever heard, or when she tells me she wants a Gastric Bybass, I really blast her then. She lives through it, I do too and it's probably one of the reasons we're such good friends. Last time we visited I mentioned the spoiled rotten text to her and she promptly put her head on the table and laughed.... "I hope you didn't take that wrong." I certainly didn't, I took it as the absolute truth and didn't have a hard time swallowing it. She could have called me a lot worse, but guess she is saving the rest for later (guess I'll have to get my big girl panties on). Yeah, we're still friends, I appreciated the honesty and I don't thinks she loves me any less because I'm spoiled and I don't love her any less for saying it. Like I've said before, it's not what people says that bother me, but what they don't say. The eyes are windows to the soul and the most painful things are sometimes left unsaid because there is malice behind them that can't be hidden.... With or without words. They say that truth is stranger than fiction, but trust me.... Nothing can be as strange as what I see staring back at me in the mirror of my soul sometimes. Just because I hope others are blind to it, doesn't mean they are. I appreciate those who give me a little heads up on the fact that I may need to get my stuff under control...  Friends should be comfortable enough with one another to be lovingly honest, brazenly bold and eagerly open to helping each other strive toward self improvement. If I want someone to agree with me on everything than I'll never have friendships that run very deep. If someone needs a friend who is always going to stroke their ego and tell them they are right, then they probably don't want to choose me (frankly I suck at ego stroking).  Of course the key to everything is LOVE. You're not going to nit pick someone you love to death over every little thing. You're not going to be hatefully honest with someone you love. And you certainly don't want to see someone you love meander down a path of self destruction just because no one around them had the guts to be honest with them because they fear their wrath. My friends have authorization to stop me in mid stride should I head down a dangerous path and I choose my friends wisely enough to know they will do it with love, caring concern, with hopefully a dose of humor on the side (because humor softens the blow of everything). Meanwhile, I'll try to keep a handle on the spoiled rotten, queen of all things routine (although I'll admit I'm really good at that act). Apparently it gets on some peoples nerves and I certainly wouldn't want to do that.  You know who you are and I just wanted to tell you thanks for being a friend, thanks for loving me in spite and if you do get Botox.... I promise to make fun of your perma-smile:-)

Broken People

One of my favorite authors is Beth Moore. I've done several of her bible studies and few people can break things down to real life like she can. She is animated and hysterically funny because she is so female. A friend sent me a text yesterday saying she had just started her new book titled "So Long Insecurity, You've Been A Bad Friend". I don't typically consider myself insecure, or let me say any more insecure than most woman. But let's face it, women deal with a lot of stuff. Some of the stuff comes from our childhood, some of it comes from being a woman. Some women cover their stuff up with arrogance and pride, while others cover their stuff up with shyness and impenetrable walls they've built around them. Some of us boldly display our stuff right out there in the open, others hide it deep inside, and others pretend that they don't even have stuff or had it and have totally overcame it. Yep, we've all got our stuff and we've all got our ways of dealing with the stuff we got. I downloaded the book onto my blackberry and I'm only on like the 2nd or 3rd chapter, but I highly recommend it to every woman, I can just tell it's going to hit the nail on the head and help me where I hurt. I'm not paralyzed with insecurity, but after reading a couple of chapters I know that I have enough that it hinders me from being the person God made me to be. I'd like a little help getting past my stuff so that I can get on to the next thing he has for me. I'm certainly not going to hesitate to reach out for help in being a better woman, wife, mother or christian. After all a big part of my personality is to fix things (usually things that I myself have broken or caused to be broken), some times I feel like I should be able to fix other people but the truth of the matter is I have to fix myself before I can help someone else. I've said this before, we are all broken people being put back together by a loving God.