“I’m trying my best!” I say to myself for the 10th time today. My child never stops making noise. I’m trying to work, not make her feel ignored, straighten up the house, make lunch, etc. and I am overwhelmed. I’m overstimulated. I’m an introvert and my energy is derived from time alone. My daughter never gives me a freaking second alone as long as she is awake. It gets to the point where I am getting testy and basically yelling at her to “Give me space!” She doesn’t quite get it. She’s a little slow to develop in the emotional intelligence department or so I’ve been told by her therapist who thinks it wouldn’t be bad idea to get her tested for ADHD at some point. I wouldn’t be surprised, her dad has it and swears that she does too, though I hesitate to put a label on who she is and start cultivating her belief that there is something “wrong with her.” Though I also see the benefits of understanding how to nurture her and bring out the best in her by working with who she is rather than against it.
As someone who lives with 2 people, one who has been diagnosed with ADHD and another who may potentially have ADHD, it’s challenging. So often I feel unheard as though I’m speaking into a void. So often I feel frustrated as though nobody takes me seriously. I question whether it is me and my boundaries or communication style that need adjustment or whether the issue is their ability to focus. I seek to own any areas where I can improve or make tweaks so that the relationships I have and my peace are maintained, but sometimes I can’t help but think (or sometimes say if I’m keeping it real), “What the fuck?!”
I’m doing my best to love though it isn’t always easy. I think that’s one of the biggest misconceptions about love… that it’s easy. It is not, or at least it isn’t always. Love is challenging, raw, real, and hurts at times. It is not just an emotion. I love my daughter, but sometimes she tests my limits when it comes to patience and self-discipline. Some days it takes everything in me not to lose it with her and start screaming and yelling like a crazy person. Some days I fail, but most days I succeed. I hope that my failures won’t define me in her eyes. How do I know I love her? One word, maybe two … effort and commitment! I try like hell to be the best parent I know how to be day in and day out. I show up for her. I’m there always, even on days where I don’t feel like it. Love requires effort, self-discipline, commitment, and compassion. Without any one of those things, it can’t flourish.
“You have to pick the places you don’t walk away from.”
– Joan Didion
I’m tired of people walking around in this fake world with fake ideas of what love is. It is detrimental to one’s well-being to define love in an incorrect way. For years I walked around believing that love was a feeling and I almost missed the real thing when it was right in front of me as a result. I was so focused on this physical sensation I was “supposed to” feel that I almost overlooked all of the actions I was being shown on a consistent basis that ultimately made my fiancé the best fit for me. Once the infatuation wears off, whether it be the infatuation of a new partner or the bliss bubble of the new baby, that’s when real love starts. That’s when commitment to those people drive your actions and efforts. That’s when self-discipline is required to remember your commitment and lots of compassion is necessary toward yourself and those you are loving in order to keep the tank full so that you may continue to exercise your love muscle. Ok… that sounded dirtier than intended, but love is an action… it’s like a muscle that needs to be worked in order to be strengthened. Stop putting in the work and watch the relationship atrophy.
“Don’t imagine that love, to be true and burning, must be extraordinary. No; what we need in our love is the continuous desire to love the one we love.”
– Mother Teresa
Love is like a being that needs to be nurtured and fed. We feed it with our thoughts and actions. Through choosing healthy thoughts, we are guided toward loving action which then brings the fruits of our labor… good relationships, strong sense of dignity, integrity, joy, wholeness, and divinity. When our thoughts are unhealthy, that’s when our actions are ineffective at cultivating the life that we all want for ourselves (see the above “fruits”). When our thoughts are unhealthy, we have a tendency to treat ourselves and others with less than what they deserve. We fail to recognize the divine and sacred nature of human beings and we fall short, or in Catholic/Christian terminology, we sin.
I had a conversation recently about Catholicism and the meaning of sin. I believe it’s often taught incorrectly to youth and adults. This word starts being used as a weapon instead of a tool for empathy and compassion. In this discussion, where we talked about our experience as kids growing up Catholic, we felt shamed for being “sinners.” In Catholicism, as a child, there was always what felt like a suggestion that the priests and other clergy members were “perfect” and that the rest of us somehow didn’t measure up, as though we were all lacking some special favor from God. Confessing to a priest always felt like an interrogation of some sort where you were being judged as worthy or good enough. Then, when they doled out the “punishment,” i.e. the number of scripted prayers you were supposed to say for forgiveness, well that was the icing on the cake or the nails in the proverbial coffin that said “You suck at life and God isn’t happy with you.”
Sin is simply, as I said above, when we fail to recognize our own God given divinity that is our birthright and take actions that lessen ourselves or another in some way. It’s the ignorance of who we truly are and in this world everyone of us are guilty of this for a time. Even when we are pretty sure we know who we are, we still often forget and need to place priority on consistently remembering. Jesus says, because we are alive we are worthy. He did not look for others to prove their worth before he came. He did not make them meet all of the requirements before he doled out miracles. Yet, so often, we do. We fail to accept those we claim to love because they don’t check all of the boxes we have in our mind of how they should act and who they should be. We insist on our own way… that others must meet our expectations, otherwise we label them as “toxic” and keep it moving. Yet, this is not love. Love and acceptance are synonymous in my opinion. Love says, “I see your flaws and shortcomings, and I choose to love and accept you anyway. You are safe here because even if you don’t know who you are yet, I do and I honor your divinity.”
“There is hardly a more gracious gift that we can offer somebody than to accept them fully, to love them almost despite themselves.”
– Elizabeth Gilbert
This, right here, is exactly why love is not what the world makes it out to be… this high that we ride because for some magical reason we can’t get enough of certain people. Instead, it is seeing all of a flawed person… baggage, scars, open wounds, buried secrets, insecurities, fears, stubbornness, anger, jealousy, hostility, etc. and all of the other traits that the world often deems as “ugliness” and choosing to see beyond it, believe in the person they are at their core, and nourish them enough so that hopefully one day, they look in the mirror and recognize themselves for all of their wonder, beauty, potential, and sacredness. It is helping others rise into who they are destined to become, not waiting for the “perfect” person to appear and prove they are worthy of your love.
Yes, love is challenging. It’s hard to look beyond a flaring temper, negative attitudes, occasional apathy, ignorance, indifference, etc. and stay committed to loving anyway. In times where everyone is smiling and having a blast with one another, it’s very easy, but it cannot be called love until it is tested in the fire of the heated battles. Love is forgiveness. I forgive you for not recognizing that I need space to feel fully alive, to rekindle my light, and to come to the world ready to give. I forgive you for taking every last bit of my energy day in and day out without so much as a, “Thank you for everything you do for me mom.” I forgive you for being aloof and not seeing me fully or saying things like, “Baby, I see you struggling and doing your best to love us how we need to be loved even when you haven’t had much time to yourself and I appreciate you.” I forgive you, though you have never asked for my forgiveness, because you are the people I’ve chosen not to walk away from and that is what love is.