Guilt trip
Back and forth. Back and forth.
We gently rock. My arms curled around my nine-year-old whose long limbs are trying spill out of the cozy chair we are sharing.
I’m loving every minute…but in this peace another voice calls for my attention. It’s my own voice. The voice that represents the woman that has work to do and passions to pursue. You have a presentation to finish. And a book. When are you going to get it all done if you’re just sitting here with your daughter? But I know it’s not idle time.
Play with me.
Come see this!
Guess what?
Did you know?
How long does this stage last? I feel the answer.
Not long enough…
This back and forth brings up the emotion I hear from just about every mother - guilt.
How do we define how much is enough time to make us feel like the good mother, wife, daughter, or friend? Guilt always seems to be triggered by something outside of us, but it’s something we plant and nurture within us. It’s fed by our thoughts, beliefs, and definitions.
It’s also pruned with the same things.
What I keep witnessing is that we’re all students of “learned deprivation”. And when we allow ourselves to succumb to guilt, we go from student to teacher. We teach our children to practice it, our family and friends to utilize it, and ourselves to keep believing in it.
The great news is you can stop. Just like that. When you stop feeling guilty you can stop the reactive decisions that come afterwards. Practice the High Vibe Habits of clarity, control, confidence, curiosity, and creativity. They tip off a new cycle of thoughts that offer you another option. One thought at a time to shift one belief at a time.
So what did I do?
I remembered what mattered to me. The answer was both my children and my work. So I allowed myself time to snuggle being fully present. I soaked up my little one’s features, her weight in my lap, her Pokemon pajamas, our sweet conversation about the tiny toys cupped in her still small hands.
I set a time to get started and gave myself the reminder to believe that it was possible to do both. That being fully in this moment would give me the freedom I needed to be fully in the next moment. No guilt necessary, just faith.
It’s this unblocking practice (releasing guilt) that lets us find what is right in front of us and all around us - happiness. And we get to gift it to ourselves and become students and teachers of proactive happiness.
Guilt doesn’t linger with High Vibe Habits because they give me the ability to use the evidence around me that shows me that my fear of not being available or not doing enough for my children is unwarranted. They give me the confidence to make the choices that I won’t regret.
It’s all five High Vibe Habits (clarity, control, confidence, curiosity, and creativity) that have allowed me to redefine what mothering looked like for over the years. Sometimes putting one thing or the other on hold. Sometimes rising early to efficiently work and so I can still meet those sweet smiling faces when they rise.
Trust. Faith. Belief. Whatever you might call it, it’s the antidote to guilt. It lets you meet your own needs and your need to be there for others. It’s offering yourself flexibility and self-compassion. And you can strengthen that trust with High Vibe Habits.
Your happiness, alongside your other desires, is a thrive goal. And those can never be met if we don’t value what it takes (and what we get to let go of) in order to reach that higher goal. What you need is a way to see the full range of possibility in yourself and in your life. That’s what high-vibe offers you.
With learned deprivation, we always fall short. WIth High Vibe Habits, we rise to the occasion.
I’ve developed a deep trust that I will achieve what matters to me: a strong, healthy relationship with my children, a loving marriage, and a platform to bring joy to women.
Because they all matter to me, I know - I trust - that I will show up in just the right amount for each of these things to be possible. That strong faith is there because I work at it. Because I nurture it - and not its opposite.
