Art happens at our house.

I must tell you guys, my mind has been completely preoccupied with my children for over two months now. I’m feeling such a pull inward toward my family and my home, and away from the rest of the world. I have always tried to make the very best choices that I could for my family. I think that much of the time, I have done well. I haven’t done as well as I would like, but I think that given my set of personal challenges involving health, pregnancies, temperament, our affiliation with the air force, and the other usual everyday stumbling blocks in the road, I have navigated these things with success. My children are healthy. My children are intelligent. My children know that they are loved. My children love to read, love music, love each other, and love God. A person could do worse.

I find myself wanting more. I want more peace in my home. I want my children with me. I want to be enjoying our life together, despite problems, despite my imperfections. I want to do things differently, more peaceably, more wholly.

I have spent many hours in silent debate with myself, engaging in rational skepticism, questioning who I am, what my goals are, and what I’m doing to accomplish those goals, and why I am choosing to live within the perimeters that the world has set as typical.

I have noticed that I have changed. I am not the same person I was a few years ago; I’m not even the same person I was a year ago, and I’m happy for that. Life is about growth and change. My priorities remain the same. God, family, happiness still reign supreme, but my motivations are different, my capacity to work and be patient and accepting has increased. My understanding of myself has grown immensely, and I am finding joy in mothering that I have never found before. I think, just maybe, I’m becoming less selfish.

I am a very selfish person by nature. I am a person who requires extra self time, more time to recharge just me and focus on my goals and what I want. Over the past few months, I’ve both needed and wanted less. I’ve recharged by more perfectly fulfilling my role as a mother and homemaker. Oh, I still need my me time, but it is less, and when I am present for my family, I am wholly present and filled with a lot of joy and peace in what I am accomplishing within that sphere. Children are demanding, and when you add health concerns and other large stresses to the mix, my first response has been to escape. I rarely need to escape anymore. That is no small blessing.

This change, among many others, has led me to want to make different and better choices for my family. Some of these are very doable, and others are dreams that are beyond my reach. Some have been a long time coming, and others are more recent observations. I plan to share these with you guys, but, as I said, I’m still working my brain around them all, trying to figure out what will work and what will need serious tweaking.

I am not comfortable with change, and find that old habits die hard with me. Self discipline isn’t my forte, and changes require that. After months of consideration, I think I’m up for it.