The moment I started to think about what my children thought of me as a mum was when my son gave me his preschool Mother’s Day gift. Here’s what it said:
I’m going to ignore the fact that he got my age wrong by a decade, and just note what my five-year old said what I think about him and why he loves me. That gave me a pretty good idea about what was important for him at that stage of his life, and what I need to keep doing to make him know that I love him!
Now it’s you’re turn. Stop for a minute and think ahead ten or fifteen years. Your children are teenagers, and they’ve grown into responsible young adults that you can be proud of. One day, you overhear a conversation with your son or daughter, and they are talking about your family. They are talking about YOU. What are they going to say about you, and what it was like to grow up with you as their mum?
This is such a wonderful question to ask yourself today, because you’ve got the opportunity to shape that answer to be anything you want it to be. So, what do you want it to be?
“I was a fun mum, I always surprised the kids and was involved in some crazy plans that they loved.”
“I was a caring mum, they always knew they could talk to me about anything.”
“I was focused on helping my kids learn about responsibility and teamwork, and so we did lots of activities that helped them grow in those areas.”
(None of those answers are mutually exclusive, by the way!)
Right now, the season you are in isn’t going to last. The interruptions, the demands of a baby or toddler are going to change within a short few years (even though a day can feel like forever right now!). But while you’re in the middle of it, there may be a tendency to lose sight of the bigger picture that is coming: one day, they will grow up.
That’s why I believe it’s so important to ‘start with the end in mind’ and be intentional about who you want to be as a mum right now. And then one day, you will look back with confidence knowing that you truly lived out your values in front of your children. I don’t want you to have regrets about how you spent the season when your children were young.
If you want some help to create a vision of what you want your children to say about you, maybe get them to fill out a checklist like the one above! The answers will change each year and they’ll be fun to look back on. If you want even more help then that, please check out my online course ‘Be The Mum You Want To Be’. The lessons are short and sweet, and they will take you through a journey of creating your vision and making an action plan for today so that you can create the life you want to, and be the mum you want to be.
All the best,
Tanya xx
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