when you are "rookies" at this science event that demands dropping and egg from 10 feet up and having it land in the center of the target, unbroken. when the "rookie" thing means there is great confusion and lots of trial and error and when the supervising teacher comes to help and says, "let the boys do it. alone." and you wonder if she's had a 9 year old and if she's ever given that 9 year old a raw egg to play with...to keep "safe" with 20 plastic straws and a meter of tape, because it is easier said than done for you to give that freedom to your 9 year old.
when this teacher encourages you to really let go and just let the boys have fun and it triggers something deep in you, something that has been working its way to the surface for months. years?
because you see it, that you've been operating for years in survival mode and when you are just trying to stay alive, you can't be free. because there has been no space to be creative or individual here when all the babies came so quickly one after another and there were multiple jobs to juggle so mouths could be fed and there was much crying and figuring and working through finding a good pace. and this became your habit that stuck around long after you found a rhythm and kids could get through 2 hours without needing to eat and could sleep for 12 hours at a time and life was less threatening.
when you let the fear of crumbling hold you back from thriving.
but that's what the teacher is saying to you now: "they're fine. they're great. let them try. let them fail. you are fine. you are great. sit back and watch and let learning take its natural course."
and all these years of demanding that kids fall in line and do as told and don't talk back for fear that if one stepped away from center it would be enough for the entire family unit to implode, all those years are over and you can, you should make a way to let creativity become your habit. make a way to encourage individual thinking, inspire them to think bigger and dream more vividly because really, their options are endless. god has laid out for these people opportunities that half the world will never even know and they can, they should live life abundantly, fully, to capacity, and then more...because they know the God who dreams bigger dreams and inspires more greatness than their heads, or yours, can conjure.
