There are messes everywhere.
Dishes stacking up,
Laundry strewn across the floor.
Is it dirty?
Is it clean?
Handprints coating the windows and walls.
Sticky strawberry remnants abandoned on a brightly colored plastic plate.
Little fingers tug at your leg.
Mama,
Mama,
Mama.
A chorus of needy voices echo through the rarely quiet house.
You need to make dinner,
But you're still cleaning up from lunch.
You need to make dinner,
But someone needs a diaper changed.
You need to make dinner,
But you're also the nurse wrapping Disney character band-aids on a tiny scraped knee.
You feel like you do it all,
Never a break,
Always rushing,
Somewhere to be,
Someone to help,
Hurry,
Hurry,
Hurry.
But stop.
It's ten years from now.
And no one needs you so much anymore.
You rushed your way through it all.
You barely remember through the blur.
It all went too fast.
Yet each day felt so painstakingly long.
But it doesn't have to be this way.
It doesn't have to be this hard.
You don't have to feel this rundown.
Don't you hear that tiny voice in your heart telling you to just slow it all down?
That tiny voice whispering of the joy to be found.
Why do we rush so fast?
Get your shoes on quick,
We say.
Walk a little faster,
Please,
We say.
Stop messing around and follow me now,
We say.
But what is the emergency?
Where is the fire?
Why are we always looking to the next thing,
The next place,
The next day,
The next phase,
That will surely be easier than this one?
But what if,
What if we slowed down long enough to look at life through their tiny,
Bright eyes?
Let's do that together for a moment.
Let's practice living in the present moment from the eyes of a toddler.
Go ahead and close your eyes and take a few deep breaths.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Inhale.
Exhale.
Ground yourself into your body.
Let the present moment melt away until you're left with that little version of yourself.
That inner child who's still in there,
But buried deep through layers of complexities,
Years of rushing through life.
Everything is new.
There's no sense of time.
You have no obligations,
No responsibilities filling your mind.
Your sole purpose is to just be.
To inhale the world around you and exhale the hunger for more learning.
Your observations captivate you.
The lace winding itself through holes on a shoe.
How does it fit so neatly on that colorful leather?
The soft and squishy moss covering that rock.
Your tiny hands caress it as your puzzled eyes scrutinize its intricate details.
These noodles on your plate.
How if you wiggle them,
Stretch them,
Throw them.
The soft,
Expansive skin of your mama's squishy belly.
The warmth and love that you feel from her.
The rain hitting the sidewalk.
Your shadow stretching away.
These vibrant leaves crunching under your shoes.
The waxy crayons whose colors pop just so when drawn on the expansive canvas of the living room wall.
The stars.
The water in the sink.
Bubbles on your fingers,
Dirt in your toes.
How does this zipper work?
How does this doorknob turn?
Everything is new,
Beautiful,
Captivating.
You want to explore it all.
Take in every detail of this fascinating place.
Yet you're pulled along.
You always seem to be late for something.
You're told to hurry,
Stop stalling,
Move quicker.
All you want is to slow down so you can explore,
Understand this place and all of its secrets.
To be a child is the ultimate form of freedom.
Free from the knowledge that a critical eye exists.
Free from your own self-critical monsters that haven't found their grip on you just yet.
Free from the fear of failure.
Free from the pressures and expectations of society.
What a beautiful life it is to live free from it all,
Even if just for a time.
A sliver of magical,
Mystical,
Captivating time before it all starts slipping away.
With every hurry up,
Move faster,
Come on now,
It's pulled a little further away from your grasp.
Until soon you're moving too fast to notice that sliver of silver in the rock on the ground.
You're now captivated by the hustle and bustle of this world around you.
It always sounds so urgent,
It must be important.
Mama,
You dear sweet mama,
Let them be in that magic just a little longer.
Slow your days down.
Slow your breath down.
Calm the chaos,
The buzzing in your head.
Let the do's go and just be for a while.
Let the little ones be your teacher.
Let them dictate the pace of your day,
The direction of your purpose.
For in the end,
We're all just searching for joy.
For the freedom that comes from a purposeful splash in a muddy puddle of rain.
There is no emergency after all.
There's just peace and curiosity to be found in the little details of our days.
So let them show you where to find it.
Let them,
Not your full-to-the-brim list of to-do's,
Be your guide.
You're doing great,
Mama.
Hang in there.
