Adulting is humbling.
Parenting is humbling.
Life is humbling.
My journey has been humbling.
Despite having what many would describe as a “great life”, I still have felt humiliated, embarrassed, and downright stupid during my 42 years on this planet. Now anyone who knows me (or thinks they do by following the ridiculous amount of social media posts I put out there) is also acutely aware that I’m overly proud at times, vain for sure, perhaps a titch egotistical now and again. But I look in the mirror. I look at the real me. I see what I like. I see what I don’t like. I never avoid mirrors. So I like to think, I balance out the highs and the lows. I actually SEE the highs and lows. I actually share the highs and the lows.
But those lows.
Those moments when you have to think to yourself:
“What the F was I thinking?”
“How am I going to explain this one to my friends? Family? Parents?”
“What in the world am I doing wrong as a mom, that would make my child do _____(fill in the blank with something horribly embarrassing)?”
And despite the many life wins, and precious moments you want to put in a frame and protect from any type of tarnishing… those damn lows are so powerful!
I’ve found that trotting along this long, crumbly, broken-path, and then sometimes having to sprint over the repeated and unexpected obstacles, gets easier when we remove our masks. I once heard this quote at a momma-conference: “You build walls by only sharing your successes, you build bridges by also sharing your failures.” So I’m about to share with you my biggest failures in life. I feel like I am transparent most of the time in my posts and/or human interactions… with my sloppy parenting techniques, my shoddy weight loss efforts, and my repeated relationship stumbles. But I’d like to share more, which will then also release more weight from my tired shoulders. Kind of a “help me, help you” kinda deal.
The most common example of “failure-sharing” that I’ve observed on social media is the before/after pics. People who share those are saying to everyone, “Let me show you my worst.” Now often they show it while also offering their best, which is an attempt to motivate themselves and others that THERE IS IN FACT A WAY to get to the finish-line. but honestly, people who do that are tough. They are humble. They are offering their broken-path-lessons to you all. You should thank them.
So, anywho… onto my humbling moments. Those moments I would’ve preferred never sharing with another human. Those that can still make me cry, make me blush, make me second–guess my character. Some are at the hand of my own poor decision-making, some are just a plot-twist from life where you truly learn your own strength. My most humbling moments:
1) My divorce. Hands down the most embarrassing moment of my life. I’ve explained why many times … see my previous blog on it if you haven’t read it. But essentially, I barely survived that marriage. I had no idea that the divorce would be harder to overcome. He was entirely too young and immature for me. I was a dick and jumped out of the window of our burning marriage as soon as I possibly could gather the strength. End of story.
2) My Academy experience. Again, wrote a previous blog on it. I lost myself for years there… I had behavior and decision-making skills back then, I can’t (and don’t want to) recognize now. I loved the Coast Guard, I loved being part of such an amazing service, but damn… those Academy years almost did me in.
3) My Parenting-abilities. My children are my world. I would give my life right now for either child, but I know I’ve made many mistakes in raising them thus far. I do not have any sort of child-rearing education or experience. I truly don’t know what I’m doing. So my kids act out. They say things they shouldn’t. They do things they shouldn’t. It’s horrifying at times. And sadly, I have babysitters, teachers, friends, family, strangers, etc., inform on my children’s bad behavior over and over. Telling me stuff they’ve done (hitting, biting, stealing, cussing, fighting, kicking, blah, blah, blah) where I want to hide under a stone. I want to disappear. I don’t know how to fix their issues, but I know how to love them. Everyone is so quick to see their blemishes… how they inconvenience people with their mishaps and bad behavior. The whole world is missing my baby-girls’ inner glows. Their power. But I have to parent. I have to correct the problems. So after the yellings, the time-outs, the punishments… I hold them tight trying to fill them with love by osmosis😂 Hoping they know they are my most important parts of life.
4) My father-in-law’s passing. Big surprise, I’ve written a previous blog about this—apparently writing is my therapy for all painful moments in life. I think this one knocked me out for a longer (and harder) than I expected because I didn’t realize how much he was holding my little family together. He was our support system. He was our rock. He was our friend. Way too soon & way too unexpected. Damn-near cracked me and my family in half.
5) The Sibling-Spousal Effect. I had no concept of this being any sort of issue as a child. I thought my brother and sister would always be my closest friends and confidants as we grew up. The impacts of all of our spouses joining the family, and then later on departing our family, affected how our family functioned. Clearly, every grown adult understands that once you are married, your closest friend will become your spouse. It took me a long time to recognize that, and adjust my behavior accordingly. That was humbling.
6) The Big Bad Boss. I was an officer in the military and an operational leader in a manufacturing plant for a total of 20 years. Those roles require certain types of leadership. Every mission is urgent, every deadline is critical, you cannot be meek and survive. You need to make shit happen fast, or you will be passed over or demoted, or even worse—your crew or team would lose faith in your abilities to turn the ship around. So I lived that part—the big, bad, boss. I honestly, loved that part. I loved changing results quickly and building relationships/capability in teams and feeling the camaraderie. But… I was the boss. The boss who had to fire a lot of people. The boss who had to have very straight-forward, sometimes not-so-nice, chats with hundreds of people. It was my job, and I knew how to do it. I like to think I made some amazing relationships with some phenomenal people that I got the pleasure of leading along the way. But the hard part, or humbling part, was that some people on the other side of the table from me hated me. Some hated me for what discipline I had to administer on them. Some hated me for my position-power. Some hated me for disciplining their friends. Some hated me for what they heard I might’ve done… sometime… a few years back… maybe. Some of my peers hated me for moving up faster than them. But, the point is, I have some serious haters out there. For example, one extra-angry-hater, posted a happy post on FB and congratulated the technicians at the plant the moment I announced that I was leaving and changing careers last year. That’s scary-humbling. Try telling your proud parents that one over Christmas dinner.
So there you have it. Me, warts and all. I am not as good as I want to be. But I am a person I love, and a constant project of self-improvement. Most importantly, I am light-years ahead of those folks out there who avoid mirrors.
Time to take a long gaze.