what women should do

The other day I was having breakfast with Everly at a local bagel place, and a group of sorority girls began smiling and waving at her. I thought nothing of it; she's a super cute baby and we get hounded everywhere we go.

Next thing I know, I'm overhearing a loud conversation about why none of those girls want to be me.

"I could never be a stay at home mom. They just like, clean and read a magazine."

(One girl starts acting like she's made of plastic, doing a princess wave, insinuating that stay at home moms are silly.)

I was shocked. They had just spoken to my sweet little girl, and here they are less than 10 feet away from me berating my choice of lifestyle. I posted about it on Facebook and got a huge response, and I realized that we have strong feelings in our society about What Women Should Do. We want to "have it all" and all is just too much for me.

what women should do (as society says)

wake up like this
be attractive
but not too slutty
catch a good man
but be independent
have a great career
have children
have a natural birth
but lose the baby weight in 6 weeks
feed them organic food that you grew without pesticides in your pinterest perfect garden
dress them in teeny designer outfits
avoid gluten, dairy, and sugar
but treat yoself with a frappe and pastry
have friends
keep your husband satisfied
make time for yourself
but also martyr yourself in the name of good parenting


And these are just the standards of the culture that I have chosen to participate in. All over this country, women find ways to judge each other based on what we do or don't do.

The standards are ridiculous and unattainable. We are basing our lives off of results rather than roots. The roots of a happy life are as follows:

1. Love yourself.
2. Love others.
3. Be around people who love you, and don't let the haters get you down.

By taking these three steps in order, all of the other things will follow.

three steps to being an awesome person

1. Love yourself:
Work out just because it makes you feel happy.
Treat yourself but eat healthy foods to take care of your body.
Believe in your dreams and follow them because you know you are worth it.
Take time to listen to your own heart and the Lord's heart for you, because they hold answers to many of the questions that stress you out.

2. Love others:
Kids will be fine if you make decisions with love and not fear. Don't worry about so much. Every single person you see around you was once a baby and they made it.
Spend time and energy with your husband.
Invest in your friendships. I feel like the investment is so underrated; we seem to think that meeting up for coffee once and not becoming instant bosom buddies is a failure on our part, but friendships take time and intention. 
*note: to properly love someone, you have to love yourself first. You want to give them the best in the world, so start believing that you are the best version of yourself and give them that.

3. Be around people who love you, and don't let the haters get you down.
If you surround yourself with people who love you, this becomes a cyclical list.

love yourself--> give love --> receive love --> realize just how worthy of love you are (answer: very worthy)--> love yourself more.

(don't let the haters get you down is self-explanatory.)



After all that, I feel like the biggest thing to takeaway from this incident is that you never know a mom's situation, and so should only provide support (as long as she's not hurting anyone.) When in doubt, just love.

--Caroline

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