Grounded in Love
I love my young mama friends. Those with babies and toddlers, those announcing new pregnancies on their Facebooks every eighteen months.
I love their enthusiasm, their love for their children, their determination to do what is best, no matter how hard it is, for the little ones under their maternal wings.
And how I remember those days. When I woke up at the crack, made homemade oatmeal, mowed the grass before 7. Ha!
They were busy, busy ones filled with diapers, training the beasts to come when I said come, force feeding peas, all that bathing.
But then one day I woke up and they weren’t so babyish and it was time to train them. Here’s how we put away the silverware. Here’s how we hang up a towel. Here’s how we sort the clothes.
Then there was one brief moment I thought the hard work was done. Everyone could hit the toilet. Everyone brushed their own teeth. Everyone could dress him or herself.
It was a brief, but beautiful moment:)
Because the next thing I knew, I realized that all that coming to Mommy, all that potty training, all that teaching to work didn’t mean a darn thing unless it was done in love.
As my friend, Kim, would say, if it was grounded in love.
Cuz everything’s worthless unless grounded in love.
Everything.
All the training and coming to Mommy and putting away the knives sharp side away from you.
All the getting up early, the oatmeal making, the lawn mowing.
All the bed making on Saturdays and the keeping them away from honey until the age of one and the natural shampoos and all the fresh veggies and all the vacuumed edges of the room and all the books and all the Bach and all the flossing.
Worthless.
Unless grounded in love.
Clanging cymbals.
Unless grounded in love.
Sounding gongs.
Unless grounded in love.
All that training, all that drill instructoring…did I work so hard on these I missed the whole point?
Possibly.
Probably.
Ground them in love.
I hope it’s not too late.
ps. This pic is of me and my sweet niece, Brooke, summer 2009. She’s probably twice this size now.
I have a degree in psychology, which I have found to be useless. And I am planning on going back to school and getting a Masters in Creative Writing, because I enjoy writing and would love to learn more techniques to make myself a better writer. I am worried, however, that this degree will not open up many doors in terms of the job market (just as my psychology degree has failed to do). Any thoughts? Thank you..
my husband stumbled onto your site last night and told me he thought i would like it. i’m a first time mom to a seven month old little boy that i’m crazy about…and this particular post just resounded with me. thank you for writing it. thank you for posting it. it is beautiful. and such a good reminder as i go about these crazy days and wonder how my little man will turn out. ground him in love. amen.
Amy, thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. This was the perfect read during a week that has (already!) been busy making me weary. I so needed to hear this – “remember the love!”
Hey Amy!!
It has been waaaaay too long!! I was just googling my blog {I know, so prideful} and saw your comment back to my comment well over a year ago.
I guess I never checked back, but have searched for you occasionally. Crazy!!
Yes, I am finally a blogger! The Lord had been leading for a while, I was just slow to put it together – not a surprise. :0(
Come say hello if you get a chance!
Thank you for this, Amy.
Great post, Amy.
The same could be said of writing like this. Grounded in love. Thanks again.
Sniff.
You wouldn’t have done any of it unless it was . . . Look at your kiddos! Grounded in love!