A Placeholder

A couple weeks ago I had an idea for a newsletter I wanted to write here. I still do, it’s coming TBD. Then as it sometimes goes, Life Stuff™ kept getting in the way. I do not like that feeling of things hanging over my head. Duh, who does? I’m constantly making lists, a little thrill each time I get to cross something off. But as the days piled up and I couldn’t get to the meat of the piece I’d been ruminating on, I got more anxious, more critical of myself, more of that annoying voice with a lot unproductive OPINIONS.

Two nights ago over dinner, Jimmy shared a photo of a poem he’d found on Instagram:

The internet tells me the author is Lucas Jones

He had shared it first with June, our oldest daughter. It’s a frequent topic of conversation in our house - whose voice is that? Is that anxiety talking? What do YOU want to do? Is this an old story being replayed?

I guess I’m saying a big part of our parenting is trying to support humans who know themselves, trust and listen to themselves, value their individual intuition in a loud and messy world. Obviously (earmuffs, June) it’s much easier said than done. Parenting is reparenting yourself, blah blah blah. We mess up, as parents and individuals, all the time.

But as the philosopher Allen Iverson famously said, “we’re talking about practice, man!” That quote has morphed and been misunderstood over the years. I forget too. Two decades on, it’s a quippy punchline, a gif of encouragement. But he’s in a defensive stance, responding to criticism.

Of course, it’s both/and. It’s all practice. It’s all offense and defense, failure and joy. Rinsing and repeating.

I’ll get to the next post. I’ll get to the Sisyphean lists. But first, I’m going to make a snack and drink some water.

xo,
Kate