I’m sitting in my kitchen, it’s about 8:45p – I’ve got my sweat pants on that I’ve had for about 13 years (the Victoria Secret’s oldie but goodie PINK sweatpants), a sink full of dishes and if I could see my reflection in the computer screen right now, my reflection would be starring back at me with heavy eyes, messy hair and make-up that was put on over 12 hours ago and barely hanging on. All the tell-tell signs that it’s time to wrap up this day and start getting ready to embrace a new day. And normally I would, as I’m not much use to anyone, or myself, come this time of night – but tonight has been different and I just needed to sit down to write out my thoughts.

You see, lately I’ve been worried about my son and being a good mom (sound familiar out there to any of my momma’s?). He seems to be going through an emotionally harder season than I think he’s experienced in the past and the whole situation is worsened by the fact that he is a 17 year old boy who doesn’t like to “talk about his feelings.” I ponder whether to 20 question him to death to try to figure out what is going on, is it better to give him space to process things and not feel interrogated, is it something serious-serious that if left alone could do more damage than good, is it just normal teenage stuff that will work itself out, does he know I’m here to talk to and listen to what is going on, have I been so preoccupied that he doesn’t feel like he can talk to me or that I will judge him. .  .  ALL THESE THOUGHTS SWIRLING AROUND, ALL OF THEM LEAVING ME TO ASK “WHAT IS A MOMMA TO DO?” 

I would be lying if I didn’t say most of Shane’s 17 years of life, I have had no clue what to do as a mom. Having a kid at 18 might be some of the reason for that?! But, the one thing I have been blessed with and have been able to tune into, are my instincts – and so far that seems to have worked out okay for me as I’ve stumbled through mommyhood. So today, as I’ve wrestled what to do to help my son through whatever it is that he seems to be going through, I listened to my instincts and decided that the only thing I needed to do was not to pester him with a bunch of questions OR leave him alone to deal with whatever mountain of feelings he has been struggling with – what I needed to do was just to make sure he felt loved in this moment and that meant making time for him tonight.

I came up with a brilliant plan but knew that it might not go over very well, as my plan involved us hanging out together (most teenagers’ worst nightmare). Originally, I thought of just picking him up after work and running off to do something fun and adventurous but then I realized I’m on a budget L and escaping wasn’t really the answer I was looking to achieve. I settled on making a good for the heart, but bad on the diet type dinner and after dinner we would play a board game together; just spending time together like we used to do, hopefully get a laugh or two in and provide him with an opportunity to be preoccupied in a game (instead of his phone) which I hoped would lesson his thoughts around whatever seems to be troubling him. 

Growing up with my dad, after my mom passed, there are three very strong memories that I have around our time together, that I hold sacred to my heart; we would go out to dinner on Friday nights (usually Mexican food), regularly go to the movies and play the game Rummikub together for what seemed like hours. There isn’t a doubt in my mind that if my dad was still alive, we would be doing those same three things together to this day, and I know that when I walk through the pearly gates of Heaven and I see him again, that he will be sitting there waiting with a game of Rummikub to play.

As I was putting together the plans for a ‘mom & Shane night,’ it only seemed fitting to make Mexican food and play Rummikub (I would have added in a movie but knew I was already pushing it with dinner AND a game). I anticipated there being a bit of a fight and some-sort of a negotiation stand-off when I told him my plans (which is usually what I encounter when I ask him to do something that he doesn’t want to do) but there really wasn’t any push back, to my surprise. My mommy heart wants to believe it’s because deep down that was really what he was longing for and/or needing – but I think in actuality, it might have been because it was getting him out of cleaning his room like he was supposed to have done. Or maybe a little of both?! Either way, everything was executed as planned.  I made California Burritos (for those nonnative Californians, a California burrito is a carne asada burrito with beans, cheese, avocado, sour cream, salsa and FRENCH FRIES. Yes, french fries) and we played ONE game of Rummikub; I couldn’t get a second game out of him, but that was okay as I felt accomplished in being able to have one game together (and I let him win).

I’m not sure if the evening achieved everything I was hoping for, or if it provided him any relief, but the reason I felt compelled to write is because I know that while he is back up in his room right now, back in his thoughts, deep into his phone – that tonight, he felt loved (even if he picked the French fries out of the burrito & didn’t eat them – that’s how you can tell someone is really in the dumps, they don’t even eat their fries). There were no right answers as to what I should do to best help him get through, other than just letting him know that regardless of any situation, he is loved and worthy of love. 

Just as God so perfectly does, he goes before us and leaves us bread crumbs along our path; messages and notes to provide guidance, wisdom and encouragement. This living loved notion came up a few weeks ago in my bible study, as we are reading Lysa TerKeurst’s book, ‘Uninvited.’ It’s as if this seed was planted long before I knew the reason for it and God has nurtured it along the way - waiting for the moment it will bloom into purpose; that purpose was for tonight and oh how it all magically bloomed. As I wrapped up this evening and felt somewhat accomplished, I couldn’t help but think of how many people are going to sleep tonight with the exact opposite feeling of living loved and how that weighs so heavy on my heart. I have definitely gone through seasons of my life in which feeling unloved was a front and center thought; feeling unloved by God when he took my parents, feeling unloved when we never seemed to ‘fit’ into another family and moved from house to house, feeling unloved as I found myself at 23 going through a divorce - but regardless of those seasons, I always knew that my parents loved me and at the foundation of who I was, I was loved. My hope for Shane is that I have done a good enough job and that he will look back and feel the same about himself – no matter what challenges and valley’s life might throw his way.

I can’t help but feel that somewhere along the way, we have created a society of people who are going through life feeling unloved. Shane was recently telling me about a friend whose parents are about to get divorced and how his parents have just been constantly yelling. He asked if his friend could stay at our house for the night, as his friends’ dad (in the heat of moment) told his son that he was the reason they were getting a divorce! As one would suspect, his friend just didn’t want to go back to his house at that moment and was looking for a comforting place to land. I of course said that he was more than welcome to stay with us and tried to make his time at our house as comforting as possible (offering lots of food & accommodations) – trying to somehow undue the wrong that was placed upon his young, impressionable heart. While I hold steadfast in believing that his dad was caught up in the moment and was coming from a place of hurt (we tend to hurt others when we ourselves are hurt), I just couldn’t shake the notion of what Shane’s friend will carry with him from that one comment.

The father’s comment to his son not only weighed heavy on my heart, but the hurt for the whole family right now aches in a part of me that I know all to well. The comment also made me really stop and think about how many moments have transpired in the course of Shane’s life, big or small, that might have pierced his heart just as much?! There are many times I think how much better of a mom I would be if I had Shane when I was older, if I was able to start now, with where I am and what I know about myself, life, etc. Hindsight is always 20-20 and I know that there have been peaks and valleys in my parenting – that there are words, actions and behaviors that I wish I could take back (read here about one of my major parenting fails that I wish I could take back). However, all I can do is take those moments and use them to approach the next day as a better, wiser and more loving version of myself. To find opportunities to right my wrong  and to hopefully have more moments of him feeling loved, than moments where he feels less than loved. Being a parent is hard, we aren’t going to get it right. All we can do is hope that the sum of all our parenting parts comes out as a positive and not a negative.

I took some time to really reflect on this notion of living loved and how we can approach it in our everyday lives and in our relationships with others and came up with a few ways in which I have approached life and how I believe we transform the world to one of less hurt and more love.

How to Show Up in Your Life & the Life of Others Living Loved:

1.       You have to fundamentally believe that you were created in equal parts love and perfection! No matter what has happened to you, what has been said to you, what has been done to you – you have to first and foremost believe that you are loved and are love. You have to believe that you were created in and for love and that you were designed in perfection. I wholeheartedly believe that this comes from a place of believing there is a higher purpose for our life (for me, my belief is in Jesus) and that we were created for a purpose.  When we can find the source of our purpose, our meaning of life, then we can feel rest assured in life that we were created for something bigger and that, in and of itself, centers our heart in a place of love. You can’t give what you don’t have, so if you don’t get this first part down - it’ll be hard to show up in the other areas of your life!

2.       Giving love is about meeting the person where they are vs. where you want them to be! Have you ever tried to change something about yourself? Maybe a habit, a lifestyle change, a behavior? How did it work for you? Chances are that it wasn’t easy, that you resorted back to old patterns/habits before officially changing, or you just miserably failed altogether. Now try to get someone else to change? Fat chance. You can’t make someone change and when you have expectations of what someone is supposed to be, then you can rest assured that all you will accomplish is disappointment. Your job is not to make someone out to be someone that you want them to be – your job is to accept, love and appreciate people for where they are in life and who they are in life. If your love for someone is based on their ability to meet your standards, then you aren’t coming from a place of love & they will never be able to live loved, as they will constantly fall short in your eyes. People will choose how they want to show up in life and we are all constantly evolving, so focus on being your best self so that others will see that and want to decide to be their best self.

3.       Living loved means that you believe people’s intentions are not malice in nature! No matter what the other person did, if you can believe that their intentions were not malice in nature, then you can come from a place of forgiveness, understanding and love. You can also come from a place of knowing that their actions are a reflection on how they feel about themselves, and not a reflection of how they feel about you. If you believe that someone’s intentions ARE malice in nature, then you need to consider how you have this person show up in your life. If it isn’t someone that you can get remove from your life altogether, then you need to make sure that you have strong boundaries to protect yourself.

4.       Living loved means that we acknowledge that people will never fulfill our needs! Humans are bound to disappoint or come up short; it’s just the way it is. Others will hurt us and hate to tell you this, you will hurt others. Living loved is an internal job! If we are looking to others to fulfill pieces of our hearts, then you can rest assured that those pieces will be broken open again and again. Somewhere along the line, those broken pieces were caused by someone else and if we aren’t intentional about healing ourselves from the inside out, you will create what you fear; you will attract people that will keep hurting those places and repeating the same actions. It is our minds way of sabotaging our life to tell ourselves “See, I was right. I can’t trust anyone, I’m not worthy, I’m not smart enough, I’m not capable, I’m unloved . . . . .” When we can come from a place where we recognize that people are only human and that we are all bound to mess up, then when it happens you can see everything with a little more compassion and a little less hurt.

5.       Living loved means embracing all the parts of ourselves! This one can sometimes be the hardest. How much easier it is for us to accept, love and acknowledge the less than perfect parts of others – but not show the same love, grace and compassion for ourselves. Like I said, living loved is an internal job and part of that process comes from a place of embracing all of the wonderful, beautiful, messy and unlikable parts of who we are. If we don’t love ourselves, how can we expect anyone else to, and how can we put up the boundaries we need to protect ourselves from those who intend to do harm? This means we’ve got to stop comparing ourselves to others, that we’ve got to heal our hearts and that above all else, we make a promise to ourselves to put loving ourselves as our highest priority.

6.       Living loved means forgiving and asking for forgiveness! Gosh, I wish some people in my family could have read this and mended some broken relationships that definitely did not need to end the way they did. If we understand that we are not perfect and that people are not perfect – then we can understand the value of forgiveness and that forgiving and asking for forgiveness is at the heart of living loved. If we embrace the parts of ourselves that show up messy and less than our best selves, than asking for forgiveness acknowledges those pieces – which allows people to do their own internal healing and also gives them permission to also ask for forgiveness when they come up short. There is always an apology in making someone feel a way that you did not intend to make them feel – even if you don’t believe you were wrong in what you did. Living loved also means being open to forgiving someone that might have hurt you, when they are coming to you with a meaningful apology. Forgiving is less about the action and more about allowing space for healing in both your heart and the heart of the other person. Everyone needs forgiveness, including ourselves.

I know that my dinner and game night tonight won’t heal everything my son is going through and I know that the journey he is on might be longer and mightier than I am capable of providing (I’m grateful knowing I have a powerful God fighting for him too) - so tonight my head and heart are at peace just knowing I was able to follow my instincts long enough so that I could be present for him and give the one thing that our kids need most from us – unconditional love.

To each and everyone one reading this post – I hope that you know you are loved and my prayer for you is that you live a life where you feel loved and are able to take that gift to spread the message to those in your life, so that they live loved too. The world is heavy and hard and if we aren’t careful, it can lead us to believe that we are unloved, unworthy, undeserving and incapable. When we begin to believe and see that side of the world, we are unable to show up from a place of love for ourselves or for others. I don’t know what the answer is, but I hope that my thoughts on how we can all live loved help everyone to show up in the world a little differently? All I know is that we are all wrestling with the same feelings and seeking refuge and rescue from an imperfect world and imperfect people - and if we can all do our part to bring a little more love into our life – what a sweeter world it can be.

Live loved my friends!

<3,

Kristin