Did you ever read William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying? In one of my favorite passages in all fiction-dom, the story's heroine Addie Bundren recounts a story in which her well-meaning but misguided neighbor shows up at her door to call her to repentance. Addie then goes into a little sermon about what repentance is, and what it means.
"She prayed for me because she believed I was blind to sin, wanting me to kneel and pray too, because people to whom sin is just a matter of words, to them salvation is just words too."This part has resonated with me since first I read it. That moment when something you've heard all your life and thought you understood suddenly becomes more than just very familiar words. When something you thought was a cliche turns out to be rooted in some pretty serious truth.
Thursday was the perfect storm: Poor diet+lack of sleep+two kids needing my attention at every turn+a healthy dose of my own impatience=Becca meltdown of (almost) epic proportions. And when I say epic, I don't mean, "Dude it was epic." But real epic. Like Odysseus and the Charybdis.
I was doubting everything from my choice of wardrobe to my divine calling of being a mother. When the day was finally over, part of me wanted to forget it all happened and drown my sorrows in the boob tube and the aforementioned Ben & Jerry's. The other part (and, it turns out, the greater part) wanted to unload all of these emotional burdens on my husband.
As it all came spilling out, he just sat there, so patiently, listening to my word vomit--things you think you mean at night, only to discover in the light of the morning that exhaustion made some latent and pretty benign feelings seem much more pernicious. When I was done spilling my guts, he reminded me that the divine calling of being a mother has nothing to do with changing diapers, fixing meals, or any of the mundane and often frustrating parts of my day. Being a mother is about loving and caring for my children. All the other tasks are just side duties. This is something I believe in and preach often enough to my mom friends in need of just such a pep talk. But I have to say, it's pretty powerful being on the receiving end.
As I sat there, feeling the Spirit for the first time that day, I began to review the day's work in my mind. All day, the running self-pitying commentary in my head was that I am never able to get done what I want to get done. That I would love to be the mom I want to be... if only circumstances would let me. And as I thought about this attitude (that I've had since becoming a mother), I realized that this is exactly what people are talking about when they talk about the need to become the person Heavenly Father wants them to be. This concept--something I'd understood only definitively--suddenly became more than the words used to express it.
I've had this image in my head of what I think the perfect mother would be like--and maybe I lose my cool sometimes because this image is incompatible with reality. And maybe I keep running into barriers because this person I'm trying to become is neither real nor what my Heavenly Father has in mind for me.
It so happens that the Conference talk I read during my Gospel study that day was Lynn G. Robbins's talk, "What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye to Be?" I had completely forgotten about this talk. As a matter of fact, I've actually been praying lately that in the next Conference, someone would give a talk about parenting and how to discipline--turns out, my prayers had already been answered. For anyone else dealing with a toddler and a newborn, I strongly encourage at least a look-over of these inspiring words. Especially:
"A sweet and obedient child will enroll a father or mother only in Parenting 101. If you are blessed with a child who tests your patience to the nth degree, you will be enrolled in Parenting 505. Rather than wonder what you might have done wrong in the premortal life to be so deserving, you might consider the more challenging child a blessing and opportunity to become more godlike yourself. With which child will your patience, long-suffering, and other Christlike virtues most likely be test, developed, and refined? Could it be possible that you need this child as much as this child needs you?"
It seems that there's something more powerful at work than my 2-year-old's willfulness. Maybe I'm not the worst mother on the planet. Maybe I wasn't overlooked when divine feminine attributes were being passed out in the premortal realm. Maybe my kid is just learning, and I'm learning right along with him. And at the end of the ordeal, maybe we'll both end up being a little closer to who we're meant to be.
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