Now What?

I spend a lot of time taking care of other people. It’s important to me. I firmly believe that much of life is about serving others. With this said, self-care and self-love is essential to being capable of giving the best of myself to others. In the spirit of transparency, I struggle with the latter.

I recently took a break from over subscribing. I flat out stopped with the “yes” and implemented the “no, thank you.” Aside from my family and friends, I am on hiatus from trying to do too much for others and then neglecting myself. This doesn’t mean I am done with others. Rather, I am taking care of myself for others. This shift is harder to implement than it is to write.

We are conditioned to please or join. We emphasize more over less.

Writing this feels cathartic.

I have spent much of the past ten years prepping for or emerging myself in motherhood. It has been the greatest privilege to do this while flexing personally and professionally. Often on hiatus from one thing to the next, I’ve been able to give myself fully and reverently to people and passions while being available for my babies. Truly, I am thankful.

My girls are my touchstones for goal setting. Listening to their lists of dreams and to dos is always inspiring and they like to ask me questions about the period I refer to as BK (before kids). Some of my life stories and aspirations stay the same, while others are drastically different. Small slivers of me are unrecognizable with no love lost, and tiny tadpoles of my BK self are still swimming in my soul. I told them that this is the year they become acquainted with the mommy of the now and the Katie of the BK.

I am taking the year for myself. What does this look like? I’ll be reading and writing to the max, I’ll be working out like I am training for the Olympics, and I’ll be choosing causes that add to or enhance my condition. Healthy in all ways and for the long run is my latest and hopefully forever jam. As I told my kiddos, sometimes mamas have to relearn how to take care of ourselves. It be different than BK, but it’s just as is important.

I didn’t really feel the need to share except to say that you will notice a frequency in content not yet seen before, or a version of me that you have never quite encountered. Be patient and kind, please. Shifting is scary.

So now what? I guess the answer is the adventure.