Souling #202: Souling Through Motherhood: A Mother’s Day Reflection
Motherhood cracked me open in ways I never expected.
It’s been one of the most beautiful and brave journeys I’ve ever walked…full of sacred joy, deep exhaustion, unexpected grief, and overwhelming love. To mother is to constantly shape-shift. To pour out and reach in. To lose yourself and slowly remember who you are—again and again.
Becoming Ryder’s mom was the beginning of a lifelong unfolding.
He is my mirror and my muse.
He carries the best of me and Brian…the softness, the spark, the stubborn determination and yet he is wholly his own. Ryder came into this world with his own light, his own rhythm, his own soul signature. And it has been the greatest honor of my life to witness it bloom.
But let me be honest:
There were days that I felt like I was failing.
Days when my nervous system was fried, when I spoke with a sharpness I regret, when the weight of responsibility felt oh too heavy to hold with grace.
There were days I longed for more space. And then, in the very same breath, I grieved and still do how quickly time is slipping through my fingers. Being the mom of a boy is like enduring a SLOW break-up even though he tells me, “I loved you first, Momma”!
Motherhood has made me more tender, more human, more awake.
It has stretched my heart in ways I never imagined. I’ve asked myself often how I could possibly love him more when the love keeps growing.
It’s taught me to surrender what I thought I knew and to be okay with what I didn’t. .
It has taught me forgiveness. To forgive the spaces that were filled with “mom gulit” and to shed the shame of my selfishness that snuck it’s way in as a young mom.
It has taught me to hug with meaning. After all, Ryder says a proper hug is at least 30 seconds long. Before Ryder came along hugging was not my jam at all. These days see if you can get past me without receiving one!
It’s shown me that Souling, my way of living and loving from the inside out, is not a side practice. It’s my survival and my sacred ground. It’s the breath I take before I speak. It’s the pause I find when I’ve lost myself. It’s the remembering that even in the chaos, love is still here. I am still here.
This Mother’s Day, I’m honoring the beauty and the hardship. All necessary.
The moments I’ve soared, and the ones I’ve sobbed my way through. I actually have more moments now in my mini sobbing then I did when he was little. I miss him! He’s being who we raised him to be. In that he is living his best life. I hold sacred that we are still at the same place with one another…we are both still becoming!
The fact that showing up…imperfectly, wholeheartedly, honestly…is enough.
To every momma out there:
You are seen. You are sacred. You are not alone.
Your love is a force that reshapes the world.
And to Ryder,
thank you for choosing me.
You make me braver, softer, truer.
I am a better soul because I get to be your momma.
Soulfully Yours,
Mindy
