The Beauty of Becoming: Growth Through Life’s Changes
I had a week of quiet tears as I thought about life’s changes and the journeys my grown-up kids are on. Trying to lighten up, I went to Facebook and watched a few reels. The first that came up was about ducks and time management. For some unknown reason, the reel that followed the ducks was the 2005 Stanford Commencement Address from Steve Jobs..
It starts where he spoke about losing the work he loved:
“What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.” He was talking about being fired from Apple. But as I listened, I didn’t think about computers. I thought about motherhood.
I put my heart into being a stay-at-home mom.
It felt like my true calling. I also had dreams of doing creative work, like graphic design, and I was accepted to grad school. But those dreams had to wait. My days were already full with something even more meaningful: being mom to three wonderful kids.
Somewhere along the way, I didn’t realize it, but I started to imagine the future. I pictured myself as a mother-in-law and a grandmother, still closely involved in my children’s adult lives, just as I was during their childhood. It felt like a natural next step, but I was making a lot of assumptions.
Grown-up children don’t always follow the plans we imagine for them.
Our children begin to follow their own paths before we notice. They love in ways we never expected. They move in directions that are beautiful, different, and sometimes hard to accept. We let go, not because we want to, but because we trust in the beauty of who they are becoming.
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