You’re doing SO much, mama.

In fact, I’d be willing to bet that when you factor in the emotional labor, the unpaid caretaking, the self-care practices, the mental load you carry, and the healing work you’re so dedicated to, you are working as hard or harder than most people you know.

And yet, I bet you still battle The Demons of Never Enoughness more often than you’d like. This makes perfect sense. Day after day, not only are we fed BS images of what happy families, thriving businesses, and moms who “have their shit together” on social media and in advertising, but…

• The bulk of our work is invisible to the majority of non-mothers.
• Because of the aforementioned, even WE don’t count half of what we’re doing as valuable or important. We’ve been conditioned not to see or acknowledge our own work.
• You are tracking the wellbeing of so many loved ones. You have your finger on the pulse of so many unmet needs and society makes it seem like it’s your responsibility to meet those needs in order to qualify as a good mom.
• You care deeply about so many people and their realities, and you sometimes feel desperate to make a bigger difference.
• Pandemic madness has you under-resourced and exhausted, which means you’re having a hard time even meeting even the minimum standards you have in place for yourself and your life. Your unmet needs are keeping you from living from your values as often as you’d like.

These are tough times, and the lion’s share of the cultural dysfunction is falling on mothers (especially mothers of color and other marginalized sub-groups of moms).

I realized a while back that I need a simple tool to turn to when The Demons show up (which is almost always when I’m depleted from overwork and/or sleep deprived). In my experience, this process gets easier the more often you use it and is a great way to cut through bullshit fast. Here’s what it looks like:

When you catch yourself scanning your life, gathering evidence that you’re not doing enough, try this:

1. Identify the story – what cultural and/or familial narratives have you internalized about what you should be able to keep up with?
2. Identify the fear beneath the story – what are you afraid might happen if you don’t “keep up”? (Pro tip: our deepest fears are usually rooted in a need to feel safe and secure and/or to belong.)
3. Notice inequities being perpetuated – name the people, institutions, and/or systems who gain power or profit when you believe this story.
4. Complete this sentence: in the healthier, more beautiful world I’m here to help co-create, the story goes like this…

One thing I know for sure is that we need to be spending less time judging our worth and worthiness based on the toxic and too-small-for-us narratives all around us, and more time deconstructing them and imagining new ones.

Motherhood and homemaking are FULL of shoulds, every one of which needs to be examined. When we take the time to deconstruct them, we often find that most aren’t aligned with our values, with the vibrant, juicy lives we want to be living, nor with our vision of the kind of world we’re here to help co-create for the next generation.

WE have to choose which narratives are worthy of us and our kids. Please don’t give that power away to people and institutions that don’t have your or your family’s best interests in mind.

You’re doing a beautiful job,