You thought I forgot about you? I didn’t forget.

Sometimes we have to pull in, in order to make our way back out

Consider the last six weeks my cocoon phase. As 2019 arrives, I make my way back outward. My wings breaking free from the captivity of my chrysalis.

And after how many times reading The Hungry Caterpillar, how does one not compare to the metamorphosis of the caterpillar to butterfly.

Is it not the story of pregnancy?

Is it not the story of post-partum?

Is it not the story of our cyclical and spherical rebirth?

As I reflect on the year and the coming opening, I lean back into my wings. I lean back into my strength and I fall hard on the pieces of myself that I know to be true.

But you know that creep creep creeping?

That feeling like maybe you don’t have it all figured out.

Like maybe I’ve gone in one too many times to sooth my daughter as she cries out for me before bed. Perhaps I’ve become too accommodating. Have I overcompensated for the deficiencies in my own childhood? Have I become too soft? In an effort to facilitate my children’s own self discovery have I laid down to low?

And yet, the harshness of “no,” the restriction around making it through my own life hearing negativity and distrust and knowing that I am capable. How do we instill that knowledge of capability in our children. How do we make them feel like they can make mistakes and damage things and do unsafe things without the fear of no? How do I raise fearless children; aware of their surroundings, street savvy, culturally knowledgeable, but exploratory, willing to push boundaries.

I think it starts now.

I think it already has begun.

I know they can’t intellectualize everything back to me, but as I have felt a shift in myself, hitting on my inner mantel, so do I see their inner fire burn brightly. They haven’t build all of their layers yet. They haven’t had the opportunity to really open out and down and back in again. They are simply ping-ponging their way all over the place, sorting out what hurts and what feels good. And while we want to warn them, does it really work? I can’t tell you how many adults I say: hey that’s probably not a good idea, and they do it anyway. How much SPACE is enough space? How much space is too much space? Is there such a thing? Or are we all destined to make our way through this corkscrew of life hitting the same barriers.

This week my partner reminded me of the famous quote “ the line between insanity and genius is measured by success.” I think there is also a dash of privilege and a spoonful of love, but the point is, we live in a community of social structures full of unwritten rules, and it seems that in order to make it, to swim in the same lake, one must know the waters. That takes a bit of swimming, no? You can’t simply stay on the beach and then make your way into the waters one day. So we have to push, we have to pull, we have to say yes and say no, and monitor the levels to which we allow those things to consume. The level to which we create structure versus allow the free flow.

These questions I find myself coming back to over and over and over again.

What I know is that I need to show them some some some of me.

My son always asks for “some some some of that.” I don’t actually think it’s a stutter. I think its that he wants more than just a little bit, and so he has adapted to asking for many ‘somes’ in order to get a little more than I would normally provide him. And it works. I think its sweet, and I always give in; it’s the best way to avoid the no. Have they not already begun to figure this out?

Is it not through showing them our own exploration.

Is it not from NOT having the answers to 100 different questions. To me, that is how we show them. This is how we create space to move through the unknown together.

This is my tuning fork for now to hit a vibration that makes sense. By showing them who I am, by treating them as my peers, in the same quest for knowledge and information, by participating together, we are making our way through the fruits, the snacks, the leaf, into the cocoon, and out wings free, to make our way back through this cycle once more.