At my age, I’ve done most of my big risking. (Although writing monthly blogs is a hug risk for me!) I get it that I still take risks every day but probably the biggest risks I’ll ever take, have been taken.
I was driving just the other day and listening to a new Celtic Women CD and I heard a line in the song, “When You Believe,”
which said something like “I was moving mountains before I knew I could.” That line really struck me and stayed with me.
It struck me because it is true.
You’ve heard it said, I’m sure, that one is better prepared to drive a car, has even had lessons and practice, than one is prepared to become a parent. And yet, one of the most gigantic risks one takes is becoming a parent.
You learn what you can before the baby is born but you’re never really prepared for what’s ahead! Of course you make mistakes but how remarkable it is that one parents, making decisions and taking risks for yourself and your child, every single day.
Hopefully, there are two people to parent the child or children. More often today, there is just one. The parents set up boundaries to protect and teach the child with nothing to refer to except their own intuition, the model of their own parents and a book or two.
The child’s job as they mature is to push against the boundaries the parents have set up and convince the parents to move the boundary a little bit. It’s a dance that’s been around since there were first parents and children.
John and Laura, my children, are grown now. Goodness knows I made mistakes parenting them but they have become wonderful human beings.
In looking back, I feel as though, while parenting them, I moved mountains before I knew I could. Is that the reason they are the unique and wonderful people they are today? Or, In becoming who they are, have they moved mountains before they knew they could?
Mary Ann Taylor is a retired banker who's embarrassed to be technoligically illiterate, but proud to be Laura's mother. She realizes that at her advanced age, she's done more risking than she has yet to do, but is willing to risk this.
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Mary Ann,
I love this! Thank you!
The line “I was moving mountains before I knew” made me smile and gave me hope. Thanks for sharing this.
I think it was both.
This is so beautiful, Mary Ann. And especially coming from such a wonderful Mama as you are. What wise perspective you offer!
Good on you Mary Ann, for denoting the risk of parenting> moving mountains, that’s for sure! So often, I think, we take parenting, raising children, contributing two people into society, for granted. I don’t know John, but your Laura is surely a testament to raising an incredible human! I am picturing all that you have done for her as a mom in little and big ways to bless her with her audacious life. Her life (and it sounds like yours as well), is force to be reckoned with. And that, I truly admire!
This is beautiful, Mary Ann. I love the idea of moving mountains before you even know you are doing that. I think that is someone who “leads with the heart”. The heart wants to do something and doesn’t recognition the difficulty. Just one pebble today and another one tomorrow. This is a very peace making thought you have shared. Thank you so much for the way you have always led your life by heart.