"It's just past midnight."
"I've only just stepped back from the closet-sized kitchen inside my studio apartment where I watched, ironically unplanned, as all three clock hands met at 12:00 am."
I wrote these words in 2015 in a blog post as I turned 27 years old. At midnight tonight I turn 35 years old.
As an unmarried, childless woman, it is a bit of a hard pill to swallow that not much has changed. Even when I was as a strong and confident teenager I was certain that I would find the love of my life in college, marry, and begin the story that was just like my parent's story. To be honest, I had my chance, but I chose to follow my dreams and learn a little more about myself. That choice has taken me on the journey of a lifetime and something I am eternally grateful for.
Yet my first instinct when I feel down on myself is to compare myself to the friends I grew up with and every 30-something on Instagram who I think has totally figured life out.
Guess what, that gets you nowhere.
I get asked quite often about how many kids I have. It does surprise me sometimes because I have to remind myself, while wearing my Wonder Woman t-shirt to the grocery store, that I am not a teenager anymore. Most women my age have children. And while none of them have come from my womb... I have had children too. And I have come back to them.
About a month ago I left my "happy place" at my favorite theme park because, well, I knew that they could handle the trash situation just fine without me and my kiddos out there in the world needed me back in their world. It hurt my heart to leave friends and loved ones, but my cup was empty. The relationships that I built and that I had prayed for happened.
To be ready to go back to work with kiddos, I knew I needed a few things. The first was rest, and rest includes not only sleep but taking care of your body, mind, and spirit. The next thing I needed was support. I have seen multiple professionals (who I honestly don't always want to go see but I do anyway) who have helped me talk through past trauma and who are guiding me into my future. Lastly, but certainly not least, I needed Jesus.
I started going back to my church and seeing the women I did small groups with. I go with a friend who I met at my old job and it has become a regular tradition. In these weeks of transition of starting a new job, trying to learn new skills, and accepting the fact that I will not be perfect right away, I remembered a great piece of advice that one of these wise women at my church gave me last year...
"You can't pour from an empty cup. We all know that. But we cannot keep pouring, pouring and pouring. Being full and then again empty isn't healthy. So instead we keep our cup full and we pour from the overflow of love. We pour from the saucer"
That comment shook my brain at the time and I still have to remind myself daily of it. When my cup is full, I am a better friend, family member, person of society, and behavior technician to my kiddos. How do we do it though?
By doing things the world may see as selfish.
Taking a day off, saying "no," setting a boundary in a relationship or circumstance. For me, those are all really hard things to do. But I am learning how to do it.
It is just past midnight now. I have turned 35 years old and I know I am a very cracked cup because I poured and poured and poured for so many years without keeping my cup full enough to to let the excess overflow from the love and support from others and, for me. Jesus. A person I admire always because He loved everybody, always.
I'm Mandi, I'm 35 today and I am vowing from this day, always, to keep my cup full and healthy and pour my love into this word from my saucer. So that I can continue to create and enjoy magic in this world as long as I can.
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