An Open Letter To The Me Of One Year Ago

Dear Crystal of August 2013 (and parents in the thick of it everywhere),

You look like... um, well we won't go there, Sweetie. Go take a shower after you are done reading this.

I know things are really hard right now. I know you are more tired than you have ever been in your entire life. I know all those negative things that people told you would happen, seem like they are happening. And all of that makes you want to crawl into a hole.

I know this may seem unbelievable, but it will get better. It may sound trite, but it is truth.

And the "getting better" will be more than just "getting used to it."

I know you feel like you can't go anywhere because everyone will stare and judge. Here is a secret, one that it has taken me until just about now to understand: the way you worry about things and apologize for everything makes people look and judge that much more. People do not care about you and your crazy kids nearly as much as you think they do. And if you feel judged because, in the past, you have judged others, well sister, that is called karma.

Let it go.

Look around you! I know it seems like everyone else has it together. They don't. I promise. And there is someone, somewhere, who thinks you have it all together, too, and we all know that is a laugh.

Give yourself grace. God has. Why are you withholding something from yourself that God has freely poured out? Don't be stingy with yourself.

I know there is all sorts of "wretched me" rhetoric. Don't buy it. You have been fearfully and wonderfully made. The spark of the Divine is in YOU! Just as it is in the Tasmanian devil of a kid you brought home with you. And in the mother who gives you the stink-eye at the zoo because your kid splashed her kid. And while we are at it, I suppose it is in those terrors at church who beat your kid up. 

Capisci?

You are great at doing things and in your self-supposed aptitude you have taken God off the throne. You feel like He is not efficient enough for you. Not sufficient enough for you.

A friend will point this out to you, and you will struggle to figure out how to let God take control. Trust me. You are over-thinking this. It is ridiculously simple: Stop. Stop feeling like the earth is crashing down when things don't go according to your plan. Stop taking responsibility for other people's actions. You can only facilitate so much. You can only teach so much. Ultimately your kids will have to show what they are made of. (And a kid with a helicopter parent is often disliked on principle).

You can't fix everything. You can try. You will try. And some of it will stick. Celebrate what sticks. And stop bashing your head against the wall when it doesn't.

Drink more water. 

Do more yoga. Learning to meditate and commune with God despite the noise is a holy, powerful skill that will bring you more peace than having everything perfectly quiet.

You will grow. You will become more beautiful. More special. More strong. More fabulous. 

More fierce.

You will learn to be shaped instead of broken.

Now, I know I told you to take a shower, but before you do that, jump up and down a few times. Get the blood flowing. Turn on the keurig so it is ready to go once you are done in the bathroom.

Breathe.