Meaning

As I keep thinking about what I want to write today, I come back to my blog's title: "In The Becoming."  I'm not sure I've fully explained that yet.  I thought long and hard about what to title these ramblings.  The title matters because it gives me focus.  Although this blog is meant to be a thought-sharing platform (with no specific theme), I don't want it to be utterly random. 

So, why did I choose "In The Becoming"?  Because that phrase best describes my current season of life.  To be specific, here are the major life choices I've made in the last few years that have significantly altered the focus of my being:

• The decision to become a mother: I now have two beautiful young children (two kiddos in two years)
• The decision to quit my job: more on this in a minute
• The decision to claim writing as a career and pursue it professionally, taking myself seriously in the process

About the first: it's difficult to describe to someone who has not experienced motherhood, but it completely alters you.  And, from what I understand, in a way that is utterly different than the shift fatherhood creates.  When I was pregnant with my first child I described the physical change like this: I felt like an alien had taken over my body and I was no longer in control.  I still think that description holds true.  As a mother (a birth mother, to be specific), you physically co-create another human being.  The energy - physical, emotional, spiritual - this requires is magnificent.  Your whole body becomes focused on one thing: creation.  You can't think, eat, breathe, walk, even talk the same.  You are wholely internally focused.  As such, you both begin to examine yourself and forget about yourself at the same time.

The metaphysical - yes, even spiritual - process I went through with these two pregnancies, to sum it up, brought me freedom.  Most think of children as tying one down.  Not me: having my children released me in a way I did not expect.  Everything trivial ceased to matter.  I was no longer bogged down by the worries and cares of - frankly - stupid things like "does so-and-so like me?" or "am I cute enough?" or even "is my boss pleased with my job performance?"  For the first time in my entire life I can honestly say that I have started living for me, that my opinion of my choices and performance matter most.  Not in an ego-centric, prideful way; but rather in an "I have too many other things to worry about" way.  Quite simply, self became center in order to create space for other.

When I stopped pouring energy into others' opinions of my self - fueled by the fear of rejection, effectively - I found space to love.  More effectively and more completely because I could engage love with more of me.  And love is the most important thing: love of God, love of self, love of husband and kids.  These things are the real fuel that keeps me going.  The process of both giving and receiving love.

Ultimately, that's why I decided to quit my job.  I found it was sucking up way too much of my energy.  The job space turned into a black hole that sucked in calling, creativity, sense of self, healthy pride in my accomplishments and much more.  Staying in it was the opposite of love (of self or the others in my life).  I needed to make a clean break with that season in my life in order that I might move more fully into the next.  Again, the key word here is freedom.

So now I find myself starting a new season.  I will label this season Becoming because it feels transitional to me.  I am starting things, trying things, moving in the freedom that comes from self-acceptance.  Each day I am becoming more at home with myself as a mother (soon to be a full-time stay-at-home mother!).  I am also claiming the title writer as I move in that direction, backing up my words with actions like writing this blog, submitting manuscripts of various finished works, networking with other writers, etc.  I am thrilled to be here.  I've been walking toward it for fifteen years (when I first felt a calling to write) and now here I am, actually doing it!  It feels amazing.  Now is the time, now is the season, now is the becoming.