Smashing the Jar

I was listening to something the other morning, part of an online conference, and the speaker… Tonya from Inkwell Press  spoke about something that struck my heart in such a way that I just honestly can’t put it into words!  Obviously I am going to try though because pals, it’s just way to true and way to amazing not to share with you.  Tonya spoke about smashing the marble jar!  I’m going to tell you right now, if you are a mom like me:  a mama that is vulnerable, that wears her heart on her sleeve, that tries so hard to be everything to everyone yet also pretty darn real and realistic as well then you probably smash the jar without knowing!  If you are a mama who laughs out loud at life because she knows that life is so far from perfect and mistakes happen and they make life not only funny but fun;  but also secretly tries so hard to not make those mistakes in the first place.  Well then mama pal… guess what, you too are with Tonya and me and you smash the marble jar!

Let me explain:  In our house we actually have a marble jar!  Well, it’s a glass stone jar of beautiful “sea glass” but you get it.  Linc gets to put a stone in the jar whenever he is kind, or he makes a good choice or basically he just does something pretty awesome.  It’s a great way for us to use positive reinforcement!  Linc loves it!  Whenever he fills it up to the top and he uses all the stones, he gets to choose an adventure and an experience that the whole family gets to enjoy!  Last time we all went to Gatorland for the day and it was actually awesome!

Now… back to us pals!

Did you know though that as mama’s we all have our own imaginary jar?!  It’s basically follows the same principal, whenever we do something awesome, kind or pretty great we fill up our jar.  Sometimes it’s hard for us to recognize this because as mom’s we tend just go about our business being awesome and not even taking note.  So just for a minute, go with me on this:  We wake up in the morning and we get our little ones up and ready for the day, drop a marble or stone in our jar!  Way to go us!  We make our little ones a healthy breakfast (or any kind of breakfast and they are eating) way to go mama, give yourself another marble/stone!  The little ones head off to school and all is well:  marble/stone.  This list can go on and on depending on who you are , what you do, number of littles you have and their ages!  If you truly think about all those jobs and tasks you do as a mom throughout the day, your jar get’s really full and if you truly take a moment to recognize all that we do as mom’s… I mean wow:  mind blown!

But here’s the catch:  we can do all these amazing things and then BAM one small thing happens or goes a bit wrong and we tend to hit rock bottom.  It can be something silly, like for me for example, I forget to take a load of laundry out of the washing machine and transfer it into the dryer!  When this happens, it means having to take that wet laundry out still wet, run the clean washing machine cycle because now it smells like serious funk and then start all over.  It’s totally not a big deal but it just stinks (literally).

Now remember all those marbles I had in my jar?!  I go grab that marble jar filled with all those wonderful marbles of accomplished tasks and good deeds so far in this one day and because of one silly little forgetful moment I had, I take my jar and I smash it!  I smash it over one silly tiny event that really doesn’t even matter and I don’t take into consideration all the amazing accomplishments or good deeds that I had already accumulated that day.

I mean guys… over one silly forgetful moment of laundry, forgetting an ingredient for dinner, accidentally losing my patience or heck forgetting to take out the chicken from the freezer, I take a big bat to my jar and smash it all to pieces!

Do you ever do this?!  Do you smash your marble jar?!

When Tonya was speaking about this I actually held my breath!  Why is it that I allow myself to do this?  Why do I wreck all my progress and self sabotage this way?  What if Linc did this to his marble/stone jar?  How would I react?  I can tell you I would be so upset.  So why do I allow myself to do this?

I think as mother’s we just get so caught up that we aren’t even aware that we are actually doing all that we do and also that we can let something silly totally undo all the work we’ve done in our hearts.

We’ve got to stop it!  We’ve got to stop being so hard on ourselves!

We’ve got to breathe and truly believe that we aren’t perfect and that is more than ok! That actually that is more beautiful than perfection ever will be!

We’ve got to understand that recognize that we are pretty amazing and all those little tasks that we do every single day are mountains of incredible when added up together!

Let’s make a pact right here and now to stop smashing our marble jars!

Let’s make a pact to stop seeing those small moments of “whoops” and mis-steps and forgetfulness and in those moments remind ourselves of all those great things we have done throughout the day out of love and commitment to our family!

Are you with me?