Hey so um, yeah.
I'm feeling reflective.  I've been writing this week.
And reading and pondering a lot the last few weeks.
I've been letting some things soak in and I'm realizing that I'm in kind of an odd spiral of chaos. Even while mostly feeling cheerful and positive daily, there is a core of doubt and insecurities that I am feeding.  And it's keeping me from progressing.

I have always beat to my own drum a bit and so I've never really compared myself to others in a way of wanting to be like them.  But what I have been doing since making big life altering decisions almost 15 years ago is gauging where I'm at in life to those around me.
I've never been envious of what others have or look like because I feel like I am pretty genuine in my excitement and appreciation for those things.  I love what people look like...truly.  I love the quirks and beauty in even a stray curl and often when I look at people I want to draw them....that's how detailed I see people.  And I always try to make the eyes or the body movement match the depth or personality. Even if a pencil never touches paper, I sketch them or create them with various paper mediums in my mind.
I love when people find good deals or treasures or splurge or create or arrange or organize in a way that expresses themselves or their family and I am usually empathetic-ly right there in their moment.

But because I am venturing off pioneer style in this new life (of educated and spiritual and budget wise and fanatically dedicated to motherhood) I do often (and have for a long time) compare what I am doing and how it's working for me/my family to what others are doing and how that's working for them.  And this often translates into some very negative self talk. I have had to teach myself so much logic that when my instincts creep in and do their usual impulsiveoverthetopness I scold and distrust myself, and feel embarrassed and uneasy about my decisions.  And I think enough of this self talk will wear down a spirit.
And while I am simultaneously wearing myself down, I am working to build myself up by trying to stay particularly in tune with the way Heavenly Father wants me to live and for the most part doing that...but also overlooking some pretty clear messages of how to gain eternal happiness because I'm too busy setting my own expectations and kind of constantly not meeting them....and often not even trying.

I want the peace that comes from eternal happiness.  I want contentment.  And I know that I've been so overwhelmed at making these kinds of decisions or even following through with living the details by myself, and not at all feeling comfortable enough to turn to family or friends or visiting teachers or home teachers because it appears needy and that's uncomfortable and exhausting. And then while I sit in my unsure state almost doing nothing (so that I don't choose the wrong thing) I put myself into a place of stuck.  It gets confusing there and the details of life get construed.

Even in a place of stuck I have done the things I felt prompted to do...get my education, even continue on to graduate school, be a teacher, have a relationship with God, be a part of a church family, and the very detailed consistencies of parenting and mothering.  Those things I feel really good about.  Those are things I feel like Heavenly Father told me I should be doing.  Those are the things that make up my life.  Those are the things I do and live for every single day.

Yet as I approach my 35th birthday I feel frantic that I'm running out of time.  I'm getting out of the "setting up the life I'm going to live" phase and entering into the "this is what you did now live with it" phase.  I didn't find the guy to spend my life with.  I didn't even look.  I wasn't even interested in trying to look because I got really happy without that component of love.  But without him I didn't grow the additional babies I yearn(ed) for.  And with the risks that come at this particular age, I'm coming to terms with the fact that I likely won't mother more littles of my own again.  The career that I felt prompted to do and that I really do like doing brings me a salary that doesn't allow for much temporally.  I feel insecure about not being able to give my boy a house or a yard or more space to physically grow and mature in.  I need to teach 9 more classrooms of public school children and I'll have saved myself a lot of money through the student loan forgiveness program...so my job and my income are solidified for a while.  Our budget just doesn't allow for extra and I know my mind does not live within my means. So my list of wants is unattainable and I am constantly disappointed.  Because even in those basic ideals of living educated, with God, in a church family, and for the career I worked for and the with the boy that makes up my family, everyday I want more.  I want to be able to pay for the things we need and want (within reason) with no hesitation.  I want to provide more experiences and opportunities for my child and even for myself.  I want to do lavish things for fun on my own dime.  I want to live with less caution and less guilt.

So now my task is to live for now.  To find a way to soften my heart to truly live for Heavenly Father and find real peace with what I have and what I'm doing.  And to not look to others to gauge my place in this world, but to look to God.  And to know that what I have is enough.