What a mother wants is to be a mother. What she wants is to make a difference. What she wants is for her children to do well in life. What she feels is their pain in her heart. What she does is take on the whole world for them, and will stand like a tigress at the first sign that anyone is troubling them, or misusing their effort or obstructing them. She does not hesitate to wear her heart on her sleeve because her heart is no longer with her anyway!
And she feels the pain and the tears and the laughter and the pride as raw emotions. These cannot be felt by anyone else. No one else can ever feel the same way- because she carries it inside her gut and inside her soul. This goes much deeper than just the heart, or the head. It goes deep into her soul and stays there for eternity.
Infinity is nothing as compared to the weight of all that she carries. She cries lonely tears, and feels an anger so deep that it cannot be measured. She will stop at nothing nor will she be stopped by anything. Her children have to win. Even at the expense of being hated for her effort. The weight of being a mother is not simply in grazed knees and fevers soothed. It is not even only in the medals won and the applause received.
It is in the occasional, "I hate you, mom!" It is also in the more frequent "I love you, mom!" It is in the fibre of her life. It is in the tapestry of her breath.
So what does a mother really want? She wants for her children to be the best they can be. And she will accept nothing less. She begins to expect The Universe, and The Gods and Destiny herself and even her own children must deliver. Nothing less is possible. The expectation sets the standard to which she compares everything. She compares her own effort and that of everybody else only to that expectation. She measures everybody and everything only on the standard of her expectation... and when that is not met- it is simply not good enough.
She does more, and more. She wishes and asks more and more from everyone because she will not accept anything less, and will not tire from the effort.
She looks on- the tea at the table. Perfect, like her children. She looks on- a perfect brew- deep orange and golden yellow, thick and full bodied tea. The aroma itself is enough to refresh anyone. It gives her immense pleasure- almost a sense of pride. She had a role in this. It looked great and smelled wonderful. But, she needs to add some sugar.
The necessity to add sugar implied a deficiency. All of a sudden, that great tea was reduced to great tea that needed sugar. All the other great qualities became insignificant. Putting in a spoonful of sweetness would make the tea perfect. But we're human! And because we are human, we MUST make sure. So- we stir. We stir up a veritable storm in the tea cup. The whirlpool in the cup goes deeper and deeper and the edges rise higher and higher. Soon, the tea spills over and the family appears to be losing its coherence and togetherness.
And in our wisdom we try harder still. We get hurt. We bleed. We do not give up.
But... in that pain, and in that agony, the best thing to do would be to stop stirring. To stop. And to wait.
To wait for another, "I love you mom" before you give up.
And a mother never really gives up. No matter what.
And she feels the pain and the tears and the laughter and the pride as raw emotions. These cannot be felt by anyone else. No one else can ever feel the same way- because she carries it inside her gut and inside her soul. This goes much deeper than just the heart, or the head. It goes deep into her soul and stays there for eternity.
Infinity is nothing as compared to the weight of all that she carries. She cries lonely tears, and feels an anger so deep that it cannot be measured. She will stop at nothing nor will she be stopped by anything. Her children have to win. Even at the expense of being hated for her effort. The weight of being a mother is not simply in grazed knees and fevers soothed. It is not even only in the medals won and the applause received.
It is in the occasional, "I hate you, mom!" It is also in the more frequent "I love you, mom!" It is in the fibre of her life. It is in the tapestry of her breath.
So what does a mother really want? She wants for her children to be the best they can be. And she will accept nothing less. She begins to expect The Universe, and The Gods and Destiny herself and even her own children must deliver. Nothing less is possible. The expectation sets the standard to which she compares everything. She compares her own effort and that of everybody else only to that expectation. She measures everybody and everything only on the standard of her expectation... and when that is not met- it is simply not good enough.
She does more, and more. She wishes and asks more and more from everyone because she will not accept anything less, and will not tire from the effort.
She looks on- the tea at the table. Perfect, like her children. She looks on- a perfect brew- deep orange and golden yellow, thick and full bodied tea. The aroma itself is enough to refresh anyone. It gives her immense pleasure- almost a sense of pride. She had a role in this. It looked great and smelled wonderful. But, she needs to add some sugar.
The necessity to add sugar implied a deficiency. All of a sudden, that great tea was reduced to great tea that needed sugar. All the other great qualities became insignificant. Putting in a spoonful of sweetness would make the tea perfect. But we're human! And because we are human, we MUST make sure. So- we stir. We stir up a veritable storm in the tea cup. The whirlpool in the cup goes deeper and deeper and the edges rise higher and higher. Soon, the tea spills over and the family appears to be losing its coherence and togetherness.
And in our wisdom we try harder still. We get hurt. We bleed. We do not give up.
But... in that pain, and in that agony, the best thing to do would be to stop stirring. To stop. And to wait.
To wait for another, "I love you mom" before you give up.
And a mother never really gives up. No matter what.
