My Biggest Parenting Job

My three older ones are teens.  Some parents in my case could say "Thank God they are almost all out of the house."  Others could say "I feel like I am going to be obsolete."  The parenting job some say is the hardest job you'll learn to love.

Speaking of teens almost adults, I'd like to say that it can feel amazing to be an adult!

Only, I didn't find that out until now.  To me being an adult meant that life would be dreary, tiresome, no playing, no fun, just "responsibility."

I realize that I need to be responsible and such.  However, too many times I have wondered why my actions seems so hit or miss.  I have not done what I wanted to (but didn't, but did, but didn't). It leads to not being dependable.

So, I began really thinking about it.  My usual MO is to read about a topic I want to know more about.  This time, I began writing, looking at why I do what I do; specially, why do I do what makes me feel worse about myself.

It is a rebellious thing: that "responsibility" thing was what others told me to do.  

Today, I tell myself thinking about my life and living it is my job. I need to tell myself to go to bed, to eat good food, to exercise, to pray, to smile, to have fun, to work hard, to be gracious with others.

This responsibility is linked closely with knowing what I want, who I am, where I am going, how I will think, act, believe.  The adult is the one who knows all of that and manages it.

Well, when a teen, I did not commit to asking all those questions at once and getting answers to live by.  

The sad truth, then, is that I have been living immaturely, expecting others to do my job for me.  I have not been showing up to my own job of living my life.

I hid behind being a people pleaser, a whiner, a complainer, a demander.

In the end, it all came out when I "committed" to things to avoid saying "no" and then didn't follow through.  It came out when I was not showing up for others.

I have been unreliable.  I have grown to dislike my unreliable, immature self.

Life, it happens, can be "lived" by going with the flow, doing what others want me to,  not rocking the boat, looking for getting what others have, comparing myself to others.  It is a series of lack of choosing, stumbling along, thinking I can never be enough so why try.

The commitment to being that better version of myself--the grown up one--is the framework to hold in all the answers for my life.  Commitment to myself can push me to go that healthy way of difficult growth--when the wider, non-thinking road seems better for demanding less and being "easier.  This more travelled road is not mentally rigourous, not spiritually challenging, not intellectually stimulating.  It is more mentally zoned-out, spiritually dead, intellectually unchallenging.

It is the way that one ends up on and then says "How did I get here!"

It was the ship without the captain steering the rudder with constant vigilance.  It was not making plans that led to goals and missions and legacy.

Going the road less travelled means one needs to think more, stand up more, be thought of as unconventional (at best).

Waking up the captain makes all the difference in results.  It is parenting oneself, rather than remaining an adult child.  It is getting out of the "house" (bad habits) and making childishness obsolete.  It is relishing decisions, practicing and knowing that makes one better at whatever one needs to learn how to do.

I can finally pinpoint what it all means:  rebel against rebelling.

Once I would be 18, I had also thought the world would open up to me.  It opens up for no one of its own.  One has to take it on.  A Mel Robbins YouTube video talks about how we make decisions and are there for ourselves. Parenting oneself gets one to do the hard things that will get one to become who one wants to be.

I get to manage my day-to-day projects, responsibilities, and needs to stay on track, advance and be someone my parents are glad to see thrive.

I get to do that for me!  Amazingly, that is when I like myself.  I begin to get what I really wanted:  being me.

Parenting myself is my biggest job ever.