Let's Get Real

Things don’t always go as planned. The fact that they sometimes do, feels like a miracle. Our kiddos had the week off after a week of trading places on the sick bed and the interruption to our flow is no joke. 

Sometimes it feels great to get a break from the monotony of the weekly rhythm. Other times it feels like the weekly rhythm is a third heartbeat, one that ensures proper circulation for the energy of the family system. When it’s interrupted, it’s like the family system is having a mini-heart attack. 

That may be a little dramatic, but we’ve been in struggle city. Zephyr has decided to shift out of his “sweet 2 year old” flow and into the notorious terrible twos, fighting us on everything. And Hazel is going through some developmental process that apparently happens around 5 and ¾ where she argues about everything and defies our requests regularly.

With both of them it’s a uncomfortable dance to set firm boundaries, without losing our sh*t. Sometimes we lose our sh*t. 

Raising empowered humans who have a sense of agency but still respect and understand that they don’t run the show is not easy.

We imagine that many of these emails paint a picture of two heroic humans who have it all figured out and dance through life with ease and grace. If that’s the case, we’re doing a poor job with our writing. We want to be honest and real about how hard it is sometimes. A lot of the “wellness” messages out there paint a picture that if you just meditate/do yoga/get acupuncture/go to therapy, everything will be great and your life will be filled with unicorns (and faeries too!). And while all the new-agey things can help make things a little easier, it’s not a magic fix.

The point of inner-work and dancing and acupuncture and herbal medicine and meditation isn’t to transcend life. The point is to help us be even more present to the messiness of it all, to finally have the capacity to feel the ickiness and overwhelm and still show up. This is something that Hannah Kinderlehrer and Noah spoke a lot about in the last podcast episode and we hopes comes through as our message overall.

So, we’re surfing some gnarly family waves (neither of us actually surf in real life). 

We hope things are going more smoothly for you, and if they’re not, you know you’re not alone. The good news is, weather changes, kids shift out of one developmental stage and into another, seasons flow by, and it’s ultimately life is all a miraculous cockamamie beautiful yet strange flow that we get to be a part of.

Here's a mood boost playlist to get you moving...try surfing the music :-)
iTunes or Spotify

With humility and abundant love,

Rachael and Noah