I recently read a post from a fellow mom friend. It read
"I am in need of encouragement. I don't need or want advice, just encouragement. Between a strong willed, potty training toddler, a new baby & a husband out of town with work I am just struggling. If some of you can just encourage me and tell me that I can do this. I just need encouragement that I can make it through the rest of this day..."
As I read her words I felt the vulnerability in her words, I pictured tears rolling down her face as she typed, I saw her sitting on her bathroom floor with the door shut trying to hide herself for just a few seconds. She had probably considered typing those words before but was worried of being judged for needing/soliciting encouragement. But the time had come, she had reached a point that she was more than ok to admit that she needed her village. And boy did her village show up!
Much like a line to a new release movie, was the line of mom's and friends writing the most beautiful, encouraging words. Mom's confirming that they had been in her very place and now several years later were living proof that she would make it through, mom's offering to keep her kids for a couple of hours so that she could shower and have some time to herself. She had friends that said they might not be a mom but they wanted to share verses that had been just the encouragement they needed on days that felt impossible. This mom who a couple hours before had been on the brink of throwing in her towel was suddenly being flooded with her village. They were filling her up emotionally, spiritually and physically.
In a world where Pinterest, Instagram and Facebook exist it is so easy to see pictures of people's good days and hold them up beside our bad days. In a world where everyone has an answer and a solution it is so easy to feel as though you are the only one failing at this mom thing. In a world where it doesn't seem you could ever take to social media to post about your REAL struggles...the post is there. A vulnerable friend who puts her insecurities aside and asks for help. And as warm as her cup of coffee is to her lips so are the words of her dearest friends. Much like a small village that has to work together to survive she finds her village of friends lining up with encouraging word after sweet encouraging word. She smiles and picks herself up off of her bathroom floor and she KNOWS that she can finish today.
May we all be transparent vessels that share our struggles with our village, for we were never meant to bear our struggles alone. May we all be encouraging to the friends in our village. In a world where it is so easy to tear each other down let us do what feels good and build each other up! May we all work together to have a successful village where I am weak, you are strong.
