If you have been listening to my daily podcasts you know that the past few weeks have left me feeling quite depleted and tired. I shared in a previous blog post how there is a ton of advice out there about how it takes a village to raise a child and I even received an email yesterday from a pregnancy site saying, “if you are tired, now is the time to take maternity leave or to ask for help.”
As if taking maternity leave just because you are tired is a viable option for every mom-to-be or as if there is this long line of people we are comfortable leaving our children with so we can rest. Or, if like me you are introverted and extremely sensitive to the energy of others, having people in your home is never helpful (just adds to the overload of energy we introverts/sensitives already feel) or perhaps, you don’t have anyone to help.
I have been struggling with this off and on for years. I go back and forth between perhaps my own inability to accept help combined with the reality that when I have accepted help-in the end it didn’t really help.
It’s like borrowing money at a crazy high-interest rate. Sure someone came over and “helped” but that help cost me in the end and now I just kinda wish I cleaned my own house because I could have napped after rather than making tea and “socializing” for an hour.
Yesterday was a really hard day for me. I had pretty much no energy. None. I attribute it to the busy week I had last week and just really needed some in-depth solitude for the past 2 months or so. Regardless I needed some self-care and as is the norm, when I need self-care it seems the world around me starts screaming “ME TOO!!!” and systemically piles on top of my chest telling me all about what they need or why things are so hard for them.
It was not a good day.
So in the depths of all this, I did what I usually do (which never works) and I tried to find others like me and hear their bits of wisdom. Again I was met with the “it takes a village” and ask for help mentality.
I did read one author’s summation that sometimes you have to accept that “there is no white knight and no one to rescue you.” Maybe it’s true. Maybe, the village, the true village that will actually support and lift up its members, care about and support them will come when more and more individuals stand in their own power and say, “I got this.”
What if, to have a truly authentic and helpful village, aligned with the highest good we first need a group of strong, capable people who own their role in the creation of their own lives. Who, when faced with tough times and adversity don’t look around to blame all those that aren’t helping them but rather dig deep into their already depleted well and say, “no, I created my life, whether consciously or not and so I know I have what it takes within me to not only survive but to come out on the other side feeling better than when I went into the darkness.”
Even when we aren’t sure we do.
Even when we feel weak and tired and like we can’t do anymore.
We find a way to dig in, wake up to a new day and say, “today will be better even if only slightly.”
And let that be enough.
See you around the campfire.
Until next time…
-Michele, aka The Dreaming Dilettante