This week, I'm here to give you some very cliché advice, but before you roll your eyes at me, just hear me out.
You have probably heard a million times already, as a mother of young children, that you should enjoy them while they're little, or you'll miss this stage one day.
That advice is often well-intentioned and meant with love, but it can often fall on deaf ears. It's often presented at the wrong time. It feels like it's dismissive of everything that we're going through as parents of young children: not enough sleep, the house being a mess, not getting to do anything that we need to for ourselves, worrying that whether or not they're going to make the transition to kindergarten smoothly, whether they're actually on track with where they should be, dealing with the 100th meltdown of the week, or sleeping problems, potty training difficulties, etc.
The advice to "soak up this time and enjoy it" can feel really dismissive.
But I'm here to give you some tips on how you can actually do this, not just survive being a mother of young children and all of its difficulties, but really soak it in and thrive in it. Thrive in the chaos, and thrive in the challenges, and thrive in the difficulties as best as you can. It primarily involves your mindset, habits, and perspective on things.
Mindset shifts to help you stop feeling overwhelmed by parenting
Here are a few things that helped me actually enjoy my little children when they were little.
Practice mindfulness to reduce stress
I was a big practitioner of mindfulness. Almost all stress comes from either fretting about what happened in the past or worrying about what will happen in the future. The more you can be present, especially when you're in the moment with your little children, the better it will be.
Let go of multitasking: Be present with your child
A significant part of this for me was avoiding multitasking. So, getting away from my phone, not trying to spend time with my child and get the house clean simultaneously, but to separate everything out and have specific times to accomplish things as much as possible.
That's not always possible, especially with young children. But even when you can't and even when there's a multitude of things going on at the same time, just being present at that moment and not thinking about the past or the future often goes a long way.
Don’t sweat the small stuff: It won’t matter in a month
Another favorite piece of advice I got somewhere was: if it doesn't matter in a year, don't spend any time worrying about it. However, I would shorten that timeframe significantly when it comes to little children. Think about how much they change in just a month. So, will it matter in a month that they embarrass you in the grocery store with a meltdown or that they want to wear this crazy mismatched outfit to go out and run errands today?
Well, it won't, so don't fret about it. Don't sweat the small stuff. It's not going to matter. Don't let it get you down. Don't let it ruin your day at all. Just go on with it.
Practice gratitude: Focus on the good moments
Another significant tool I used is gratitude. When I was feeling really frustrated and overwhelmed, and nothing seemed to be going right, I sat for just 60 seconds and found all the good that actually was there.
It's there. You may have to look for it sometimes, and sometimes it's hard to see when we're in the depths of this parenting of small children, but you can find it, and you get bonus points if you find silver linings, which are good things about less-than-ideal circumstances.
My youngest kid was not a big sleeper. I was often up in the middle of the night. 3:00 AM wake-up calls were routine for a while. Sometimes I would be exhausted, and it would be mid-morning, and I wouldn't have accomplished anything I was supposed to or felt like I should have by that time of day.
But she would be sleeping on my lap, and I would think that if she hadn't gotten up at 3:00 AM, she wouldn't be taking a nap on my lap now, and I would miss this time.
And again, it would pull me back to that mindfulness and being in the moment, just enjoying that time with my child, and not worrying about the mess in my kitchen, the work I had to return to, or the laundry I had to fold.
Taking that moment to intentionally look for the good and the things you're thankful for does go a long way to helping you survive and thrive in this season.
I hope this gives you a little perspective.
Why mindset matters: Shifting from survival mode to thriving
It is often just these habits of our minds that make the difference between something being incredibly frustrating and us being able to sail through it, seeing the good rather than the bad.
It's so cliche. Enjoy them while they're little. You'll miss these days one day.
But it is true, and as much as we sometimes hate to hear it, and sometimes it's offered at terrible times. I'm glad that I listened to some of the advice that I did, and I'm happy that I made the effort that I did to enjoy those moments because now mine are a little bit older, and I'm glad that I have those times to look back on and that I wasn't completely frazzled and frustrated all of the time.
So I hope you also take something from it, and we'll see you next week.