I’ve been thinking a lot lately about wishing I could find the woman who can do it all.  It seems like it’s a daily fight to balance everything as a mom, wife, and professional.  I really want to find the woman who loves her body as it ages, who works out almost daily with muscles to show for it.  I want to hear about how she fills her body with nutritious food without obsessing about it or when she will get to the gym that day.  Surely there is someone who reads her bible daily, spends time in prayer for her children, husband, family, and friends.  Who volunteers in the community and travels abroad on mission trips occassionally without her focus being completely shifted into how to change the world.  I want to find a woman who is there for her children before school, after school, and reads with them at bedtime without feeling like she is giving something else up right then to do it.  I want to hear how her incrediblely perfect quailty time with her children raised well behaved teenagers who make all the best decisions.  Would she have the discrenment to know exactly what’s going on thier soul and speak to that without missing the opportunity?  I want to ask her how she gets herself ready for work without forgetting the nutritious lunch and healthy snacks she packed and still had time to load the dishwasher and wipe down the counter tops before she left the house.  I want to know how she presents herself at work as refreshed, ready, and in control of her day without needing two or three cups of coffee to keep herself from looking tired.  I want to know how she keeps it all in her digital calendar with reminders that work right when she needs them- when she actually has the time to do the task that she is being reminded of.  I wonder how she plans all of the family’s meals out in advance and still lines up her grocery list so she doesn’t forget key ingredients that she needs to make it happen.  I want to meet this amazing person who invests in her marriage throughout the day, prays for her husband and after the kids go to bed has the amazing energy to invest in their time together as if it were 10am that morning.  Her house must be clean and organized, and not with the help of a professional cleaning service.  The laundry is done, the dishes are never dirty, and she times them just right so that there is always room in the dishwasher and none leftover in the sink for the next load.  Is there anyone out there who has this figured out?  Someone who can accomplish all of this without being labeled Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Anal or “A” type, Controlling, Self-focused, Frigid, or too rigid in her routine or structure? Is there anyone out there that achieves physical, social, psychological, and spiritual balance on a weekly basis?  Where are you?  I would love to interview you… or would you even come forward because of the kind of confidence it takes to say you have done it without struggle, and yet… would that be your issue?  Is it possible to be all of these things wihout having it cause some other breakdown in some part of your life?

On second thought.  I don’t want to meet you.  I would only feel worse, or would worse than that… strive to be you. Something that I don’t think I want to be now.  There is something about the struggle of balancing it all that makes me choose each day what and for whom my day is for and I don’t think I am ready to let that go yet.  I hate that I can’t balance it all.  I hate that some days I choose to be on my treadmill rather than lift in the gym, or some days I choose to forego it all to do something way more important.  Why do I feel like you are out there and that I may have a shot at being you?  Maybe I’m okay with the fact that the last few years of life have given me lines on my face and the well earned gray stripe in my hair. My husband actually says he likes it.  The reward that comes from the choices I make thoughout the day feel good when I hear “I love you Mommy” and feel the satisfaction of succeeding that day to the best of my ability.  Being tired means I did something, invested in something or someone I believed in.  Getting up to do it all over again is the opportunity to put forth my best no matter how it compares to someone else.  I think you would be an extremely annoying positive person, with a skewed sense of reality and your relationships.  There is always something to work on.  I need my husband to call me to the carpet and remind me of how I can be better.  And I need the reminder that I’m not perfect, from him and my children so I can be an example of humility and showing growth.  My children need to see that sometimes taking care of me is more important than obsessing about housework or my career. And that sometimes they are more important than whether I got a run in that day.  My husband needs to see that sometimes taking a few hours of silence are what refresh me and then other times ask me to choose time with him when we can be quiet together. The struggle to figure it all out feels a whole lot better when I have others to struggle through it with me.  I like our conversations that are filled with moments of failure, weakness, and exhaustion.  We laugh and cry and beat the table and then share strategic, creative ideas that worked in that area of our life that maybe encourages one another.  Those relationships will be with me on this journey and must include struggle in order to achieve what is most important: Knowing that I was never intended to do it all alone and that there is One God and I am not Him, but need His perfection desperately.

So nevermind, if you are out there.  I don’t think I want to meet you.  I think I’m okay with me for right now.  I like who I am.  I work hard, love my family, love my husband, and love God.  I’m not perfect, and rarely will I ever have a day when I felt I ‘did it all”, but that’s okay.  Maybe on that day, I’ll have an extra piece of chocolate to celebrate considering you won’t be enjoying it.