The Gift of an Ordinary Day

One of the greatest challenges I've faced as a mother--especially in these anxious, winner-takes-all times--is the need to resist the urge to accept someone else's definition of success and to try to figure out, instead, what really is best for my own children, what unique combination of structure and freedom, nurturing and challenge, education and exploration, each of them needs in order to grow and bloom.  p. 24

Rather than try to project who our older son might or might not one day turn out to be, we needed to try to appreciate and understand who he was right now.  And then we needed to meet him there, loving and accepting him just as he was, supporting his journey of self-discovery, crooked and long though his path might turn out to be.  When we began to see it this way, our own path suddenly seemed clearer.  p. 26

"The definition of the 'best' is pretty limiting in our culture, and it doesn't seem to take into account the fact that every kid is different... I've had to make decisions with my daughter that made her feel happy and fulfilled now, instead of pushing her to do things just because they'd look good someday on a college application."  (quoting a friend)  p. 27

"Our children drop into our neat, tightly governed lives like small, rowdy Buddhist masters, each of them sent to teach us the hard lessons we most need to learn."  Jon Kabat-Zinn  p. 27

But a few things came into clearer focus as we began the work of bringing one long life chapter to a close and embarking on a new one.  We could love the home we'd had and leave it anyway, leave it without knowing what would replace it.  Really we had no choice.  But we also came to see that a gift can only be received with an open hand, and in order to find out what life was about to offer us, we would first have to release our hold on what was already over.  That in itself proved to be quite a challenge and certainly a good lesson for our sons to learn.  p. 28-29

And I realize that whatever it was I'd hoped to accomplish this night has indeed occurred.  Surely each one of us, sitting close by one another on the crest of this hill, feels blessed to be here, grateful that fate, or circumstance, has led us tonight to this particular spot in the world and no other.  p. 48

If happiness really could be bought, surely most of us would feel much more satisfied than we do, blessed as we are with such an abundance of good food, beautiful places to live, accessible education, entertainment, opportunity.  Yet our impulse, our human nature, seems always to be to strive for more.  More wealth, more recognition, more stuff.  p. 56

It may be that success lies as much in our ability to behold the world before us in gratitude and wonder as it does in owning things and doing things.  And it may be, too, that happiness really is a state of mind we choose for ourselves, a way of being that we cultivate from one moment to the next, rather than the result of realizing our ambitions or acquiring whatever it is we think we most desire.  p. 56

I think the word ordinary has a bad rap.  We encourage our children to srive to lead extraordinary lives, in the belief that such striving is not only admirable but necessary if they are to realize their goals and grow into fulfilled, successful adults.  Many of us live in fear that our children may not live up to their potential, may fall behind their peers, may fail to embody our--or the culture's--notions of success. 
     But as I've watched my sons and their friends meet the demands of their lives, as I listen to other parents share their worries about college rankings and admission percentages, their children's future carreers and life shoices, I can't help but wonder, What is the cost of all this striving?  And what gets lost in our relentless push to achieve, have, and do more?
     It's easy, given the times we live in and the implicit messages we absorb each day, to equate a good life with having a lot and doing a lot.  So it's also easy to fall into believing that our children, if they are to succeed in life, need to be terrific at everything, and that it's up to us to make sure that they are--to keep them on track through tougher course loads, more activities, more competitive sports, more summer programs.  But in all our well-intentioned efforts to do the right thing for our teenage children, we may be failing to provide them with something that is truly essential--the time and space they need to wake up to themselves, to grow acquainted with their own innate gifts, to dream their dreams and discover their true natures.  p. 57-58

Moment by moment, we have the opportunity to say yes, to move into our lives and open ourselves to the adventure--but that doesn't mean that we ever really know where we're going or that we can predict what we'll find when we get there.  If we're lucky, though, the life we end up leading is one that makes us feel alive.  p. 64

If you share a house with teenagers, you know exactly what it's like to live under surveillance, to be monitored for the slightest inconsistency in thought, word, or deed.  Observed by the merciless eye of youth, we are judged without pity and, as often as not, found wanting.  Where once they gazed upon me lovingly, my adolescent sons are now more than happy to point out my every fault and shortcoming.  p. 68

I could choose to worry, to turn my clammy fear about "what next" into anger at being dismissed so summarily.  Or I could try to follow my sons' lead and accept this unexpected ending not as a disaster, but as yet another chance to move in a new direction.  And isn't this, after all, the lesson I would most want the two of them to learn?  That we can't always choose what happens to us, can't always pick the hand we're dealt--but we can choose our response and decide how to play the hand we have.  p. 70

...can I be grateful for what I've had and at the same moment embrace the practice of letting it go?  p. 71

It occurs to me that perhaps I don't have to push at life quite so hard after all, that sometimes the best thing we can do is allow our lives simply to take us where we need to go.  The truth is, I don't have any idea what goals I should be focusing on or how I ought to compose my life at this juncture... p. 86

But as all the identities I worked so hard to construct over the years begin to slough away, I feel myself reconnecting with my own quiet center.  It is as if I am, at last, catching a glimpse of myself not as I might wish to be, but as I am.  I see a woman who is less ambitious than she one was.  Someone less self-conscious, less invested in appearances, but also less "special' than the person I always thought I was meant to be.  I see my own ordinariness.  And I see that to be ordinary is ok after all.  p. 87

But now I begin to view our time together differently, begin to see that stepping up to one's life adventure doesn't necessarily mean doing extraordinary things.  It also means coming to understand that viewed in the right light, through the right eyes, everything is extraordinary.  p. 90

Releasing my death grip on perfection, I realize that of course our house does not need to be "just so."  The quality of our lives within it's walls will not be improved by any of my decorating home runs, nor will it be diminished by my strikeouts.  Were I to insist on perfection, nothing in the house would ever be finished to my satisfaction anyway.  p. 101

I realize I've already wasted months fussing over making the "best" choices, when all I really needed to do was make some good choices, accept them without looking back, and move on to the next.  It seems to be a lesson I need to learn again and again.  p. 102

The hardest part of being a parent may be learning to live with the fact that there are so many things that we simply can't control, so much of the journey that is not our doing at all, but rather the work of the gods, the unfolding of destiny, fate.  We give birth to our children, we love and cherish them, but we don't form or own them, any more than we can own the flowers blooming at our doorsteps or the land upon which we build our homes and invest our dreams.  We may tend the garden for a while, take our brief turn upon the land, nurture the children delivered into our arms, but in truth we possess none of these things, nor can we write any life story but our own.  It's a truth I had to confront right away, one that I'm still struggling to accept seventeen years later.  p. 111-112

I began to understand that perhaps the best thing I could do for both my children was not to grab them by the hand and dive each day into the great rushing river of life, but instead to create for them, for all of us, a protected island, a quiet place from which we could hold the world and its busyness at bay for a while.  p. 120

Being a good mom, it had always seemed to me, meant taking advantage of the many opportunities and experiences available to all of us.  A full calendar, a busy life, a packed schedule, meant that I was doing my job, ensuring that my children were getting the experiences they needed in order to grow up prepared to compete in a complex world.
     By the time Jack arrived in the airy, rose-colored kindergarten classroom, I had begun to wonder if, in the midst of all our comings and goings, we were missing something even more important than any swim lesson or playdate.  My children were just five and eight years old, still so young, yet it felt as if our life together had become a blur of activity, our travels dictated by our array of exracurricular activities, school schedules, work schedules, and social schedules.  p. 121

Giving up at this point...just too many things I would type out!!

What to read when

Not a book for me right now...but would be interesting for a younger mother.

Here is where, as a parent, you will accompany your child through this essential journey of making choices and finding acceptance, standing up for yourself, and knowing when to forgive.  Books give you ways to talk to your children about these big ideas.  Later, when your child is on the brink of leaving childhood behind, you want to share words with your child  that will help her move more gracefully into young adulthood.  According to the poet Billy Collins, poetry tells the history of the human heart.  But I think that all of great literature maps the human heart, and children's literature knows how to do so best of all.  p. 4

As a child, books were my transport.  Through reading, I discovered worlds of people I had not known before.  I read stories about history and places and people that moved me, reduced me to tears, brought me off of my couch and on a journey that never ended.  p. 4