The funny thing about being a music specialist is that I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to create this life as a teacher and entrepreneur without the event that predates everything in my recent history - becoming a mom to my son, 18 years ago this year. I always think of his birthday as my birthday, for on that day, the world tilted on an amazing and challenging and terrifying and sublime axis.
I know I would have continued along, but in retrospect, there was no set direction in the ebb and flow of life. I was happy to be moving along. Motherhood stopped my feet in their tracks, and whichever way they were heading, it all came to a blissful halt right in my son’s eyes. I know I am a better citizen of the world for becoming a mother, though like each of us, I work hard to keep life on an even keel in the day to day.
From the first moment we greet those babies, I believe we are working mothers. Like billions of mothers through human history, we are learning to balance a new little life on our physical and spiritual hips. However, back in my early days as a new mom, if someone had suggested that much self-reflection concerning my own wellbeing, I might have punched them in the nose from sleep deprivation and worry that I might not have been cut out for the challenge after all. For me personally, self-doubt never loomed so large as when I adjusted to my role as center of my son’s universe, and yet, when instincts kicked in, I learned that joy is a very active pathway of communication, and it helped me remember something more ongoing and definite, as opposed to sleep and nap schedules.
So, in honor of RaisingMOM and moms everywhere, I’d like to give a nod to work/life balance and the gracefulness we somehow possess in our inner depths when we are wrung out, tired and needed. I’ve learned so much about work/life balance and life in general because of my own experience of motherhood. But, thanks to my job, which somehow seems to have created itself, I’ve had the honor to meet and greet and and hug and nurture thousands of new moms in their evolving role as center of the universe to their baby, right through to the schedules, concerns, fears, angers, angst and joy that we share when their children take their first social steps….away from us. Shifting balance again, every step of the way.
Dip into the well of your children - remember all that joy when the balance seems impossible! Remember that they can fill our souls with one smile, one tiny hand in ours, a pat on the back, and a new sound from a gummy mouth. Renewable energy 24/7, and it all runs on love.
-by Nanette DeCillis, RaisingMOM Music Specialist
Tags: balance, birthdays, career path, direction, encouragement, fulfillment, inspiration, joy, mothers day, rewarding, struggles, working moms
The musical adventure we are navigating; the one you and I and the moms of third street and millions of other women will experience is a strangely wonderful “through the looking glass yellow brick road”. Now that our offspring are at that “teenage summit next to cavernous precipice” we realize just how responsible we must be- forever. To this there is no end and we can thank our children for demanding our presence. At the same moment comes the realization that they are totally unable to understand that responsiblility until they have thier own little musical adventure to raise.
I love Nanette! What a wonderful essay. Rosa and I are looking forward to seeing you, and taking a class? Soon, cheers,
Michele and Rosa
I am so touched and inspired I now plan to have more children so you can be nurturing them as well as the one I’ve already sent out into the world.
Won’t Michael and Al be surprised!
love, later, M