Sustainability

When it comes to most habits, it feels more realistic for me to kind of be more like the tortoise than the hare. I suppose it’s simply because if I want a habit to stick with me throughout my life, I have to adopt the ones that I can manage even if they seem so small and insignificant that they’re hardly worth making note of.  One of my favorite sayings and mantras is “By small and simple things are great things brought to pass.”  I guess I just don’t like setting myself up for temporary success.  I believe in small life-changing habits that over time will have made a difference.  More so than binges of excellence that can’t be sustained long-term.  In my mind there’s no point in trying to change something that will eventually fade back to where I am right now.  I want improvement, but I’m ok with subtle over the long-haul.

I know myself.  Or at least I’ve come to know myself.  There have been some rough patches as I learned that I’ll never really be the kind of mom to put marbles in jars for kids’ good behavior.  It worked for a few days, but I couldn’t stick with it.  It felt so outside of who I really was—even though I longed to be that kind of mom.  I gravitate toward expectations, natural consequences, “Sure, you can go outside with your friends.  Just make sure you’ve done your weeding, dishes, and your room for the day.”  There.  That felt like me.  Unlike the little jars and star charts, I’ve been able to sustain this method for years because it felt like me right from the start.  Not clever, not magazine worthy, but real.

As a younger mom just figuring things out, I would’ve loved to have gone overboard at holidays and birthdays, just like the magazines and blogs and moms I’d heard and read about .  I remember crying and crying after my third baby was born early one April.  I tried to make Easter boxes out of paper and special symbolic cookies that Easter Eve that required smashing of nuts (for effect) and allowing them to rise in the oven to become hollow by morning when she was maybe 2 weeks old.  Todd was on-call.  I was knee-deep in thank you notes, dealing with visitors and clothing (new gifts, boxed up pieces that needed to be assessed, as well as just regular laundry for a family of five).  I also decided it would be a good idea to travel with everyone three weeks after she was born and fly back home alone with my boys ages 3 and 5 and the baby arriving home at 1 a.m.  I cried to my mom during those first few weeks, so embarrassed that I had been prideful enough to think I could handle and afford a third child.  I was so ashamed to have thought I was strong enough; I thought I should’ve known myself better.  I wasn’t (and am still not) a kid person.

But what great data!  I learned that I am not a magazine-worthy mom.  I can’t (because I don’t enjoy it, it doesn’t feel like the real me) go overboard on Christmas, for instance, and make all sorts of fancy traditions that cause more stress than joy.  I choose sustainability instead.  So we’re simple.  We make and decorate sugar cookies, we see the lights, we go to the Stroll, we have the same breakfast and dinner every year, we read the Christmas story and watch a movie together, we exchange family gifts.  That’s the backbone of our Christmas.  I know it’s not anything to boast about on a blog, but it’s stuck with us for almost 20 years.  To me, that’s success because we’ve truly created bullet points that are realistic for our family.

Same philosophy with diet and exercise.  I’ve never been the kind to diet because I know myself well enough to know it would only be temporary.  I’d never last.  I’ll never give up desserts, bread, or See’s candy completely.  But I know myself enough to know to freeze the See’s, that I should drink more water, that I can easily make more vegetable soup and can handle having salad with most dinners.  I SO admire folks who have lost like 100 pounds in a very short amount of time. But I almost feel their depression when it sometimes comes back.  I have friends who lose weight so slowly that I don’t even notice.  But when they reach their goal they can say they’ve lost 30 pounds!  To me, that is sustainable because it’s been a series of life tweaks taken slowly and steadily.

I hate running and nearly cheered aloud when I completed my last mile in a p.e. class in college, but I do admire all my friends who have run distance races of all kind.  To me they are on par with super heroes.  I have nothing to boast about when it comes to bulging muscles and excellent marathon times.  But I get the feeling I will be able to continue my simple exercise routine way into my grandma years simply because I’ve been doing it for over 20 years already.  It’s deeply embedded in me to get up early and work out. 

When I’m tempted to indulge in a self-improvement operation, I have learned to settle down and be real about what I can incorporate long-term.  Is this something I can still do as an old lady?  YES to so many things!!

I know this can be misread.  I’m not saying to forget ambitious goals, to not set the bar high.  Not at all.  Make your goal big.  But then approach it in a way that is doable.  Make it look like you whether it’s parenting or getting healthy.  If you want to reach a goal, don’t set yourself up for failure by comparing yourself to others or by not being realistic about how long it might take.  That’s all I’m saying.

If you could only know my heart, you’d know how much I LONG to improve and incorporate every mothering, marriage, organizational, cooking and health tip as well as scripture highlighting program I come across.  I want and LONG to be a fun mom with energy and sparkle to share.  I would love to have an amazing cooking repertoire and memory.  And nail beds that look pretty instead of jagged cuticles from filing books and mopping floors.  I’d love to serve as heads of committees (only because I have the vision and the time).  But in spite of all my longings, I know myself.  I am a quieter, steadier, paced kind of soul.   I just know that I have been overwhelmed by my desires to improve, and so I’ve learned to be realistic and ok with small and simple.   I’m content when I notice that the tiny steps I’ve taken over many years have turned into miles.