Are mother’s different today than I was? Considering the cultural change in expectations for woman today, I would think so.  I recently listened to the audiobook, the Feminine Mystique, by Betty Friedan. I learned a great deal about myself and the expectations for me as a woman, professional, wife, homemaker, and human in the fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties. The clarity was life startling and life affirming. For it wasn’t just my childhood that played a role in my life but now I realize that it was also the culture of expectations of women and their roles. In my journey of discovery over the years, who my soul yearned to be and who I was meant to be were at constant odds. This had a great deal to do with who I was a mother. My life choices suggested this also for no matter what my choices were, they were always at odds with what a good mother should be and do. The conflict within played itself out in so many scenarios that all I know is that I did the best I could considering the cards I had been dealt.
Are mother’s different today than I was? Oh my God, I hope so. They have so many more opportunities to discover and explore their talents, their soul yearnings, their minds, their hearts, and who they want to be as a human being. They have the chance to experience their children’s individualism and share in the joy of exploration with them. And yet, are they taking this opportunity to enhance their togetherness in this life’s journey together? Are they staying intuitive and present? Are they stopping to consider what is important to teach their children?
I don’t have the answers to these questions. But what I do know is that women and mothers have the capacity to change what is for themselves and others. Women have vulnerabilities that far outreach and surpass our male counterparts. Women and momma bears, can step up to the plate and open to what is important and help raise a new generation of men and women who experience their true talents, their hearts and their humanness in ways that I always been overshadowed by expectations, rules of culture and binding formalities.
It took me 71 years to understand what I might be capable of doing and being! Young mothers who may read this….do it today, today it now…do it for your children and the generation to come.