One thing I learned early on in motherhood is that I needed more structure in my life if I was going to hold the responsibility of motherhood in a way that didn’t fully drain me.
I think of this similarly to if you wanted to lift (or “hold”) more weight than you have previously at the gym, you would need more physical muscle fibers, or else you would get trapped under the weight and not be able to lift it. Or, just like as a tomato plant grows it needs a tomato cage or wall to climb up or else it becomes a jumbled mess of vines and inaccessible fruit.
Our lives can also get too overgrown or heavy for us to hold alone without some solid systems in place to support us.
For some reason, however, many of us seem to have the idea that we should be able to pile more and more on ourselves; more tasks, more activities, more responsibilities; and hold it all without any help or assistance (and not show any signs of strain in the process).
I believe part of this false line of thinking is a deficiency in our culture of The Mother, or what I’ve called The Collective Nurturer, whose job it is to say, “Stop. That is enough.”
She can see from a higher (or maybe lower and more grounded) perspective. She can feel we are moving too fast, with too high of expectations. She is the one who tells us, it’s time to rest and enjoy the fruits of our labor.
She is the one who tells us, after a pause of appreciation for how far we’ve already come, “It’s time to reevaluate, readjust. It’s time to put some more support in place.” Because she can see and is tapped into the long game.
I have always been a highly functional person. I have always been capable of doing a lot.
Since I was 23 years old I have basically only worked for myself, so I’ve always had a ton of flexibility with my schedule and how I spend my time.
(Honestly, the main reason I became an entrepreneur was because one of my highest values is freedom.)
I love being free to do and spend my time as I see fit. It’s never been hard for me to be self motivated and to move into action.
Before I had kids; my days flowed. I would always wake up and do some sort of spiritual practice and eat, but the rest of the day was totally free form.
I might have clients, work on the computer, meet up with friends, workout, have meetings, go to the grocery store, travel, go on a hike; whatever.
My time was wide and open and that’s how I liked it.
When I was pregnant with my oldest I was determined to keep living this way. I hated even making my own schedule too rigid because even that felt like I was being trapped. I rebelled against even my self-made rules. (That’s how much of a rebel I am..haha).
I had the idea my baby would sleep when she was tired and I would just bring her everywhere as I kept doing my stuff and it would all be totally fine. HA.
I wasn’t going to be one of those mothers that made her whole life revolve around being a mom!
I wince, shake my head and chuckle lovingly at this past self of mine that was so (endearingly) clueless about what was about to smack her square in the face.
The first 6 months postpartum were all the things postpartum is: sweet, nourishing, exhausting, tender, raw, and a lot like being thrown into the middle of a game you don’t know the rules to. Where the consequences of fucking up involve the livelihood of a tiny human you now experience as your own heart outside your body.
But, for the most part, my husband and I kept flowing.
We didn’t meal plan or think about what our “working hours” were. We didn’t think about childcare, but just kind of passed baby Alma back and forth to do whatever work either of us needed to do in the moment (and of course, when she needed to nurse).
When Alma was 6 months old it started to become glaringly clear that this “going with the flow” was no longer possible.
My inner Mother said, “Stop. This isn’t working for anyone.” I was clear we were going to need some structure; set childcare hours and some clear delineations about family time vs work time. We were going to have to figure out how to have food for us all to eat at regular intervals. Basics to some, but to us, this felt like a radical adjustment.
Then I got pregnant again.
Just as I am starting to come to terms with the fact my life was going to become way more structured; I was hit with the responsibility of another precious baby on the way.
We hired our first nanny around this time and started doing a semi-strict nap schedule with baby Alma. She had decided to stop sleeping at night and I realized that it may be because she is not getting enough sleep during the day with my lackadaisical idea of “she’ll just sleep when she’s tired” but then not actually creating any space for her to fall asleep.
This was my first hard learned lesson about the importance of building in more structure as you expand in family and in life: the need for scheduled and regularly available down time with kids.
I resisted the nap schedule idea so much until I was pregnant, breastfeeding, and deeply sleep deprived and very desperate, I would try anything; even ….duh duh duuuunn…a nap schedule!
As my husband and I committed to creating time in our days to lull baby Alma to sleep by nursing or swaying her back and forth in a carrier, her sleep at night improved and our energy system as family recharged a bit.
Another piece of structure we added: childcare.
Adding childcare was the first time I had to choose working hours.
I recognize this may not be a common experience but before this I just worked, pretty much whenever I needed to. I had very classic entrepreneurial-grind-“boss-babe” vibes. I loved my work, it didn’t always feel grinding. It’s just what I was into. I had lots of freedom and flexibility but I was also very ambitious and driven to “succeed.” I went on vacations, sure, but I would work if I needed to. I probably worked less on weekends. But no time was technically off limits. I was always available to work. I was always creating. Always dreaming and scheming about what was my next offering, idea, or post would be.
Once Alma came, I pretty much operated the same. I just worked when I could, but as any mom knows, that “working when you can” with infants and children, is basically a recipe for resentment and/or total chaos and feeling like you’re constantly being pulled between quality time with your family and creative expression.
We hired a nanny, now her working hours were my working and self-care hours. I had to be more structured with my work. For me, this is what it really took for me to feel like I could do a good job at being a mama and a good job at my work.
I couldn’t just work all the time because all the sudden I wanted to have time that was family time.
I started having set days of the week that were my work days.
This was really the beginning of what is now so key to the structure in my life that really keeps me grounded and sane, while I hold businesses, my household and a young family.
I struggled adding in this structure. I resisted it. I really pushed back against it; but now, I’ve finally really embraced and accepted it; I see so clearly how the more we add to what we need to hold energetically, the more structure we need.
If we beat ourselves up because we feel overwhelmed with what our daily lives require of us or because we find ourselves energetically dropping things we care about or we feel disorganized and like we’re barely getting by the majority of the time, I bet it’s not that we need more internal pressure.
If this is your experience, I bet you need more structure to hold you. That structure could be internal, eg keeping promises to yourself, creating a schedule that works for you and sticking to it, experiencing yourself as worthy enough to take time for yourself and receive help. But, it could also be that you simply need more help, externally. You might need to hire someone to clean once a month or hire childcare (like I did in my story).
You might need to get really real and take things off your plate while you build the stamina to hold the life you’ve been wanting. You might have to make your life much smaller. It is not shameful or regretful to need to downsize. It could be really true in this season of life you’re in.
The actions you personally need to take will come from The Nurturer within you and they will be individualized to you and your very beautiful and precious journey. However, so many times we find ourselves in a ditch with our wheels spinning. We’re not going anywhere, but we’re using all of our energy. We just loop around the same issues again and again. Which is also a place we can build deep wisdom from, but a place where we will eventually need to hear the quiet, loving voice of The Mother, saying “Stop. This is enough.”
Personally, I am currently feeling really supported. My kids are older (which is such a huge part of me feeling more resourced) and so I have recently been feeling a season expansion coming.
From when baby Alma was born up until just recently, our family has been in a season of major stabilization. We grew fast without much structure to hold us, we had to build it as we went and even retroactively, at times. It’s interesting that my health was also a reflection of this.
But now, it feels like we have steadied. My health is really burgeoning, just as the Spring season we are in. We feel secure and solid. I have come to recognize this place as the restful, preparation-time plateau before the next big level up.
Our family has a lot of potential growth coming.
We are coming into a season of change and evolution.
There is a lot coming and I can feel that it is time to start putting the scaffolding in place so we can open to this next iteration of us. This is my Nurturer at work. She is the one who senses and sees this. She can see the bigger picture and she has been directing me to soften, take things off my plate, give myself more space. To really open to receive, we have to feel safe. She has been hard at work ensuring my safety.
This has looked like getting a little more help around the house; with cleaning and food. I, myself, have been doing more meal prepping and getting more efficient with our nourishment and making sure we, more often than not, have easy nourishment available via freezer meals and extra food in the fridge. (My kitchen philosophy is efficiency and reverence.)
Saying no a little more to social things that don’t feel aligned or easy or like they give us energy vs take it away.
I have also hired some help in the backend of my business which has freed up a seemingly disproportionate amount of energy. I had no idea how much more supported I would feel with someone just doing a few hours of work on my tech and back end stuff each week. There were all sorts of reason why I shouldn’t do this, but it feels like such a wildly solid investment in my well being.
One thing that helps me immensely with having a lot of supportive structure without it feeling suffocating or too rigid is to have a daily rhythms and a day of the week rhythm.
For example, every day; we form our days around meals. We don’t skip meals because that doesn’t serve our family energy system and it’s literally the scaffolding upon which our day lies.
We eat breakfast; lunch, snack, and dinner. If we are out or traveling, we still plan our day around these meals. It doesn’t change. It’s not rigid for us; it just is. Nourishment is central. (I wrote more about this here).
We also have a “quiet time” every day after lunch. This is a time for the adults to rest, nap, read, *sometimes talk on the phone or catch up on some of work* and a time for the kids to rest, nap, read, or just be generally more mellow and chill.
We don’t always do this if we are out and about, but I will try to build in even a 30 min period of sitting outside or even just in the car to rest a little bit and regroup after lunch.
Personally, I always have morning and evening routines daily as well.
I have a morning practice of warm lemon ACV water, greeting the sun, movement/lymph, and then eating breakfast within 1 hour of waking.
In the evening, the kids and my husband or I take a bath; I wash and massage my face and brush my teeth.
These are the pretty much nonnegotiable daily rhythms. I don’t force these things; they are literally like structure upon which my day exists. It would feel much harder for me to not do these things than to do them.
Sometimes it’s time for shift and something about these habits changes a bit, but for the most part this is always the structure of our days.
Society’s day of the week rhythm is Monday through Friday are work days and Saturday and Sunday are weekends.
However, that doesn’t actually align with a lot of families with young kids these days.
Here is ours currently:
Mondays
nanny comes 9-5
Clara and Sean work workout/walk 9-5
evenings family time
Clara puts kids to bed
Tuesdays
Kid’s school 9-2:30
Clara and Sean work/personal appts 9-2:30
After school, family time
House gets cleaned and get some help with food prep this day
Clara and Sean share bedtime duties
Wednesday
Kids’ school 9am-2:30pm
Clara and Sean Date Day, grocery shopping and Yoga together 9-2:30
After school family time
Sean’s Personal Practice time 7-9pm
Clara puts kids to bed
Thursday
Grandma with kids 9-1
Sean at work 9-5
Clara work, workout, self care 9-1
Clara with girls 1-7pm
Clara personal practice time 7-9pm
Sean puts kids to bed
Friday
Clara with kids and movement practice, Sean work/workout/walk/self care 9-1
Sean with kids, Clara work/workout/walk/self care 1-6
After 6pm family time
Clara puts kids to bed
Saturday
Family Day
Clara Workout
Sean puts kids to bed
Sunday
Family Day
Clara long walk
Sean puts kids to bed
So now you know my whole life. ; )
Maybe to you this looks insanely rigid or weird. Maybe it looks totally normal or even less scheduled than your life. I don’t know. I’m only sharing because I know people love to see real life examples of how to organize your days.
I know, if you would have said this schedule would be my life a few years ago I would have told you to fuck right off and thrown my head back and laughed.
But the truth is, the only way we as a family can hold the things (family, businesses, non profit organization, clients, multiple homes, relationships, real estate, our health and ongoing healing, well being, our dreams and hopes for the future, and even more!) we hold with the grace we do, is because of this structure. This structure holds us, so we have the space to hold even more.
Do I sometimes totally disregard this structure and do what feels good and right? Yes, after all I wrote most of this far after my normal bedtime.
But this structure holds me, so that I can open to receive even more.
There is a big difference between forcing a structure like this and allowing it to grow organically and intentionally based on what you value and as what you are carrying increases.
It’s a nuanced and delicate thing knowing when to add in structure and when to let things be flowy. All I can say is the Nurturer within you knows what you need.
If I have a ‘goal’ it is to open wider and deeper to Life itself flowing through me.
I want only to receive my life and all Life has to offer me more and more fully without feeling zapped or depleted.
Will I feel tightly stretched at times?
Will I be taken to my limits?
Will I fumble and fall down completely, make major mistakes and be totally and completely humbled?
Yes, I expect to, because all those things come with a life well lived.
There is only so much we can hold as an individual; if we want to grow beyond, we have to start to let structure hold us. We have to listen when our internal Nurturer says, “You are doing too much, my love. Time to rest. Time to refill.”
We will not open unless we feel safe. And the right amount of structure allows to us to feel safe to open even more. What amount and what kind of structure is appropriate will be different for different people and different seasons of our lives.
We get to be the creators and channelers of the relationship between structure and flow that is right for us at this moment in our lives. We can have the structure we engage be nourishing, regenerative, and right-sized vs depleting, suffocating, or overbearing.
Questions to contemplate as you connect to your inner Nurturer and feel into what structure would be supportive for you:
What is the state of your family’s energy system? Are you overwhelmed? Is there a deadness or a lack of flow? OR Is there a feeling of aimlessness, chaos, or like your days just float by without ever finding a solid footing?
What season is your family in right now? Expansion? Stabilization? Integration? Gathering? Something else?
What structures would support your opening and ability to receive more (nourishment, space, beauty, connection)?
If you feel you need more structure; what part of you is resisting it? What does this part need or want?
If you feel you need more flow, what part of you is resisting it? What does this part need or want?
Would love to hear if and how any part of this article lands in you and what it shakes up or shakes loose.
Thank you for being here.
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