Becoming a parent can bring a lot to the surface. It can push you to your limits and reveal emotions that you didn’t even know existed. It also opens the door to opportunities to teach life lessons. Our children are constantly looking to us to help them navigate daily life and how to exist in this confusing world. It is these teachable moments that can shed light on our own upbringing and what lessons we were taught. Through my journey of parenthood, I’ve spent quite a bit of time questioning my beliefs and if they still hold true. Do they serve me anymore? Do I want to instill them in my child? 

One narrative that I’ve recently been evaluating more intensely is the one I’ve learned about success. It’s hard to pinpoint when this narrative developed or the many influences that shaped it but it’s one that I believe a lot of us grabble with. What does it mean to be successful? And how much of our self worth is tied to it? 

Often times it is the amount of effort we’ve put into something and the benefit we’ve received from that effort that constitutes success. Finishing the marathon we’ve trained for, getting the promotion, our children getting a good grade on a test that we helped them prepare for, hitting the fundraising goal for a cause we care deeply about. We tend to always be chasing some goal that will allow us to feel that dopamine rush of success. It feels good to accomplish something! We teach our children to put in the work. Why do we teach them that? So that they can reap the rewards of their hard work. The story wouldn’t sound nearly as appealing if we said to put in the hard work and there’s a chance you could still “fail”. We don’t like those stories. 

But the reality of life is that nothing is guaranteed. Maybe success isn’t working really hard at something and reaping the rewards that await at the finish line but rather the lessons you learn during the process. What if we’re conditioned to be so hyper focused on the shiny success waiting for us at the the other side that we potentially ignore the more important things happening along the way? 

My life was always centered around accomplishing goals. I realize now that they were ingrained ideas of success that fueled a lot of my daily activity. Go to college, get a respectable high paying job, get married, have children, and live happily ever after. The more I faced life challenges, the more I started to question these ideals. 

Going to college is where I started to question what I wanted to do with my life. More importantly than that, this is where I learned to be vulnerable. I got proximate to the idea of not knowing what I was doing and started to trust my instincts when it came to romantic relationships and friendships. I started understanding myself a bit more as I changed my major, navigated living with roommates and fell in love with my now husband. What my life looked like upon graduation was certainly not the idea I had going into it. Did that mean I had failed? No, because I had lived and the lessons I learned along the way are what made this time in my life so special. 

I went onto enter the working world and had grandiose ideas of being independent, making money and a name for myself. I worked at several different companies and during each role succeed. I was promoted often, compensated at higher amounts throughout time and praised frequently for my work. So when I decided to resign, did that mean I had failed? No, because it wasn’t the compensation or the increased stock options that equated my success in corporate America. It was the lessons I learned about myself along the way that will stay with me forever. The coworkers and mentors that changed the way I see the world. It is these moments of connection with those people that made this chapter of my life a huge success. 

As we enter into marriage, we often spend more time planning the details of our big wedding day than the actual marriage. The early years of my marriage were filled with fun trips, lavish dinners, carefree exploration and lazy weekends at the pool. As we navigated tougher conversations around finances, family planning and extended family things were a bit less idealistic. There were certainly moments where I questioned if I’d made the right choice. Did that mean I had failed? No. Entering my ninth year of marriage I can confidently say that the daily process of communication, a deeper understanding of one another and compromise is the more important measurement of success than the certificate you sign on the wedding day. Marriage is hard. It’s a constant rollercoaster of emotions and situations that test your ability to ride the waves together. It is definitely not a destination. 

When it comes to bearing children, I was determined to become a mother. After a long road to become pregnant I certainly felt a wave of success when my fertility doctor confirmed the pregnancy. However, as the road to birthing my baby became more rocky and uncertain so did my understanding of motherhood. Nothing was easy about my birth story. It was literally a knock down, drag out fight for survival every step of the way. Had I failed because it wasn’t the way I had envisioned becoming a mother? No. It was this process that has shaped the mother I was meant to be and for that I am immensely grateful. Mothering is nothing if not a constant process of learning and being present enough to respond authentically to the needs of our children. Success is not solely the act of birthing a child but rather the beautiful journey of raising them and the lessons we learn along the way. These are the lessons that have allowed me to find a way back to my true self and I’m learning all the time. 

Now we come to the happily ever after part. Since the earliest days of humanity we have used storytelling as a way to make sense of the world and pass down knowledge to future generations. Stories all follow a simple cadence that allow the recipient to make sense of a problem and ultimately learn a lesson. There is a beginning, middle and end. In my redefined understanding of success, I think I will live my life in what I call the “messy middle”. I am no longer waiting to tell my story until there is a way to wrap it up with a pretty bow because I don’t think that’s possible. To live is to constantly be learning, evolving and questioning. My new success metric is allowing myself to feel deeply along the way so that I can navigate this world as my most authentic self. 

I’ve started to accept that there is success that can come from being still and quiet. There are accomplishments that can stem from doing much of nothing. I’ve started to create space to feel the up’s and down’s of everyday life. It can be deeply uncomfortable to slow down. To not have a specific goal but rather letting there be room to explore my innermost desires. What brings me joy? I’ve realized that this question is fairly impossible to answer without having a deeper understanding of self. 

Pushing up against engrained narratives is really hard. It is foreign and does not include a roadmap. It can seem radical or impractical especially to a society that clings to these narratives to feel safe. As I question this narrative and my relation to it, I have to remind myself that my value is bigger than my original understanding of success. I am worthy, just because I am me. 

I was reminded of the importance of reiterating this to my daughter whenever I can on a recent car ride home from school. “I got a math award today at school”, she said. “That’s awesome baby. Congratulations!” I cheerily replied. I caught a glimpse of her sweet face in the backseat and she changed her expression and said, “I actually didn’t get an award today.” Thankfully I had been writing this blog before pickup so this lesson was fresh on my mind. “You know what’s really awesome? You’re amazing whether you get a math award or you don’t” She looked confused. “Yeah, you’re amazing just because you’re Juliette. Not because of an award or anything else. You’re really awesome just because you exist”. She thought for a minute and then smiled, “that’s cool.” Yeah baby it is. It’s really cool. 

I am comforted by the fact that the work I am putting into reframing this narrative for myself will now give my daughter the opportunity to grow up with a different understanding of success. She will have an opportunity to learn that her life is miraculous and special just because she is. There is no amount of money or accolades that are going to make her more worthy of love or valuable to this world. I want her to have space to explore what ignites her spirit, win and lose, learn and ask all the questions along the way. Because life, my sweet girl, is most certainly not a destination. It is simply a series of events, good and bad, that you are lucky enough to experience. Life can certainly be hard, but it’s so worth it. 

Sending love to you today and always