It has been a wild summer!
My oldest five children were running personal businesses on our property, so a wide variety of ages and stages of people were coming and going inside and outside for months. At one point, I hired a friend to make a sign that says "Welcome to Grand Central Station" for my wall. That’s what it felt like!
Amidst all of this, mother was the sounding board. "What should I charge?" "What days are we available?" " How should I advertise?" " Do I remind them?"
And then there was the rest of life’s questions. "HE TOOK MY TOY!" " How do I tell this boy I don’t like him like that?" " What’s for lunch?" " Why do I have to do the dishes? It’s not my turn." " HE WON’T GIVE ME BACK MY TOY!" "He’s still texting me. Maybe I was too nice." " Why won’t these pimples go away?" " Can I have a friend over?" "Can I hold the baby?" "Do I have to change this diaper? I did it last time." <WHACK> "MOOOOM! Hungry!" " Who is changing pipe with me?" "Who is supposed to be feeding the pigs?" " Mooom! Food!" "I need a ride to cross country practice, please." "Aaaargh! He shut me out of our room."
At one point, after watching my young adult daughter essentially break yet another heart, I commented to my husband, " This is kind of hard. I think I feel too much."
Weeks later, on a Sunday evening the day before full-time school started, my sweetheart was giving Father’s Blessings to the children, individual priesthood blessings of direction and comfort as they started a new school year.
At the end, I asked for a blessing too. Much to my surprise, I was blessed "to not hurt so much". "Guide them, but don’t live their lives for them."
It was a gentle reminder that I don’t have to carry the emotional load of each child’s problems. I can listen. I can support. I can brainstorm. I can also find great joy and satisfaction in watching them learn to seek their own personal revelation and direction from the Holy Ghost.
In the end, our real job is to "devote our hearts and our hands to helping all of Heavenly Father’s children to know Him and to feel His love. As we do, He promises us eternal joy and happiness in this world and in the world to come." (K. Brett Nattress, October 2016 General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints)
And in the mean time, on a daily basis, I can field the little detail questions like "What’s for lunch?".
No problem.