I love my life so much, almost every moment I live it. I've spent the last 14 years immersed in my most precious lifelong dream -- I've been first and foremost, mom, to two wonderful sons whom I believe know, to their very cores, they're incredibly loved, and incredibly special, and have worth and value that can't be measured. I get to be creative for a living (even if that living is a hard one most times), and I'm very happily married to an attractive, passionate man who adores me and who, as an MFT, does meaningful, tangible good in this world; he helps people get through hard times. Most people who know me like me at least a little, I think. And even though age and time have taken a toll on my once-nubile figure and smile, I'm still a pretty rockin-hot, juicy, open-minded chick whose brain is, on most days, still sharp as a tack. If I do say so myself. :)
So mostly, truly...I'm living my bliss. I'm lucky. And i know it.
Still... When I'm meandering around the internet, occasionally stumbling across old friends from high school or college who've gone on to achieve high-level, big-status, corporate CEO-type things with their lives, I find myself feeling kinda... small.
Maybe that's in part because I'm Silicon Valley born and raised, where such things are valued more than, probably, most places, and life is lived large, large, LARGE! Or maybe it's because I went to UCLA in the 80's, when women were supposed to be and do it ALL, all at once. And then there was me. I wanted to be "just" a mom more than any other thing, and to work with kids, which never does churn in the bucks, does it?
I think maybe this is also the (occasional or chronic) curse of all creative people; of all people whose ambitions don't make impressive resume grovel.... but are just as valid as running a company, for example. I can't and don't intellectually feel bad that I chose to study psychology and education and to be a parent and to scrape by as a creative person in a home-run business, even though those subject areas don't knock socks off or lead to impressive job titles. I really believe in the choices I've made in my life and I'd make them again. But sometimes, still... I do. Feel small, I mean. Because 20+ years after high school graduation, I don't have "Partner/President/CEO" written after my name, as so many I know can, and do.
My guess is that if I polled my many creative friends -- some of whom make their living as designers and artists -- they'd admit to this same internal struggle.
I'm okay with who I am and what I do and I feel luckier than hell on most days. But I wish, sometimes, that I lived in a world where "At home mom for 14 years and running" said as much, as efficiently, and was as impressive and informative to strangers as, "President, Owner, and CEO." I guess what I'm saying is that it strikes me as just a little unfair that those impressive sounding titles have come to represent a stereotype of hard work and achievement for those corporate-based folks; their job title sums up, in a quick nutshell, all they've done with their lives.
I've done a lot in my life, too! I've had the same decades-long learning and struggling and sacrificing and nurturing that goes with any job, no matter what the pay, visibility, or ladder rung. But I don't have a quick, impressive job title to represent all that effort and care. To view MY job titles, you have to look past easy shorthand phrases, and take a moment to read the lines on my face... to hear the songs in my heart... and to feel the rush of joy, the blissful release I feel, when I make someone happy... by making something beautiful that touches a heart, or by listening and being there for someone in need, or simply by making one huge hug the absolute focus and priority of my life, for a given moment, which is sometimes exactly what's needed to make life that much better.
Life perplexes. Doesn't it? Happily, I welcome the mental stretch. :)
