It’s All Nuance
Dear Unconditional Love - what would you have me know today about failure?
Oh honey. How scared are you to ask me this? I saw you sitting, waiting, Hoping that some other question would come to your mind today. Or that you could just write “what would you have me know today?” and leave it at that. But wow how quickly our deepening connection has brought you to a place of trusting what it is you know you need to hear. That’s such a cool thing about you. You can try and convince yourself out of something, but it doesn’t take you very long to come back to what feels authentic anymore. That’s fucking brilliant.
I know you’re worried about failure right now because of how you’re feeling about people making mistakes. I see you say out loud to Smooshy so many times, “Mommy made a mistake” so that you’re modeling what that looks like, feels like, sounds like, but also so that you PRACTICE admitting a mistake for him to see that it’s normal. I know it’s just been little things so far, but we have to start somewhere.
I know you know that you’ve made mistakes in your life, and I also know that you know mistakes aren’t failures. The only thing I can tell you about failure is that it feels to me like a vapor. Does it feel that way to you? I know that “vapor” word keeps coming up for us. I think it’s because these ungraspable concepts really lend themselves to that word so well.
Failure by definition means you didn’t succeed. But who gets to decide what success is? Is success being the best, the fastest, the smartest? I mean, seriously, who knows! Only we can define our own successes.
I know you hate that word success, because again it’s SO fucking intangible. It feels like it’s compiled together based on someone else’s definition of what’s good and bad. Shouldn’t success just be how warm you’re feeling in your body when you do something, say something, etc. that’s aligned with your values? Is being in integrity something our society defines as successful? Not really. But I know that resonates with you as something warm and desirous.
But doing something that is not in line with your values doesn’t mean you FAILED. It means you had motivations that drove your behavior in a different direction. It means you weren’t safe to do what you wanted.
This is tricky right? Because it feels like excuse after excuse about success not being achieved, or the right thing not being done, or the failure being had. But it’s not, my love.
When you (and your ego) beat yourself up for failing to speak up in a moment to protect your son, it makes so much sense that you’re worried you didn’t do things perfectly. That feels like failure. But you’re teaching your son about nuance. And you’re learning about nuance along the way.
So maybe instead of the word “vapor” we can use “nuance” for all these things that we can’t seem to nail down. These ideas aren’t meant to be nailed down. Personal success is ever changing, so is personal failure, personal warmth, personal sadness, personal joy. It’s not that these vapors can’t be grasped or achieved. It’s not that we don’t succeed or fail, it’s that there is nuance, for everyone.
When you notice your worry of failure come up for you babe, you can turn to me. I’m here. When you’re past your worry and you’ve “failed” to measure up to your own expectation or the expectation of others, I’ll be here to remind you that you didn’t fail, you’re just living in the nuance. We’ll talk about it, work through it, love each other all the way. Because reaching success doesn’t make you worthy of love. Failing doesn’t make you unworthy. No matter what nuance you’re in, I’m here.
Renu-iassance. That sounds beautiful doesn’t it? And it’s centered around YOU. That’s what’s so cool about it. I love you so much. Go get your little rainbow baby and nuance together. I love you.
No nuance here, this shit is amazing! And so are these beanie boys =)