Live Simply, Love Deeply, and Reach Your Goals

I was asked recently what my major plans in life were. My go-to response, of course, was to

build my savings, finish my degree, buy a house, make enough money to provide my child with

every opportunity. These are all good, respectable things but, as I sat pondering later that day (as I

usually do), I realized that these were goals I had for myself and there were so much more I wanted

out of life.

My primary focus, and what motivates my every decision, since my daughter was born has

become what kind of person am I; what kind of role model is she going to be looking to for the rest of

her life? With that in mind, I have had to refocus, rethink and reprioritize. I figured out that there

were three things I wanted that were fundamental to the kind of person I am and the kind of life I

want to build for both myself and my daughter: live simply, love deeply and reach my goals.

LIVE SIMPLY:

I have always been an over-thinker, an over-worrier, with thoughts that were so complicated

that I had a physical reaction of anxiety. I have always loved the idea of living simply but I

had a hard time actually doing that when every decision I faced required a mental meltdown

before I could choose the path on which to go. Once I did decide, after much fretting, I

doubted myself and wondered if I had made the right choice. I had no confidence in my

ability to make good choices. (I do not exaggerate this. It applied to every decision, even

something as small as being in charge of the restaurant that a family dinner would be held at.

My brain threw questions at me and I would end up with chest pains and perspiration.) As I

have gotten older, I have been able to release a little of that anxiety but it wasn’t because I

was trying to live simply. It was because I taught myself to stop caring about what I wanted

and learn what made everyone else happy or the complete opposite: don’t care about

anyone but myself. Neither of these are healthy options. Life, in itself, thrives on relationships

with other people and you can’t have those if you don’t show care and concern for others but

you also have to be able to value yourself and what you want. But you can do that without

have a panic attack over choosing Mexican over Italian for dinner. I mean, looking back even

I can see how completely insane that was. Changing this was pretty easy, actually. When

faced with a decision I simply asked myself, “How important is this to me?” If it wasn’t that

important (I love food and I’m not picky) then I didn’t stress it. I asked for input and made a

decision without questioning myself. If the answer was that this was really important to me

then I took the time to think about it, process it and then I followed my gut instinct at that

point. And once I made the decision, I didn’t allow myself the option of mistrust. I relied on

the confidence I had that I was smart and had enough life experience to know how to make

informed decisions. Once I did this, living simply came so much easier. I found that my

desire for complexities and distractions from simply being me and loving me were minimized.

I began to enjoy my hobbies, like reading, so much more than my distractions, like television.

I began to embrace my desire to learn and grown rather than dread it and put myself down

for figuring out too late in life what I wanted. I owned my mistakes but stopped letting them

define me and, literally, I did all of this by simply answering the question, “How important is

this to me?”

LOVE DEEPLY

I love love. I love love so much that I spent most of my youth warping it into the idea that

everything was meant to be like a fairytale I spent all that time watching in the movies. With that

warped mindset, I led myself into two failed marriages and countless ended romantic relationships. I

found myself heartbroken more than anyone should ever be and completely beaten down because I

blamed myself for every error made by both me and the person I was with.

Changing this became the biggest challenge of my life because I always envisioned myself in a

committed relationship, dedicating and loving the family that I built for myself above almost all else

(God and safety being personal priorities above romantic love). In order to change my views and

expectation of love, I had to reassess my love of self. We hear it all the time and, if you are like me,

immediately roll our eyes at the repetitive and boring nature of the comment, “In order to love

someone else, you must first love yourself.” But I cannot express enough that, after fighting against it

for so long, the importance and truth of that statement became glaringly obvious. People are

imperfect. The man who seems perfect to start will not always be perfect. We all have pet peeves

and easy-irritations. Cohabitating is, essentially, an invitation for these buttons to be pushed. So, if

we are looking to someone else to solely fulfill our need for love and self-assurance then we will

always be disappointed. We have to be in a place of self-acceptance and loving who we are,

weaknesses and strengths, when we enter a relationship. And the other person has to be in the

same place but you can no more fulfill their sole need for love and acceptance than they can yours.

Again, balance is importance. We, as individuals, will never be at a place of perfection. We will

always need to be changing and growing as we enter each new phase of our lives. So will our

partners. So, we need to be able to balance between loving ourselves and being able to love them

and both parties should expect support from one another as they grow and modify themselves for

the better. Unfortunately, you can’t support someone else’s desire to change if you don’t love and

accept yourself enough to know you can be happy as you are and still desire to constantly be better.

It’s when we reach this place with ourselves that we are able to give and accept deep love. I found

this to be true when Lola was born. Another saying we here all the time: I didn’t know true love until

my child was born. Again, I spent many years rolling my eyes. And I don’t know that it’s true for

everyone. There are many people who fell in love, stayed in love and, down the road, had a child

that they were able to love because they already had the skill mastered. But for people like me, who

struggled to love themselves or anyone else, I didn’t become motivated to change that until I found

out I was going to be responsible for someone else. And I didn’t have the typical story. They didn’t

place Lola in my arms and I immediately became overcome with love. Yes, I loved her but I didn’t

realize it was a life-altering, deep-seeded love until weeks later when I looked at her in her little

bassinet and thought, “I did that. I’m responsible for her. And I’ve never felt love for anyone or

anything as I do for her.” I realized in that moment that she had motivated me to want to be different,

better and that the desire for that would never go away because in order for her to be her best self I

had to be my best self. Have I found a partner to share in this with me? No. Will I find one anytime

soon? Maybe not. But I am in the mindset of self-love and self-improvement and that puts me in a

better place to love deeply and purely in a way that I was never ready to do before.

Reach Your Goals

This is the easiest of the three plans I have in life. However, had I not begun to learn to do the

other two then it would be, and was at one time, one of the most difficult tasks I set before myself. As

I listed in the beginning, I have some very major, focused goals. I want to earn my degree and begin

working in a field where I feel fulfilled and like my talents are being utilized properly. I want to make

enough money to move out of my godparents and into my own home. I want to build up a savings

that allows me to provide Lola with every opportunity she want to pursue from band to cheerleading

to modeling to college and so on. I don’t want to have to choose between paying my mortgage and

letting her join an extracurricular activity.

I have been going to school for associates degree for, literally, years. When it got too hard, I

didn’t understand the material or I was overwhelmed with my schedule, I simply quit. I quit

participating and took at F in the class or I withdrew from school altogether. That’s why a two-year

degree has taken me four years to complete. I knew when I found out I was pregnant, however, that

I wanted to get that degree and move on to complete my bachelors. I didn’t care how old I was when

I finished or how long it was going to take me. I wanted to show myself that I could do it and I wanted

my daughter to see that education is important and you should never give up on yourself. So, I

dedicated myself. I took one class while I was pregnant. (It was all I could afford and all I,

realistically, felt I could commit to and successfully complete.) After she was born, I took the time to

bond with her and then re-enrolled at full credit status and began working away at my goal. I am on track, currently, to graduate at the end of next semester and transfer on to a university for my

bachelors program. I am proud of myself. I am proud of what I see and what I know that Lola will

see. It’s hard. I’m not going to lie. My mornings are early. Sometimes my nights are late and I have

to prioritize when to shut the computer and go spend time with my child because she needs my

attention more than an essay or an exam. Time management is important and you can’t follow a

self-imposed schedule without motivation.

It took the same amount of motivation, focus and dedication to begin to build a savings.

Savings has never been my thing. I wanted to spend the money, not save it. I’ve never made

much more than enough to live paycheck to paycheck. So, when an influx of money came

my way I wanted to buy myself things I thought would fill the void of misery. And they did for

awhile. But looking at my closet today, I own three pairs of jeans, a handful of nice shirts and

a lot of pajamas. There are two purses that are sitting on a shelf because I utilize a diaper

bag currently. All of those nice things I thought would make me feel better have been

donated, given away to friends or sold at garage sales because when I realized that I was

still miserable a week after I bought them they didn’t hold any importance or value to me

anymore. Treating myself didn’t truly feel like the blessing it should be until I began to value

myself. Then I really believed I deserved to have a new pair of shoes from time to time. I

wasn’t trying to fill a hole with things. I just wanted to feel as good on the outside as I did on

the inside.

The, hands down, most important part of continually being motivated to reach my goals is my

support system. I had to evaluate who I was surrounding myself with. People who were okay

allowing me to hate myself, or even encouraging it because they felt like they had a comrade

in misery, had to go. People who I never felt good, and began to hate myself again, after

spending time with had to go. I had to surround myself with people who love me as I am and

also encourage change and growth. I needed a sounding board that came back with

messages of encouragement rather than beatdowns or acceptance of a giving up attitude.

 This wasn’t as easy as it sounds because I was content to wallow in misery with toxic

environment and those who occupied it. But I realized that, by doing that, I wasn’t making

myself a priority and I damn sure wasn’t becoming the role model that my daughter deserved

to have. I asked myself, “Is this the person I want Lola to see and immulate?” The answer

was a fast, “HELL NO!” So, I knew it was time to implement a change in my surroundings.

And I found that, once I did that, my motivation didn’t waver so much and my accountability

increased (not always fun, by any means, but necessary for change).

So, am I there yet? Am I where I want to be? Am I in the place I envision my future to have

led? Nope. Not by a longshot. But am I a helluva lot closer than I was five years ago? Yep.

Do I have the confidence in myself to know that I am going to get there and get there sooner

rather than later? Yes, absolutely. And that is more than I could have imagined I’d be capable

of before the words ‘I’m a mom’ ever entered my world.