Staying Motivated

It’s not just blogging. Really. It’s…homemaking. Now, don’t say it too loud! In an age where the latest homeschooling, homemaking, motherhood, wife blog is just a click away, it’s become almost something terrible to admit that one is just plain burned out.

I have read the blogs of women with far more children than I have, who run home based businesses, help their husbands with businesses or ministries. These women are busy homeschooling, baking bread from scratch, keeping their homes clean, educating their children in the faith, and decorating. Where have I gone wrong?

My house is never as clean as I want it to be, and time spent cleaning it is time that I’m not engaging the children. That means it’s time that they are elsewhere, making a new mess I’ll likely have to clean up when I’m done with whatever I’m doing now. If I’m really on top of things and starting to feel good about it, the cat will pee. I swear that cat was sent just to keep me humble. Then around 3 pm I become totally wiped out. I need a nap. I only manage to drag my butt out of bed to make dinner, try to get everyone wrangled into pajamas, things put away, and then to bed.

I know part of it is that I’m pregnant again. But Michelle Duggar has 18 kids, and she seems to do plenty while pregnant! Then again, I don’t really know that. I don’t live in her house and I don’t know anyone in real life who has as many kids as I do. So, I know I’m probably judging myself by a completely unfair standard, and yet, I still do it.

Some days I think I’m going to turn this into the kind of blog that will attract all kinds of mothers who will come to see what new thing I’ve learned, or what lesson I can impart. Honestly, though, I don’t know that I will ever be able to make that happen. Sometimes I just plain laugh at the truly lovely homemaker blogs where a mom with 2 very young children is imparting parental and spousal wisdom to me. It’s not that the information shared isn’t valuable or that the blogs aren’t truly well done. It’s that I wonder how they’ve come to have such expertise when I’ve been at this gig so much longer and sometimes feel like I’m still playing catch up! Regardless, I’ve come to realize and appreciate that I’m the blog you go to so that you know you’re not the only mom at the end of the day who’s happy if she got through the basic school subjects with her homeschooled kiddos, managed not to make the place look worse, and made sure no one received any serious injuries.

I don’t know what the trick is for staying motivated. Most of the blogs I read make me feel like I’m starting from behind, and somewhat defeated. But I know I’m not the only one at the end of the day who contents themselves with having been “good enough” and puts the rest in God’s hands.

My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him.

Psalm 62:1