Milan and I are walking up the road through the woods – dirt and gravel and moss through the trees where there’s never a car. Picking wild raspberries. Running for fun holding hands. My time to be with him, and myself, and my body before afternoon client calls.

He sits down in the middle of the road “let’s sit here where it’s nice and flat.” I feel charmed and annoyed all at once. I’m ready to get back, take a shower, and step into that other me that gets to help creative souls dive deeper than their fears and find confident purpose.

But resistance often backfires, so I sit by his side. Pretend we’re in a car on the road driving. Pretend we’re in a plane. Pick up some rocks and throw them as far as we can.

He picks up a fist sized stone. The swoop of his arm from low to high makes a full arc, pitching the stone back at my forehead. My hand shoots up to cover the pain and before I can stop him, a second rock hits a bullseye on the back of my hand. Is this for real?

Parenting doesn’t pause when you’re in pain. I hear myself explain to him, calmly and firmly, how he can be more careful throwing stones, but I also hear a memory in my head, my cousin Nika’s voice saying “No one ever told me how much my kids would physically hurt me.”

And these words I have often remembered with an understanding laugh suddenly pierce me more deeply. I feel the well of sadness—the one that holds every abuse I have lovingly, servingly absorbed, the one I never have time for—and I let myself cry.

Milan sees my face and laughs. When I don’t join him, his laugh turns to a whine. He claws at my chest “I want to nurse!” I say baby, not right now, mamas having a little cry.

And after a pause, he throws his soft arms around me, presses his beautiful face to my shoulder, breathes tenderness into my heaves.

Then I’m ok again. I was always ok. We start back towards home, towards helping my clients find their authentic answers, and he doesn’t want to walk, so I carry my giant toddler in my sweaty, aching, superhuman arms.

Weaving motherhood together with the good, orderly direction of a flexible work life is a blessing.

Because motherhood is by far the toughest climb. It’s unrelenting, it calls when you’re down, it shows you your reserve tank, and the one behind that—the ones you didn’t know existed, the ones you’re angry, amazed, inspired and fulfilled to discover—and that can fuel your self-belief in your purpose work.

Motherhood is chaos. Sheer chaos, especially now, in a pandemic—and routine making through soul-focused work is the ground.

Motherhood is ecstasy. Physical pain, mind pain, heart pain, and the sweetest, brightest, addictingest, heart-explodingest intimate bliss simultaneously. Impossible, unbearable, truer than true.

Weaving motherhood together with the spaciousness, ritual and freedom of flexible, passion-driven work feels so balancing.

Whatever you are mothering—a project, a program, a dream, a relationship, an enterprise—I wish you abundant support and the faith and courage to pursue a nourishing lifestyle to match.

If you’re a up against a decision, working through a transition, trying to live a truer life, feeling the desire for shift but clouded by fear and doubt, learn more about my Wayfinder Deep Seeing Sessions and 3-month Mentorship.