It’s Mother’s Day in the UK 

Mother’s Day is held on a different day in the UK to Australia. Do you know why?  Nothing to do with actual mothers.  It comes from the 16th century.  Easter was a big holiday - a time people would return home to their ‘mother church’ from the farm/land they were working on for the celebration.   This was 2 weeks before Easter and called Mothering Sunday.   Naturally they did see their family and celebrations around this and spring, the mother land, took place.  

Mother’s Day has become incredibly commercialised.  Which leads to alienation and feelings of loss and despair.  I know I used to feel this way for many years after mum died.  I actually went through a phase of finding the day pretty miserable and loathing myself and we would be ferried around visiting the our grand mothers and going to the cemetery.   Thankfully social media was not around then as it propagates a total fantasy around the day which applies to such a small percentage of the population.  

Mother’s Day  can prove to be an unhappy reminder in so many ways.

Broken families, broken hearts, broken dreams.  

We all have our story.

I have had plenty of time to move on from this.  While I am not a fan of ‘hallmark holidays’.   When I think of mothers day as a day for celebrating, creation and new life it broadens the scope and makes it a far more inclusive celebration.  Whether we think it or not we all create all the time so rather than think of motherhood in the literal sense of bearing or nurturing a child, think of it as birth and nurturing of an idea.    

On the subject of nurturing.  

On a recent doom scroll the quote

‘be the woman you needed as a girl’

popped up on my feed.  

Which got me thinking.  

Who is that?  

As I imagine my 8 year old self standing by me who would I be to her? 

Kind

Someone to give me a hug and kisses and let me know I am loved, I am worthy, life is to be enjoyed and it will be okay.

I have been and still am incredibly unkind to myself.  It has been a default mode for years and it was not until I did my yoga training and in studying the philosophy related to it that this is not a way to be. 

Since them I have been working on it and it takes practice.  I have daily conversations with the negative committee inside my head.  

This little practice I do every morning helps me when I wake up with a dose of the 'self hates'

So to be the woman you needed as a girl….

Who would that be? 

Let me know I love hearing your stories

Sending you lots of love and kindness