Do you take time to process your day?
Not gonna lie, many times I end my day feeling so overwhelmed by all its events I have to process, that I often feel the need to let my mind go numb with a large glass of wine.
(There’s nothing wrong with that by the way).
Honestly most of the events we moms feel overwhelmed by, are events completely out of our control that we need not worry about.
I mean on an average day I am overwhelmed by, not having dressed my kid in the prettiest out fit for school. Not having packed the best food groups for lunch and snacks. Not having put enough time into each aspect of running Maturing Mama. Not having put enough time into potty training the two year old (she’ll be three soon and we still haven’t perfectly figured it out).
Not to mention all the unexpected hiccups within an average day. One day the five years old literally forgot her jacket at home when leaving for school. It wasn’t even warm out. It was the middle of winter and some how she rushed to the car without it and Daddy didn’t notice. That was an awkward phone call to have from the school, “Your daughter has no winter jacket today!”
Another day it was that all the toddler’s shoes went missing… All of them. She didn’t even know where they were (apparently). How does that just happen? I have no idea! But it made us late to pick up the five year old from school.
Motherhood is chaos with all its ups and downs. It’s like, there’s no road map at all. You can never tell a new mom exactly what to expect when raising her own child. Every child is different and every day is different.
So when the day is done and we Mamas are left in a haze wondering how we survived such a chaotic day- how do we process? How do we remind ourselves that we are not failures, but we simply had a crazy day.
For me, I journal. And it doesn’t have to be a play by play of the entire day’s events too. I like doing roses and thorns. Like, what were the best parts of my day and what were the worst parts.
Roses help me see that my day wasn’t as bad as I thought. Often time I make the difficult aspects of my day seem like they were my entire day. But many times, they were the smallest parts.
Writing out the thorns of my day often time help me to realize aspects that were in my control and aspects that weren’t. After I get it down on paper, I suddenly feel like a huge weight has been lifted. Like before I’d written this down, I was blaming myself and just left feeling guilty. But after having written it down I see that much of what I went through could happen to anyone. And I also realize some changes I could make in our routine to help that bit of chaos not happen again.
I honestly love journaling. I started when I was nine. I remember it was in a Rugrats journal. I had watched my big sister writing in her diary and I worked so hard on my penmanship to get to the point where I could do the same.
I remember my first entry was questions about death. Funny enough, they were questions my oldest ask me today. I still have that little Rugrats journal. It’s amazing to read through it and get into the mind of six year old Chanelle.
My mom constantly encouraged me to journal. She saw the importance of me understanding the world around me through processing this on paper.
I never journaled daily. Definitely weekly. And during key moments when I had life altering events take place in my life, I journaled multiple times a day.
I literally feel panicked when something sudden happens in my life- whether scary or exciting. The moment I put pen to paper, I calm down.
As a teenager I got super depressed. I think that’s a pretty standard season for most teenagers. But I remember writing down all of my dark and scary thoughts and questions about the world. And as I wrote, thoughts would come to my mind like answers to my questions like responses… Like epiphanies!
When I wasn’t journaling, I felt so disconnected from the real world. Like I wasn’t real. Like none of it was real. I felt trapped in my own dark thoughts. I was scared to tell anyone how I really felt. So I journaled.
Every time I wrote and conversed with myself, I felt calm. I felt like everything was going to be ok. One day I read through my journal entries. They looked like conversations between two people. One that was unwell and another that had all the answers. I soon discovered it was God that was answering me. And I soon started writing prayers to Him and listening for his answers.
Journaling is a moment of prioritizing our mental health. A moment of putting ourselves first. I think we moms spend more time thinking about everything else and everyone else before ourselves. It’s a habit that can drain us. Trying to process without a journal can prove impossible for us moms. We have so many distractions and can constantly lose our train of thought.
But writing it down- firstly we have to take a moment to sit down in a stable environment. This alone can remove a large amount of distractions. In moments I’ve gone to the dinner table, leaving the kids to play by themselves, they’ve followed me and joined me with paper and crayons, scribbling pretend words. Such a cool habit for them to pick up from me.
When writing down the day’s events, we have the opportunity to reread this information to better understand it.
Also writing this information down, gives us the opportunity to let it go. It’s in the journal now. There for us to go back to if we need to. It’s no longer detrimental to keep it in our minds on replay.
I guarantee, whether you journal as prayer to God or simply journal to process information- it will enhance your days.
So try it! Simple roses and thorns to start. And Maturing Mama has its own designs of journals on sale now. Click below to purchase!
