In Honor of International Women’s Day! 

What does “International Women’s Day” mean to you?

One of the most important women in my life once said to me “if all the women in the World united together we would be an unstoppable force.” The sad part is that we do not. We walk with our eyes facing forward. We keep our heads down. We are crossing off things of our own to do lists. We are constantly checking the time. Checking the calendar and the list goes on.  

Why don’t we unite? Why don’t we band together to get through the days? Why don’t we support one another and encourage not just survival but thriving and enjoying being a women? There are so many reasons…but one in particular that I have been thinking a lot about lately.

We are too busy self-analyzing ourselves. We are spending so much time critiquing, judging, and being our own worst enemy that we don’t pay attention to others. Other women who might need us. Other women who might be able to help us. There are times we see other women struggling. We all have. Maybe as a young women. Maybe a mom. Maybe a wife. Maybe a friend. Maybe a coworker. The bad part is although we might see them we don’t reach out. I’m not suggesting that we offer up laundry services for the mom of a little one who we have never spoken to at the grocery store. What if though we simply said “you’re doing a great job mom.” I think if a random women came up to me when I had young kids I may have lost it right then and there in the produce aisle… with my cart full of junk food and wine. I never expected someone to do that to me. They don’t know me. Sometimes I wasn’t great and why would they even care? Maybe I would have thought it was weird. What if as women we gave each other a “benefit of the doubt high five” so often it wouldn’t be weird? That is how we unite. We pick our heads up from our to do lists and look around. That is half of the issue. The other half is we are looking down and not looking at ourselves in the right light. We need to stop being so hard on ourselves. That same women mentioned above also told me multiple times in multiple phases of life to give myself some grace. When you have one million things on your mind 80% is good enough. I mean really let’s be honest somedays, it’s all I can do feel like I scored a 35%...

There have been nights after a long day I plop into bed thinking “Another day down, Another one tomorrow… shit. What the heck did I do all day that I still have things on my to do list?”

We need to change our mindsets. We NEED to realize how amazing we are. We need to recognize how much we actually accomplished instead of what we didn’t.  This life we are leading is not just  repeat of a mini routine. It’s a glorious marathon. I know if my friend Cathy is reading this she will laugh that I dared to use something as sporty as a marathon for a reference … as if I would ever run a marathon. LAUGHABLE!  I can only use this as a reference from what I have watched in movies. You train for a marathon but never really know what you are getting into or what you will get. You train but did you really know what it would feel like on mile 7 or 23? Was it Rainy? Sunny? You’re not feeling 100% that day? Every piece of that 26.2 mile terrain offers something unique. In the midst of that race you keep going. You keep going because you have to. You crank up the jams and tell yourself how stinking awesome you are. If you did anything else you wouldn’t finish. Negative self-talk does not complete marathons! I can only imagine the pep talk I would have to be giving myself every step of the way! What if we did that in our day to day? Just like the terrain we never know exactly what lies in front of us. Our day could totally take a crap and our entire plan has to change. The kids are sick. I was asked to present at work tomorrow because my boss has been pulled out of the meeting. I didn’t take the chicken out of the freezer this morning so it’s noodles and butter for dinner. I’m late. I tried to do too much. I didn’t do enough. Laundry. Work. Husband. Tired. But you know what? Ya did it. You freaking did it. Might have not been your best work but instead of being hard on yourself for maybe “walking that mile during the race” what if you gave yourself a benefit of the doubt mental high five? Women. You crushed it. You crushed it the best way you knew how today. You have many miles and days ahead of yourself and although negative self-talk won’t stop you from going through the motions… you will spend so much energy judging yourself you will forget to see how awesome you are. Be proud of yourself. It’s ok. It’s ok to tell yourself that you are awesome. You’re also enough. Your 35% is fine. What’s not fine is not recognizing it in our own selves or IN EACH OTHER.

So on this “International Women’s Day” what if we commit to do what my mom suggested years ago. Let’s unite and support each other. Let’s give ourselves some grace.