Content is everything

Lessons from my sons

My oldest son is home and has been staying out in my old office above the garage. He came inside and said, “Mom, it is really nice how content you are.”

My reaction was immediate confusion. Wondering if my son even knows me at all I asked “What are you talking about?”

I am rarely content. I am a maximizer and a producer and a driver of change— which means great things happen, but also means there is always a way to improve. Always. It is both exhausting and exhilarating and it seems to be a compulsion I cannot shake.

“The sign on the wall” he said, “The sign that reads ‘Content is everything’. It has always been there.”

The sign above the window of my old office has been there 15 years. The office that produced Mamalode with its 4000 first person stories of parenthood, and 27 print editions, and plays, and events all centered around CONTENT— the guts of the story. I doubt a single story was about someone feeling contentment. It was always yearning, learning, struggling and snuggling.

I had anchored on CONTENT IS EVERYTHING, but somehow my 20 year old son had grown up completely sure I was seeking contentment not content. Honey, I was happy, enthusiastic, and loved being a mom, but I wasn’t content with myself. Maybe I should have been. Looking back now from my near-empty-nest I can see that I should have been purring everyday just to be within arms reach of my kids.

But now shifting into this new stage of my life I wonder if I couldn’t perhaps have both. Stories to share, and peace in what is. Could I let myself be content? What if it is boring? What if I am? What if it takes away my drive?

But the flip— Do I really want to have a visceral response when someone dares to declare me content? What am I missing now like I was missing then, that should have, could have, been enough?

Enough to make me purr today.

Enough to make me believe that content about contentment could be my story.