A catch-up blog is necessary once in a while. Something that regroups and reconnects on a more formal level instead of the minute compulsive postings on social media. When you keep up with the P's, we Padulas manage to have something always going on. No, no new babies coming that we know of (although I'm not against the idea). Just a lot of the unknown looming ahead, with our choices being very important to the well`being of ourselves, our marriage, and our family.
Being in Texas has been good for us as a family; I've been challenged to be a better mom, a better wife, a better me to myself. I have sharpened my ears and tried to keep the tone of my voice down. Tried to be good to myself and learn what I need to do to keep myself afloat creatively and in terms of passion. Most of the time, I talk with my peeps on social media. It helps keep me connected. Sometimes, I isolate myself for a very small amount of time to read or think or send catch-up texts to friends.
Random blurb: I've never been a card-sending person. I like receiving them and I can feel the thoughtfulness behind them. But people will sometimes cause you to feel as if you are not a good person if you don't "think enough of them" to send any. Well I have to forgive myself this tiny flaw and continue to try to use my words in connection with the people in my life in place of a memento. Sometimes our capabilities differ from those of others. No reason to breed resentment for feeling as if you must fulfill some certain action to make others like you. Make all of your actions sincere and all of your interactions as heartfelt as you can, is my philosophy.
In other news, I'm really going through a "thing" with Kendrick, my youngest middle son. He is in full-throttle toddler mode, and this time I'm definitely exercising more patience and restraint in dealing with him day to day. I'm more sympathetic to his tantrums (not to be misunderstood as being a doormat and hitting post, although sometimes it feels that way when I'm not spanking his bum) and noticing that sometimes it does take me being gentle when I really want to walk away to cheer him up. I am trying to trade relief of my frustration in the form of active impatience (using my actions to relieve myself through yelling or spanking too hastily. I actually make myself try to parent without relying on corporal punishment and yelling as much. I can honestly say it has been a true eye-opening experience into just how much parenting can change your life if you allow it to. I won't always get it right, but I will always put forth effort to attempt to do right by those babies.
I feel like I need a "life break"; that is, I need to go away and do something completely outside of myself and regroup from the information overload I dump onto myself. My own doing, I know. But I feel a responsibility to inform myself on things of this world, since I do happen to live in it and want to do so in the best way possible. Learning new things are hard. I often never know who or what to believe, because of all of the contrasting opinions. Sometimes I wish I could live in a little bubble, where everything is perfect and I don't have to put so much effort into learning how to protect myself and my little family. Utopia sounds good right about now.
Making choices in what to believe reminds me that part of the responsibility of being an adult is learning how to make choices. When we are small, our parents make most important choices for us...how we will be fed, what kinds of education we will receive, what extracurricular activities we will participate in, where we will go with them on vacation. As adults we have to make all of those choices for ourselves and our little dependents. This comes with so much pressure. Even trying to reduce the amount of sugar you feed them becomes a hassle and fight, one that might make wonder if it is worth fighting. Of course you know it is, but something good and right shouldn't be so downright impossibly difficult to pull of, right? Thus, the back and forth of making the right choices. The right choices are never always the easiest to make.
I'm working on not second-guessing myself as much. I do a lot, and I do care what others think about me. I always have been sensitive to the image I'm portraying and don't like it when someone misreads me or my intentions. It's a personal flaw to an extent, but one that also helps me generate more compassion towards others when I am confronted with a different view than what I would normally adopt as acceptable. Whether it is a religious or lifestyle context, I am learning to not take everything so personally. Towards others or myself. I am learning to let others live their journeys and step in when needed, when they need to hear encouragement or need to feel like their lives matter and make a difference. Everyone needs to know they are valuable and necessary despite their choices, despite their social media postings and crude views. (The word "crude" means that something is "in a natural or raw state, not yet processed or refined"). I often post very crudely myself. With my commitment to being in a present state of living there are times my sharings are motivated by own personal struggles with making choices in the past, and have been shaped by learnings that help me feel as if I am making much better choices in the present and have the ability to continue doing so in the future.
Enough about me...how about the rest of the P's? I can honestly say they are amazing. I am in awe of them and their personalities, even when they push me to my limits and beyond. It is awesome to see my husband grow in his journey. I recently told him that I think we accompany other well in life. He probably thought I was too "out there" with that statement but it best expresses how we function. We are very different people, but we both convene together in raising our family, hashing out how we think things should best be done, and out-talk one another to get our opinions heard...just how we roll. But in the end we end up learning a lot, and I have become a more graceful person because of our differences. All people can learn so much about themselves and humanity by enduring the exercise of living with another person they can tolerate. I say tolerate because at the very basic level of love is spirit of tolerance. Even when you don't agree and click 100% of the time, you can tolerate your partner's differences and that is the bridge to understanding if you are willing to dig that much deeper inside of yourself to offer another level of loving to that person. My eldest son inspires me all the time to do better as a mom and person, to show him the passion life requires to brush against happiness and joy and the beginnings of how discipline works and how it doesn't always feel good. Making yourself be disciplined is very hard to teach and to learn. It doesn't come naturally to children and as adults it takes us almost half a lifetime to even find a healthy balance to practice it ourselves.
My daughter is a special case; I ponder at our connection because of all society's finger-shakings at young girls as youngsters and as teenagers. "Wait till they get older", "They are worse as teenagers", "That's the one who will give you trouble". I shake my head at these precursory warnings and predictions of ill times ahead. It makes me sad that girls are often the cause of premature parental inhibitions as they grow, making them some wild thing to tame and constrain less they cause grief and dishonor for the family. I celebrate my girl, her emotionally-charged responses, her annoying growls and grunts when I ask her to show obedience in a task, her resistance to bedtime and finding any tiny excuse to saunter casually into our room at nighttime. This child is my golden flower. She is the challenge I have to not repeat past relationship errors that I experienced as the child in the parent-child relationship with my own mother, simply because I want a better and healthier bond for my baby girl. It will be hard and it is already hard, but hard we knew it would be no matter what because the hardest things for adults to do is to respectfully allow children to grow. Plain and simple. We feel we have to constantly stick our hand into the soil to make sure the seeds are still there and don't let our seeds alone enough and give them time to take root and blossom. I enjoy seeing the Padula kids grow. I cherish my time at home with them despite my creative brain urging me to run off to create. I will never regret this, having any of them. I won't continue to make myself feel guilty for wanting to procreate till the cows come home, or feeling happy in the number of children I have accrued. I am so grateful to really experience life as it happens, something I've been exercising when I worked hard to stop living in the past. You miss too much of the present when you expend all of that energy.
How are the P's? Fine and normal. In our mode of fine and normal. Life going forward is still a mystery for us, but we are blessed to be able to know we can create great things with the time ahead of us.
Blessings,
Moni P.
Being in Texas has been good for us as a family; I've been challenged to be a better mom, a better wife, a better me to myself. I have sharpened my ears and tried to keep the tone of my voice down. Tried to be good to myself and learn what I need to do to keep myself afloat creatively and in terms of passion. Most of the time, I talk with my peeps on social media. It helps keep me connected. Sometimes, I isolate myself for a very small amount of time to read or think or send catch-up texts to friends.
Random blurb: I've never been a card-sending person. I like receiving them and I can feel the thoughtfulness behind them. But people will sometimes cause you to feel as if you are not a good person if you don't "think enough of them" to send any. Well I have to forgive myself this tiny flaw and continue to try to use my words in connection with the people in my life in place of a memento. Sometimes our capabilities differ from those of others. No reason to breed resentment for feeling as if you must fulfill some certain action to make others like you. Make all of your actions sincere and all of your interactions as heartfelt as you can, is my philosophy.
In other news, I'm really going through a "thing" with Kendrick, my youngest middle son. He is in full-throttle toddler mode, and this time I'm definitely exercising more patience and restraint in dealing with him day to day. I'm more sympathetic to his tantrums (not to be misunderstood as being a doormat and hitting post, although sometimes it feels that way when I'm not spanking his bum) and noticing that sometimes it does take me being gentle when I really want to walk away to cheer him up. I am trying to trade relief of my frustration in the form of active impatience (using my actions to relieve myself through yelling or spanking too hastily. I actually make myself try to parent without relying on corporal punishment and yelling as much. I can honestly say it has been a true eye-opening experience into just how much parenting can change your life if you allow it to. I won't always get it right, but I will always put forth effort to attempt to do right by those babies.
I feel like I need a "life break"; that is, I need to go away and do something completely outside of myself and regroup from the information overload I dump onto myself. My own doing, I know. But I feel a responsibility to inform myself on things of this world, since I do happen to live in it and want to do so in the best way possible. Learning new things are hard. I often never know who or what to believe, because of all of the contrasting opinions. Sometimes I wish I could live in a little bubble, where everything is perfect and I don't have to put so much effort into learning how to protect myself and my little family. Utopia sounds good right about now.
Making choices in what to believe reminds me that part of the responsibility of being an adult is learning how to make choices. When we are small, our parents make most important choices for us...how we will be fed, what kinds of education we will receive, what extracurricular activities we will participate in, where we will go with them on vacation. As adults we have to make all of those choices for ourselves and our little dependents. This comes with so much pressure. Even trying to reduce the amount of sugar you feed them becomes a hassle and fight, one that might make wonder if it is worth fighting. Of course you know it is, but something good and right shouldn't be so downright impossibly difficult to pull of, right? Thus, the back and forth of making the right choices. The right choices are never always the easiest to make.
I'm working on not second-guessing myself as much. I do a lot, and I do care what others think about me. I always have been sensitive to the image I'm portraying and don't like it when someone misreads me or my intentions. It's a personal flaw to an extent, but one that also helps me generate more compassion towards others when I am confronted with a different view than what I would normally adopt as acceptable. Whether it is a religious or lifestyle context, I am learning to not take everything so personally. Towards others or myself. I am learning to let others live their journeys and step in when needed, when they need to hear encouragement or need to feel like their lives matter and make a difference. Everyone needs to know they are valuable and necessary despite their choices, despite their social media postings and crude views. (The word "crude" means that something is "in a natural or raw state, not yet processed or refined"). I often post very crudely myself. With my commitment to being in a present state of living there are times my sharings are motivated by own personal struggles with making choices in the past, and have been shaped by learnings that help me feel as if I am making much better choices in the present and have the ability to continue doing so in the future.
Enough about me...how about the rest of the P's? I can honestly say they are amazing. I am in awe of them and their personalities, even when they push me to my limits and beyond. It is awesome to see my husband grow in his journey. I recently told him that I think we accompany other well in life. He probably thought I was too "out there" with that statement but it best expresses how we function. We are very different people, but we both convene together in raising our family, hashing out how we think things should best be done, and out-talk one another to get our opinions heard...just how we roll. But in the end we end up learning a lot, and I have become a more graceful person because of our differences. All people can learn so much about themselves and humanity by enduring the exercise of living with another person they can tolerate. I say tolerate because at the very basic level of love is spirit of tolerance. Even when you don't agree and click 100% of the time, you can tolerate your partner's differences and that is the bridge to understanding if you are willing to dig that much deeper inside of yourself to offer another level of loving to that person. My eldest son inspires me all the time to do better as a mom and person, to show him the passion life requires to brush against happiness and joy and the beginnings of how discipline works and how it doesn't always feel good. Making yourself be disciplined is very hard to teach and to learn. It doesn't come naturally to children and as adults it takes us almost half a lifetime to even find a healthy balance to practice it ourselves.
My daughter is a special case; I ponder at our connection because of all society's finger-shakings at young girls as youngsters and as teenagers. "Wait till they get older", "They are worse as teenagers", "That's the one who will give you trouble". I shake my head at these precursory warnings and predictions of ill times ahead. It makes me sad that girls are often the cause of premature parental inhibitions as they grow, making them some wild thing to tame and constrain less they cause grief and dishonor for the family. I celebrate my girl, her emotionally-charged responses, her annoying growls and grunts when I ask her to show obedience in a task, her resistance to bedtime and finding any tiny excuse to saunter casually into our room at nighttime. This child is my golden flower. She is the challenge I have to not repeat past relationship errors that I experienced as the child in the parent-child relationship with my own mother, simply because I want a better and healthier bond for my baby girl. It will be hard and it is already hard, but hard we knew it would be no matter what because the hardest things for adults to do is to respectfully allow children to grow. Plain and simple. We feel we have to constantly stick our hand into the soil to make sure the seeds are still there and don't let our seeds alone enough and give them time to take root and blossom. I enjoy seeing the Padula kids grow. I cherish my time at home with them despite my creative brain urging me to run off to create. I will never regret this, having any of them. I won't continue to make myself feel guilty for wanting to procreate till the cows come home, or feeling happy in the number of children I have accrued. I am so grateful to really experience life as it happens, something I've been exercising when I worked hard to stop living in the past. You miss too much of the present when you expend all of that energy.
How are the P's? Fine and normal. In our mode of fine and normal. Life going forward is still a mystery for us, but we are blessed to be able to know we can create great things with the time ahead of us.
Blessings,
Moni P.
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