My Heroine's Journey into Motherhood

Hello, it's Alexander J. Johnson. Hope you're having a great day. So today's video is my heroine's journey into motherhood, AKA my biggest challenges so far. And my intention for this video is just to share my process. It's going to be sharing my journey and some of my challenges and what I've learned and how I'm navigating motherhood. And I have some ideas. I've actually had notes for this for, like, a month, and I just haven't done this video. And I got an email from Mandy, who's a new friend, and she has a little baby. And we just had a great conversation around surrendering and becoming a mother and how there isn't that much talk in preparation of the challenges for the mother of, like, what it takes to become a mother. That the transition of mental, emotional, spiritual, like the transformation that happens for a woman once she gives birth or becomes a mother. Like, it's huge. And it happens overnight. You're just. You are in it on the job training, and it can be intense. And I think every woman has her own story, her own dance, her own rhythm to figure out who she is as a mother and who she wants to be and what she stands for and how she's going to do it and what she believes and all of that. It's a very amazing time. And it can also be overwhelming and stressful and there can be a lot of emotions around it. And I think the more that we talk about this, that mothers, you know, share openly about their challenges and not complaining about them, but just sharing, these are my challenges. And then supporting each other to rise up like, you've got this. You can do this. And helping each other and figuring out how to rise up and be the mothers that we want to be. And it is a heroine's journey. It is such a heroine's journey. And I love the quote by Joseph Campbell and. And when I saw this quote again, I saw it a few probably about five months ago, and my son's 20 months now, and I just had this, aha. Then the quote is, you must be willing to give up the life you planned in order to live the life that is waiting for you. I think that's right. I hope it's right. But the idea of that just, like, hit me of, wow, I must give up the life that I planned. And there was a part of me that was holding on to my life before my son was born, and the freedom and the spaciousness and the creativity and the mental stimulation and just life before Having a child. And then I was in this other. I was kind of one foot here and one foot here. And I love being with my son and I love being a mom. And it's so, so much fun and it's like a whole new reinvention. But there was kind of this like, you know, emotional dance of like, ah. And you can't go back. Once you're a mother, you can't go back. And I love my son. I can't literally imagine my life without him. Like, I love that kid. Every time I see him smile, every time I hear him giggle, my heart just like, oh. And there's this quote, something about when you become a mother, your heart is forever walking outside of you or something. And when I read that before a mom, I was like, that's a little weird. And now I get it. Like, he. He is me. I am him. Like, I. He's the light of my life. So this isn't about him and my love for him. This is just about me and my emotional, kind of spiritual stepping into motherhood. And I. I think we need to be gentle with ourselves in the process of doing this because it doesn't mean that we don't love our children if we're stressed and we're overwhelmed and we're. And we're trying to figure it out. And we wish that we had more time and we wish that little people didn't need so much love and attention and care and that they didn't have. That they didn't cry and they didn't have temper tantrums and that everything was just like peaceful and rah, rah, rah with kids. And so where was I going with that? It can be challenging. I think we just need to be honest about the challenges. And that has been my biggest process. My biggest challenge has been I thought that I was going to just work and have my son. And that's just what, you know, he would be over here playing and I'd be working. I was a little naive, as I think most new parents are. Like, you have fantasies and ideals of how it's going to go and it doesn't really go that way. And you have to adjust and find your own path. So. So it just became very clear to me that motherhood was my new vocation. And granted, I still do videos and I have a newsletter and I teach classes and I help my husband with our amazing business and theos. And I'm very engaged in business and work. Yet my day to day is very family oriented, taking care of my son making 98% of our meals. We do have somebody who helps clean. And also I have somebody that comes two days a week to give me a little bit of time to do videos and just to kind of have some spaciousness, which is awesome. And I'm super grateful to have her support. So I do have support around that. But my main gig, my main vocation is motherhood. And that feels like it's my destiny, my dharma, my where my soul wants to be. But it hasn't been easy. There was definitely a period for me where I'm like, oh, I just want to go back to being able to work and create like I did before. And I used to kind of have this feeling of I wish I had more hours in the day so that I could create and do all that I wanted to do there and. And also be with my son, you know, all the time. And I had to let go of that. And, you know, you need to let go of the life that you planned in order to live the life that is waiting for you. And I'm not the type of person who can get by on five hours of sleep. Like, I am in bed an hour after my son goes to sleep. And I sleep as much as I can because I just. I love my sleep and I love a lot of self care. So something had to give. I was not going to be a tired, cranky mama. I am committed to feeling good as much as possible. And I know what makes me feel good and stressing myself out and working and staying up late and whatever just does not work for me. And if it works for some moms, which I know it does, they got superpowers that I just have currently. So I've had to surrender to motherhood, and I've had to also find my own path. And I have a lot of friends who work and are moms and they run businesses and they're, like, fully engaged with their businesses and they have kids. And I so, like, wanted to be that. And in many ways I am, but in most ways, I'm not. I'm not really that into the business and stuff. I'm more into, like, researching about parenting and kid stuff and family life and home stuff and cooking and figuring out how I keep our whole house organized. I just stepped into this, like, domestic goddess, and it wasn't what I planned. Like, I didn't really think I was gonna be that into it. And I am. I like it. There's something, like, beautiful about having family, family rituals and cooking our food and doing dishes And I've just really opened up to family life being my temple, my monastery, my spiritual practice. In many ways. Like my home is my temple and everything that I'm doing for myself and for my son and for my husband and for our home is blessing our home. And it's literally my spiritual practice. And that is, that's how I made the leap from wanting and reminiscing about my past over here and then being in this life here and just kind of that dance, once I read that quote and I was like, I'm integrating, I'm integrating. I'm gonna get an alignment with my soul calling right here and right now. And I'm gonna rock this. I am going to be home CEO and this is what I'm going to do. And everything that I do, from diaper changes to the dishes to the laundry to all of it is, is, it's my life's work, it's my purpose, it is the season of my life. So once I made that, it's been so much more easy. And granted there's still times where I compare or I fantasize or I wish or whatever, but I just come back to and I do a lot of journaling on this and meditating and contemplating and just sinking into my essence of like, okay, this is the season of my life. I have chosen this. This life that I'm living right now is chosen 100%. At any point I can choose to change it. And I think it's really empowering for women to say, at any point you can change it. I could if I felt it was necessary for me and my family's well being to hire somebody, you know, a full time nanny, I could do that if I wanted to. It's not what I want to do. And yeah, it's not what I want to do at all. Like this, when I ask my soul, my heart, like, what is calling to me right now, it is this. It is motherhood. Full on. Like, how do I be present, how do I be mindful? How do I be a loving presence to my family? Like my energy and how who I am and who I am being is the tone of the family, it's the tone of the house. If I'm in a bad mood, it impacts my son, it impacts my husband, it impacts our whole family dynamic. So I've chosen to make this my life's purpose currently. And like I said, this is a season and it's probably going to be a season for the next 15 to 20 years. And I'm consciously choosing It. And so I think for us as moms, it's really important to get clear about what you're choosing, why you're choosing, and get in alignment. Like, be in integrity with your soul's calling. Don't do something because somebody else is doing, or that's what that mom does, or yada, yada, whatever feels most resonant for you, you have to do it. So that has been my process and really owning that and stepping into that. And like I said, it wasn't. It wasn't how I thought it was gonna be. And I'm sometimes shocked, like, what I'm interested in right now, but it's totally changed me. And I think being willing to let motherhood change you, it's such fertile soil for transformation and reinvention. Like, this is an amazing time for you to reinvent yourself. Like, who do you want to be? Who do you want to be as a mother? Who do you want to be as a wife, a partner? Like, who do you want to be? This is the time to step into that and to get really clear about who you are and who you want to be for yourself and for your child, and then rock it and give up perfectionist tendencies. You know, I've had to just realize I can't have it all. And, well, I can have it all just in different ways. And just redefining what having it all is like. I feel like I am having it all because I get to do everything that I want to do. I can't obviously be creating 247 or being with my child 24 7, but I feel like I do have everything that. That I want. And in those moments where I feel like I'm tired and I wish I was doing something else so that I had a different vocation or something more fabulous and amazing, I come back to, I'm choosing this. I'm choosing this life. I'm choosing this path. I'm choosing. I am choosing motherhood. Like, it's an empowering choice for me. So that's a little bit into my heroine's journey, my arc, my transformation, all of it. And I feel very happy with it. I'm excited to see what keeps happening when I keep surrendering to motherhood and keep surrendering to the process and keep being mindful and keep bringing my awareness and my intention to. To my daily life and bringing spirituality into the dishes and into the laundry, into everyday. To everyday living. And it's really. It's a really simple life, but it's so. My life is so much richer and deeper and more magical and miraculous and connected. I think those are the biggest things for me. So this video is already really long, so if you stayed with me for 15 minutes as I rambled through my heroine's journey, thank you. I hope that it was helpful for you that you got something out of this video and me sharing and. Yeah, keep. Keep sharing your stories. Keep being you. Keep. You know, all moms are going through their own process, so be willing to be vulnerable and be willing to say, this is my challenge and this is what I'm going through, and being willing to go deep with other mamas, because I think we're all wanting deep connection with one another and wanting to support each other and wanting to hear the good, the bad, the obstacles, like wanting to hear all of it. And moms are just amazing. Every mom that I've talked to is just so supportive. And, you know, we all love our children, and we're all doing the best that we can, and I think it's really important that we. That we support each other and share our stories. So I hope you have a wonderful day, and lots and lots of mama love to you.