Entrepreneuring, Mothering, and Laundry Basket Despair, #365StrongStories 47

I prefer mountains of laundry to mere hillocks. So, when I enter a marathon sorting and folding session, I know there will be plenty of time for introspection. Today, however, both kids are home thanks to some freezing rain and a minor fever. Turns out I can’t get much deep thinking done when I must constantly exclaim “Please do not knock over mommy’s stacks!”

So I’m left to consider the clothes themselves. Since I could tell you my life story by giving you a tour of my closet, this is actual fertile territory.

There’s this fuchsia Marks and Spencer sweater that’s just beginning to pill. I find this terribly disappointing and give myself over to a little bit of laundry basket despair.

Even in that moment I knew I was actually mourning the fact that I’m folding and refereeing rather than writing and planning. This was supposed to be a brilliantly productive professional day. But wishing I were entrepreneuring instead of mothering isn’t going to get these clothes in drawers or make me any nicer to my kids, so I focus on that sweater (and sounding kind when I beg the girls not to jump on the towels I’d just turned into relatively perfect squares.)

This sweater doesn’t owe me anything. It was some hand me down that I never even put on my first daughter because it always looked too fancy. With my second daughter, I’ve tried to quit hoarding pretty things for the day when our lives were perfect and posh enough to do them justice, so she’s worn it during trips to the grocery store. As I sit in the midst of this domestic mountain range, unable to control the weather or viruses or my own work day, I breathe into the realization that our lives will never be what the glossy catalogs tell me I’m supposed to be striving for.

We’ll have brilliant days while wearing our mismatched pajamas and we’ll suffer through others while wearing our newest and brightest best. Eventually, it will all come out in the wash.

An Invitation to Create Rather Than Sacrifice for the Next 40 Days, #365StrongStories 41

“Oh, Marisa!” exclaimed a new client. “We worked together so long ago, but I have had your name filed away in my mind. When I saw one of your Strong Stories I knew that I had to call you.”

Right there - that is the proof that forty days (and, often, nights) of collecting experiences from daily life, current events, and my own memory and sculpting them into stories has been worthwhile. Writing all these stories is in fact good for business. Gee whiz, content marketing does work!

Thing is, I’m not just powering through #365StrongStories to impress potential clients. My dedication to marketing just isn’t that robust!  No, in order to devote up to an hour of each day conceiving, writing, image wrangling, and posting these stories, it’s got to more than a visibility gimmick.

I have dedicated myself to writing and sharing a story every day in 2016 because I want to show you that it’s possible.

You can look at the world with fresh eyes each day and tell a meaningful, authentic story that changes the reader in some small, vital way.

A Creative, Rebellious Act

But there’s another reason I launched this project. Let me share an an anonymous quote that has been following me around the internet:

“In a society that profits from your self doubt, liking yourself is a rebellious act.”

Here’s my truth: I’m writing and posting a story a day because I like what I write. I also happen to like the act of writing and the satisfaction of having written something.

And damn, to like myself and my writing enough to do it each day without fail is a personal rebellion for me right now.

It’s rebellious to send my two year-old to go find Daddy in the kitchen because I’m trying to get all the ideas on paper before dinner. It’s a rebellion against what mothers are “supposed” to do when I train my first grader to “respect the hand” and walk quietly away so mama doesn’t lose her train of thought.

This creative rebellion may just be about survival in a distraction-plagued world.

Thanks to 40 Days of Experience, Here's Some Insight into the Next 40 Days

It’s a delightful coincidence that I can speak from 40 days of creative practice at the moment we begin another 40-day cycle. Today is the first day of Lent, a time that is generally about sacrifice rather than creation.

To be honest, there has been an element of sacrifice inherent in this project. Giving up wine with dinner, Netflix and a snuggle with my husband, and desperately needed sleep - sometimes I do that grudgingly. Not infrequently, I’ve had to chose my commitment to my own project over my kids. And sometimes we’ve eaten frozen pizza so I could hit publish before I hit the pillow.

Guess what? Everyone still knows I love them and still manages to eat a balanced diet. And I’ve never had to give up anything that was too precious to lose. There’s a really good chance I would have spent that “quality time” sneaking peeks at my phone anyway!

Overall, #365StrongStories has been a creative celebration - even on the days I curse myself and this terrible, demanding project.

When you honor a daily promise to show up to the page and actively partner with the muse, you’re actively erasing self-doubt.

This is your invitation to create rather than sacrifice

It doesn’t have to be a yearlong project. It doesn’t even have to last 40 days. It doesn’t have to be about stories or even about writing.

But do consider how this period of the year that is significant to so many people can help you start a personal creative rebellion and kick meaningless sacrifice and self-doubt to the curb (regardless of religious affiliation).

I'm just inviting you to doing something every day that makes you like yourself a little better.

Have you seen the stories in my series? Subscribe to the weekly #365StrongStories Digest so you can catch up on these quick reads each Saturday morning.

Viewing the Super Bowl through an Innocence Filter, #365StrongStories 39

We’re a football family, but I feel there should be an asterisk beside our names. At our house, there’s a love for the game and even for the hype. But there is also a whole lot of ambivalence.

If not for my husband, I probably would never watch. That said, I admit to being completely obnoxious when my team is on the field.

We love losing ourselves in the drama of 4th and inches and we’re suckers for a good Hail Mary pass. Because the kids aren’t old enough for many movies that capture parental interest, we rely on 300 pound men to entertain us and help pass cold winter Sunday.

And yet, we’ve programmed our six year-old daughter to avert her eyes whenever a “bad” commercial comes on.

I've laughed when my husband says to me “It’s not television, it’s football!”  But how can I blame him for saying something so silly when I'll let the girls sit on the couch with him, exposed to the kind violence and sexism and commercial idiocy that I usually protect them from? (Such is the price of some time to myself!)

Feeling like a hypocrite is never fun, but last night’s Super Bowl freed me from that stress. I was able to see that we’ve struck a balance that works for who we are and what’s important to us.

You couldn’t miss that it was the “Pepsi Halftime Show.” When I asked my daughter if she new what Pepsi was she looked at me with wide-eyed certainty: “It’s a beer with lots of Pep and See in it.”

Clearly, football ads are not responsible for soda addiction in children.

And during Beyonce’s Formation on the 50 yard line, our toddler stared up at her and asked “Riverdance?” We rushed everyone up to bed before there was a full scale tantrum over the fact that the show did not include Irish step dancing.

The tides of mainstream commercialism are fast and insistent, but we seem to have created a little raft for our family that allows us to safely navigate those waters and have fun on our own terms.

What about you - can you make peace with the football menace and all the madness that surrounds it? (Yes, I know I am opening Pandora’s box considering all the ugly behavior of the players, but that’s not the sort of stuff that my kids see when they’re watching the ball make it down the field so it’s not part of this particular equation for me.)

Testing the Truth of Two Birth Stories, #365StrongStories 34

It went on for pages. Exacting descriptions took the reader minute-by-minute through the entire 28-hour process. Though the story was written over several weeks, the narrator would tell you she remembered every detail because she'd been exultantly present in every moment. The journal pages filled more than four years later were more like notes on a dream. The writer lingered on the result, not the road that got her there. When you finally do find out what really happened, entire hours are summed up with “I was lost in the torturous, incremental progression of it all.”

Though the stories were written by the same hand, it would be hard to say that the same woman gave birth in 2009 and in 2014.

After my first daughter’s birth, I considered myself a force of nature - triumphant and ecstatic at the power of the female form. When I survived the second, I was a deeply humbled creature who contentedly swore “never, ever again.”

In truth, the second birth was probably the safer one… transition was a long, brutal hell, but I pushed that baby out in the space of eleven banshee-screaming minutes. The first time around I flirted with “failure to progress” and I’m sure the story would have ended very differently if I wasn’t in the care of trusted homebirth midwives.

Both stories were rooted in my truth as I understood it, but none of it was necessarily true.

Birth is ascending to the stars and falling to your knees. It’s all hope and despair, euphoria and desperation, and the words on a page can only offer a distant view through a cloudy glass. For something so sacred, that is just as it ought to be.

How to Evolve Like a Freaking Mother Goddess, #365StrongStories 27

The modern world likes its goddesses to look and act a certain way. Gorgeous nymphs in gauzy gowns. Abundantly bosomed beings who offer wealth and well being. Great mothers who nurture their beatific babes.

Once upon a time, I used to agree. Six years ago this January, when I was leaving my first daughter to return to my J-O-B, I wrote this:

Want a surefire, foolproof, 100% guaranteed way to become a goddess on earth?  Follow these steps:

• Be born a woman.
• Make love at your most fertile moment.
• Act as a hospitable vessel for nine glorious months.
• Love the little creature that you have created with all your body, heart, and soul.
• Leave aforementioned angel child with a trusted caregiver after she has been lavished with two and a half months of dedicated attachment parenting.
• Return within four hours to a child with eyelids slightly purpled and swollen from much weeping.
• Hold her in your arms and offer her that sweetest mother’s milk.
• When this child falls back in a delighted coma of sleepiest nourishment, witness the rapture on that flushed face.

That’s lovely, but I’m revising what it means to be a goddess. The sweet innocence of a milk dripping deity is great, but there’s another way to earn your place in the pantheon.

I’m nearing the end of my breastfeeding journey with my second child. My boobs can still soothe a crying kid, but I’m less amazed by my alchemical powers. (Wow! I eat food and it ends us as someone else’s poop!)

Now, as I endure the two a.m. screaming that I can feel in my teeth simply because I will not submit to being treated like a human chew toy, I discover I have another superhuman skill: the firm but gentle “no.”

Every mother who resists the desire to devour her young - even when they seem hell bent on swallowing their mother whole - yeah, she’s a goddess.

There is something divine about cradling an infant and pledging a lifetime of nourishing devotion. The refusal to turn into Kali in the darkest hour before dawn? That’s the love that creates the world.

The Exhausted Heroine's Inevitable Death, #365StrongStories 24

There comes a day when the heroine is no longer exhausted. After an arduous journey, she simply vanishes. In her place, you get a crabby lump of protagonist. Creativity, passion, and proactivity have all given way to listless desperation. The new character is simply named “Exhaustion” because no one has the energy to argue or come up with something better.

It’s nearly impossible to write a story about Miss Exhaustion. She’s drained of dreams because everything is so dreamlike. She doesn’t think she has the resources to make a single useful change. She prone to conflict, but it’s all petty and dull stuff that everyone has heard too many times before.

And yet, Exhaustion loves story.

She binges on Mad Men instead of listening to thought-provoking podcasts. She lets the kids watch a movie. And then all the cruddy straight to video releases in the series too. She rereads paperbacks that comforted her in high school and every chapter is a surprise because her memory is shot by this chronic, crushing fatigue.

Exhaustion find it impossible to write a story. Her own story isn’t worth a second glance. But at least she has gratitude for all the authors and showrunners and exuberant children who fill the days and nights with narratives that give her hope to awaken to another day.

Every Family Story Is About One Thing, #365StrongStories 22

“Mama! Why are you crying about that letter from Tatu?” My perceptive first-grader recognizes my grandfather’s handwriting. Sending clippings from the Wall Street Journal, prayers and pictures of saints, and packets of stamps for my husband’s inherited collection, Grandpa is our most faithful correspondent. Today, it’s a half-page ad from the New York Times. Grandpa would like to buy me an audio course on storytelling, if I’m interested. Even as I tell the story now, the tears well up again.

Marketers and people who help you build online visibility like to expose your pain by asking “what do you do when the only person who reads your blog is your mom?” It’s rather a rude question and, since my mother died in ‘09, I especially loath that line. Perhaps now I’ll merrily substitute “your grandfather” and forgive the speaker for being so glib.

You’ll hear different perspectives on “what makes a good story.” Conflict and tension are two of the more common answers. To me, one thing makes a story compelling and meaningful: transformation.

A good story is one that changes the reader in some small way.

A story about how nice it is to get gifts from my grandpa isn’t exactly wrought with tension. Admittedly, I wondered if it were fair to ask him to spend his money on one more piece of content I barely have the time to consume. But that evaporated quickly. If you’re a 37 year-old woman with a letter-writing, blog-reading grandfather who thinks of your business and your passion while he peruses his daily paper, you say “yes, please.” You then compose a very nice thank you note complete with pictures drawn by the great grand daughters and you gratefully make the time to listen and learn.

Instead, let’s focus on transformation.

The story of any family is one of constant change. The endless rising and ebbing of generations. The perpetual fluidity of roles that only children get to ignore.

Now, when we’re navigating a crazy supermarket parking lot during a Saturday visit, I’m watching for Grandpa’s footing as much as I’m making sure the kids don’t dart into traffic. We have all been transformed, but then, that’s where all the meaningful stories come from.

Guess Who Seth Godin Calls “The Best Storytellers” #365StrongStories 21

“Who are the best storytellers?” After a serious binge on this particular podcast, I knew this was the host’s pet question. As ever, he indicated to the guest that he wanted a “creative” answer that would challenge the assertion that marketers are the greatest storytellers. (Only on a marketing podcast does anyone assume “marketers are the best storytellers” is the most interesting answer). Seth Godin, the man behind All Marketers are Storytellers and so many other brilliant books, broke the mold (as usual). According to Mr. Godin, the best storytellers are:

Mothers.

The host spluttered. He dissolved into nervous laughter. He tried to explain Seth’s answer for him and talk about how mothers are empathetic and caring. Then he trailed off about how he wasn’t going to get all “soft and fuzzy.”

Seth didn’t go there. Instead, he described mothers as people who devote 15 to 20 years crafting a human being. They don’t use tools or hacks learned at a conference. They merely set standard and live a life that leaves a story behind.

On behalf of the mothers out there - those of us who know we’re storytellers and those of us who haven’t discovered that yet - I thank you Mr. Godin, from the bottom of my maternal but not-so-soft-and-fuzzy heart.

The greatest story you’ll ever tell is the story that you live and devote to someone else. This is the foundation of my approach to telling stories that connect.

Get My Free Storytelling Guide

The Gift of the First Reader, #365Strong Stories 20

Story has been trying to find me all day, but I’m too tired to draw together myself together and let narrative arrange my scattered pieces. And so, I flip through the books that crowd my office couch hoping someone else’s words can conjure the magic that eludes me.

Just don’t pretend to know more about your characters than they do, because you don’t. Stay open to them. It’s teatime and all the dolls are at the table. Listen. It’s that simple.

My copy of Anne Lamott’s Bird By Bird was a used one, apparently. It’s so easy to lose track of how books find us these days. Generally, it’s enough that they find us at all. The harder thing is finding time for them, of course.

The pen that underlined that passage was black and inky, just like mine. I assumed the marks were my own until I noticed how straight the lines were. When juggling a nursing child or reading in bed by flashlight, all a mother can hope for are bold zigzags that don’t obscure the text too much.

And as exhaustion-warped as my memory is, I know I’ve never read that paragraph. A stranger had absorbed this book and let it go long before it made its way to me.

These days, I have little time for characters. My writing is focused on the “you” of the reader and the “I” that strives to tell good stories.

I do, however, try to make as many tea parties as I can. And I am as kind as I can be to the dolls at the table, and under the table, and even those who gouge the small of my back when I roll on them in the night.

Tonight, when I’m too weary to be the writer, I can be grateful for Lamott’s story and the book’s mysterious first owner for teaching me to be a better mama.

Winter Called: It's Coming, #365StrongStories 17

The wise have long been counseling the headstrong heroes. Warriors have fallen with a final warning on their lips: Winter is coming.

Of course, Game of Thrones viewers have known something nasty was on its way. Over several seasons, we’ve watched the threat from the North take shape. All that stands between the innocent citizenry and zombie army is one last great wall.

Today, the leadership at our house got the call: Winter is coming this way too.

“I want a cell phone! Kids at school have them!”

(You can try to imagine that this was gently and logically delivered, but you’d be living in a fantasy world more mystical than Westeros.)

Everyone who watches plugged-in parents of small children have seen this coming. Technical forces whose power we don’t completely understand have us under siege. And they’re coming for our kids.

We’d been warned. We’d been talking about how we’d prepare. But there was always a more immediate dragon to slay and we assumed winter wouldn’t come to us ‘til she at least knew her multiplication tables.

It is not time for the great battle. Not yet. Queen Mama and King Dad still have a mighty arsenal excuses - all of which begin and end with “you’re six!” And our words still have more power than her demands.

We will join forces to maintain our girl’s childhood. Finally, we know it’s not just rumor and paranoia. It’s just the first concerted attack of our wall.

I’d love to say we were better prepared.

After the Fire and Fight, #365StrongStories 13

She still had the scars on her hands. The sensation in her fingertips would never be what it was. That was alright. She wanted to remember. She still burned with shame for what she’d done to set that fire. Even worse, she mourned that she’d fed the flames and brought the whole place down.

If only they’d understood what she was really trying to do. Yes, it was destructive and foolish and horrifically self-righteous. But she could see the future laid before them. Why was it that no one else was driven mad by the thought that they’d committed to living a life in the shadows?

Yes, she had burned downed the barn. Truly, she had done it because everyone needed a chance to see the moon.

But she’d given up all radical action. She was a mother now, not an arsonist. She had her own home now - but she’d never have a barn. And she had taught her children that it was perfectly alright to interrupt dinner and run to the window if someone spotted a waxing crescent in the wide evening sky.

Trading fire and fight for endurance and patience had been exactly what she needed to do. It was her penance and it was her obligation to the passage of time. And yet, her daughters would always wonder why the moon made their mother smile but she left any room that danced with candle flame.

What My Grandmother Couldn't Teach Me in the Kitchen, #365StrongStories 11

One day, back when I was a college student, I entered the kitchen to find my grandmother looking at an uncooked turkey that sat on the counter.  She looked at me and asked, with that most beautiful twinkle in her eye, “Marisa, if you were to come home to this turkey, what would you do?” Without a trace of irony I replied, “I’d put it back in the fridge.”

Nanna’s laughter made it clear that this was not the sort of answer she was seeking.  She wanted to share a moment with her granddaughter, passing on culinary knowledge.

I was concerned that the family might get food poisoning if the bird stayed out too long.  It didn’t occur to me to be interested in cooking anything. Even spending time with Nanna was not enough to convince me that preparing a meal was more worthwhile than reading a book.

Thing have changed. Sorta.

Ok, so I’ve never actually been solely responsible for the cooking of a turkey, but I have roasted a few chickens in my time. And tonight we might have feasted on frozen pizza and mac n’ cheese, but they were served with a side of peas and mixed greens so no one is getting scurvy here.

I read precious few books before bedtime these days, so “I’m reading!” isn’t the excuse that keeps me out of the kitchen. Admittedly, however, it’s not unusual for me to hit the freezer when I’ve got a launch coming up.

The good news is I had a Nanna who’d love me anyway. And I have a husband and kids who do too.

What We Mean When We Say Motherhood Is "Incredible," #365StrongStories 10

“Moms, how come you never told us?” Back when I was high on whatever cocktail Mother Nature serves new mothers to enable us to survive the stress of being responsible for another human life, I wrote an open letter to the Baby Boomer moms.

Sweetly self righteous, I thanked them for teaching us to take on the world, but I took this generation of women to task for holding back an essential piece of information.

“How come?” I asked like some daft hen staggering about under the influence of yummy postpartum hormones.

“How come you never told us that motherhood was this incredible? You never mentioned the spell that was cast when you first looked into our infant eyes. You never described it as the greatest love story never told.”

The mommies who came before us didn’t get around to waxing poetic about every magic sparkle moment of motherhood because… motherhood.

Finally, I know that that word really means. Incredible is defined as “difficult or impossible to believe.”

All of the joy and rage and numbness and passion that get mixed into the mother-child bond… it really is incredible.

Yes, parenting is difficult and impossible to believe. I cannot fathom how I - and all the rest of the moms I know - can be a kind, smart, creative individual who practices any level of self control when forced to live with this kind of sleep deprivation and these draconian limits on personal and professional time.

And yes, to balance this all out and to show that I am mother that I purport to be on Facebook, the tremendous love I feel for these girls is incredible too. But tonight, the new mommy glow has long since worn off and just wish everyone would figure out to sleep through the night and wake up pleasantly in the morning.

It's an Epiphany, Baby, #365StrongStories 6

The story has it that on this Twelfth Night of Christmas a trio of wisemen reached the end of their starlit path and offered gifts to a baby with a great big destiny.

Of course, back then, the only one who was counting Christ’s days was the young woman who marvelled that it had been twelve days since she looked into her little boy’s eyes for the very first time.

This is the Feast of the Epiphany. For those of us who will not celebrate with a mass or observe any of the Christian customs wrapped up in this visit from the Magi, it can simply be a day of revelation.

What have the first six days of the year revealed? What’s become clear now that the gifts have been given, the calories consumed, the credit card statements received?

I’m looking back to the myth for inspiration and counting to twelve with Mary. I am recovering the wonder of holding a twelve day old baby when every sigh was a message from the divine. I’m reclaiming the stillness you experience when you witness a new life unfolding.

And, because it's a day to receive gifts, I'm politely asking the universe to remind me of all the bliss of cradling a newborn without any of the sleeplessness or the spit up!

Stories Come Before the Sunrise, #365StrongStories 5

Before my eyes were open and before the sun made it over the horizon, it was time to discuss when my six-year-old’s doll had been born. “I think that Margaret’s birthday is in May.”

Clearly, this had us thinking about the calendar.

“Mama, why do we celebrate the fourth of July?”

Brief description of Revolutionary War. Disambiguation: no, the Pilgrims didn’t fight.

“Did they wear armor in that war?”

Discussion of wigs as seen in most recent Magic Tree House book.

Interspersed throughout the Q & A period in which I mumbled and Moira mused, Mairead began her own interrogation.

“Mama! Hello!”

Hi.

“Milkies?”

No.

“All gone?”

Yes.

She accepts this and knocks me in the face with her water bottle. Really, she is being quite reasonable for a 23-month-old. I’m able to yank my shirt down and tickle her ‘til she giggles. It beats the screaming.

Everything beats the screaming.

But Mairead is persistent. “Hungry?”

We are on the precipice of the hysterical screaming danger zone.

“Eggies?”

I assume you hear the plaintive desperation in the toddler’s voice.

Finally, I  clamor through the tangle of sheets and dolls and little girl limbs to reach for the phone. Must be sure it’s dawn and not my neighbor’s ever-present flood lights casting a cold glow to the curtains.

“Clock. Time. Eighteen. Ladybug?”

This is Mairead’s first of 187 attempts to steal my phone and find the app about bugs.

I stumble out of bed as the whining begins. I am going to the bathroom before I answer another damn question or scare up a single morsel of food. They resent my selfishness.

But there’s magic in this morning. There is hope in the air. A sliver of silver hangs in the steel blue sky.

“Lady moon! Quick, everyone out of bed!”

And they listen. They’re as excited as they’d be if they spotted Santa’s sleigh.

Clearly I’m doing something right in spite of it all. 

There are stories being made before the sun is up and before your eyes are open. Can you see them?

Sunday Morning Supposed To's, #365StrongStories 3

Someone is sitting on my journal, so I'm writing this in my head. The babysitters are doing everything they can to amuse my daughter with their sweetly inappropriate ironies, but she's not having it. It's a great honor to be someone's safest place, but when I'm supposed to be someplace else, it's like being conscripted into impersonating a piece of furniture.

My lap, my journal, and I long to be alone together on the lumpy floral couch halfway between the nursery and the Sunday School classroom.

But wait... I've left that solitary existence behind.

I'm a wife and a mother, of course, so it's hard to even be solitary in the shower. But now we're thinking of joining a congregation - something I never thought I'd do - it's absurd to think I'd find time to myself in the midst of a Sunday morning community.

I'd left the church that claimed me from birth and wandered happily in the land of the faithfully unaffiliated. Moving now with this Unitarian Universalist Fellowship isn't the path to the gods I was supposed to take either.

The Ache of Forbidden Stories, #365StrongStories 2

The girl stands at the top of the stairs. She hears gunshots. She hears screams. There’s a lot of talking and then she hears gasps and groans and nice, gentle music. It’s getting cold (she told Dada she didn’t want to wear her footie pajamas that night), but still she crouches there. Listening.

Intrigued. Confused. More than a little frightened.

Eventually, the blare of the television cuts off and Mama mutters, “Did you hear something…?” In a louder voice, “Moira?”

It amazes me that this scene doesn’t repeat every night that my husband and I ignore our grownup responsibilities and lose ourselves in the binge-worthy show of the moment. Clearly we prioritize a damn good story over much-needed sleep. How can we expect a six-year-old resist what we cannot?

This holiday break, my daughter has been pushing at the limits of story.

She was intrigued by the intricate packaging and lush images in the Outlander boxset that waited for me under the tree. She can’t understand why she can listen to our vintage 70s record of The Hobbit but can’t stay up with Dada to see the movie. And she’ll be in mourning about the absolute “no” she’s getting about seeing Star Wars in the theater.

We tell her that we set these limits because we love her. We tell her how wonderful these stories will be when she’s ready. (Yes, husband and I are already having lots of debates about when she’s ready to read Outlander!) We go to her overflowing shelves and pick dozens of stories that are perfect for who she is right now.

Boundaries are blessings, but I feel every bit of her longing and her frustration.

Certainly, when it comes to stories, we have no self control. Humans are the storytelling animal. None of us can stop ourselves.

Writing page one of 2016's blank book, #365StrongStories 1

I’m staring at the empty book that is 2016 and I’m paralyzed by the promise of this new project, #365StrongStories. How can I tell 366 stories (it’s leap year, remember) when I can’t even tell one? The Christmas tree droops, crumbs and toys crunch under foot, and yet another “big game” dominates the family room. Unless your idea of drama is a toddler’s quest to steal your iPhone, I haven’t got a single story to enchant you.

But I’m forgetting everything I know about story because I’m frightened by the blank page.

The strength of a story doesn’t depend on high stakes and shocking plot twists. A story is made strong by the writer’s passion for the scene and the her desire to connect with the reader.

Motherhood is a story - a sprawling epic crowded with characters who transform from sentence to sentence. The narrative structure is messy and some chapters are agonizingly kind while others are painfully short. Much of the writing in the motherhood story is riddled with typos, but that's because the author hasn't had a good night's sleep since 2009.

There are stories to tell here. There are stories I must tell and stories I think you must hear.

#365strongstories, day 1

Nutella on a Spoon (Or, Why Entrepreneurship Can Leave You Starving)

Sovereign Standard, Issue 15  Every Thursday afternoon, I found myself at my kitchen island, trying not to get peanut butter and Nutella on my laptop. Mindlessly, I’d swallow spoonfuls of creamy fat as I massaged my weekly newsletter and blog post into a form I deem worthy of the creative entrepreneur.

By the time my daughter woke up from her nap in her carseat (I was writing and snacking with half an ear for the thin wail that would come through the propped door to the garage), I would have the post 85% written.

I would also feel 105% awful based on the crap in my stomach. Everything was curdled by the fear that I had wasted another perfectly good naptime on a piece of writing that was derivative or fraudulent. Though I still trust the quality and usefulness of what I produced, something was “off,” but I didn't dare name what it was.

(Yes, I was being hard on myself and yes, I would be incensed if any of my dear readers with their own business writing goals treated themselves so poorly.)

But I pushed on through indigestion and negativity and managed to click send on that email so it reached the Sovereign Standard audience by 11:35 AM ET on Friday.

I did this fourteen times. (Ok, so I published fourteen newsletters… my jeans still fit, so some weeks I must’ve satisfied myself with a cup of tea while I typed.)

I am pretty darn sure I am not going to do it anymore.

Why Entrepreneurship Is the Wrong Shaped Container

It’s spring. Our food, even if it’s imported from way too far away, seems to have a new vibrancy to it.

I want to be eating out of wide salad bowls. It’s time to start drinking from one of those smoothie cups that fall out of the cabinet every damn time I open it. I’m sick of sneaking into the pantry and stretching to reach the jar of goo that I stash behind the tarnished champagne bucket.

Yes, I’m done with palm oil and I am done with contorting myself into the shape of an entrepreneur just because it’s what I declared I would do when I quit my job five years ago.

Here’s the quick history of my entrepreneurship:

When I returned to work after my first daughter’s birth, I knew I had to get out of the windowless office where I spent my 9 - 5. Seven months later, my mom died of a totally unexpected heart attack. I gave my notice and declared I was starting my own business.

Five years on and now a mama to two, I am still straining to find the joy as a mother, a lover, a creative, AND the president Marisa Goudy Inc. (What is that, even?)

“An Entrepreneur Can Sell Anything” (Oh, Crap!)

This discomfort with “I’m an entrepreneur” has been around since the moment I took up the title, but it finally crystallized thanks to a conversation I had with Molly Morrissey, Traditional Astrologer and Vision Consultant.

As she put it, there are some people who are able to sell anything.

They’re not necessary unethical. They’re just able to see a need in the marketplace and craft the exact solution to make those people happy to pay them. (She mentioned something about a guy who sharpens pencils for a living.)

Molly inspired me to reconnect to what I already knew about myself:

I am a writer first. And a salesperson… never. At least not in a way that made me feel nourished and content.

Even as I’ve celebrated and explored creative entrepreneurship on this blog and with my clients, I’ve been haunted by my own late night kitchen breakdowns about never being enough. Most of the time, it has been impossible to be the mother, lover, and creative I wanted to be… not when my belly was full of leaden entrepreneurial dreams.

There’s so much about life that is bloody perfect, and for that I am grateful, but I just can’t keep relying on a sugar high to fuel my professional body of work.

Two key things I just realized about my entrepreneurial journey:

• I’m intensely grateful that the silver lining to the worst event in my life was leaving a job I hated
• I’m intensely crazy to think that I need to stick with a decision that was made in the midst of soul shattering grief

I think entrepreneurs are the awesome engines of our economy and I love ‘em. There so much I get about them. I still want to support them and work with them.

I'm just not so sure I'm supposed to be one.

Entrepreneur Versus Freelancer (Eek, does it have to be so divisive?)

Somebody once told me that it’d take as much effort to build a $50K hours-for-money business as it would to build a $500K+ firm. Armed with that “wisdom” (though really, let’s call it BS), as an overachiever who’d declared her destiny, I was obligated to create something bigger than myself.

After five years, I finally know that I have been feeding myself from the wrong source.  And I am bound to starve eventually.

Not only is entrepreneurship about building something bigger than yourself, it’s about devising ways to make money while you sleep, building something investable and scaleable and sellable, and supporting a staff.

I’m able to pull that definition straight from memory, but a good writer researches (or starts Googling stuff she already knows as an act of procrastination) and I found this seven year old blog post from Seth Godin:

The goal of a freelancer is to have a steady job with no boss, to do great work, to gradually increase demand so that the hourly wage goes up and the quality of gigs goes up too.

The goal of the entrepreneur is to sell out for a lot of money, or to build a long-term profit machine that is steady, stable and not particularly risky to run.

In my heart, all I was ever aiming for was that life of a freelancer… I wanted freedom, steadiness, greatness, and quality. “Selling out for a lot of money” sounds nice... for other people.

The Courage to “Just” Be Free to Work in the Sweet Spot

There are a million people who’ve left the soul crushing job, whether it’s rat race corporate or ho-hum non-profit, to chase that entrepreneurial dream. What’s true for me - and for you? - is that the entrepreneurial container can be just as cruelly and impractically shaped as the salaried shlep.

Another part of that powerful conversation with Molly (she does this stuff for a living by the way, so do check her out) was to sit with my assertion:

“If I stopped doing my business as it is right now, I would be a failure.”

Molly handled my feelings around this with such mastery, it was abundantly clear that I’m not the only who believes something so damaging - and so stupid.

For me, to change course after five years would be a declaration of defeat… and failure. I had planted the pole of entrepreneurship and claimed my little patch of land, dammit. Who cares if it offered a meager harvest and the only greens that sprang up came from the poison envy plant?

I threw myself into the fire of entrepreneurship so many times that I stopped feeling the burns. I convinced myself that I was a phoenix rather than a woman who had been charred to a crisp by a work life I didn’t want.

Rejecting “Entrepreneur” Isn’t Just Semantics

I have been misusing the “e” word, even though, deep down, I knew better.

Shame on me as a writer for being imprecise, but I think there’s a collective fog around the term.

“Mom entrepreneur,” for example. Surely that ubiquitous phrase contributes to the confusion since many in that club are freelancers or multi-level marketers or crafters selling their own wares.

Like so many, I started to throw that word around as if it just meant “earning a living & being your own boss” rather than “building an enterprise that can be scaled and sold.”

Everything felt true as I wrote it - I still stand by pieces like this one and this one. Apparently, as I talked about "entrepreneurship" I was thinking about the adventure of creating one’s own livelihood, not about the reality of venture capital.

But this is what I know to be true, and it goes beyond word choice:

When every day you spend as an entrepreneur is measured against some dream of growing beyond yourself when all you really want to do is be who you are, you’re poisoning yourself.

When you buy into that grand entrepreneurial mission and realize that it takes too much and still doesn’t feed your passions (or your family) but still push on anyway you are setting yourself up for failure.

Blah, Blah, Blah Personal Epiphany… Now What?

I am writing this post to explore this new self-knowledge. I am publishing it because I can’t seem to sit on this revelation because everything suddenly looks so different.

And I’m sharing it because I don't think I’m alone in this.

Right now, I am full of more questions than answers and more possibilities than anything else as I consider trading the “e” word for the “f” word.

No, Really, If Not Entrepreneurship, Then What?

If freelancing soothes the soul and fills the piggy bank (if not the corporate coffers), bring it on. I’m seeking “enough” right now. I’m seeking a way to bring in an income and exert my creativity.

Thing is, it may be time for me to stop trying so hard to tangle up the two. "Creative Entrepreneurship" sounds like such a delicious combination, but in practice, it's a dodgy mash up.

Freelancing. Finding a work-from-home J-O-B. Some other way to use my writing to pay the bills that I can’t even dare imagine yet... I’m staying open.

If I can take the money stress out of each day and if I can stop trying to leverage my creative output into something bigger than myself... that seems like how I need to nourish myself right now.

This Thursday afternoon I went straight for my emergency stash of kombucha. I knew I deserved the life enhancing nectar of that tea, something that resonated with hope and promise of self care - not nasty comfort calories.

Tell me I'm not alone in this.

I  want to know if you’ve been starving parts of yourself thanks to the seductive soul crush of entrepreneurship - and whether it has been pushing you to your own unhealthy coping mechanisms, like Nutella on a spoon.

Is it time for you to feed yourself and the people you love from a just-the-right-sized container? I want to hear your stories… I think many bellies are rumbling with this truth. Is yours?

As Entrepreneurs, As Writers, As Mothers: What's "Enough"?

One of my girls had an accident this weekend. Though it was terrifying at the time, it ended up being relatively minor. Now I can claim a parenting merit badge my mom never earned: held my daughter as she got stitched up. It was an accident, yes, but it could have been prevented. I could have had my hands on the kids instead of sitting inch beyond an arm’s length away. I could have said “no, honey a five year old isn’t big enough to carry her one year old sister yet.”

But I didn’t.

And we ended up at the emergent care center, covered in blood - and sidewalk chalk and dirt from what was supposed to be a typical Saturday spent in a yard just awakening to spring.

We’re so proud of our girl for healing so quickly and handling it all so well. And I’m pleased to report that I’ve emerged from shame’s shadows. Truthfully, the horrible guilt dissipated within twenty-four hours. (Likely that’s because much of the swelling did too).

No longer blinded by self-recrimination, I can simply hold my little one tight, overcome with gratitude and rendered speechless by how precious she is to me.

Yes, gravity won in that split second, but I forgive myself.

I’ve decide that I am mother enough for my daughter - even if I’m woefully and beautifully imperfect.

 So that’s the question: how do you know what “enough” is? And how do you peacefully maintain that state of “enoughness” when you find it?

This isn’t just a question for moms with accident-prone kids - it’s a question for everyone trying to balance priorities and keep the whole enterprise from teetering into disaster.

As I understand it, the secret to contentment and enoughness - especially when it comes to motherhood and entrepreneurship and maintaining a writing practice - is in finding balance.

Balance Isn’t About 50/50. It’s About Enoughness.

I know balance triggers people (“balance is a myth!” and “balance is BS!”), but I wish we could reclaim it. Balance is essential - but we don’t often realize that until it fails and someone ends up in the ER.

The iconic Scales of Justice have brainwashed us into perceiving balance as a 50/50 or nothing proposition, but why do we trust a blindfolded statue with something so fundamental to our happiness and success?

Balance is not about giving half our effort to work and half to play. It certainly isn’t about giving half our time to business and half family (unless that’s really the right mix for you).

 As I understand it, balance is a much more rewarding, complex equation. It requires heart math I could never do in my head.

Balance is about reaching the end of each day saying "I am enough."

You may have told your partner you had too much work to do to come to bed on time. You may have blown off a writing deadline because you needed to play outside until sunset. OK. Try again tomorrow.

The essence of balance isn’t in recreating the same pie chart every day. Each portion of your life may not always get its precise allotment of resources.

Balance is about knowing what slices of pie you need to serve, and what slices you need to save. You're in balance when you can honor your commitments and ensure everyone (including you!) is getting enough.

When Everything Gets the Perfect Amount of Attention

If I over-mother I start to drive myself - and my children - crazy. Most likely trying to overcompensate for something that has nothing to do with parenting, I hover and hug until we all get stressed and fatigued by a mama who is trying too hard.

And if I push mothering off to the side, whatever I focus on instead - like client tasks and writing deadlines - it never gets my best work.

When everything gets the perfect amount of attention, everyone feels like they’ve been seen and supported. I go to bed full of gratitude, sure that I’ve been of service and certain that I have access to the help I need.

I won’t presume to give you advice on how to do the heart math about how much time to spend with your babies or your novel or your lover, but I know something about how to decide how much attention to offer to the different kinds of writing you do for your business.

How to Prioritize Your Business Writing Commitments

Foundational Website Content, Email Marketing, the Book Project, Blogging, and Social Media: How Much Attention Does Each Deserve?

Everyone's business writing pie is going to be divided differently. You'll determine how to spend your writing time and resources depending on how well you've established your business's story, your individual goals, and the size and responsiveness of your audience.

I've ranked the six writing tasks below by their general importance to your visibility and sales.

Remember, the goal is a sense of balance and “enoughness”! You. Don’t. Need. To. Do. It. All.

To prioritize your writing commitments, just make educated choices based on where you are now and where you want to be six months or a year from now.

1. The website copy that clearly expresses who you are, what you offer, and who you serve
2. The opt-in offer (eg. a special report or a “mini course” you deliver over email) that proves your expertise and acts as the first step in the clients' buying journey
3. The weekly or at least bi-monthly messages to your email list
4. The book project that gives you an opportunity to explore and expand your theories and stories
5. The regular blog posts that boost your visibility and prove your credibility to the first-time website visitor who wants to know your work is current and your business is vibrant (stick guest posting and article writing into this category too)
6. The social media posts that remind your community about the great things you do

Reorder the list based on your own personal pie. Here are a few additional ideas to help you set your writing priorities:

#1: your website copy is a non-negotiable top priority. If people spend a minute reading your site and say “Looks great…. but what do you do?” then you're wasting your time on items 2 through 6.

#2: your opt in offer is often put on the back burner, but if you want to build an email list (something you need if you expect your online efforts to make money), you need this sooner rather than later.

#3: your ongoing email marketing is the essential follow up to your opt-in offer. The people who open your emails are most likely to buy from you, so treat these individuals like the valued community members they are. (Keep in mind you can often combine this with your commitment to blogging!)

#4: a book project may not even make the list (which is totally fine!). But if it does , you can never expect to get it done if it’s less important than blogging and Facebook.

#5: blogging is great - but it’s also completely overrated if you’re focusing on weekly posts or guest posts rather than a homepage that invites people to dive deeper and crystal clear services page that gets them to pull out the credit card.

And #6... We’ve come of age as social media users and finally realize that “likes” aren’t anything more than a number. Use your social media reach as a tool to bring people back to the writing that matters - the web content that reveals your Sovereign Story.

Again: the goal is balance and enoughness. You don't need to do every item on this list and you don't need to apportion your writing resources in the same way every day.  

But, as I promise to neither over-mother nor shortchange my kids on the love and attention they need, please promise me you won't lavish your attention on the writing tasks that don't matter at the expense of the projects that tell the core story of your business.

Not sure what to put first when it comes to writing for your business? Let’s set up a free 15 minute conversation to assess where you are and decide how to best invest your writing energy.