About the Author

Profiles

Feel Good Articles

Mothering Yourself

Other Sites

Archived Newsletters

Community

Recommendations

Subscribe! Enter your email to join Mothers Who Dream today!   HTML Text AOL

Be You—There's Nobody Better
By Sheri McGregor

Recently, I told a friend I was going on a short "holiday."

"Holiday?" my friend repeated? "What are you British now?"

"No," I replied, thinking about why I'd chosen the word. "I started to say 'mini-vac,' but that sounded strange," I explained. "'Vacation' sounded too long."

"And 'holiday' doesn't sound too . . . weird?" my friend asked.

I had to laugh. Actually, "holiday," though not typically used in this way in the United States, had seemed the perfect fit. It's fun, it's short, and it made me feel festive--just the way I wanted to feel for this three-day jaunt to a nearby resort with my sister and children.

What Others Think
Are you getting caught up in saying the "right" word, doing the "right" thing? Or do you do what's right for YOU, without fearing ridicule or worrying what others think?

Most of us want to fit in. But getting caught up in others' possible perceptions only paralyzes against being ourselves. This leaves disappointed both you and the people you aren't letting know the real you.

How many times have you met a person who looks like she has it all? With hair in place, professional dress and a confident smile, the projected image may not be wholly true. You've seen what you've been allowed to see. Do you really want to get to know a perfect person? Or will you only feel inferior by comparison?

Societal peer pressure breeds fear of judgment. Many have been taught their whole lives to conceal the proverbial family skeletons, not to air the dirty laundry. But we all have skeletons and dirty wash.

A little healthy concern about how others perceive you may be a good thing, but don't let it isolate you. If a friend stops by and your house is a mess, letting her inside will prove you're not perfect. You're normal instead. And seeing your "normal" clutter and chaos may you're your friend feel "normal" too. (Yes, you read that right--normal homes of normal people aren't always clean; it would take a full time maid.) The house work can wait, time doesn't.

Believing in You
What if Dr. Seuss, had decided the 27 publishers who rejected his first children's book were right? They said that since nothing like his story was on the market, it would never be popular with readers.

I cringe at the thought of wonderful Dr. Seuss molding himself into a more mundane writer. Luckily, he didn't. We got the real Seuss, along with Horton and his Whos in Whoville, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas, the sneeches on beaches, and The Cat in the Hat. Those characters make the world a better place.

Be you--there's nobody better.

All material on the www.motherswhodream.com website is copyrighted
by Sheri McGregor and may not be reproduced without express permission.