This is not a sad story. There was a time when a thing happened to my tiny daughter that I did not handle in conventional parenting way, and if you want to ask me about that once I tell the story you can DM me. She was a Brownie and a Girl Guide and we had sold a lot of cookies, which if you’ve been there is sometimes fun and sometimes cold and super inconvenient and lots of work, but we had done it and done it well. I had left the bag of the money sitting on a shelf in the front room but for some reason which I cannot remember I could not get a hold of the Guide Leader to send in the money which my child had worked very hard to raise and felt very proud of her tiny Brownie self for. And time went by and by and by and some shit happened and the money was forgotten. Until in a tragic unfolding of events tiny child found the money and thought it was a windfall. Maybe somewhere in her big tiny heart she worried that it was too good to be true, but for tiny complicated reasons she needed it to be magic. And so she made it magic.
She sprinkled the money into unlikely places, and for a while I was surprised and delighted that we kept finding money. Finding money feels like magic, doesn’t it?
Now I could have made this a “hard life lesson”. I could have pulled out heavy morals. I could have called her a thief or a sinner and made her shamefully apologize, or scared her straight. Instead I hugged her. I told her she was good and pure and that she deserved to have joyful things happen to her, like finding money in an old purse and making her mom smile and laugh and going on a surprise shopping trip for something small and unexpected. And that even though we couldn’t keep the money, not to worry about the bucks I had chipped in, that magic was not lost, that I appreciated her heart. She could have felt like a monster, projected that on to me and carried a conflict. But she did not, and today she is a hardened criminal. JK. Today this child won’t spend $5 of my money without asking me first. She offered to give her birthday present toward her sister’s medical needs. She is honest and big hearted and giving. That is just her.
Love accomplishes everything that responsibility accomplishes, without the fear. That was my model and my choice.
There’s a world of difference between working to feed someone because I love them and working to feed them because I’m responsible, with all of the moral high ground, falling short, pressure and pain AKA FEAR that this concept engenders.
SO today I want to give you some found money. Some sugar, some love. I want you to believe with me for the next ten minutes or twenty four hours or as long as you can stretch it, that you deserve joy, ease, whatever it is that lights you up; a new purse, or house, the love of a lifetime, laughter on the face of someone dear to you. You can’t steal magic, so let yourself off the hook.
The idea that something is too good to be true is a paradox of ego.
Better to walk around telling ourselves that it’s too shitty to be true, in other words “it” AKA the bad stuff is too shitty to accept as something meaningful, as our reality, as what we deserve or as the end or the fact or story or to set up camp in or blame on ourselves or take on.
It’s good enough to smile at it, to say yes to it, to hold space for it, to share it or to say it out loud or give it some lime light.
I am not trying to peddle you Airy or sell you on Fairy. Fluffy yes, but that is because everyone deserves a hamster for surviving Covid.
Shit comes with a free bottomless pit.
Whereas MAGIC, well that is just a code word for how great it feels when the plumbing works.
— Love Erin
P.S. TUNE IN NEXT WEEK, when I will be sharing Erin’s Oracle where you each get to choose a card with a special message for your 2021. Kind of like fortune cookies, but it’s BYOC. Bring your own cookie, get it?
P.P.S. One of the kindest things you can do for me is to share my writing. If you enjoyed today’s Monday Musing and know someone else who would pleaseforward it to a friend.
P.P.P.S. You can also follow me on Instagram, for real time updates, funnies and photos!
