Please stop telling me to enjoy every moment.

Dear Well-Meaning Person,

You tell me to enjoy every moment because they “grow up so fast.”  I know you mean well, really I do. And maybe you’re giving me this advice because you wish someone had given it to you.

I’m thankful for your heart and good intentions, but I’d like to make a request.

Can you please please PLEASE stop telling me to enjoy every moment?

When you impart those seemingly innocent words, it thrusts me into panic mode.

My heart starts racing, and I start analyzing what more I need to do to “enjoy every moment.”

You see, I actually think about this every day.  I realize with every breath I take the days are going by quickly.  That the “days go by slow, but the years go by fast.”

And it’s paralyzing.

Paralyzing because I want to do everything “just right.”

Paralyzing because I struggle with perfectionism and wanting to make the most of every opportunity.

Paralyzing because I lament over the difficult years which sometimes feel like years lost,  years in which I spent countless hours helping my kids with their various special and additional needs.  (Please know I understand the years were NOT lost, and I’m thankful God gave me the kids I have, and for how He has grown me over these years. This is not lost on me.)

So, well-meaning person, I get what you’re saying and I appreciate your heart.  But maybe, just maybe, you could simply remind to be thankful for the blessings that my children are.

To be content and present in today.

If you could do that, I would be ever so grateful.

 

Sincerely,

A mom doing her best to live in the moment