What are we teaching our girls?
You can be anything.
You can do anything.
You can have anything.
Now get going.
There is much to do.
So much that you will never feel like you've done it all.
Allow me to introduce you to your new lifetime companion
Her name is "To-Do List"
She will follow you everywhere from now on
She will be there to greet you when you wake
She will hang out near you all day long
And she will be there when you lay your head down to rest
Making sure that you don't forget her, even as you try to sleep
You will learn to wear her as a badge of honor
This flashing symbol of busy-ness
She thrives on attention,
lives for compliments,
She seeks out acknowledgments of her busyness,
and ability to 'get it all done'
without a sweat, and with a smile
She is not stingy
She loves to share accolades with her sister super women
Swooning and commenting on their multi-tasking feats
As if their doingness was the latest, most fabulous, all-the-rage hat
Some days you will be tired
And will want to set down the to dos
Take a break from your badge,
Whose weight you notice has become quiet heavy
You will try to unpin it
Pull it, tear it, yank it,
But no matter how hard you try
Your badge of busyness
Will not budge
Your to-do list
Doesn't take kindly to being set down
Or Forgotten
She is fiercely intent on
Staying alive
Remaining on center stage
Where she can always be seen
What they (we) didn't tell you
When you accepted your to-do list as a rite of passage
And fashioned on your badge with pride
Was that try as you might
When you tire
No matter how hard you try
You can't hide
You can't run
You can't even pin that relentless list on some other unsuspecting soul
But YOU can choose
Girl, woman, sister
You have a choice to NEVER pick up
This badge of busyness
You have the choice to walk away and NEVER look back
Not because you stop doing and achieving
Which I know is one of your (my) greatest, unspoken fears
But because you know that you don't need a
Badge of busyness or a never-ending list of to-dos
To prove your worth
Stand tall
Turn on your heel now
Do not follow us
A generation of women who unknowningly ran down the aisle
To marry busy-ness
And ended up with a sense of self
Tied to 'what I've accomplished and gotten done in a day"
Turn away
Run away
And change your sense of self
for the good
of us all
As you turn away
We will burn our badges
And together we will change
The decree of women forever
"Yes I can do anything."
"Yes I can be anything."
"Yes I can have anything."
BUT NO ... I DON'T NEED TO DO BE AND HAVE EVERYTHING
I am valuable simply because I am
Even if I never pick up another to do
Even when I am doing nothing
Especially when I am just being
I am worthy
Because I know the truth
I am enough
Simply because I am
And so are you.
Mother.
Sister.
Daughter.
Woman.
About Christine Arylo
Popular author of Choosing ME before WE, Every Woman's Guide to Life and Love www.mebeforewe.com Christine has been called the Queen of Self Love. Her insights, fresh perspectives and daring take on love, in all its forms, have been featured on TV and radio stations across the country, in the top spas and retreat centers in the world, and in colleges and corporations throughout America. She is the founder of Madly in Love with ME, an international movement of self-love, which includes a FREE self-love kit downloadable at www.ChooseSelfLove.com. She is also the co-founder of Inner Mean Girl Reform School, a virtual school where women go to transform their self-sabotaging voices into self-empowering ones.
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