Some Seasons Are About Holding On, Not Healing

There can be a pressure nowadays to always be ‘working on yourself’ – always growing, always improving. There is a culture, especially in such a fast-paced world, to always be working very hard on being the best version of yourself that you could possibly be.

As a parent, this can be louder, with lots of voices around you telling you how to optimise things or be the best version of yourself, to keep pushing yourself to learn. Always questioning, always thinking, always healing something.

Growth, introspection and healing are incredibly important, and are vital to being a parent to little humans. But we cannot be healing all of the time. We cannot always be pushing to improve something. Sometimes we just need to hold things, sometimes we need to just be.

In motherhood, some periods of time are about survival. They feel huge, and it feels like there is no room for anything else. Maybe your baby is going through a sleep regression and waking every hour, maybe your toddler is resisting naps and in a cycle of overtiredness that you are desperately trying to break, maybe one of your children is teething and one has started school and is experiencing separation anxiety.

In some seasons of motherhood, it feels like everything happens at once. Sometimes what is going on feels all-consuming, and you are just hanging on. These are not the seasons to be trying to optimise anything. They are not the times to be analysing yourself. These times are about holding on, not pushing anything forward.

Healing is important, but it is not linear, nor is it urgent. You cannot force it, either – it happens often in bits and pieces, like something we untangle quietly or something that comes into focus at a certain time.

Sometimes things feel a whole lot better, and then feel a bit worse or tender again. There is no timeline for it, and no pressure needs to be applied. We are all finding our way through and all often healing something at multiple points in our lives. Healing can be gently set aside in seasons that are tougher, especially as a parent.

Holding on, holding yourself and keeping things steady, is incredibly meaningful work in itself. When it feels like the waves keep on crashing, holding on is strength. Knowing it isn’t a season to try to learn anything, to try to improve yourself or optimise things, is quiet wisdom and resilience. It is amazing parenting to know when to hold things still and when to gently move things forward, when to just get through and not to try to do too much. That is self care and awareness that is essential in parenting your little humans, as well as in life in general.

You can rest where you are. You do not need to always be developing yourself. It is healthy to let things be in seasons where it feels a challenge to hold on through the day when everything feels like chaos. You are doing so much, and deserve to just be held, and to be kind to yourself.

Some seasons are for holding on, not for self-improvement.

Be gentle with yourself this week.