Hi, my name is Dallas, and I’m a recovering martyr.
“Hi Dallas!”
So, in every people group that I have participated in, I eventually get asked to serve. If that’s a faith group, a social group, a work group, a professional group… if I stick around long enough, I get a job, and eventually a job in leadership. It has been this way all my life. I can’t think of one where that didn’t happen. So I usually temper my participation in a group if I don’t want to “get involved” right away.
Each year, since my babies were born, I have taken them to a tea party around Mother’s Day. In the years we couldn’t go to one I would cook and set one up in our home. It has made for great memories. This year, we are attending one a few weeks before Mother’s Day, so I was thinking I could do something – for myself – on that day. My heart was longing for rest and honor and appreciation from a deep place, and my children as wonderful as they are; are too young and unable to touch the place that I’m wanting to be touched. It would be unhealthy to expect that of them.
So as the date gets closer one of those people groups I’m in asks me to serve that evening. It didn’t feel good, it felt like work. I didn’t say yes at first, thinking that saying no might be the healthier choice. That’s what the experts say, right? Learn when to say no. It was like being called into work on your birthday. There’s a benefit to showing up, but…
So I waited. That’s my go to strategy when in indecision – procrastinate. A few days later, another one of those people groups asked me to serve on Mother’s Day afternoon. Okay God, what is this about? I sat in my feelings for a minute. So the usual thoughts of “people always want my time, people just want to take from me, they just want me to serve they don't care about me” paraded through my mind. I was also in my feelings like a pity party. My mother died many years ago, so I have no mother on Mother's Day. I don't have a mother-in-law at this point either. My children are too young to celebrate me, and I have no husband to honor me. Woe is me!
It was pretty desperate y'all. I was getting flashbacks from all those other times in my life that there was no one to celebrate me and I was just a workhorse and my first thought was to reluctantly say yes to these opportunities to serve and feel bad for myself and do it out of the identity of a martyr. I've lived in that place for so long. But this is a new day and I know that is not would it be. Opportunities that came now had a new smell to them, a new purpose. I had a choice: I could just sit in my familiar comfort zone martyrdom identity, or I could #chooselife. But what would choosing like look like in this situation?
If it wasn't my children's job to celebrate me, whose job was it? If it wasn't the job of my family members friends or associates to honor me, provide me with rest and appreciation, whose job was it? I only had myself left to consider. So what would it look like for me to provide the things that my heart needed for myself? I could imagine the way I wanted to rest but who would make time for that? There were no others to do that for me and if I did not choose to do so, I couldn't be angry at other people for not giving me what they didn't know that I needed. No one owes me these things, but I do owe it to myself. So I will be scheduling some rest and honor time for myself like I schedule time to take care of my other responsibilities. I am my own responsibility.
Instead of choosing martyrdom, I choose life. <3
What does choosing life in your parenthood look like for you? Let me know in the comments!
“Hi Dallas!”
So, in every people group that I have participated in, I eventually get asked to serve. If that’s a faith group, a social group, a work group, a professional group… if I stick around long enough, I get a job, and eventually a job in leadership. It has been this way all my life. I can’t think of one where that didn’t happen. So I usually temper my participation in a group if I don’t want to “get involved” right away.
Each year, since my babies were born, I have taken them to a tea party around Mother’s Day. In the years we couldn’t go to one I would cook and set one up in our home. It has made for great memories. This year, we are attending one a few weeks before Mother’s Day, so I was thinking I could do something – for myself – on that day. My heart was longing for rest and honor and appreciation from a deep place, and my children as wonderful as they are; are too young and unable to touch the place that I’m wanting to be touched. It would be unhealthy to expect that of them.
So as the date gets closer one of those people groups I’m in asks me to serve that evening. It didn’t feel good, it felt like work. I didn’t say yes at first, thinking that saying no might be the healthier choice. That’s what the experts say, right? Learn when to say no. It was like being called into work on your birthday. There’s a benefit to showing up, but…
So I waited. That’s my go to strategy when in indecision – procrastinate. A few days later, another one of those people groups asked me to serve on Mother’s Day afternoon. Okay God, what is this about? I sat in my feelings for a minute. So the usual thoughts of “people always want my time, people just want to take from me, they just want me to serve they don't care about me” paraded through my mind. I was also in my feelings like a pity party. My mother died many years ago, so I have no mother on Mother's Day. I don't have a mother-in-law at this point either. My children are too young to celebrate me, and I have no husband to honor me. Woe is me!
It was pretty desperate y'all. I was getting flashbacks from all those other times in my life that there was no one to celebrate me and I was just a workhorse and my first thought was to reluctantly say yes to these opportunities to serve and feel bad for myself and do it out of the identity of a martyr. I've lived in that place for so long. But this is a new day and I know that is not would it be. Opportunities that came now had a new smell to them, a new purpose. I had a choice: I could just sit in my familiar comfort zone martyrdom identity, or I could #chooselife. But what would choosing like look like in this situation?
If it wasn't my children's job to celebrate me, whose job was it? If it wasn't the job of my family members friends or associates to honor me, provide me with rest and appreciation, whose job was it? I only had myself left to consider. So what would it look like for me to provide the things that my heart needed for myself? I could imagine the way I wanted to rest but who would make time for that? There were no others to do that for me and if I did not choose to do so, I couldn't be angry at other people for not giving me what they didn't know that I needed. No one owes me these things, but I do owe it to myself. So I will be scheduling some rest and honor time for myself like I schedule time to take care of my other responsibilities. I am my own responsibility.
Instead of choosing martyrdom, I choose life. <3
What does choosing life in your parenthood look like for you? Let me know in the comments!
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