Blue Flame

I read a great book the other day.  Jen Fulwiler, a Catholic blogger, radio host, and mom super hero, released her second book on May 1st, titled One Beautiful Dream.   I knew it was coming, and had eagerly awaited the chance to read more of Jen's writing - she'd been one of my favorite bloggers when I first discovered the world of Catholic blogging, and so much that she'd had written in the past had really spoken to me.  

I'd devoured her first book in a couple of days a few years ago, and this one was no different.  I managed to finish it in a day.   (Thank you, Chicago traffic).   It was really just that good - I couldn't put it down.   It felt like, with every page I turned, Jen had really been a fly on the walls during my own life experience.   I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since finishing it on Tuesday evening.

One of the themes that I keep coming back to in my contemplation is what Jen referred to as a "blue flame."  A blue flame is your passion - the thing that keeps you going and re-energizes you.  The thing that "fills your bucket", to use a common analogy.    Far too many of us moms, she suggests, try to put out our blue flame because of this mistaken notion that we need to suppress our own desires and loves in order to fulfill the call to motherhood.  Guys, I cannot tell you how much this resonated with my own lived experience.   I really can't.  For so long, especially when Mike was in med school and residency, I felt like I couldn't even consider fostering any kind of passion - I couldn't light any blue flame at all - because the weight of parenting was completely on my shoulders.   Mike is an amazing dad, and completely and totally involved and dedicated to his family, but when you're being worked as hard as he was in med school and residency, there really just isn't any leftover time or energy to be "home."   He was only guaranteed 24 hours off a week, and so I wanted to spend all of that time doing fun, family things.   That meant that every other moment of the week, all of the parenting and homemaking duties had to be my responsibility.  It was hard (too much for one person), and that, plus some other medical issues that we didn't realize at the time, made for a very miserable and defeated Heidi.   I knew, deep down, that we were being called to a large family and being open to life, but I just couldn't wrap my mind around the *how* I could do that without losing my spark, without losing the very core of my existence.

Now, there's some good in that sacrifice.   I'm Catholic - sacrifice isn't bad, not by any means.  It's through sacrifice and accepting of crosses that we are brought closer and closer to Him.   We are called to surrender ourselves to His Will and become more and more Christlike in the process, but what I was going through was not that.   What I was going through was very much leading me into a mental breakdown, and severe depression and anxiety.   Some was situational - this stress of family life and med school/residency - and some we later discovered was due to side effects of medication - but all of it was unhealthy.   

We made it through the situational stressors, to an extent.  Med school and residency ended.  Mike was finally bringing in an income, although the hours/schedule didn't change much at the time.   He was home a little bit more, but the change in income meant that I could hire some help at the really tough times - a babysitter here and there, and someone else to mow my lawn so one less task was my responsibility.   I could quit my part time job because we didn't need it to pay the grocery bill anymore.   All of this helped, it really did.

We went on to welcome more kids, move a couple of more times, and hopefully have now settled into our forever home and forever job (for Mike).  I've rediscovered the time and ability to carve out some time during our day to take care of myself.   That's mostly come in the form of working out and exploring new recipes because we're trying to lose weight, but it's also helped me have time to reflect on just what it is that feeds my "blue flame."  

To be completely and totally honest, I'm not sure what it is yet.   It seems so very long ago when I had time to do what *I* wanted to do and what fulfilled *me*, that I really can't remember just what it was.   I've never had a hobby that stuck, other than reading.   I'm not crafty, I'm not an athlete, I don't really like being around people all of the time, and I don't know how to do a lot of "fun" things.   I love traveling and camping.  I love writing.    I love to learn how to cook, and play with flavors.   All of these things bring me happiness, but are they my "blue flame?"  I don't know.  

I think the closest things that come into that rejuvenating/re-energizing goal are writing, specifically being able to learn about and then develop ideas (so, more like philosophy, not creative writing), and traveling/camping.   I love both of these things, and even when they're not perfect, they refresh me.   My dream would be to drive an RV around for years, exploring and hiking and visiting the most far-flung corners of our continent, and writing about the things I learn along the way.  Not a travel/review kind of thing - a chance to sit down and learn about cultures and beliefs and histories and then parse through those through the written word.  At the moment, this isn't exactly do-able with a young family.   It's not impossible, but it will have to come in chunks.

The other thing that I'm really passionate about recently is connection.   We are human beings, made for and reliant on relationship.   I'm an introvert, through and through, and you guys know this, so it might seem silly coming from me, but we need each other.  We need interaction with each other.  We need support from each other.   We are not meant to be alone.

How does that translate into a passion?  I'm not sure yet.  I do know that one thing I'm hoping to start working toward is inspiring and helping those around me to form connections with those around them - especially woman to woman.   I just don't know what that's going to look like yet.   I just know that all have these skills, we all have these blue flames, we all have these gifts....and we're not feeling free to share and develop them.   There's this great lie out there that tells us that to be a woman, to be a mom, we have to be independent....and independently perfect.   That's not been the case, historically, as far as I can tell.   We should be mentors, we should be working together, we should be holding each other up.  I should not have felt like I needed to go it alone as a young mom when Mike was working/studying so hard, but there was no one to turn to.  Social media has made us louder....but more alone....and that's not okay with me.  I've seen so many personal connections severed or tossed aside due to ugly moments on social media or the internet.   We are losing our human connection, and that's such a part of who we are and who we need to be.  It scares me and worries me. There are great grassroots movements starting out there to connect women together and support them, but I worry that it ends there.  Conferences and blogs and books are wonderful....but do we let them come home with us into our daily lives?   Do we let them change us and the women we see every day?   I didn't.   Maybe I'm just behind the times and slow to catch on to the trend and everyone else has, but it doesn't seem like it to me.   We women are still struggling, we're still drowning, and we still need community.   

But how to get there?   I don't know.  

I just know that thinking about it, reaching out on my own, writing about it....it feels like my passion, my blue flame, is right around the corner.  I just need to figure out how to get there.