Spirituality is often defined as the personal side of religion, the side
where we focus on our personal growth and relationship to our faith, or on
spiritual beliefs we hold outside of any particular religious affiliation.
Spirituality thus encompasses every area of our lives, and everything we do can
be considered spiritual practice. Motherhood, in particular, both inspires and
challenges us in ways that can’t help but develop us spiritually - whether we
are looking for that or not. Consider:
Facing Our Past: We often have to look backwards to
move forwards, and becoming a parent frequently triggers a
reconsideration of our own childhoods, and the resulting psychological
patterns. We have to really consider how we were parented, what we want to
repeat with our own kids and what we want to discard, what values were
instilled in us, and what values we want to pass on.
Building Self-Awareness and Overcoming Ego: Our
children try our patience, challenge our authority, and generally bring us to
the brink of sanity sometimes. What better way to discover and overcome all or
our ego’s triggers and patterns? Doing so is the true definition of humility -
the building block of all spiritual faiths.
Showing Us the Moment: Children, especially
young ones, live completely in the moment. They marvel at a new flower, the
colors in the sunset, the feeling of the wind. They can cry one minute, and
laugh the next. They naturally appreciate and wonder at the world, in a way we
adults are often too busy or caught up in our own worries to do. Our children
can show us how to appreciate our world as it is, and thus how to create the
potential for deeper spiritual moments in our lives too.
Building Our Endurance: Let’s face it, parenthood is
often exhausting, but there are no days off and no comp days. You may have the
flu, have been up for two straight days already with your kids’ bout of the
flu, and feel ready to collapse, but your kids (now recovered) still need help
with their homework, packed lunchboxes, some kind of breakfast, and maybe a hug
or two when they fall down. So, you soldier on. The needs of our children
bring out a level of self-sacrifice and endurance that few other things can do.
And as long as this doesn’t mutate into martyrdom, it sows the
seeds for true selfless, spiritual service.
Developing Compassion: When our children
are hurting, physically or emotionally, it is like a knife through our
hearts. The most self-absorbed of adults can’t help but be transformed by their
own desire to protect their children from harm. And that often opens the door
for a more compassionate worldview, one in which we can recognize other’s
suffering more fully, instead of turning a blind eye.
Renewing Our Inspiration: Watching a child
develop often feels like witnessing a miracle, and can reignite our faith
in a higher power. How exactly do they learn to walk? How do their little
brains sort through the myriad of things we point out to them each
day, and learn to distinguish red from yellow, an apple from an
orange? Or for that matter, how is it they seem to arrive with so much
individual personality? For many of us, biology and genetics just doesn’t
seem to account for the totality of it, and as we watch the process of creation
in action, we begin to wonder anew at the power behind it all.
Opening Our Hearts: Many people say that
the love they have for their children is the most unconditional
love they feel in their lives. In this sense, our love for our children
can be a doorway into the universal love spoken of by the greatest mystics of
every world religion. The trick is in allowing our love to open our hearts
more, as opposed to closing them down out of a sense of vulnerability or
protectiveness.
Lisa Erickson is a mom, meditation teacher, and writer. Visit her blog Mommy Mystic for more information on meditation, her classes, and related topics.
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