Can We Please Stop Telling Moms That They Can Do It All?

Is anyone else really tired of being told that as moms, we can do it all? Because it sounds like what you’re actually saying is that what I’m doing isn’t enough.

And guess what? Maybe I don’t want to do it all.

January is a month of goals, resolution, and the new you. But life doesn’t automatically shift just because the date on the calendar has, and frankly, I’m over the whole “new year, new you” mentality.

Don’t get me wrong, I am all for growth and change, and stepping outside of your comfort zone, as long as it doesn’t cost you your mental health or sanity. I am just over being constantly told that we, as women and as moms, can do it all or have it all if we just do x,y, and z.

We are constantly surrounded by images, slogans, and ads telling us if we just do this or take that then we’ll be able to do it all! As if doing it all suddenly became the ultimate goal. Well first, I never said I wanted to do it all in the first place. Has anyone? Who’s idea of a good life is doing all the things? (If it’s yours, more power to you!) I actually want to do fewer things, so that maybe I can do some of those things really well. Or at least not be too burned out to try. But the push for doing it all is suffocating. It feels like trying to swim when you can’t see the finish line. Where exactly is that endpoint where we know that we have reached it?

Spoiler alert…

There is no endpoint. “It all” doesn’t exist. It’s fiction. It’s a push for our dollars, our health (mental and physical), and our time. It’s a weight on our psyche and adds to the comparison trap hamster wheel that we are all trying so desperately to get off of.

Aren’t we all doing enough already? Especially given the state of the world over the past two years and the fact that what we can actually do and not do is hard enough to keep up with as it is? My head spins just thinking about going to the grocery store sometimes. But maybe, just maybe, after I’ve gotten the kids to all the places they needed to go, did the laundry, cooked the meals, ran my business, made sure I got some exercise in, made all the appointments, helped my kids with homework, packed the backpacks…maybe then I’ll have the energy to think about “doing it all”. Even though I was pretty sure that’s what I was just doing…

And you know the irony about the whole “doing it all” mentality?

THERE IS ALWAYS MORE!

More to do, more to be achieved…more, more, and more. It’s a vicious cycle of an impossible (unknown) standard that never ends.

How about instead of constantly telling moms that they can do it all, we just tell them, you can do it. Whether “it” is getting dinner on the table or running a marathon. Whatever. That the it is just the next thing that you have the capacity for. That it is enough and that they are enough.

So no, if that message hasn’t already come across abundantly clear in this article, let me shout it from the rooftops one more time.

I don’t want to do it all. I want to do the best that I can with what I have, whatever that looks like on any given day.

This year instead of trying to keep up with Sally on Instagram, I’m just going to try and keep up with me. The me that was here yesterday because she was perfectly fine, and the ten years ago me because she helped make me who I am today. I love her, and I think I’ll love tomorrow’s me too.