Back in high school my best friend and I would spend countless hours at the library and Barnes & Noble. We would go through countless books as we sat on the floor, criss-cross style and collect words. I’d share the inspiring and uplifting quotes that I’d find in between sips of my iced caramel macchiato. She would look up at me from her magazine, smile, nod, and would take out our notebook & pencil to jot down the phrase where it would live on for months to come.
It is one of the many things I am nostalgic about–those carefree and easy afternoons where my single responsibility was to not get myself into any (major) trouble. Thinking of those days sitting on the floor of the community library is what brings me the most joy. For it was in those moments that I felt the most at home. It was during those hours that my broken heart would mend. And those words we frantically wrote down, kept me sane on the days where everything seemed to be falling apart.
Every once in a while my friend and I would bring someone along–we would task them with finding the most thought provoking, heartwarming, knot in your throat quotes, and our notebook got fuller. Then as life would usually have it, we got older, the days went on and somewhere during that time our notebook was lost to the universe.
Yet, my love for words only grew stronger. Till this day, it is one of my most favorite things to do. As I sit down, coffee-in-hand, computer screen up, I can get lost in the digital world of words once written & spoken by women and men from all over the world. If I relax and close my eyes, I can envision my 15-year old self on the floor of the library pondering what lay ahead for me.
And so, here I am, almost 10-years married, two children, tons of filled notebooks, and many trips around the sun later still finding inspiration in writing. Which leads me to this: seven quotes for seven days.
Day one: “When your worries are louder than howling winds, and your strength is growing but growing thin, and things breaking more than they bend, that is when you’ve reached the end; the perfect place to start again.”-Morgan Harper Nichols
Day two: “In nature, nothing is perfect and everything is perfect. Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways, and they’re still beautiful.”-Alice Walker
Day three: “Let go of who you think you’re supposed to be and embrace who you are.”-Brene Brown
Day four: “You are allowed to be both a masterpiece and a work in progress simultaneously.”-Sophia Bush
Day five: “Don’t make yourself small so others feel more comfortable.”-Rachel Hollis
Day six: “And if today, all you did was hold yourself together, I’m proud of you.”-Anonymous
Day seven (And my personal favorite): “If cauliflower can somehow become pizza…then you, my friend, can accomplish anything.”-Anonymous (But if you know who wrote this, let me know!)
This parenting gig can be lonely and sometimes we can barely muster up the energy to plan a night out with friends (Though, I highly recommend you do this at least once a month). So, on those days where you feel like those tiny people you created have turned against you, the laundry has been left in the washer for days, the dishes have piled up (Again), and solitary confinement starts to sound appeasing; take a breath, pull out your phone, and reread those quotes.
Better yet, take out a notebook, pick up that pencil, fire up google and jot down what inspires you. You see, “I get by with a little help from my friends,” even if those friends are tiny printed words in my leopard printed notebook.
