Yesterday morning we dropped off my husband at the airport to head out to work. He is usually home for 10 days and gone for 3 weeks. This has been the schedule for a while. Or something similar since well before either of the kids were born.

Well, yesterday morning (like at least half of Daddy drop off days) my 4 year old started crying. Intensely. Tears streaming down her face, pout to her lip and all. She was sad Daddy was gone. I immediately stopped the car, got out and hugged and kissed her and tried to help her feel better about seeing him soon.

20 minutes later she was fine and smiling and forgotten all about it. We usually think "Typical child, off to the next thing. Mind like a goldfish." But let me tell you I admire this.

Last weekend I was in some Restorative Yoga Teacher Training and my teacher wrote a Ernest Hemingway quote on the board.

"Try to learn to breathe deeply, really to taste food when you eat and when you sleep, really sleep. Try as much as possible to be wholly alive with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell. And when you get angry, get good and angry. Try to be alive. You will be dead soon enough."

Well today I was angry. And I tried to suppress this anger. Not letting what was bothering me, bother me. But then I thought about my 4 year old and her tears streaming down her face. How she got sad. Good and sad, let it all flow out and then she was done. Letting it all go.

So I got mad. Good and mad. Without reacting I just got angry. I thankfully had an amazing friend there to let me do just that and listen. I got mad and then pouted a bit. Then I was able to just let it go.

I embraced the intense emotions instead of trying to push them away, felt them and was able to move on.

Things will upset us, that will never change. It's whether we let it eat us alive or not that matters.

Love,

Jen