©Annie Pliego Photgraphy

Today, May 10th, is Mother’s Day in Mexico and I am looking forward to spending the day with my Beloved, my children (all but my oldest who is in his finals week in another country), and my mom and dad. I will try a new steak recipe for our meal with roasted spiced carrots, and bake an apple cake.

I love having special days to celebrate different things, events, or people through the year, and I love that because you are somehow forced to think about them. You stop and can take time to reflect on the role you play in life, or the role those people you celebrate have played in your own life.

I have not read the book Eat, Pray, Love, but I love the title (one day, I guess, I will have to read the book***). But today as I reflect on my role in life as a mom I was thinking how these three words are seriously needed in our everyday life as moms. The order, however, must be slightly different: Pray, Eat, Love.

On Praying:

Prayer comes first. Prayer should be the breathing of a mother. That is the way we start in the labor room, breathing. I was told not to lose the rhythm in my breathing or I would be in great pain. My husband was there. Breathing with me. Prayer in the life of a mother should be like that, it should be the rhythm of our days. Through the pain, through the hard moments, through the uncertainty, through joyous times, through tears: in and out, a rhythm of prayers.

If we stop praying, our labor will not be easy or enjoyable. I remember that clearly. If I would lose the rhythm of my breathing in that labor room, I would, all of a sudden, feel extremely nervous and fearful until I was able to catch it again. Our labor has not ceased, and if we lose the rhythm of our prayer life we will soon live in discontent, anxiety, fear, pain.

Pray all day, at all times. Intercede for your children. Let your breathing be a life of prayer.

On Eating:

I am sure you remember how hungry you get during the time you nurse your children. Everyone tells you how important it is to be well nourished during this time, so you gladly heed their advice. It is clear, if you are not well fed you will feel very tired and weak, and your baby won’t be taking all the nutrients he needs from your milk.

So it is today. My children are not babies anymore, and yet I need to be well fed to be able to give and give and give to them.  I must eat daily from the Scriptures. God’s Word must be my daily food, day and night. My mid-day snack, my craving, my joy. If I don’t feed my Spirit with God’s Word I will soon feel very tired and weak. If I stop eating from God’s Word on a daily basis, I will soon start  murmuring and complaining. I will soon hear myself asking silly questions and demanding attention as if I were a queen. There is no way around. How can I possible give and give and give if I am not well nourished? If my soul is not well fed? If I never come to feast at the Word of God? How can I possible be a mom, a full time mom if I have not made God’s Word my refuge, my strength, my life?

On Loving:

Aren’t moms supposed to love and love *perfectly*? Isn’t a mother’s love always used as a picture of resignation and unselfishness? Well, I have to admit that my love is not like that. It is not perfect. Love always seems to be an easy thing until it demands something hard from us. But we know we just can’t hide our sins behind our weaknesses. That would be just too easy to do and will make our lives and the life of those around us miserable. If we are to love the children God has entrusted in our hands, we must start working hard in loving them the way God wants us to love. Yes, I said it was not easy. Love, true love, is much more about dying to self than enjoying oneself.

Love is a verb, we have heard that, so how does this verb looks in your life around your children? How do we walk in love at breakfast and when all is a mess and we are late? How do we walk in love when lies come? How do we walk in love when we see in our children what we never thought we would? How do we walk in love when they don’t think the same way we do? How do we live loving?

Happy Mother’s Day to all my friends! Sharing this calling with you is a privilege. Thank you for all you have taught me in the kitchen, or over coffee, on Skype through the distance, on an email or on your blog. You know who you are. I love you!

Becky

P.S. Today my daughter Annie published a photo-shoot in which I feel loved and honored. You can see it here.

©Annie Pliego Photography

*** DISCLAIMER: Whoa! Really? I never thought I would have to clarify this… but here I go. I do not agree with any kind of Hinduism, neither am I promoting it. I just used these three words as a “prompt” to my blog entry today. Please, please, see things the way they are. If I ever read Elizabeth Gilbert’s book is not because I am planning on including Hindu practices in my life. not.at.all. If I ever read it, is because many dear friends of mine who doesn’t know the Truth have read it and I would love to know what is that they found so fascinating about it.I want to know what is going through their hearts and minds.
Now I hope you won’t accuse me of not reading only Christian literature, because if that is the case, then I am guilty.