Woman.

That is what I am.

Though I shrink to hear the way the word is sometimes used to manipulate,

control,

and order.

I am woman. But I am also free and strong and here.

I believe myself capable of many things.

At times the weight of ‘woman’ pulls me under my capability. I should be beautiful and charming and reliant on the way others perceive me.

But no.

I am a woman.

The juggler of all the stars around me. Flying in and among the rage of the children as they figure out their freedoms in their small bodies that are forever detained by the seeming whims of their adult people.

We are free, but we are also restrained and constrained to our setting, to our wishes, and the wishes of other people who we cooperate with in order to shape the world we settle in.

Constraints that push us further into creative ways of breaking free.

Restraints that urge us to live our lives within them, but also with that delving that reframes our restraints into the beauty of a world we chose.

The world we get to form,

And reform,

As women,

Who change things.

That sounds like something I could go for.

---

Linking up for the weekly five minute writing prompt at Five Minute Friday

Find me on Instagram or sign up for my newsletter? I’m working on a whole and free mama manifesto to help us claim who we are even as we are helping our kids do the same. That will go out with the first newsletter in September.

Happy Weekend!