Once our daughter started school I had extra time to volunteer. At her birth I had quit my job and later did not have to go back to working full time. I spent hours, then years volunteering on the booster club, the annual auction fundraiser, PTA and helping on the playground, in the classrooms and lunchroom. One day, during the junior high years, I was helping host a teacher luncheon. There was chit chat amongst us moms as we set the tables, prepped salad, heated the bread. I was newer to this group and met several that day who had seniors graduating in a few short months. One mom in particular still flashes through my mind. Her youngest child was graduating. The question was floated, “What are you going to do?” She was the outgoing president of the PTA. She had spent the last 10 years as a devoted volunteer at her kids’ school. She looked a little lost as she shrugged her shoulders. She didn’t have an answer.
I don’t remember the woman’s name. I just remember the feeling of wanting to have an answer. The realization that my day to day life had become small with our daughter and her school at the center was scary. And it didn’t sound healthy for her (my daughter) or me. I think I probably became depressed.
I spent the next few years journaling, cutting out articles, exploring options of how I was going to answer that question. Several times I tried to make a list of my strengths. Have you ever done that? It is hard. I could easily list 10 things I needed to change, to improve. Listing my strengths was challenging. I started to see a pattern, the same goal listed in a variety of ways: to be of use, to be a servant, to be useful, to serve others. I think I was still depressed not knowing the answer to that luncheon question.
One day I was at a follow up appointment with a sleep specialist. I had done an overnight study to try and determine why I was sleep deprived. He made a recommendation that turned out to be life changing. ‘Instead of thinking of your upcoming fitness training as something small’, he said as we talked about my life, ‘why don’t you think of this as the start of something big?’
And it was. Turns out I needed a wake up call more than I needed sleep.
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