How To Win At Homemaking (When You Feel Like a Loser)

The runners all gather at the starting line.  As you look around at the others, you feel so incompetent and out of place.  This race doesn't even seem fair.  Many of the runners are dressed in expensive gear. You notice their well-trained muscles glistening in the sunlight as you painfully try to stretch the muscles in your own weary body. As you look down the lanes, you see hurdles and random obstacles in your lane while theirs have none.

Just as you decide that you don't belong here, you see other runners coming up to the starting block.  Some are on crutches; some are hunchbacks; some have blistered feet with bandages on them.

You don't have much time to ponder why this race includes such a variety of people with so many hindrances because the starting gun has blasted and everyone begins making their way down their respective lanes.

You don't get very far before your cramped muscles rebel against the exertion and you fall.  But your mama always taught you never to quit, so you pull your perspiring body from the track and keep going.  You catch a refreshing breeze which cools your aching lungs and you propel yourself forward.  For a glorious few minutes you feel the wind at your back and think you are making some headway; in fact, you begin to convince yourself you might even catch up to the experienced runners at the head of the pack.  As you focus on getting yourself to the front, you fail to notice one of the obstacles in your lane, and you trip and fall with a bloody gash on your shin.

You lay motionless for a time.  “What is the use?” you wonder.  “This race is a joke.”

As you determine to exit the track and go nurse your wounds, one of the other runners comes up behind you.  She's nearly crippled, but she makes her way along, inch by inch.

“It's not a competition,” she tells you gently.  “You don't win by getting to the finish line first; you win simply by getting there.”

You struggle to your feet and both of you inch your way down the track.  You each fall several more times but every time you get back up and keep going.  “I don't have to get there first.  I just have to get there,” you remind yourself with each panting breath.

Eventually one of the more skilled runners notices your struggle and comes to your aid.  You lean on her shoulder and continue to limp along.  Your crippled friend is being helped by another strong runner.

While you wish you weren't hurt or that your muscles were stronger or that you didn't have so many obstacles in your lane, you realize that this race is not about being the fastest or the best.  It's about sticking it out.  It's about getting up when you fall.  It's about taking one step at a time until you reach the finish line.

Weary friend, that's what homemaking is like.  Often you look around at your friends who are so much more skilled and organized than you are and you feel like you're hopelessly behind in the race.  You wonder why you have so many more obstacles or physical hindrances than others do.

Just remember: It's not a competition.  It's not about being the fastest or the best.  You don't win by getting to the finish line first; you win simply by getting there.

In order to win, you have to keep getting up when you fall.  And when you're stronger than the others, you stop to help them when they fall.

Don't look around at how much better everyone else is or how it's not fair that their lane doesn't have as many obstacles as yours.  Just keep going.  Keep going when you're behind.  Keep going when you're hurt.  Keep going when nothing you do seems good enough.  Keep going when you're tired.

Keep going.

And when you get to the finish line, you'll find that you've won.