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It's Not Easy Letting Go

Change has never been a comfortable thing for me. I cling to the familiar, the regular and the routine. Handling change isn't easy for me.

A friend posted on her Facebook wall that she'd signed her little one up for Kindergarten and that was perhaps why she was feeling so blue. I flashed back to putting my first Kindergartner on the school bus. I cried as she flashed me a grin, in her jean skirt, pink shirt, flowered vest and white cowboy boots, long blond hair held back by a black headband...

Oh yes, I remember every detail of that morning.

I recall hugging and kissing her goodbye at BYU Idaho. I cried then as well.

I've never been good at letting go. She's 22 now. I love her more today than the day that I brought her into this world. She amazes me each and every day. I'm so proud of the young woman she's become. Still...it's difficult to let go of being The Mom. It's all I've known for so many years.

Kahil Gibran put it so well:

On Children
Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.


I love you, Stephanie Ann. Some day soon I know I'll be letting you go for a very long time. You're strong, beautiful, smart, spiritual and you know your own mind. Forgive me for hanging on too tightly at times. You are amazing. I admire you more than I could ever express.

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