I didn’t buy tortillas….

Colin’s room with a view

I walked into Trader Joe’s yesterday and for the first time in years I didn’t buy tortillas. I didn’t buy something that had been a staple in my house for two decades, the two decades that I have had children living at home. Officially this week, all the children have left the nest for college and I didn’t buy tortillas.

As I was pondering this on the drive home I started thinking about all the stages of our lives and what happens to our vision when our stage in life changes.  Changes are inevitable? When it feels like the change is coming slow (anyone remember waiting for the magical birthday when they could drink) maybe you have to prepare and align?. When the change comes fast, all at once and you can’t catch your breath (graduating from high school, moving away from home, starting college) you may be surprised at how it feels.  Sometimes the changes are real life catching up to your vision. Whatever the change it’s important to pause and determine how what has happened and how you responded aligns with who you are and what you are trying to create (your vision).

For me, the empty nest is a realization of my BigLifeVision. I’ve raised successful young men who I am proud to send into the world AND I am terrified that I haven’t raised them enough to send into the world. This creates a lot of creative tension. How much I worry about them, how much I miss them, how I wish they were little sitting on my lap or holding my hand again AND encouraging them to go far, to stretch their minds and lives, to expand their view beyond me. So in that creative tension I will focus on supporting their growth, accepting them for the men they are becoming, challenging them to stretch and loving them big. And is how they continue to fit into my BigLifeVision, even though they are 10 years older than when I defined it.  That’s the thing about vision, it has to be able to evolve with you, support your life at any change and through any change and help you make the right decisions to create the life you want.  Vision shouldn’t be something you break yourself against,  it is the thing that catches you when you fall and props you up to try again.  At the end of the day my vision has always included me NOT buying tortillas, as momentarily sad as that makes me, even through I would never have been able to define it that way until I walked in to Trader Joes.

What’s in your vision that has surprised you?

– p.s. Check out my post from a few years back when Dylan left for college.  It’s the same x2 this year…this feeling doesn’t go away, but it finds it’s spot! Like your heart walking around outside your body!