Those who constantly attempt to become legends rarely do. -Ancient Proverb I just made up.

I just came inside from running a puking dog out to the front lawn. I'm on day three of these yoga pants and have accumulated enough fuzz on them to prove it. My youngest is crying at the door because I won't let him go outside. (It's winter and he's insisted on being naked all day.) I'm 11 days behind the "Read-the-bible-in-a-year-plan" and it's January 12th. My Christmas tree is sitting dead in the corner, it's needles slowly creeping their way around the house. The dog needs a bath. The kids need a bath. I could use one myself, actually. We're out of milk and I couldn't tell you the last time my kids ate a vegetable. I'm ignoring all the committee emails from my eldest's school. I'm not a natural home-maker so being a SAHM feels like prison a little bit and if I'm totally honest, I often get jealous that the hubs is in his dream job. I'm still not sure what I want to be when I grow up and I'm weeks away from turning 37, which in my head feels like turning 40 three years early. And this isn't even a bad day.

I would hate for today to be the day I'm scrolling through my mom's Instagram feed from 25 years ago and see that all the pics of me have a #worldchanger hashtag.

I'm noticing this trend among my parenting friends, specifically my christian ones. Posting a picture of your kid and adding the hashtag "World Changer."

#dailydez #worldchanger #clothesoptional

This morning as I took pause and looked at the reality of me right in this moment I was extremely thankful my parents never added that title onto my identity, at least not that I'm aware of. Holy pressure! Upon seeing that I think I'd start cataloging all my "good deeds." I could read fifty articles about how being a mom is one of the highest callings, I could look at our ReSource ministry and pat myself on the back, I could assign undue credit to the influence our adoption stories have had on our community, all these in attempt to build my own heavenly crown, hoping to prove to myself I'm being a good steward of my life, that these things add up to *kind of* changing the world?

But you know what? These are not the things I should be finding my identity in, and neither are the fuzzy yoga pants and puking dog. I don't feel like I'm disappointing anyone because I'm living today as a child of God. That is my identity. No additional banners attached.

Do I want my kids to be world changers? Duh. But to put that on them is unfair. (To put that on me is unfair, for that matter, I don't know how to grow world changers, although I'm sure there's a book out there that can teach me.) I don't know what my kids will do with their life but I want them to proceed just doing their best. Doing what they feel is their purpose, doing what glorifies God without the standard of pushing constantly to be a world changer. Adding that title changes the goal. I want them to be so secure in their love from both God and us that they feel the freedom to pursue even the most mundane life-style if it glorifies God and they love it.

It's not that I have low expectations for my kids. It has more to do with me wanting them to figure out what they love, discover what they're good at, what God created them to do and work at it with all their heart, regardless of the outcome.

I'm not trying to add to the mommy wars, not trying to say we're doing anything better than anyone else. We've just been talking lately about the weight of the common things we say to our kids and trying to think more critically about why and what and how that may impact them.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to change the crap in our world. There's nothing wrong with wanting your kids to make this place better for everyone. If you need to call yourself a "World Changer" as you get out of bed each day because thats the motivation you need to do what you do, then great. At the end of the day, though, simply call yourself a child of God. Because at the end of the day it's not about whether you checked stuff off your list, whether you failed or achieved, it's about resting in a place you couldn't achieve no matter what you did that day.

#childofGod #clothingstilloptional