You failed as a Mom today OR My daily battle with my inner voice.

I once attended a workshop where the instructor was attempting to get us to make friends with our own inner voices.  The result was supposed to be to make your inner voice cheer for your successes instead of point out all your defeats.  I remember calling my mom on the way home and crying because I didn't want to make friends with my inner voice.  Unlike an unkind neighbor that you can avoid, or a mouthy primary kid you can tell to be quiet, my inner voice is always there.  She sees everything I do, and is super quick to point out all my mistakes while rarely saying a thing about anything I do right.  Sometimes I look around me and wonder if all of those other mothers have access to some amazing mom handbook.  My kids didn't come with anything like that, and all four are very different.  I finally figure out what works for one, but when I try the same technique on the other three it is a complete disaster.  I've often wondered if I'm the only one who worries that I am ruining my kids (especially that poor oldest one).

Yesterday at church as I was chatting in the hall with a few other moms, the topic of failing came up.  One mentioned that she tries to go an entire month without feeling like a failure.  I told her, "That is amazing.  I'm just trying to get through Tuesday."  She laughed and said she was too, but she couldn't say she could only make it a few days or people would be appalled. Just then my husband came around the corner looking for why I hadn't yet returned to class.  He proceeded to tell the group my little kept secret of the EMF or Epic Mom Fail.  Examples of some of my EMF moments are a child wanting to kill the prophet Jonah because he's evil. OR the kids telling the home teachers that we never read scriptures or have family home evening.  OR yelling at a child to stop crying when she's broken her arm.  You know those times when the voice in your head is screaming at you, "YOU ARE FAILING AT THIS MOTHER THING!!!!"  Who wouldn't want to be best friends with this person?

As the group laughed and shared more examples of EMF moments, I realized yet again this is what motherhood is, a series of moments where you feel like you are failing.  But found between those moments are glimpses that you are doing at least something right.  These are the moments when you need to listen to the Voice that never yells at you.  The Voice that is still and small and is a tremendous gift from a loving Heavenly Father.  This Voice tells you "Well done, thou good and faithful servant."  This is the person I want as my constant companion, not the one who reminds me of my failures.  So when I sit between my girls in sacrament meeting and hear them sing all the words to "I'm a Child of God" and "Teach me to Walk", I remember that I'm not so bad at the motherhood thing.  And maybe, just maybe, the kids will turn out okay in spite of all my EMF moments.