Follow YOUR Passion

A Mother’s Day blog should be  meaningful, perhaps profound,  poignant, maybe a little sappy, and really chock full of platitudes about the importance of mothers.  It should be, but I am on a different journey.

I was sitting in Disney Hall, watching the dynamic Gustavo Dudamel and listening to the brilliant Los Angeles Philharmonic with my dear friend, Freida Mock. I sat there thinking how angry I am that music education has been cut from public schools and how important it is that children be exposed to music of all kinds at the earliest age.  Exposure to music not only enriches our lives and speak to our souls, but education and experience with music actually affects a child’s neural development. Music is good for you!

Freida feels as strongly about music and all the arts as I do. But her life is the arts; she is a documentary film maker. We were first friends because our kids went to nursery school together, trick-or-treated together, celebrated  birthdays together, shared vacations at Red Fish Lake together.

Freida is a wonderful mother, but film is her life. Her family has traveled the world (literally), shooting films of all kinds in the most remote places. Their holiday cards each year have told the tale, the whole family in the most unexpected places, making movies.

It should come as no surprise that Freida and Terry’s kids are both artists. In particular, Jessica is a film maker.  As an adult, she has made quite a career for herself at a young age. She has created many well regarded documentaries and is now working on a feature film. On top of that, she is a film director in high demand.  What a success story she is!

What does this have to do with Mother’s Day, you ask?  Every time I have watched a Jessica Sanders film, I cry. It hits me in the mother place. Jessica is a star because Freida-the-mom followed her own passion. Jessica grew up absorbing her mother’s passion for film making.

We mothers are told that we need to help our children find their passion. We are supposed to expose them to much so a flame will be ignited somewhere within them. Sure Jessica took ballet and played soccer. But she lived with her mother whose life was film, and that passion was caught. And now her pilot light has burst into full flame.

How important it is that while we are busy being mothers—driving carpools, making lunches, cheering at  Little League,  and kissing boo boos– we must not lose our own passion.  While your children may not become film makers, they are witness to your passions, to your devotion to your own interests.

Mothers wear many hats, each of which looks good on them. While on Mother’s Day your mommy bonnet looks best of all, how good it is for your children to know how much you enjoy wearing them all, as you are defined by all of them.  What better model could there be for your children?

Happy Mothers’ Day!