Little Mirrors

My two little ladies don't look a whole lot like each other.  I look at my sweet Alessandra and I see a reflection of myself.  She has my eyes, my dark hair, my big cheeks.

I look at my little Eva and I see someone quite different looking back at me.   She's just as sweet and just as beautiful as her sister, but she has her daddy's eyes, his coloring, his facial expressions.

It doesn't matter that one child looks like me and the other doesn't, when I look at them I see myself.

Children are an amazingly accurate and unforgiving mirror of your reality.

It's almost impossible to remain blissfully ignorant or oblivious to your bad habits, your shortcomings, your insecurities, your temper, your impatience, your loss of perspective, and every other bit of your humanity when you're in the presence of someone you love so much.
You know what you want to be for them and you know what you presently are.  You know that there is a chasm between what you wish to be for them and what you've been for them so far.

I want to give my girls my best.

My best doesn't come easy.  My best isn't something that happens naturally, effortlessly, or even consistently. My best requires working tirelessly.  My best requires acknowledging my weaknesses. My best requires learning from my mistakes.  My best requires humility.
It requires knowing that I'm the clay and, but for the Potter, I will never be the kind of mom, woman, example, or friend that I wish to be for my daughters.

My best requires consistently choosing the Good over the nice, the comfortable, and the easy.

My best requires losing myself and finding myself all at once.  Part of me is lost in the giving of my time, my energy, my thoughts, my hopes, my ambitions in giving myself over to love.  Part of me is found in the completeness, the purpose, the accomplishment, the satisfaction that comes from being love for them.

My little treasures.  My little mirrors.  Let me never lose sight of what matters.