Mind My Mojo

A few nights ago, my youngest son Lyle (age 4) came to my bedside before bed and announced with much despair to me and my husband that he had lost his  jelly cap. Like many of my conversations with Lyle it was necessary for me to seek clarification on yet another new term…”jelly cap”. He proceeded to explain in the most patronising tone, that his jelly cap (pointing to the top of his head) is what seals in his mojo, like who doesn’t know this right. “What is your mojo Lyle?” He explained that his mojo is what makes him good at stuff, makes him sing well, dance well and makes him, well, his awesome self. Now, with the loss of his jelly cap, he may be at risk of losing some of his mojo during the night. A crisis of great proportions before bedtime. As much as by now I am getting used to these scenarios and regardless of how amusing my husband and I thought it was, I couldn’t help but wonder if Lyle was on to something and the laugh may be on me.

ARE WE MINDING OUR MOJOS?

Dear Self,

When we really think about it, we all have a set of intrinsic characteristics that make us uniquely us, the talents and gifts that we were born with, those that we have spent years crafting and fine tuning, the attributes that make us “good at stuff” and who we are.  So do we arm ourselves with jelly caps to protect our mojo; or do we let our mojo seep or even spill out at will? Do we allow others to dictate what our mojo should be, how we fill up, how we store it and how much of it we should share. Do we let society and our peers drain our mojo and mould us into stereotypical, cookie cutter versions of ourselves that our current culture and era dictates us to be, expects us to be, is comfortable with us being?

It made me wonder about the status of my mojo, how well I am minding it. In our busy schedules of juggling all that we are, in my case a morph of wife, mom, executive, daughter, friend (the list is endless as I  am sure yours is too), do we take time to mind ourselves? Should we be working on being in tune with our uniqueness, who we are really at the core, and harnessing our special talents and passions. How much time do we spend on nurturing ourselves, our minds, our spirits, our emotions. If I am honest with myself, the answer is no time at all, this is definitely an area that I struggle with daily. Ensuring that I keep true to who I am meant to be and the beautiful talents that I have to offer. I need to spend more time on finding these, feeding them and by all means arming myself (with jelly caps or otherwise) to protect and save my uniqueness.

It is definitely easier said than done; but perhaps as a revolutionary thought, maybe as our nightly ritual (or whatever time of day suits you) we should sit in our quiet and be grateful for who we are, hone in on what brings us joy and focus on not only protecting this but also on nurturing it some more. 

XOXO

Elle

By the way in case you were wondering, Lyle found his jelly cap under his bed…all is right with the world.