I’m constantly failing. Here’s how.

I’ve got a confession to make. 

I’m constantly failing. Failing to keep on top of everything. Failing in running my business. Failing in motherhood. Failing in my marriage. Don’t even get me started on the fail that is my attempts at a consistent food and exercise regime.

In fact my failures seem to come in waves. For example, last week was a shocker. Not just a 24 hour period, no. My sad state lasted seven days.

I missed my cousin’s baby shower. I came down sick with the flu (for the second time in a month). I stressed about the amount of work I was behind on. I missed all my cross fit classes and netball training/game (2017 resolution of “health” clearly going well). We had a quieter week in the shop for the first time in the year we’ve been open. I had little energy to play with Flynn and steered clear of hugging Michael for the fear of adding man-flu to my already miserable week. I was snotty, phlegm-ridden and basically a joy to be around.

Now none of this is life-ending failures of course. From the outside perspective we would tell our friends “Go easy on yourself! Rest up! Your work will still be waiting for you later, people will understand! Flynn won’t be traumatised by his mother having the flu. In fact he is stoked with the choice of baked beans or toast for tea every night.”

When you’re in the thick of it it’s hard to see the light. It’s hard to see how far you’ve come. It’s hard to imagine you’ll ever feel on top of it all again.

If that’s you this week, just know five days ago it was me too. I have no magic words or remedies on how to make yourself feel better. Sometimes we just need to wallow in it. After you’ve done that however, pick yourself up and move forward.

This week I’m well again. I’m slowly catching up on the pile of work that did indeed wait for me. I’m planning ahead with more to do. I’m looking forward to travelling to Pinnaroo on Friday to take our range to our customers there once again. I haven’t restarted my exercise routine yet, in fact I think I’ve put on a kilo. Which is fine. I’m looking forward to playing netball this Saturday. I’ve cuddled and read to Flynn each night and managed to make home-cooked dinners. I’ve taken a cautionary approach to kissing my husband because, well, we’re not out of the man-flu risk zone just yet. I’m still juggling a million things, in moments that stresses me out, however this week it feels manageable.

No doubt at some stage a spanner will be thrown into works and I’ll fail in some area of my life all over again. Failing for a week doesn’t make me a bad Mum, business owner or wife. It makes me human. And I’m happy to share my failings if it helps shine light on the fact that we are all the same. We all have good days and bad.

Failure isn’t a bad thing if you have the perspective to see it’s not the alone constant in your life. If you can pick yourself back up, adjust, adapt and learn then once you’re through the other side it becomes a teaching moment. A reality check. A reminder to take nothing for granted.