Before You Were An Anxious Adult You Were a Brave Little Bean-Sprout

Let's talk about childbirth for a second. Not from the perspective of the woman doin' the pushin' (although she completely deserves all the praise + recognition in. da. world. like, holy shit.), but from the perspective of the wee human who's about to get squashed through a vah-jay.

LET'S PLEASE IMAGINE WHAT THAT MUST HAVE BEEN LIKE FOR ALL OF US.

You're in this cozy, warm, gooey, water-bed world, receiving everything you need, dreaming sweet baby dreams of milk-filled boobies, napping your way through existence, and then suddenly something in you is like, "Time to move, let's go."

And even though you are just a tiiiiny adorable baby, with a mushy head and barely-there brain function, you know to go along for the ride.

Baby you shrugs her itty baby shoulder and agrees to get the heck outta dodge. "Okay, I guess we're leaving this place and going to the next place. I guess this is what baby-me signed up for. Whatevs. I hope it doesn't suck."

And you snail-trail your way outta the water-bed, slowly but steadily heading in the direction of the most massive unknown.

THAT IS NUTBALLS BANANA-McCRAY.

Babies get no respect and recognition. Babies are insanely brave!!

Cause if that was us? Now? In this moment?

Let's be real, most of us would be tweaking out. Completely.

We would be clinging to the walls of that womb for dear life. Telling ourselves we need to just stay where we are, and not slip-and-slide through the birth canal, because unknown = bad, scary, no thanks. We're good, actually. Waterbed world is where it's at.

But BABY US was somehow so down for the ride.

She didn't fight; she got it. She went with the flow. She cried on the way out, probably because she'd just had her head smooshed through a tunnel the size of a grape. And also because stepping fully into the unknown is a always a bit of a shock, even for very brave babies.

Big huge never-forget-this reminder:

You were a very brave baby once, and you didn't have to try to do it. A la Lady Gaga, you were born that way, literally.

Before your brain was developed enough to tell you otherwise, you had total trust and faith.

You knew you had no choice but to let life move you in this new direction, and you agreed to follow the flow.

Ain't no baby trying to cling to the inside of the womb. She knows it's time. She's venturing forth. She's on the move!

There is a natural flow to life that pulls and pushes each of us in different directions, and yet we resist that flow. We want to put the brakes on the birthing. We think we can just stay where we are and like the idea of stuff remaining the same.

Birth is a metaphor for basically anything new or different you are stepping toward, but we're all acting like we haven't done it before.

We pretend we have not done hard things, or survived scary stuff, or braved the unknown in strange, unprecedented ways.

But the only reason we're here at all is because we did the HARDEST THING EVER in the first place, which was squeeeezing our way into this worldly existence and entering into a vast unknown where we had to trust in everything and everyone around us to keep us alive. And somehow, they did. And they probably didn't do a perfect job, but we're here.

In our adult lives we face challenges that frequently invite us to move in new directions, to go with the flow, to slip-and-slide our way into the unknown, yet here we are we acting like anxious womb-clingers.

But that has never been you. Even and especially when you were the purest, most untouched version of you, you were a brave baby badass.

How do we get back in touch with her? How do we remember that version of us more regularly? How do we reconnect with that little bean-sprout human, who didn't know what was going to happen, or how it was going to work, or if she would be okay? Yet she was just so up for whatever and ready to rock and roll?

Because that's you. That's all of us. We came here to rock and roll. And when we remember what brave baby badasses we were from day one, it feels a little easier to go with the flow, to honor the pull, and to trust the push.

Cause we've done it before and we'll keep on doing it. Life will show us no other way. You signed up for a ride, you didn't know what it would entail, and brave baby-you is still on-board. So buckle your seatbelt, boo boo. And keep going.