It’s the things left unsaid on status updates or tweets.

It’s what you do through the good times and the not so good.  It’s the unglamour and the unyummy.

It’s the heart to heart talks you have with wise older souls who’ve been there and done that, it’s the debriefs with your fellow warriors as you take a break from the front line over a beverage and superior snacks (with your little ones never too far out of your line of sight and range of hearing, just in case and because).

It’s those unexpected moments of solidarity shared with strangers at the shops, gruff words of support from the most seemingly unlikely people.

It’s your own ability to empathise and support where once you’d have been a bit smug and judgemental.

But most of all it’s the little one or ones who have been entrusted in your care.  Their ups and downs, their calms and storms, their seemingly continuous cycle of growing up a bit (and away a bit from you) then adjusting to the change and then doing it all over again (and again).

The thing is, while at times it seems like it’s the giving is all one sided so much is given in return.  In ways you’d never have expected or, let’s face it, hoped for.  But somehow, what you receive ends up being so much better for you.  It’s what you need rather than what you want.

I’ve had one of those reflective phases this week where I think I’ve finally understood what it is my preschooler is trying to give me and I think also, that I’m finally able to receive it as a gift rather than seeing it as a source of frustration.

I’ve realised that what I need more than time, sleep or patience is calm understanding.  Because being calm and trying to understand feel much better than their opposites.  Both for myself and everyone around me.

Finding the calm is empowering.  To know that this to will pass.  That you are in control of your emotional reactions and that you have the power to let go of that which is negative and counterproductive.  It’s not just the stuff of inspirational social media accounts, it’s a life enriching way of thinking.

Part of understanding is to see the joy.  Not just in the obvious days filled with sun, giggles and hugs.  But also to find it through the days where joy might not be the first word that springs to mind.  When everything’s a battle of wills and of not being heard.  Days when the floor’s been mopped five times and still looks a bit grimy.  Days when every meal requires four complicated options involving lots of washing up and ultimately lots of things being scraped into bin from plates or off the floor.  Joy can be relative and it can take a while to find.  But it’s always there.

For every moment where you have no choice but to proceed with calm understanding are those equal and opposite moments which give you reassurance that you are doing a good job after all.

Have you been given the gift of calm understanding in some aspect of your life?