Discover Your Voice: Beyond your Homeschool Mama Identity

So, you signed up to homeschool and you’re grateful to have followed this path, yet you know you have an identity beyond your homeschool mama identity.

You’ve appreciated all the freedoms this homeschool lifestyle has brought your family, but you’ve been doing it for a few years and you’re realizing, to your utter surprise, that you might be working yourself out of a job, and you even want to do things that aren’t related to homeschooling.

Who are you beyond your homeschool mama identity and what will be the next contribution of your life outside your homeschool mama identity?

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“Perhaps the most important lesson one can teach: you are someone and you have a right to your life”.

Richard Hugo

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Natalie Goldberg said, “I went home with the resolve to write what I knew and to trust my own thoughts and feelings and to not look outside myself. I was not in school anymore: I could say what I wanted.”

Natalie Goldberg recognized she was unconstrained and didn’t need to look outside herself to know herself and be herself.

She was a person outside of other people.

That would be me at thirty.

Thirty years old, released from my notions of people-pleasing and attempting to smooth out things that were out of my control.

And it was during this time that I recognized I had a voice.

A voice that also liked to write.

I attended a writing conference for the first time in my life, despite writing my entire life.

Walking away from that writing conference, I was determined to write.

I had finally found myself.

This is me! I’m a writer. I have stuff to say.

No one gave me a writing pen, or saw my talent, or gave me permission. I just wanted to write.

Anyone who has letters after their name, money in their bank account, or loads of followers is deemed to have made a valuable contribution.

We appreciate these people because they have made a contribution and presence in our world.

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But it wasn’t just a handful of people plucked out of the world to be contributors to our generation.

We are given that rite of passage because we were born.

We all were created for a reason.

Some common reasons, of course.

But still unique reasons for each one of us. 

With internal compelling for different activities, different thought lives, and different approaches.

When we’re each playing our part, we contribute toward a rich, abundant, interesting world.

With the demands of those around us and the demands we place on ourselves by listening to others’ opinions on our lives, we are not always living our lives or allowing our voices to come off mute. But we can.

It seems intuitive: this is your life. But we don’t always choose to engage our lives fully.

Why?

What should you be doing right now to fulfill your reason for being alive?

Live your life on purpose.

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“There are two important days in your life. The first was when you were born. The second was when you found out why.”

Terry Tempest Williams

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The process of becoming a wife and mother has changed me from the person I was before.

1. I stopped listening to myself because the voices around me were so loud; eventually, I came back to me, because I learned to listen to myself.
2. This means I learned to take time away to do things I like to do because I like doing them.
3. I recognized I needed to take care of myself just as I needed to take care of others.
4. I pursued interests I loved to do long before I was a mother, even long before I was a woman, like writing and speaking into a tape cassette player (now known as a podcast).
5. Kept a bucket list or dream list of what I’d like to do one day, just me and my husband.
6. I asked myself what creativities I presently want to nurture and asked if I couldn’t do them now.
7. I continued to listen to podcasts and learn from interesting things, so I could transition to offering my giftings to the world outside my homeschool family.

Since my childhood was one of tumult, confusion, and uncertainty, I’ve lived into Rachel Platten’s song:

“Like a small boat
On the ocean
Sending big waves
Into motion
Like how a single word
Can make a heart open
I might only have one match
But I can make an explosion

And all those things I didn’t say
Wrecking balls inside my brain
I will scream them loud tonight
Can you hear my voice this time?

This is my fight song
Take back my life song
Prove I’m alright song
My power’s turned on
Starting right now I’ll be strong
I’ll play my fight song
And I don’t really care if nobody else believes
‘Cause I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me”

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Homeschooling can be a transformative journey, helping us realize our identity extends beyond the homeschool mama role.

Just as Natalie Goldberg discovered her unique voice, we too can embrace our passions and aspirations. We all have a distinct purpose, and by living intentionally, we contribute to a richer, more diverse world.

So, let’s find our voices, live with purpose, and make a difference beyond our initial roles and expectations.

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