Amy, 36, Mother, Executive Assistant at Apple | Paso Robles, CA

“I would remind myself to give myself grace …. Before becoming a parent, it was difficult for me to empathize with adult’s frenetic ways … now that compassion is extended to everybody.

We have so many different facets to what makes us ‘us’ … we don’t need to be siloed. And the ability to apologize … I apologize a lot to my kids. That is really important. We are human and have good days and bad days … Apologizing to children is really important.

Before I felt like I had to chose either this or that …. I’m either a stay at home mom, making cupcakes and volunteering like crazy … or I’m like a full on working person and I don’t know how to have both. It is difficult to do both, of course, but learning how to juggle it, while also remaining super present. When I’m with them, I don’t have my phone with me … that time is even more precious then before.Thinking that we have to be in labels and buckets and then recognizing that we don’t have to be just this, or the mom that does this, or the mom that does that … I can dabble and uncover and engage and awaken different dimensions of myself that are all facets of my being. I’m not just one piece of myself. I go back to facets of a gemstone being cut… there are multiple facets to me to make us all brilliant; we are not just shiny on the top. There are different cuts who all reflect who you are.

How many American mothers are so frantic and think they need to be memory-making mothers? I don’t have my shit together … I don’t have time for Elf on a Shelf … How many moms think they need to do [those things] to supplement holiday making, birthday magic …. I would give this advice to moms: to not buy into that. Everything I need, I have. Everything I need, I already have. Everything I need, I have. We are constantly bombarded, and it’s so overwhelming. My kids didn’t get their first Christmas present until they were 5.”