Hi Everyone! I have a test today and can’t do my regular posting. My mother happily agreed to do a guest post though and I am so excited she decided to.
I adore my mother. She is my absolute best friend. I talk to her about 4 times a day. I call her when I’m happy, sad, angry, jealous…any emotion in the book and she has helped me get through it.
So, here goes. Mom is taking over.
What I’ve Learned in my Fifty Years
Hi everyone! I am Denise, Lisa’s mom. If you haven’t figured it out yet, Lisa and I are very close. I am so blessed that she was given to me as my daughter. She asked me if I would do some guest posts about my perspective on things so here goes.
I’m 50 years old and in my 50 years, I feel like I’ve learned quite a bit. I’ve made a lot of mistakes, but I always learned from then and became a better person. For as many mistakes as I made, I made just as many good choices. Most of you are young girls between the ages of 20-30 and are really just beginning life. There are many things I have learned along the way that I would like to share. I don’t want to sound like your mother or like I am preaching, but I am simply telling it as I have lived it.
Me as a little girl
Reading these blogs and watching my daughters’ friends grow up there is one glaring fact that I see in most young people.
You all worry too much about life and how to live it. I suggest you simply live it and let life happen. That’s not to say you should not try to achieve your goals and your dreams. However, it is to say be happy, have fun and don’t obsess over things you cannot control.
Many of you have felt the need to reach perfection with your bodies. What you see on television and in magazines is NOT reality, you know that intellectually, but emotionally there is a disconnect. It is better to be real than to try to be perfect. You will never be as young and beautiful as you are today.
Most of you grew up on a pedestal. Your parents lives revolved around you. Rules were changed so that everybody got an award whether they deserved or not in an effort to be fair. We can’t leave anybody out and we wouldn’t want anybody to have hurt feelings. Well, by now I am sure that most of you have realized that life is not fair. By now you should have realized that we are not all good at everything, and that is a beautiful thing. What do you think the world would be like if we were all REALLY GOOD at everything – boring! We all have things that we excel at and things that we are not very good at. Accept that and work with what you’ve got.
Lisa recently did a post on her awkward years. This was mine. I worked at Wendy’s.
The last thing I want to talk about is what your expectation of life is or was when you graduated highschool or college. I am sure that most of you thought that if you got a college education that you would simply be able to get a good job right off the bat and simply move forward with the rest of your life. As a lot of you have found out, life is not that simple. If you were to sit down and draw a road that represented your life, it would not be a straight road. It would be a road with many twists, turns, road blocks, detours, stalled cars and bad directions. That is what living is; you take what comes your way and get the best out of it you can.
A favorite quote of mine is..
I’m learning little by little that we decide what our lives are gonna be. Things happen to us. But it’s our reactions that matter.
Lastly, I wanted to say thanks for your support of my company, Winning Photography Solutions. I know many of you have bought notecards and I truly appreciate it.
My website is: Winning Photography Solutions. You can find information and purchase the notecards here. Also, I do digital restoration of photographs. If you have an old photograph that you would like to restore for a christmas present, you can look at my website for more information or email info@winningphotoscanning.com.
My Facebook Page: It includes all of our notecard sets, prints you can purchase, flower art, and much more.
Are you close with your mother? If not, do you have someone in your life that you consider to be a mother?
What have you learned in your years?
Lastly, this is a call for GUEST POSTS. I will need to have quite a few guest posts in the coming months. If anyone would like to do a guest post for me, please email me at LisaOkie@gmail.com. They can be about anything your heart desires. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE!!
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Wow denise, that was such a beautiful post. I lost my mother when I was thirteen, she had breast cancer. I hope it doesn’t sound creepy, but you resemble her a little. I don’t really consider any one else my mom. My mom was MY mom and no one came close to her. But I feel she’s within me, I think she saved me any time, shes my voice of reason. She’s my “healthy voice” whenI want to do eating disordered behavior (I struggled with an eating disorder for over a decade). She didnt live long, but she had a rich and high quality life. She really embraced your quote about how our reactions to life’s hiccups matter. Thanks for this, I hope to see you on the blog soon!
That must have been hard losing your mom, I can’t imagine and I am honored that you see a little of her in me.
There is nothing more comforting than mom advise. The older I get, the more I realize my mom was right.
My mom’s name is Denise too!!
Cool, I never liked my name. Does your mom like it?
Best guest post I’ve ever read! I think people my age do worry about things that they can’t control. I don’t understand it. I do it too so I’m not immune. I love your advice!! Lisa is so lucky to have you. My mom and I are not close, I could never do anything right. I could find a cure for cancer and she’d be mad it took me so long. I wish I had a mother figure in my life, but I don’t. I can only try to be a better mom to my future children. Great post! Thanks!
Thanks, Melissa. I was a little nervous to do a post. You know I never did understand why people are so critical about other people. I believe that they are so insecure about themselves that they have to project that on everybody else to make them feel better. Learn from that and be the BEST mom you can be for your kids.
That was SUCH a great post!! Thank you for the encouragement and sound advice! Lisa is a lucky girl to have you.
Wow This was a great guest post! Mom’s are so awesome! I love my mom to death and would not be the person I am without her as my role model!
I love the post! Thank you for such words of wisdom
Denise, this is such a great post! I am relatively close with my mum, but throughout university, we lived a 16 hour flight away from each other. I was lucky enough during that time to have one of my friends (albeit an older friend- one of the lovely women at my gym) become my “adopted mother”, who was always there if I needed anything.
Thanks for this post and have a great day!
I love your mom!!!
Denise, I appreciate hearing your thoughts so much. I know you are a wise woman (you raised such a great daughter) and a very caring person (seen in that email you sent me awhile ago
). I think we should always be open to really learning from those that have been there and experienced life. I loved reading this!
And Lisa – I would be happy to do another guest post for you. Let me know when you’re thinking you may need something by or any specific topic you might want me to cover.
Tina, You keep up your good works with your blog and reaching out to women who need to know about prayer and God. I commend you.
Denise, thanks so much for your honest and real post! What great advice and something we all need to take to heart, especially worrying about our lives and the things out of our control.
BTW, love that baby pic of you! SO CUTE!
Denise what a wonderful post!
I know for myself, that I do strive for perfection and I worry too much about the future, etc. I think it is great advice to just go with the flow and be who I am and be happy about it!
I am quite sure you are perfect just the way you are!
hi lisa’s mom! i love your post.
everything you wrote is so true.
growing up i wasn’t close to my mother at all, not even my dad.
when i got sick in my early 20s, that’s when my mum and i become close. to this day, we’re still really close. she’s my best friend and she’s my rock!
Thank you for the reminder advice
. Your daughter has learned well because she shares good advice pretty often herself. I’m very close with my mom (actually just moved home for a little between grad school and a new job) and I’m so thankful for it.
I am so glad I read this post early in the morning! Its so inspiring.
Aw, I loved this post! Sometimes it’s so much easier to listen to something when it comes from someone else’s mom.
Also, love your note cards… I ordered some a couple weeks ago!
Thanks for your order. I hope you got them in good condition and really like them. Just so you know, I never listened to my mom either.
Your mom is awesome. You are so blessed to have her in your life. She has such a great perspective, it really hit home when she said “It is better to be real than to try to be perfect.” I’ve recently learned that I put myself through the ringer trying to be perfect. The perfect employee, the perfect daughter, the perfect sister, the perfect girlfriend, etc. It’s exhausting and its impossible!
I’m really close with my mom too. We only talk once a day but they are always meaningful, it helps that we have tons to talk about with my siblings and nieces and nephews, but she’s also there to listen about my work, when I’m struggling with my eating issues and lack of confidence, and problems with friends. This post just made me appreciate my mom and what she has to say so much more. Thanks!
Usually Mother’s do know best:)
Denise, you are a doll. Thanks for the sound advice. You are spot on! It can be so consuming and overwhelming to try to be the woman that I think I’m expected to be. Your post has put the idea in my head to (at least) think about weeding out all of the junk and just try to focus on whats important to me and focus on the people around me that I value.
I like what you said “weeding out all the junk. I bet if you do that you will focus on the joy of life.
Gosh, your mom is so smart and sweet! I actually really needed this post today, I do take life too seriously and expected thing to be a certain way because my parents put me on a pedestal. But things WILL be okay! Thanks Denise!
okie mom! i loved this post! your wise words are appreciated and taken to heart. i am going to share your post with several people who i know would love to read your insight. thanks for agreeing to post! i have the same relationship w/ my mom. it’s great to have a mom as a best friend! xoxo
Wow, Lisa, your mom is such a beautiful and fascinating woman. Thank you for posting and sharing your wisdom with us, Denise!
I see where you get your heart and appreciation for life. Your Mom sounds like an incredible understanding woman. Who raised a wonderful daughter!
My Mother is my world, she helps me with just her voice. It’s soothing and calming. Loved this post once again!
What a great post and great idea to have your Mom guest blog!
I love my Mom to pieces and as I get older and notice myself acting like her or doing things she would do I totally embrace it!
Loved this guest post, Denise.
Great job. I super love your Wendy’s uniform!! 
PS – Your baby picture is so darn cute.
Gotta to love the thing on my head!!!!! Oh and the huge glasses
Denise: LOVED reading your post. And thank you for the reminder to not be SO concerned with the ‘RIGHT NOW’ but instead to just live our lives. Perfect wording! Thanks so much for sharing! I actually am not close to my biological Mom- she left when I was 2 & my dad & step mom raised me- who I consider my Mom. Even though we are not blood, she is my Mom & she’s perfect! I’m so lucky to have such an AMAZING Mom..and I’m so lucky that she raised me.
But it’s so cool to have advice from someone that is a bit older- such a great idea!! And, I hope you did well on your test. AND, oh ya- forgot to tell ya- got your letter yesterday- SO CUTE!! Thank you!
Lisa: I LOVE the idea of letting your Mom do a post- not that I don’t love reading your post as well
I am a step mom too. And of course I think as a step mom you have an extra special job:) You are blessed to be so close to yours.
this post was so amazing! thank you so much for sharing! i think it’s so important to keep things in perspective and realize that our lives are so precious – and this was such a great reminder of that!
Awwww, I LOVED this!! Great post!!
I’m very close with my mother too! I love hearing advice from wise women b/c it makes me feel so much more at ease and comfortable with myself just as I am.
Great post Denise! Such great advice and wisdom
I love Love LOVE this post!! And being 38, I was raised more as you were. This is the first generation of children who has had to be “entertained” by their parents and you can see how it’s affected every part of their lives.
If only they knew that what we did was to stunt the start of their lives.
What. A. GREAT. Post. This is so cool. I’m not so sure I’ve ever read a guest post from a mom on a blog. (Unless Momma B did one for Janetha once…can’t remember?)
I love that quote. I know my life has sure been one (sometimes long) windy road and I’m not anywhere near where I thought I would be at 33.
In my life, I’ve learned to be in the moment. I actually learned that in an acting class in college but over the last 13 years I’ve been learning to put it into real life practice.
Thank you, Lisa’s mom! This is just what I needed tonight. It’s easy to get caught up with life, trying to ‘get it right.’ Lisa is lucky to have you as a mom.
Great post! I love hearing about what others have learned in life and its always along the same lines—-life your life, be happy and what happens will happen—so simple yet we like to make things complicated sometimes. Love it!
My mom and I are also very close like the two of you are. My mom and I weren’t always so close but when I got to college we really became close. Somedays I’ll just be thinking about her and I thank God that I am so lucky to have a mom that I can be open with and know will always love me no matter what.
OK, Lisa, your Mom and my Mum need to get together and develop a plan to have their own talk show called “Keeping It Real: Live It, Learn It.” Denise, I love how straight forward and honest you are. No sugar coating life here, no thank you. I love this:
Most of you grew up on a pedestal. Your parents lives revolved around you. Rules were changed so that everybody got an award whether they deserved or not in an effort to be fair.
Can I get an AMEN??? My goodness, it’s like my mother wrote that line. Dare I say with the generations younger than us, it’s getting worse!? I often worry about the future of the world for my children and my generation as we age.
This was such a refreshing post and great to get a new insight. The Wendy’s uniform didn’t hurt, either.
Hey, that’s an idea – a talk show. Glad to know there are other mom’s out there who think like I do.
What a sweet post! Moms are the best
I LOVED this post!! Lisa, you have the best mom ever!
I am going to link back to this, actually, if that is okay? So many things jumped out at me – so much of it I can relate to. You are both lucky to have each other, and especially lucky to be so close!
I am a ‘lurker’-I read this blog whenever I get a chance(and love it!) I’m just getting caught up and had to comment on this guest post. Amazing-I loved it! Thank you for sharing those words with us…that is great advice. It really hit home, as I’m 20 and could identify with a lot of what was written.
“It is better to be real than to try to be perfect. You will never be as young and beautiful as you are today.”
I LOVE this quote. Thank you again for the post.
You have your entire life ahead of you. All I can say is Live it!!!
Thanks for your kind words
So sweet
I loved this! Denise, you are beautiful! Your relationship with Lisa sounds so much like my own with my mom. She means the world to me 
Great Post Denise. This couldnt have come at a better time for me.. really lets me step back think about things and kinda let things fall how ever it shall fall. Thank you!
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