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There is nothing in this world that is quite like the unconditional love of mothers in challenging times.
When the world ever feels heavy, when the future comes uncertain, and when paths that are familiar become difficult to tread upon, it is the mother who more often than not makes the most powerful choice.
She chooses love over fear. Always.
Mothers do not pretend that they know the ways of the world. Nor do they pretend that whatever difficulties lie ahead do not exist. Yet, she chooses love because she sees what they are clearly.
Precisely because she sees them so clearly.
But mothers refuse to let fear have the final word, especially where it concerns their children.
This is the truth that premises The Heart of a Mother and the many stories it tells. Love over fear is a choice that shapes children, builds families, and changes the world one small act of courage at a time.
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The Shape of Love Over Fear
The act of choosing love and denying fear is not something that occurs only in the abstract. Its results and its consequences are something that you can see with your own eyes.
You see it in the mother who stays up through the night, helping her child with a school project despite the exhaustion in her eyes. It is revealed through the mother who pushes her child to meet the world with a smile and a cheer. Love over fear is in the mother who tells her child, after they’ve failed at something, that there is always a chance tomorrow.
In The Heart of a Mother, Maya Butalid writes about how mothers carry their children’s dreams like precious cargo, explaining that mothers do not love their children only when they succeed: mothers also love them through the hard times, the messy times, and the times when nothing goes as planned.
Love over fear means choosing to believe in your child’s tomorrow even when today is difficult. It is facing one’s child at their level, seeing their struggles and saying, “I am with you.”
The choice to take the hand of love does not come naturally. It takes strength, and it takes practice. A lot of it. But every day, mothers make the choice again and again and again because they know that tomorrow is brighter that way.
Why Fear Looms and Waits
Fear is loud. Even in its silence, the absence of its noise is deafening. Fear is constantly inside a mother’s mind, shouting that the world is a terrible place for their children and that there is nothing of worth across its great face. Fear goads mothers into wallowing in doubt and paranoia, forcing them to question their own choices and their own children’s dreams.
But mothers know that keeping their children small will never ever help them grow.
Choosing fear means keeping one’s child smaller and smaller.
Yet, this fear is not a reminder of deficiency on a mother’s part. Mothers fear deeply because they love deeply. One is tied to the other, and they are never truly far apart. But there is much that can be done when a mother lets the fear pass through her without it coloring her view of the world.
Butalid describes how mothers must learn to sit with their worry without letting it take over. This is the practice of emotional intelligence and mindfulness. It means noticing the fear, naming it, and then gently setting it down so you can pick up something better. That something better is love, hope–and faith in your child’s ability to find their own way.
Finding Strength in Vulnerability
Some people think that strength is only found when there is an absence of weakness. Mothers know what is true. There is no strength where there is no vulnerability. A diamond endures because it cannot be broken.
Butalid shares stories of mothers who held their children’s hands through hospital stays, through broken hearts, through failures and disappointments. These mothers did not have magic words to make everything better. They had something better. They had presence–and they had the willingness to stay in the hard moments rather than run from them.
This is choosing compassion over criticism. It is choosing connection over control. When a mother says that she, too, is scared, but she’s there together with her child, she is embodying courage for her child. She is imparting to them that to be strong is not being without fear. Courage is moving forward even when fear is present.
A Positive Mindset for the Future
A mother’s words can have an outsized effect on the future of her child. When a mother tells their child that they are capable or that they will figure things out or simply that they believe in them, there are seeds already planted for their future achievements.
Butalid explains that the way a mother talks about challenges shapes how her child will face them. If a mother treats problems as disasters, her child will learn to fear difficulty. If a mother treats problems as opportunities to learn and grow, her child will approach life with curiosity instead of dread.
Of course, just because a mother must learn how to encourage does not mean that they also need to pretend that everything is easy. To be positive means only that it is an imperative for a mother to teach their children that difficulty is not the end of everything. It means celebrating effort as much as achievement and showing children that their worth is not measured by their grades, their trophies, or their test scores. Their worth is built into who they are, not what they do.
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A Final Word for Mothers
To every mother reading this: Your choices matter. The love you pour out is not wasted. The fears you carry are seen, and the courage you find to choose love anyway is nothing short of heroic.
If the words here touched your heart, you will find even more wisdom and comfort in The Heart of a Mother.
