I’ve been thinking a lot lately about LEGACY. Looking back in history, it has usually been the father, who has established a business, created an empire….to hand down to his children. Legacy of family name, reputation, status, money, power.

Yet, psychology finds that the mother’s influence is the one most sited for causing the lasting innate legacies of behavioral patterns – be they good or bad.

   

Maybe I worry over this more being a single mom….any lasting lessons, legacy, inheritance of both the material and the spiritual – lays on my shoulders to create and pass along to my children.

SO I started thinking….Is this part of why I want to build my own business? Maybe, but even if I don’t, my children will grow up, have their own careers, build their own professional paths.  Is this why I am so dogmatically strict about being authentic, honest, loyal etc.?  Of course those are traits I want deeply ingrained in my children…..still not legacy per se.

What would I want my children to remember most about me? Being tough as nails and surviving a lot? Writing multiple best selling novels? Helping numerous people through spiritual mentoring?

That is all lovely BUT….what kept resonating in my heart and head as my true answer….

I want them to remember their mom as the woman who bought a cup of coffee for the valet guy on a freezing, rainy day.

I want them to be proud that the homeless man at the nearby intersection knew to count on me to roll down my window and share a few dollars with him.

I want them to remember volunteering at LA Mission, and donating bags and bags and BAGS of clothing, books, toys….to those who needed it more than us.

I want them to feel the urge to do as I have done, and buy a gift card at Starbucks for the exhausted looking mom a few people behind me in line, who was juggling 3 kids under the age of 5…and needed the TLC of being treated to a cup of coffee, or paying for groceries at the market for the elderly lady who was buying only day old products to still eat within her meager budget.

I want them to remember that their birthdays mattered more to me than any religious holiday, or personal milestone of mine….that I was so blessed to celebrate THEM….their existence and uniqueness.

Hopefully, even if they only hold memories of me as the eccentric writer with too many cats, who drank too much wine, and coffee….that they will find their legacy scribbled along the margins, and in between the lines.