Love From Maria

While I was on vacation Participaction's latest report card popped into my inbox. Naturally, I opened it to read - I love their report cards and if you know me you know that nachos and active living are a couple of things I love. Well, this post isn't about nachos and the report card hasn't left my mind since reading it. This year they published their first-ever report card on ADULTS - spoiler alert - our grades are nothing to write home about. Image via Participaction You can read the full report here - and I encourage you to. It won't take you long but it will wake you up to the preventative steps (literally) we can take to make the future better and healthier for us and our children. I mean, it's no wonder our children keep getting poor grades for physical activity (you can read the Participaction report on that here ) when we aren't getting good grades ourselves. And this isn't about shaming either because I know we all have a lot on our plates an

Recently I, with the support of my husband, decided to leave my dream job. Wow - a dozen or so words to capture thirteen years of dedication to one organization.  It was not a decision that we took lightly, but when the time came, the decision felt like the right thing to do. I've had a couple of months to process it now and have been thinking about writing something. Today, after a conversation with some old colleagues I knew what I wanted to share. I have had the gift of reflection lately with my new found time and capacity. Leaving my dream job - because it was - revealed some very valuable learnings to me: 1- Always be able to remove yourself from your role.  In the final months before my departure, I found it difficult to draw the line of where I stopped and my role started. We had become one and the same. Now, I'll be honest because that's what I do, I didn't recognize this myself. Two things cued me into this. First, I had a conversation with my CEO - t

Parents, moms, dads, guardians, friends, humans of planet Earth - how do you do it all?! Does anyone do it all? Life has some serious perceived expectations - and I feel like I've been dancing with them lately. And I don't mean slow dance or even two-step, I'm talking I-carried-a-watermelon-Dirty-Dancing-dancing with what it means to be a good mom, good employee, good wife, good daughter, sister, friend, neighbour, human. It feels like there is pressure from all directions; keep the house clean, make organic meals, pack those organic meals into sustainable lunchboxes, deliver the best material, reach the largest audience, do your make-up, put on real pants - okay the last one seems fair 5/7 days but does anyone else feel me on this list? I think about it daily, in the silence when I'm walking alone, in the noise when I'm driving with the boys, while I'm falling asleep at night. I don't know for sure what the answer is or how to solve it - if you do pl

Yesterday the boys and I walked to the park - not an entirely out of the ordinary thing for us. They organized themselves into a make-shift game where one would climb the ladder while the other climbed the slide, then the ladder-climber would slide down the slide attempting to bring the slide-climber down with him. While I watched them play I couldn't stop smiling - and then thinking - of course. We all hear about how good play is for kids - how it's necessary, helps with socialization, mental health, physical literacy - it's essential. But I often think about how good it is for me too. There is little better for my mood than a walk. It brightens my mood, calms me down, eases my mind. It helps me to be a better mom, a better wife, a better human in general. It's where I collect my thoughts and make sense of things. It's also the byproduct of taking my kids out to play. The more I thought about this the more it made so much sense. When we give our kids room to p

Being an empath is an incredible thing, understanding how someone feels without even having to talk to them is a gift I'll never take for granted. It means big feelings, exhaustion from crowds, and recharging in nature - who'd have guessed, haha! It's also led me down an introspective thought path, in particular, during or after opinions that challenge my own are shared. It's not easy for anyone to engage, listen, or even entertain ideas that don't support their own worldviews. It's not natural to surround yourself with people that don't share your worldviews and it's not particularly enjoyable. Challenging someone's worldview can cause upset, anger, even - and in particular for an empath - feeling physically unwell. But here's the thing, I think being empathetic and leaning into empathy means more than what might be assumed as "just feeling things" or "understanding the underdog". It means challenging yourself to see it fro

We met at the park one day when my son had to pee. He was potty-training and while we were playing at the park he started the infamous potty dance. "You can go over there, in the long grass. That's where my sons always go."  I know, that seems like an odd line to bond over, but in that moment I knew I had a new friend. I often write about going to the park, or for walks, and I come at it from all angles. Here is one of my favourite ones - the one that brings you new friends. You see, when we take our kids outside to play, when we venture away from our yards, onto the streets, pathways, and parks in our neighbourhoods, a fantastic thing happens - we meet our neighbours. This is how I met my neighbour - my friend. Yes, we bonded over peeing at the park. Any parent who has gone through potty-training has got to be able to relate to this. We met and we talked. We talked about kids at first - you know, the ones peeing in the long grass - the ones we have in common. K