The Counterfeit and the Calling | A true celebration of mothers

When you begin to awaken, the stage of our modern world reveals itself—and it’s strange. It can be disorienting to realize you are in this world, but not from it. Walk into any store this week and you’ll find the usual suspects: pastel cards with mass-produced sentimental verses, flower-scented candles, and novelty mugs declaring love for the “#1 Mom.”
It’s polite. Predictable. A commercialized, curated nod to something wild and untamable.

But motherhood is not a product to be packaged in cellophane.
It is not a sentiment that can be easily scratched on to a Hallmark card.
It is not a day circled on a calendar.

It’s a holy interruption.
A daily dismantling.
A living altar.

There are systems without spirit aplenty these days—industries eager to sell you the image of motherhood: curated, palatable, and disembodied from the deeper initiation it truly is. They offer aesthetics without embodiment, advice without attunement. But motherhood is not a role to perform—it is a metamorphosis to endure. A stripping away. A baptism by fire that asks for your whole self, not just the parts that photograph well.
But what if Mother’s Day isn’t meant to be a performance?
What if it’s a portal?

Not a day to celebrate how well we’re holding it together—
But a day to remember how we’re meant to fall apart and be remade.

Before the doctrine.
Before the parenting books.
Before the Pinterest board of nursery aesthetics.
There was a woman who said yes.

Mary didn’t ask for a manual.
She wasn’t praised for perfect boundaries or developmental milestones.
She was chosen because her spirit was open.

She attuned to something the world couldn’t yet see.
And in her surrender, the Divine took form.

Maybe that’s the blueprint we’ve forgotten:
Not perfection, not performance—
But presence.
And a willingness to be absolutely transformed.

The Sacred Invitation

Mary’s yes was not safe. It wasn’t convenient. It wasn’t part of her five-year plan.

When the angel appeared to her in Luke 1:28, he greeted her not by name, but by essence: “Hail, full of grace—charitoō—the Lord is with you.” Charitoō is a Greek verb meaning to be endowed with grace or divine favor—not as a passive recipient, but as one who is filled to overflowing with God’s empowering presence. It’s not mere sentiment; it’s spiritual assignment. She was troubled, yet open. Aware that this blessing might cost her everything—yet she listened anyway. 

She was betrothed. Young. Her path seemingly laid out.

And then the Spirit interrupted it all.

She asked the question any of us would: “How can this be?” (Luke 1:34). And she received no logistical reassurance—only the mystery: “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.”

It wasn’t a promise of ease. It was a divine disruption.

And still—she said yes.

"Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." (Luke 1:38)

This is the sacred invitation of motherhood: a radical surrender to what we cannot control. To carry what we did not plan. To be stretched beyond what we thought we could endure.

To hold the holy, even when it wrecks our expectations of who we are. 

In that yes, Mary became the blueprint—not for perfection, but for participation in the mystery.

And in every mother’s yes, that divine pattern echoes again.

Rhythms Over Rules

Motherhood today often feels like a maze of information: courses, books, conflicting advice from influencers and institutions alike. And while wisdom has its place, what many of us are missing isn’t more data—it’s rhythm.

We weren’t designed to mother from algorithms. We were designed to mother from attunement. And yet, so many of us find it hard to tune in—pulled in every direction, constantly on the go, filling our days and our minds. 

There is a wisdom that rises when we get quiet enough to hear it, when we become still amid the relentless noise of modern life. It’s in the pattern of your baby’s breath against your chest. In the subtle shifts of mood and energy before a leap or a milestone. It’s the delicate dance of the shadows on your wall when the sun cuts through the blinds as you’re nursing your little one to rest.

You don’t need credentials or parenting hacks to tell you how to mother. You need the courage to slow down and listen—to your body, your baby, and the Spirit within.

The earth reminds us, if we’re paying attention. The moon’s pull, the tide’s rhythm, the way creation pulses in seasons—all of it speaks in cycles, not commands. Our bodies are woven into that same intelligence. The womb remembers. The intuition leads. None of it is random—it’s design, written deep in our cells. Because motherhood isn’t separate from creation—it’s a microcosm of it. A sacred echo of the larger design. The same patterns that govern oceans and galaxies are alive in the bond between you and your child.

And yet we’ve been conditioned to outsource that knowing. To override the maternal instinct in favor of one-size-fits-all blueprints. But there is no manual for a soul. Only attachment. Only relationship. Only presence.

You were never meant to mother like anyone else. You were meant to mother in rhythm with the child you’ve been given—entrusted to you as a living reflection of the imago Dei. What greater calling than to steward that divine image with reverence, humility, and love? 

And that rhythm? It’s already within you.

Reclaiming Mother’s Day as a Spiritual Portal

We don’t need another holiday that asks us to smile for the camera and pretend we’re fine. What we need is a threshold—a moment to return to what’s real.

Mother’s Day can be more than a gesture. It can be a reckoning. A remembering.

A day to bless the unraveling. To honor the women who are walking through fire and still choosing love. A day not to perform, but to pause. To let the silence speak. To see our children not as projects, but as prophets. Guides. Mirrors of our becoming.

This is not about being celebrated—it’s about remembering what we were made for.

To steward life. To grow in love. To fall apart and rise again.

So this year, don’t let the glossy noise drown out the invitation. Look your child in the eyes. Step outside. Notice the wind. Get your feet in the dirt. Listen to your body. Say yes again.

Because motherhood isn’t just something you do. It’s something that’s happening to you, and through you.

Let it remake you. Let it sanctify you. Let it return you to the wisdom that’s been in your bones all along.

The world doesn’t need more perfect mothers. It needs present ones. Attuned ones. Awakened ones.

And that’s who you already are, beneath the noise.

A toast to the Mothers Who Tune In

To the mothers who quiet the world long enough to hear the whisper of their child’s need— To the ones who choose presence over productivity, and rhythm over rigidity— To the mothers who walk barefoot in the grass, letting their children see them slow down and read the clouds, listen to the birds—

This is your honor song.

You are keeping something sacred alive.

You are resisting a frenetic culture of rush and proving. You are reclaiming the holy in the mundane. You are mothering not just your child, but your lineage. Your land. Your legacy.

The way you pause. The way you notice. The way you surrender— it ripples.

You are the revival. You are the recalibration. You are the blueprint the world forgot it needed.

And heaven sees you.

May this Mother’s Day meet you in the quiet. Not with applause, but with deep recognition.

You are doing sacred work.
You are doing it beautifully.
You are not alone.
You are deeply seen.
You are profoundly loved.
And you matter—more than you know.

Happy Mother’s Day, beloved.

In love + light,
April