Small Things with Great Love

“Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love”

This is one of my favorite quotes. It’s one I say to myself constantly.

Or try to.

And more importantly, try to live.

We do many grubby, redundant tasks every day in motherhood. We do them for our children, our partners, and every other aspect of this stage in our lives. And, it’s easy to say, at the end of the day, that what we do, we do out of love.

In our household, my husband does the majority of diaper changes. Especially when it’s poop, because 1. gross and 2. I’m 7 months pregnant and it’s EXTRA smelly. One day, when my husband was not home I was in put in charge of one particular poo-pocalypse. I had my daughter of the changing table, I opened her diaper, grimaced, looked at her and said, “I’m doing this because I love you.”

Every meal I cook for my family. Every monotonous trip to the grocery store. Every school drop off. Every doctor’s visit. Every agonizingly long nursing session. Every time I hold my daughter while she screams and flails and is altogether a human disaster.

I’m doing this because I love you. 

It’s easy to reflect on my day and think how worn out I am, or how grateful I am for family, but if I stop and think in the moment, “small moment with great love” it can uplift daily burdens into something beautiful. 

I  challenge you to live with this intention.

The author of this quote may know something about daily burdens, but I would also say that she lived doing great things.

These are wise words said by St. Teresa of Calcutta, but you may know her better as Mother Teresa.