I truly believe this. Even on the toughest days. We have a choice, we can decide to roll over the yucky feelings from the day before or smile and take a deep breath and give the new day an opportunity to enter. I won’t allow the tired, frustrating and overwhelming feelings of yesterday define my today.

I woke up the other morning wondering to myself what the heck triggered my exasperated frustration the night before. I actually had to sit up in bed and think for a few minutes until I finally remembered, oh yes, the whole “sandwich” question. A sandwich. And I thought to myself, if it took me that long to remember what was the final trigger, were all those feelings of frustration and annoyance afterward really necessary?

So as I sat there still feeling the icky feelings from the night before I knew I had a choice. I could just go on with my morning routine, get my workout done, and greet the morning – with those icky feelings lingering under the surface, or I could talk and share those feelings. The triggers.

As much as my morning workout is important to me, I knew in that moment what I needed most was to talk to my husband and share how I had been feeling. To connect. To let myself feel vulnerable. To recognize that yes, as parents we get overwhelmed and frustrated and irritable and that as I sit here remembering how the night unfolded, I feel vulnerable. Vulnerable because it meant accepting I felt shame for some of my outburst, but recognizing that the shame isn’t because I’m a bad mother, wife, partner. It just means I am a good person and just my actions could have been better.

Waking up my husband that morning and talking with him and just being honest with how I felt made all that yucky feeling go away. I made a clear choice, I didn’t want to carry over the feelings from the day before to this new day. I could start again. We all can.