On motherhood and ambition

Motherhood did sharpen my priorities; it forced me to measure the worth of my time and energy.

I have always wanted to live in London. I am not entirely sure where the idea originated and why. Now, I don’t see it ever happening—at least not in the next couple of decades. I have a husband who left Sweden because he prefers warm weather, and if we were to move anywhere, it would probably be somewhere in the South. We have a child whose future is in our hands, and the decision to move anywhere should not be taken lightly. Of course, it’s easier to make big decisions now, while she is little. Once she is bigger—her own person—we would have to account not only for her benefit but for her desires, for friendships she formed and interests she cultivated.

Sometimes I think about the version of myself who did move—to a small flat in Notting Hill or perhaps somewhere east, near the canals. She walks quickly, always late for something, and spends her weekends going to the galleries and book readings. She owns too many shoes not suited for rain. She writes and drinks wine and reads books.

That version of me belongs to a past that never solidified. The longing for London was, perhaps, a longing for a different kind of self, one defined by a certain cinematic idea of adulthood. Now, my life has unfolded differently, even better, dare I say. I don’t have regrets. Still, sometimes, when I see a photo of London—fog pressed against the glass of a red double-decker, or a line of Georgian houses washed in rain—I feel a faint ache. As if some small, untended part of me still lingers there, waiting by the Thames, watching the lights come on.

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I am still full of ambition but I am not entirely sure where to place it all at the moment. Motherhood did sharpen my priorities; it forced me to measure the worth of my time and energy. It also ignited a new creative drive - not in spite of having a child, but because of it. Yet I doubt myself constantly. Who wants to read what I write? Do I have something to say? Is what what I have to say worth saying?

I don’t exactly have my shit together. To rectify that, I started listening to The Desire Map Experience. It’s a sort of self-help book. The first time I listened to it was a few years back, pre-baby, while walking along the Spanish coastline, and it helped a ton. The idea is to figure not what you want to have but how you want to feel as a means of getting what you want, if it makes sense. I need help with that as I am not entirely sure right now what to work towards. Should I focus my energy on writing? Should I spend more time trying to make money? Should we move? Should we buy a house on the countryside? Should we travel more?

A lot of my ambitions and desires are focused on my daughter at the moment. I think about her more than I think about myself, which is rather natural I presume. I want her to grow up in a house with a garden. I want her to go outside and play in the sunshine. I want her to go to a good school. I want her to travel the world. I want her to have a lot of friends and a lot of hobbies. I want her to know what it feels like to belong—to a place, to people, to herself. I want her to wake up to the sound of birds and fall asleep knowing she is safe. I want her childhood to be filled with warmth and arts and crafts (Julie O’Rourke and her kids are my ultimate inspiration) and good food and good books. I want her to feel free but also rooted. I want her to know she can always come home, wherever home ends up being. I want her to feel the world is open to her, that she can step into it with confidence, carrying an overdraft of love.

It’s all good but seems slightly misplaced. Maybe that’s what unsettles me, the way my dreams have shifted outward, orbiting her life rather than my own. It’s a tender kind of displacement, one that feels both right and disorienting. There are moments when I wonder if this is how all mothers feel - a recalibration of the self, where what once seemed essential now feels secondary. The things I used to chase still glimmer faintly in the distance but they no longer dictate the rhythm of my days. The future I imagine is no longer mine alone. So what is the right way to go about it?

To mother is to build. It is to imagine a future and to shape it, often invisibly, through care and perseverance. Ambition is a similar act - to envision what could be, and to work relentlessly toward it. Both require stamina, creativity, a belief in the infinite possibilities and a lot of energy.

I completely underestimated the energy required to look after a baby day after day. I started a couple of projects before giving birth thinking I could continue as soon as I came home from a hospital. Haha, I know, sweet summer child. It was three months ago and it’s just starting to get better. I am finding my ground. I am finding my groove. I am no longer afraid of every sound and my own shadow. I am writing lists after lists after lists. I feel burning desire to create things but am just finding energy to actually do anything about it.

There are two questions I ask myself. Should I focus on my art or should I focus on something that makes money? Or to go even further—should I focus on art or money or should I focus entirely on my daughter? She is, after all, little for so long. Maybe that’s what ambition becomes, eventually—not the pursuit of more, but the pursuit of meaning, and the earlier you figure it out (I am not quite sure I did still) the better.

I don’t really know.