Thank goodness, J is feeling much better today! In fact, she has been singing and dancing since our visit to the doctor’s office yesterday as if she never had her headaches although she still hasn’t parted with her box of tissues, and she continues to leave a trail of used tissues behind her despite our pleas, orders, and requests to deposit them in a waste basket rather than on the floor or furniture. At any rate, I’m so grateful that J’s playful spirit and bright smiles are back regardless of her stuffy, red nose.

Although J has been ready to run a role-playing game (RPG) called, “Jadeclaw” since last Saturday, neither Charles nor I was ready to play it until today. S and J wanted to play the game over the past weekend, but we kept delaying it because we kept needing to take care of one thing or another that had to be done that very day: Saturday’s main event was to wrap and pack all the Christmas gifts we needed to send to our relatives on the East Coast so that they would arrive before Christmas; Sunday’s main events were de-cluttering and cleaning the master bathroom in addition to the Sunday “spa” ritual for the girls; and as for yesterday, I had to make a visit to the doctor’s with J to ensure her cold was not turning into a sinus infection while Charles and S patiently endured the long line at the post office to mail the gift packages. (S was a real trooper!)

Charles and I were grateful that the girls rolled with the punches. We didn’t want to disappoint them, and we certainly wanted to play the game with them to have fun ourselves as well, but we also made a conscious choice to go with the flow this year and not push ourselves too hard. This choice is a conscious shift from what we used to do in years past: we had packed every hour of the day with a chore or task on a to-do list, and ran around as fast as we could to get as much done as possible. For so many years, we unconsciously defaulted to experiencing quantity over quality when the holidays came around in terms of getting, giving, and going to places. The later in the year it was, the busier we became. I can now clearly see that Charles and I were trying to fit too many things in a not-big-enough container, and ran ourselves ragged until all the holiday joy and magic disappeared while we were huffing and puffing around. We defeated the very purpose (i.e., joyous holidays) by trying too hard to get to it all!

So, when the four of us sat down this afternoon to play the Jadeclaw role playing game together, with Julia at the head of our table as the Game Mistress, it was all the more sweet and scrumptious! Charles made a big batch of popcorn for us to munch while getting the table set for the game. The aroma and sound of popcorn popping in the old-fashioned popper filled the air, and I felt so far away from the usual hectic holiday hullaballoo we used to experience around this time of the season in previous years. I felt so blissful to be with my family to have fun, even though we were gearing up to play a game about which I didn’t know anything! I had full faith that I was in good hands – three masters to learn from!

I was absolutely right! It was true that throughout the entire game which spanned over a couple of hours, I had no idea what I was supposed to do at every single turn I had. This experience was not unlike dancing without learning any of the steps I was expected to know. Yes, awkward, clumsy, and disoriented; all these adjectives are pretty much accurate to describe my experience. I even wondered whether Charles had experienced something like this when he tried to write his first piece of music in high school without learning all the ins and outs of composing. However, my main purpose today wasn’t to “win” the game, or even to learn how to play the game. Since the girls are so into RPGs, I’ve tried to learn about them in the past, but I just could not get into it the way Charles and the girls did. Moreover, the true purpose for me today was to experience the game with my family and to simply enjoy “being” with my family while making fun memories of family time together. I had a lot of fun notwithstanding my status as a newbie. I loved the way J ran the game: she was an empathetic, compassionate and creative Game Mistress (no surprise there for me), and I had such a treat seeing her leadership pop out as we all contributed to the story line she had prepared prior to the start of the game.

Best of all, I received a delightful surprise gift while playing the game today: I felt so well taken care of by my family. It was such a sweet and comforting feeling that I hadn’t felt often in the past. I am usually the one in our family taking care of everyone, making sure everyone’s needs are met, and thinking ahead about their needs. When I used to work outside the home, although I often considered myself privileged to be the sole provider for our family, it sometimes weighed heavily on me to carry that responsibility by myself. In contrast to my role in our prior family life, today during the game about which I knew nothing, I was completely guided and advised by Charles and my daughters who helped me with genuine interest to make best moves for my character in the game to survive and thrive! I felt so pampered to be led for a change, and be taken care of by them, our resident experts who were far more experienced and knowledgeable than I could ever be in RPGs!

Today’s revelation was about the shifting dynamics in our family. I am no longer the sole provider for our family. My heartfelt wishes have been birthed, and in some ways, our new family life is like a baby in a cradle: my role within my family is morphing as well as Charles’ role. We are now co-creating and co-navigating to feed our souls and our family. I’m grateful for a soul mate who is also a soul partner to grow our enterprise together as couplepruneurs. Not only do I feel our relationship as a couple strengthening, I also feel our relationships with our daughters are morphing and maturing into a higher orbit: Charles and I are learning from our daughters as much as they are learning from us.

I’ve always learned from S and J even when they were tiny infants, challenging toddlers, and adorable pre-schoolers: their innocence, joy, and ability to be in the present moment as well as to be curious and inquisitive, have always inspired me to be a better parent, a better human being, and a better student of life. However, today’s experience of playing a game with my sophisticated RPG gamer daughters made me humble all over again: their determination and passion for RPGs have cultivated their ability, skill, and expertise way beyond a level I could ever reach. And they will probably master other areas in life in which they will possess ability, knowledge and experience that are superior to mine as they grow older. So, we will continue our bilateral learning relationship, except unlike when they were much younger, S and J will now know that they are superior in certain areas in life. As for me, so long as we have mutual respect and love flowing and fluxing in both directions, I’ll be counting my blessings with the heartfelt gratitude of a proud parent.