Celebrating the biggest Mother of us all

Spend Mother’s Day outside in nature’s ‘family’

It’s a day when, traditionally, Mum is supposed to be treated to breakfast in bed, showered with endearing cards home-made by offspring, and (hopefully) feels treasured. 

The thing about days like Mother’s Day is that while they give a well-deserved spotlight on the incredible role mums play, the challenge is making sure that recognition doesn’t end when the day does. Because come Monday (12 May this year), many mums are back to doing what they always do: quietly keeping everything running—managing the household, supporting the family, and often holding a full-time job as well. It’s a reminder that appreciation shouldn’t be reserved for just one day.

Yet making a big deal of Mothers Day, when kids (and grandkids) of all ages practise small acts of kindness and appreciation for someone who gives unselfishly all year is surely a great way of reinforcing connections between generations, and strengthening the bonds upon which we all depend. 

Parenting, arguably the toughest job in the world, often means doing things without expectation of thanks. The reward is seeing children grow up into resilient, capable and compassionate adults. And resilient, capable and compassionate adults are exactly what planet Earth, the biggest Mother of us all, desperately needs. 

This Mothers Day, if you can, insist on getting outside. Spend the day with your family in the company of other ‘family’: trees, rivers, grass, birds, mountains, plants, ocean, shoreline. Our precious kinship with nature is something to cultivate and savour, 365 days a year.