MOM! she yelled, I have TWO THINGS TO TELL YOU! Priscilla peed AND it is NEAL’S BIRTHDAY! Both of those things were true, but the second one was for sure more important.

A friend of ours is staying with us for a few months and he had a birthday this weekend. Juliet loves a birthday, anyones birthday. She loves to sing to them and wish them a happy day. She likes that everyone has one. We once met a woman at the grocery store who responded, when Juliet told her that her birthday was May first, that is MY birthday too! Birthday twins, she is now on a hunt for them. What could be better than someone else having your BIRTHDAY?

Juliet was born with a spirit of abundance, and the world has yet to crack it with the lies of not enough. Scarcity has nothing on this child. I mean, I get a little annoyed when someone else shares my special day. It is supposed to be my day. Juliet just sees it as a reason to have a bigger party.

(Juliet, just making room.)

I want to be more like this. I want to worry less about me and my celebration and spend more time being amazed at how awesome everything and everyone is.

It is pool season at the Norman house. We are currently averaging three hours a day at the pool. While I am doing a better job of accepting my body as good and healthy and wonderfully made, I am sometimes checking out other moms to see how I compare. (Just writing that makes me feel gross, so I guess I will stop.)

Juliet is schooling me in abundance at the pool. A woman approached me yesterday. “Excuse me, is that your daughter, I have to tell you what she said!” When you have been Juliet’s mother for five years you brace yourself when someone says that. Apparently my daughter had turned around in line at the pool and told the mom behind her just how beautiful she was. Later I asked Juliet about that. “I did! And she told me I was beautiful too, and she said she liked my suit, and MOM! SHE MEANT IT!”

Scarcity tells you that there are only so many beautiful women at the pool, that you better figure out how you measure up, but Juliet knows about abundance. She knows that there is no scarcity of beautiful bodies at the pool, and the more you notice, compliment, celebrate, the more beauty you find the more room there is for your own.

This is how abundance works. It makes no sense. You subtract three spaces and wind up with seven more. You give away your seat only to find a fully reclinable plush chair for you to sit in. This is the beauty of abundance. There is always room, and letting someone take your space only makes more room for you. I don’t understand it, but I know it to be true.

When I am afraid that I won’t get mine, that no one likes me, I hold my compliments tight to my chest. If there is only so much love to go around then I better keep mine for myself. But scarcity is a liar and the truth is that the only cure for that smallness I feel, the fear that I will not be loved enough, is a radical generosity.

This summer I will be the LOVE BOMB COORDINATOR for the #wholemama project Esther started. (You can read about the #wholemama summer here.) It is a place where we bring all of ourselves as mothers AND creatives. And sometimes the best self-care you can give is to make room for someone else. It gives you a reminder that there is room for you too.

So WHAT is a LOVE BOMB and how will I COORDINATE it? A love bomb is when we all come together to lavish a deserving someone with Tweets, Facebook likes, Blog comments, emails, and general social media shout outs. Imagine waking up to the amount of Birthday notifications only they are nice things about you for seemingly no reason. It would make you feel pretty good, huh? Yeah!

Each week will have a theme. All you have to do is leave me a comment that you are in. There are an abundance of spaces. Make sure to tell me by Thursday because that is the day I will email you the person and all their social media places. Then, on FRIDAY you will go lavish love via tweets, Facebook posts and messages, and blog comments. Maybe even give them a like or a follow.

Our first love Bomb is a BEAUTY BOMB and trust me when I tell you, you are going to love loving this person. Comment to come to the party, and remember don’t tell ’em. It is a SURPRISE! If you still aren’t sure how radical generosity can really alter your experience, then just give it a try. It won’t cost you that much, and I am telling you there is nothing that fights scarcity better than this.