Becoming a Free Bird

You are in the Birdy Launching process, with the end goal of becoming a Free Bird. Please take a moment and sit with that word. How different doesn’t it feel over ‘empty nester’?

When I hear ‘empty nester’ I picture a dried out, soiled, sad looking nest, with some scattered feathers here and there. It makes me sad. I don’t want to picture my home or my life like that. And it also pecks at the feminist in me – I see all these ways that women ‘of a certain age’ aka no longer of childbearing age, are being discarded and seen as ‘used’ and no longer vibrant and valuable. I strongly reject that notion!

We need a reframe! We need a reframe so much that we call it being a BirdyLauncher over here, and we are also using the term Free Bird.
Because words matter.
How we frame and talk about thing changes our experience of it.

A Free Bird is bold, beautiful and bright, full of zest and zeal. A Free Bird is strong and confident in her choices, leading her life with connection and grace.

Being a Free Bird is the goal, and that’s not the beginning of the BirdyLauncher process. You might not be there yet. Right now, you might be worried about your kid leaving, worried about your future relationship with them. Worried if you’ll be needed as a mama.

Or maybe you can’t wait for them to leave – you have so much exploring to do!

For most of us it’s a “both/and”. We are both excited for our kids’ next chapter, and sad they are leaving. Both/and.

Which word best resonates with you, describing your relationship to this major life transition?
Birdy Launcher? Empty Nester? Free Bird?