What ‘flow’ really means in motherhood

As a student of Bella Lively, I learned about the act of flowing — surrendering to your inner voice and following it over the mind’s noise.

Bella often shares magical stories of listening to her inner voice even when her mind had strong desire - and every time, life unfolded with more ease and peace.

Another teacher of flow is Michael Singer. In The Surrender Experiment, he shares how trusting life completely led him to exactly where he needed to be.

Before motherhood, learning to “flow” was new for me. I’ve always hated changing plans. It felt uncomfortable but never impossible.

Clarification: flowing is not the same as “going with the flow.” Going with the flow often means going along with others’ plans — maybe to keep harmony. That’s okay sometimes! But always defaulting to others’ plans or external circumstances isn’t flow — it’s passivity. It means you’re not taking accountability for your life decisions or being intentional about your path.

Flow, on the other hand, is an inner surrender — it’s about releasing the mind’s need to control and opening to the quiet direction of life moving through you.

I’ve found that flow isn’t optional, it’s essential in motherhood. Because, in short, flow is the softening of the mind’s (or ego’s) stronghold on controlling the moment — or future moments. And that’s exactly what caregiving requires: a daily surrender to what is unfolding.

Traveling with Meera, for example, has been one of my greatest lessons in flow. No matter how well I plan, something always changes — naps, meals, moods, timing. The mind might want to tighten and control, but the body and heart remind me: soften. Adapt. Trust that the next moment will show me what’s needed.

That’s flow in motherhood — not a loss of structure, but a loss of struggle.