At first,
I thought this was something
I only did with my husband.
A kind of invisible adjustment.
Watching reactions.
Reading the mood.
Trying to keep everything flowing smoothly.
But today,
I realized
it was much bigger than that.
Lunch
Two days earlier,
I bought two packs of Australian beef ribs.
That evening,
I grilled one of them in a frying pan.
My son ate quite a bit.
My daughter enjoyed it too.
I just tasted one piece
to check how it turned out.
My husband ate outside that night.
Afterward,
my son casually mentioned
that he might want to eat less meat.
Two days later,
I opened the second pack.
I wasn’t planning to make it the main meal.
I thought it would simply be a side dish for lunch.
First,
I sliced some onions and shiitake mushrooms.
Then I sautéed them in olive oil with a little salt.
After that,
I started grilling the beef.
Not all of it.
I left some in the refrigerator,
thinking someone might want more later.
At the time,
I didn’t realize
my system had already started speeding up.
Because grilling beef like that
requires attention.
I stayed by the stove,
turning the meat one piece at a time.
Trying to keep it tender.
Not undercooked.
Not overcooked.
Just right.
So without realizing it,
I had already become slightly tense
while trying to get the meat just right.
“That’s for the Person Cooking to Decide.”
When my son came out,
I started serving the food.
“How much do you want?”
But instead of answering directly,
he said something he has said
several times before.
“That’s for the person cooking to decide.”
At first,
that kind of response used to frustrate me.
Why not just answer?
Why make it complicated?
But this time,
something clicked.
I realized
I wasn’t simply asking a question.
I was already scanning everything.
How hungry he looked.
Whether there would be enough meat.
Whether my husband might come out.
Whether the atmosphere would become uncomfortable.
Whether everyone would feel okay.
I thought I was being considerate.
But underneath it,
I was already tuning the entire situation.
Everyone had their own system.
My husband explains everything.
My son simplifies everything.
My daughter notices the structure immediately.
And I—
I tune.
Later,
my daughter said something interesting.
“The answer was already decided.
Mom just made it complicated.”
And honestly—
she was right.
There wasn’t enough meat
for everyone to eat freely.
We all already knew that.
But I was still trying to create
the perfect emotional flow around it.
Even though no one else seemed to be worried about it.
Mid-point
Sometimes,
we think we’re helping the situation.
But we’re actually responding to
our own tension first.
The Shift
By then,
my head was starting to hurt.
While listening to the sound of my husband eating,
I walked over to the veranda
and looked up at the sky.
I let out a long breath
without thinking.
A little later,
I ate my lunch slowly.
And then,
I went out to exercise.
While moving,
something slowly loosened inside me.
The morning no longer felt so tight.
Earlier that day,
I thought the tension was coming from my family.
But later,
I realized something else.
Maybe my nervous system
had already become tense
while grilling the meat.
Trying to grill it just right.
Trying to keep it tender.
Trying to make enough for everyone.
Trying to keep the atmosphere comfortable.
And without realizing it,
I had started tuning everything again.
Tteokbokki, Misutgaru, and Pasta
Later that evening,
I made homemade soup tteokbokki
using organic rice cakes.
I boiled eggs too.
My son seemed curious.
He liked the idea of testing something new.
He tasted the soup quietly,
then smiled and said,
“Mom, you eat it.”
Earlier,
he had done the same thing
with the organic misutgaru,
a traditional Korean grain drink.
One sip.
Then,
“Mom, you drink it.”
So I made mine thick and cold,
and honestly—
it tasted really good.
My husband drank a large cup too.
My daughter said
the one I made tasted better than hers.
Then later,
I made soy sauce pasta for my son.
He added grated cheese
and ate a big bowl happily.
At one point,
I could hear him laughing in his room.
And suddenly,
the entire day felt different.
Not perfectly peaceful.
Not perfectly resolved.
Just softer.
Closing
Earlier that day,
I thought my stress
was coming from other people.
But later,
I realized something important.
Sometimes,
the tension begins much earlier than we think.
Sometimes,
it starts while grilling meat in a hot pan,
trying to make everything turn out just right.
And sometimes,
a simple shift is enough
to stop tuning everything
and return to yourself again.
