Astonishing a mean world is quite the life goal. Flipping the script. Not buying in to the smallness, pettiness, and cruelty you see around you.
Imagine the ripple effects of such kindness.
Perhaps you’ve heard the story of the man and the starfish. In sum, a man is walking along the beach at low tide finding starfish that have landed too far above the water line to survive. He dislodges them and throws them back into the ocean. A bystander is astonished and scolds him, saying that he will never be able to make a difference as there are miles and miles of beach with hundreds of stranded starfish. The man responds, tossing another back into the ocean, “Made a difference to that one,” he remarks.
Making a difference doesn’t have to be a grand gesture. It can be quite small, perhaps only affecting the person in front of you right now. Perhaps the difference is choosing an unexpected response to cruelty. Perhaps the response is to not lose hope.
Hang in there. The starfish are right in front of you on your path if you choose to see them.
This moment we are in is but one in the collection of moments that make a life, a story, a history. Each moment building on the last, forward toward a powerful culmination. To stay hopeful and earnest in each moment, no matter how dire, is a testament to what we hold dear, to hope, to a belief that all things will ultimately work together for good.
As Howard Zinn says,
TO BE HOPEFUL in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction. And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.
Do not give up on the beliefs you have. To be decent, kind, not returning hate for hate, to speak truth to power, to retain hope for a brighter future, a future willing to work for. That is a marvelous victory.
When we find ourselves in challenging times and are unsure which way to turn, let these words help guide you.
Do justice. Peace, justice, love are things we do and bring about, not things we wait for. With our best discernment, we offer ourselves to the world, hoping to make a difference. Kind words, loving hearts, calm demeanors, patience, forbearance, and forgiveness. The way of the One we follow. A servant’s heart but a leader’s strength.
Love mercy. Oh, how the world loves vengeance, cancelling, grudges, getting even, punishment. To love mercy is a kinder, gentler path, one that believes in the redeem-ability of every last one of us. One that doesn’t insist on being avenged or having the last word. One that delights in forgiveness and healing.
Walk humbly. No matter how hard we try to do or be right, we may be wrong. The other guy might be right. And, get this, God loves the other guy as much as God love you.
Are there people in your life who encourage you and make you feel stronger and lifted up? Are there some who drag you down or take the wind out of your sails? In her book, Balcony People, Joyce Landor Heatherley argues there are two types of people: the evaluators and the affirmers. She suggests:
I am sure, if there were a way to view a movie and see instant replays of all the strategic change points in our lives, that we’d instantly spot the people who either broke our spirits by their critical or judgmental evaluations, or who healed us by their loving, perceptive affirmations.
To be honest, I seem to be able to remember the negative comments of evaluators faster and more clearly than the positive remarks of the affirmers. I’m not alone in this ability to recall the negative….I suspect that not far from anyone’s conscious level of thinking lies the memory of an evaluator who pulled on his or her spiked boots and stomped deliberately over our bare soul and personhood.
Do you have any of these evaluators in your life? Maybe you can recognize the voice in your head that tells you that you can’t do something. In her book The Artist’s Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, Julia Cameron calls these the censors. Maybe you have many censors, a rogue’s gallery of them.
So what do we do with these evaluators and censors to keep them from stifling our blossoming with their negative talk or opinions? Heatherley suggests leaving them in the past, even if that past was five minutes ago:
We all have the choice to replay the harmful remarks from evaluators, or we can choose to let them pass on. We can even choose to make allowances for their discouraging, destructive words. But best of all is the choice to willingly focus our minds and hearts on today’s person who is affirming us.
So who are these affirmers in our lives? Think back…
Who by one small sentence or more, has changed and lifted your opinion of yourself? Who was the person early in your life who recognized the first sparks of originality in the labyrinths of your mind and soul and saw what no one else saw? And who is the special affirmer who catches quick glimpses of the flames from the fires of your potential and tells you so? Who, by his or her words, helps you to respect and believe in your own value as a person? And who is the affirmer who encourages you to stretch and dream beyond your self-imposed limits and capabilities?
These affirmers are your Balcony People, cheering you on to blossom and stretch. These are the people whose words you must cling to when working toward your goal. These affirmers see you “by a clearer, truer light. They [are] able to peel back the layers of pretense [you] wear like like costumes for a bad play. Most of the time they [see] through and past the masks [you] hide behind. Then, once having broken through to [you] they’d get on with the business of motivating [you] to be all [you] can be.”
Affirmation is vital to our health and progress:
When others discern the good, the noble, the honorable, and the just tenets of our character (no matter how minuscule they may be) and proceed to tell us how they admire those traits, we feel visible. We begin to ‘see’ ourselves and our worth. We feel nurtured and nourished, but mostly we feel loved.
The Basement People do just the opposite. With their words they cause you to doubt and shrink. They focus on your flaws or failings. They encourage you to not try, to stay where you are, to wallow in the “murky waters of failure and discouragement.” We don’t need to linger on their words.
Who is in your Balcony? Who cheers you on and sees your unique worth? Who do you admire in history for their accomplishments or moral victories?
When you struggle, picture these people, your Balcony People. Remember their words. Let their affirmations encourage and comfort you in defeat and to keep pressing onward in your goals.
You are meant to blossom not wither. You are meant to shine not lurk in the shadows.
One of the most joyful things about teaching is finding the method that leads to a particular child learning where perhaps they struggled before. Finding the right key for the lock. Teaching, in this way, is one of the most creative and challenging jobs because each child is unique. Not every child can simply sit at a desk and listen to their teacher drone on and somehow absorb and master the material. In fact, a student who would prefer this lecture method is rare.
A vibrant classroom is filled with hands-on, group work, mentoring, art, music, activities, and so on. There are so many ways to teach and pair the right method with the right child. This is why a good teacher will always feel they learn as much as they teach. Of course, implicit in this challenge is having as the goal, helping the child learn. When obedience and regiment replaces learning as the goal, and the teaching method is rigid and unyielding, often students will struggle and fall through the gaps.
Teachers need to always keep their eye on the ball. The bottom line, the mission, is helping children learn.
There are so many areas where the same analysis applies. Where perhaps we fail to keep our eye on the right ball.
My pastor posted the following:
The method v. The mission. There are many ‘This is the way we’ve always done it’ or ‘Technology isn’t our thing’ or ‘Let’s just keep to ourselves’ sentiments behind each failing church. And misplaced beliefs that perhaps there’s just no space for church anymore in today’s world.
And yet.
In both teaching and ministry, there remains the mission. To help children learn. To help God’s people. And these needs in the world are growing, not shrinking.
So then the question becomes, and really always has been, how can we adapt our methods to fulfill our mission?
It’s okay to be heartbroken for more than one group of people at the same time. When it comes to showing compassion, we don’t have to pick sides. Sometimes, often really, maybe even always, there is hurt and anguish everywhere, and we can mourn the lot of it.
Beware people who tell you not to be concerned for this group or that group and the hurt they feel.
Beware those who try to dehumanize others.
Beware those who lump you in as the ‘enemy’ for working to assure people are treated humanely.
Beware people who draw lines between us and them.
Beware those who try to limit you to a label or single identity.
Our hearts are big enough to embrace it all. What we must save is love.
When we find ourselves in challenging times and are unsure which way to turn, let these words help guide you.
Do justice. Peace, justice, love are things we do and bring about, not things we wait for. With our best discernment, we offer ourselves to the world, hoping to make a difference. Kind words, loving hearts, calm demeanors, patience, forbearance, and forgiveness. The way of the One we follow. A servant’s heart but a leader’s strength.
Love mercy. Oh, how the world loves vengeance, cancelling, grudges, getting even, punishment. To love mercy is a kinder, gentler path, one that believes in the redeem-ability of every last one of us. One that doesn’t insist on being avenged or having the last word. One that delights in forgiveness and healing.
Walk humbly. No matter how hard we try to do or be right, we may be wrong. The other guy might be right. And, get this, God loves the other guy as much as God love you.
I was scrolling on what used to be called Twitter and read the following post.
This really struck me. What am I doing with the power, life, opportunities, strengths, etc., that I actually have? Not the ones I dream of having, or used to have, or might someday have, or ones I admire in someone else. Mine. Right here, right now.
If you look for thorns, you’ll see thorns. If you look for love, you’ll see it all around you. And if you look for opportunities to make a difference, to shower people with love, and to take a stand for all that is good and right in the world, those opportunities will be there.
Sometimes turning off the news is the best form of mental health protection.
But then we remember. In times of darkness, there are always those working to light a path, helping, fighting for the common good, making progress.
And maybe we, too, can help.
Maybe not in large, brokering peace kind of ways. But in small ways that, combined together with the small ways of many, many others, may help to right a wrong or turn a tide.
I think of Horton Hears a Who by Dr. Seuss, everyone shouting and banging on pots to be heard, but it is the final Yopp of a child that turns the tide, saving their world.
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