Life Lessons Learned (and Re-Learned)

In today's post I will try to sum up some of the life lessons I have been learning over the past year. I think in many ways I am probably still in pre-Kindergarten. ;)

I find as I am getting back to work and I have less 'free' time that I need to remind myself of some of these lessons learned, they are too valuable to forget. When I begin to feel stressed and things that I enjoy seem more like chores I know that I need to redirect and refocus my thoughts and activities.

 Many of the talks that I have had with Norman over the past few months have had to do with my prayer that God would reflect His Beauty in and through every area of my life and the events since praying that prayer. While I have seen changes in many areas of my life, I will focus on my garden as an example.

 I have never had a green thumb in the past and yet, following this prayer it seems that the Lord has been teaching me how to create beauty in my garden, and I have to say there can be no better instructor. When I go out to the garden without focusing on all the chores that need to be done and just enjoying 'creating beauty' I love it, there is no place I would rather be. First of all I drink in the beauty and I am so grateful for what I have. Then I notice where a few weeds are encroaching on an area and I get rid of them, observing that they come up so much easier when the ground is moist and well cultivated. I notice areas of plants that are over growing and need to be pruned back in order for the full plant to flourish and I set to work, always conscious of not being too overzealous in my pruning. I also notice that different areas of my garden work better for different plants and that it would be unrealistic for me to expect to put a plant requiring a certain environment in a location that had exactly the opposite conditions and expect it to grow as it should.  I take careful inventory of what seems to be thriving and what doesn't and, after a period of time sometimes decide to move a plant, to change it's circumstances so to speak, in order to help it attain it's potential. I am also becoming more aware of the importance of diversity of colours, heights and textures of plants in creating beauty in my garden, how boring if all I had were straight rows of one colour of petunia.

When it is just me and the Lord creating the beauty in this area of my life then I do not feel the pressure to impress others with 'my abilities' or the results, the joy is in the process. I also don't feel pressure that everything has to be perfect or finished, I realize that it is a work in progress and I can rest in that. So many of these lessons can translate to living life, raising children, helping others etc. I know that my focus needs re-direction when I look at my garden and start to feel overwhelmed with all the work that needs to be done or invite others over and then worry about what they will think of 'my' work. My eyes seem to become more critical then and it seems they are drawn only to all that needs to be done or is not working and I lose my joy and I also lose my peace. My focus is not on what is best overall for the garden or the visit, for that matter, but on myself and either my inadequacies or an overinflated sense of my own abilities.

This leads me to a book that I finally found the time to read in the last month and that has blessed me and reinforced these lessons from my garden - it is called 'Freedom from Performing' by Becky Harling. I think, like many people, I have spent a lot of time trying to impress others, trying to be good enough or thinking that if I did more God and others would somehow love or accept me more.

What I am truly discovering for myself, not just 'head knowledge' but a deep knowing is that God's love for me (us) is unconditional and unchanging. There is nothing I can do to cause Him to love me any more than He already does - or any less. When I can incorporate this 'knowing' into my life then there is no pressure on me to 'be somebody', I can relax in that perfect love. I find that whatever the activity my focus is on God and I am free to experience the joy in the process, not in the outcome and not in any 'pats on the back' I might get or concern over what others think of me. I am less apt to act impulsively and I can rest in His love, leaving the outcome with Him.

One evening during this weekend I turned on the TV and an old MASH episode came on that seemed to sum this life lesson up well. I have later discovered that it was MASH Season 9, Episode 18 and featured Patrick Swayze playing Private Gary Sturges, an injured soldier whose brother was also in the MASH unit and requiring care and blood. Through the process of desiring to give blood to his brother, it was determined that he had leukemia, at the period of time that the show was set, basically a death sentence for him. I find it interesting that Patrick Swayze was later diagnosed and died from pancreatic cancer and wonder whether he ever reflected back on this episode during his illness.

Father Mulcahy was expecting a visit from a cardinal and was letting himself get very stressed about preparing for the visit. He wanted the other soldiers on the base to make him 'look good' and he was becoming very impatient and critical with them. He was scheduled to give a sermon to the troops with the Cardinal in attendance and, again, was trying to impress by what he would say, planning to spend a significant amount of time working on getting his words just right.

Right in the middle of all of this comes the drama of Private Sturges's diagnosis and Hawkeye's depression on having to tell him the news. Father Mulcahy is called to minister to both of them in the middle of the night. As he does this, focusing on their needs and not his own, he loses track of time. Suddenly, he is reminded of the Cardinal and others waiting for him and, with no time to change,  heads over in his pajamas and robe.

This is what he said -

I want to tell you about two men. Each facing his own crisis. The first man you know rather well. The second is a patient here. Well, the first man thought he was facing a crisis. But what he was really doing was trying to impress someone. He was looking for recognition, encouragement, a pat on the back. And whenever that recognition seemed threatened he reacted rather childishly. Blamed everyone for his problems but himself because he was thinking only of himself. But the second man was confronted with the greatest crisis mortal man can face, the loss of his life. I think you will agree that the second man had every right to be selfish. But instead he chose to think not of himself, but of a brother. A brother! When the first man saw the dignity and the selflessness of the second man, he realized how petty and selfish he had...
I....
I...
I had been. It made me see something more clearly than I've ever seen it before. God didn't put us here for that pat on the back. He created us so He could be here Himself. So He could exist in the lives of those he created, in His image.

Take care, everyone.