Confirmations of Success

Over my 11 years of nursing I have gotten to meet an array of people.  As a case manager I helped numerous patients well under poverty level, and I have sat in a few meetings with people who have way too much money.  Well maybe not too much, but more than I could imagine to be enough.  It is this factor that separates them and makes them different.  Sometimes I walk past an average Joe off the street and imagine him as the wealthiest man alive, and I look a mega-billionaire on TV and wonder how they would look if they had to live off of a meager minimum wage salary. One of my favorite things in my nursery rotation was to look at all of the babies in the bassinets.  They all lay there in their identical white hospital shirts, wrapped in the exact same hospital blanket.  Nothing separating them…all equal.  What would they grow up to be? What homes would they go to?  What advantages and disadvantages would they face? How would they be shaped and what would determine their success?

I used to tell people given the right circumstances I could have been so much more. More what? I don’t know.  At one point in my life (and not even that long ago) more would have been more money.  But being more to me now encompasses so many things.  I look around at people around me daily…This is something I love to do. I love to watch people, analyze them, and sadly yes…even at times label them.  I know it’s wrong! But it’s the truth and I don’t care too much for writing or saying anything that is not genuine and helpful.  What I have noticed is that everyone is looking for something to fulfill them and confirm that they are on the "right track"…confirmation that they have succeeded.  This is why poor people who “make it” buy nice things and fat kids who lose weight love 10 year reunions. Why parents love successful children.  We are all looking for confirmation and approval…our place in the world.  

I sat at my desk eagerly awaiting  the class valentine party. Our teacher told us the homeroom mom should be here anytime so we should sit and do a quiet activity while we waited.  I looked across the room at my friend; in 2^nd grade everyone is still your friend.  She was dressed in all pink and red with a big bow to match!  She had on the whitest pair of keds tennis shoes that have ever existed (as I mom I appreciate the care that must have went into those shoes…it was no small task).  Not a hair on her head was out of place.  She was so dainty and delicate.  I always dreamed of living her life…that I would go to bed one night in my bed and wake up in hers. At that moment her mom walked in the classroom carrying a gigantic chocolate chip cookie with red and pink writing on it…”Happy Valentine’s Day”.  She was so beautiful!  She had on a perfect outfit and the most beautiful jewelry.  My favorite was the gold bracelet that dangled from her wrist.  I imagined her in a big fancy house getting her daughter and herself ready that morning.  I bet they had pancakes and orange juice.  I wonder if they have one of those fancy tubs with feet on it, like in the movies.  I wish I was her and that was my mom.  I wanted my mom to dress me in pretty clothes, not the hand me downs from my cousin (who was a boy).  He was much older than me, but luckily enough I was just chubby enough that it worked out perfectly.  She was and had had everything that I lacked.  

As a little girl you could not have convinced me that this pair had a problem in the world.  She would go home after the party with her beautiful mom in their fancy car to their mansion and live happily ever after…because that is happiness, right?  All the fancy things are what made people happy.  After all they were the only differences.  I mean we both had parents, and homes, we went to the same school…the only difference was money…yes money that is what made people happy.  I rode the bus home that afternoon praying that I had not done anything to set my mom off that day and hopeful my dad had not either.  I had packed my clothes and sat through the, “We are getting a divorce” speech so many times that I was numb to any emotion that should accompany it .  I could pack and unpack my things in record time.  It was kind of a game at this point.  My mother was detailed with the reasons (to detailed in my opinion), “Your dad loves his girlfriend more than us.  Your dad has decided he wants to be single and not worried with us anymore.” And on and on.  My stomach was always in knots on the bus and I cringed when I walked in the door and could tell she was ready for a fight.  My mom was always ready for a fight with someone; if not my dad or us; it would be with my aunt of one her of “best friends”.    I have never understood her constant state of anger or why she insisted on having conflict at all times.  I remember her being very judgmental and pushy with people.  It was “her way or the highway”. 

Just be quiet and go to your room.  But it didn’t help…the screaming began and someone was gonna get it.  Life was so uncertain, but the funny thing was, in my mind the reason my life was so bad was not the drugs or the alcohol, or the parties, or the fights, or the abuse…it was because we were poor.  I thought to be a “happy family” one needed to have the fancy car, the mansion, the pretty outfits, and the keds…one must have the splendorous gleaming white keds! I’m telling you guys these shoes…you would have had to see them to appreciate them. Dirt fell. Off. Of. Them! Magic.

They wheel my little bundle of joy in. She is in her white hospital shirt and wrapped in her hospital blanket.  I feel the determination to give this child “THE PERFECT LIFE”…I have a beautiful little pair of newborn size white leather keds at home.  I think most people would agree that I am above average intelligence (at least average).  You would think that it would not be hard for me to figure out the simple fact that happiness has nothing to do with money. Welp, when you are 22 with limited knowledge of what a “happy healthy family” is you go with what you know; which just happened to be the fact that everyone I knew who had a happy childhood had money too.  I had not had a happy childhood and did not have money.  You can see how this is pretty reasonable right? So the pursuit of “happiness” began.  

Now don’t get me wrong I am all about goals and having nice things (that you can afford), but what I have come to understand over the years is that searching for happiness outside of yourself…in things around you is pointless.  Take it from someone who knows.  It always feels like we are a step behind.  I wish we could just get above water and stay there.  I was always paying something late, and it was stressing me out badly.  Yet still I bought Hannah the new outfit or the new pair of shoes.  It doesn’t matter what I have to sacrifice she will have the life she deserves! I mean our children deserve 16 pairs of pants, they deserve 20 shirts and a new laptop, and the latest iPhone, and 2 gaming stations with all the accessories. What child can survive without an iPad.  I mean these things are the future.  If my child doesn’t have their own ipad and know how the operating system works by age 4 I might as well buy the McDonald’s uniform myself! Panic sets in.  If my child does not succeed it is my fault…I should have been able to provide more.  More? More things?  Yes more.  I mean look at me…if I had a pretty pink outfit with bow and gleaming white keds I may have won the Nobe Peace Prize by this point in my life!   I may have been a huge success.

Hannah is sitting in the middle of the living room floor.  She is 4 and it is Christmas morning.  She is excited to begin opening her gifts.  She rips through the first ten and squeals with happiness at each new gift; especially the ones Santa brought her.  She had originally asked for $12.98 worth of toys.  I thought it was sweet, but I was giving her the Christmas she deserved! So I bought and I bought…and I bought.  You could barely see her little body as the torn paper and empty boxes mounded around her.  She was almost half way done opening her Christmas. She opened the last box within her sight and said, “Thank you”, with a sweet little smile.  Hannah is and has always been a very grateful and polite little girl.  She starts to get up as I am reaching for another gift.  She looks over her shoulder, turns back to me, and says, “There’s more?” with a look of exhaustion.  It was clear to me and as I looked up to James I could tell it was clear to him…I had overdone it.  I just wanted it to be perfect.  I wanted her to have everything she had dreamed of.  The truth of the matter was everything she had dreamed of was $12.98.  Everything I had dreamed us surrounded us in the living room that morning.

That Christmas morning was the beginning of a very imperfect journey I would begin to have as a Christian woman, wife, and mother. One in which I would and still struggle with and stumble daily. It was very apparent to me that morning that something was wrong.  At this point it was hazy, but I knew that I needed to change my heart in some way.  Although everything I did was out of love for Hannah and James it was still from an unhealthy place.   I would do these kind things and go so overboard, but the outcome would never match the feeling I had imagined in my head.  Suddenly the perfect Christmas I had dreamed up was not so perfect.  It didn’t make sense.  It confused me.  It was all there…the nice house, the cute clothes, all the gifts, the pancakes and orange juice for breakfast…the keds!! Why did I not feel like it was perfect?

We recently started a bible study and within the first few lessons we covered the Sermon on the Mount.  Man this was eye opening for me.  In this sermon many important things are covered, but what God needed me to hear was that there are a million things outside of you in this life that promise happiness.  You can obsess over money, your looks, you status, even your relationships.  There are many things that promise happiness, but at the end of the day until you stop and realize that true happiness and serenity are internal you will forever search for that peace and you will forever come up empty handed.  I think sometimes that back when I was younger internal happiness would not have been possible because God truly didn’t live there.  I had so much hate and anger that it was impossible for him to occupy space in my heart.  Even though I went through the motions of being a Godly person...a "good person" to those around me...my heart was empty without God at the center of it.  It tainted everything I tried to accomplish.

The following scriptures changed my life, and I hope they find you in a place where they can change yours.  There comes a point in life when you surrender to him.  You accept that he is strong and you are weak.  He is smart and you are ignorant.  He is all knowing and you are lost without his guidance.  You stop focusing on everything around you that does not matter. You do the needed work, you change your heart, you give it to him, and then your whole world changes…then you no longer need a pair of sparkling white keds.  You realize all the riches and all your happiness come from your relationship with God.  And when you finally give up and loosen your grip on this life; surrendering to him the weight of this world will be lifted. When you make peace on the inside everything on the outside falls into place. And that is confirmation of success. 

 

Matthew 5:3-12

New International Version (NIV)

³ “Blessed are the poor in spirit,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
⁴ Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted.
⁵ Blessed are the meek,
    for they will inherit the earth.
⁶ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
    for they will be filled.
⁷ Blessed are the merciful,
    for they will be shown mercy.
⁸ Blessed are the pure in heart,
    for they will see God.
⁹ Blessed are the peacemakers,
    for they will be called children of God.
¹⁰ Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

¹¹ “Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. ¹² Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

My Daily Prayer is that I desire God and his purpose more than I desire the things of this world and the false promise of their happiness...