I sit down for a few minutes every morning to read the daily Abilene paper on my computer. Something the online paper has that the physical paper does not, is the ability to make a comment on an article. It does not really matter what the article is about, most comments about the article boil down to just a few topics. Some of the favorite topics boil down to:
1. Our elected or appointed officials are corrupt and are not leading us in the right direction.
2. You are not very intelligent for believing what you believe, and I am superior to you because I believe something different.
These are not my opinions; yet these seem to be what comes out in the comments about articles in the paper.
For one reason or another we are extremely hard on those that have been elected to serve or who have been appointed to serve our schools, communities, counties, state, etc…. We all do it. It is easy to criticize those who have been placed in a position of leadership. It is easy to believe that someone else could do a better job, or at least address my concerns, in a timely manner. It is easy to make accusations when the chances of anyone knowing who really made the comment are slim. How often do we complain about things going on in civic organization, our church, our school, etc. but never sit down with the powers that be to discuss the things we see wrong? We are quick to complain, but slow to bring these matters up with those who need to hear or can make a difference regarding our complaint/”observation.”
We don’t deal well with those who believe differently than we do. We believe differently about so many things, education, politics, religions, etc. At some point in time, having interactions with others who believe differently than we do has become a more combative interaction. We are all guilty of it. It may be co-workers from different generations, or people affiliated with different groups or organizations, etc., or we may come into contact with others who believe differently than we do. Most of us are at least somewhat polite to their face, but behind closed doors or in the confines of likeminded people we feel free to make them anything but human.
People do the same thing everywhere you go. To some extent, we distrust those who work to serve the greater good of our organization or community. We feel threatened or superior to those who believe differently than we do. But taking pot shots at others does not benefit the community we are a part of.
What are you going to do? Are you going to take pot shots at people from behind a computer screen, or at the local coffee shop, or the closest salon? Or are you going to take your concerns to someone that has the ability to make changes on a particular issue that concerns you?
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Loss...
Over the past week I have had a chance to chat with a couple of friends that I have not had a chance to connect with in a while. I almost had the chance to chat with a couple of other friends that I have not seen in a while; unfortunately our schedules didn’t allow it…
Of the friends I did not have a chance to connect with, one was a former college roommate, and the other one of my best friends from college, who was also my best man when I got married. They called me to let me know they were coming through Abilene and wanted to see if we could catch up. Their calls got me thinking about our time in college. We were young, we were ambitious, we thought we were going to turn the world upside down. I have not exactly turned the world upside down, but I have been able to do a few things I never thought I would be doing. But still, for a moment or two I could feel the loss of time, the loss of opportunities, dreams, etc. that I will never get back.
Of the friends that I did get to connect with, one was a former boss, and the other a friend who I worked with at a church in Lubbock. I was able to chat with my former boss on the phone for almost an hour. He was really more than a boss; he was another father figure in my life. After our conversation I thought a lot about the many things I was able to be a part of while working with him. But at the same time I also thought about many of the things I was not able to be a part of when I left working for him.
I was able to sit and talk with my friend and former coworker after a long day of meetings in Lubbock. We talked about our kids and our wives. We talked a little about our jobs. He made fun of me because I still cannot figure out all the features of my laptop and iphone. As I headed home from Lubbock I thought about our work together. There were things we dreamed of but never got to accomplish, there were also experiences we never expected that we were privileged to be a part of. But there were many thoughts that hauntingly reappeared reminding me of so many things that never got traction.
I wonder if those who go through a mid-life crisis have some of the same feelings I have had as I reminisced about my friends and our lives together. It really seems I should have done more in my life by now. I have some feelings of anxiousness, sadness, loss that so many things I want to accomplish are no where close to becoming a reality. I think too often life just moves on and we never acknowledge we have experienced a loss. We rarely take the time to mourn, to grieve the woulda, coulda, shoulda’s… This may be because we do not know how to grieve healthily. Too many of us have been raised to stuff our stuff deep down inside, forgetting that our stuff will come out one day and it is usually not very pretty when it does…
We all experience loss. At some time we will disconnect from a friend. At other times it is a loss of a dream or possibilities, or the loss of getting to continue to make our own decisions, etc. We need to acknowledge our losses, we need to grieve them in a constructive way. We also need to remember that of the many things we have lost, not been able to complete or accomplish, there are probably that many if not more things we have to celebrate being a part of, rejoicing that we were a part of something or many something’s we never thought possible.
Of the friends I did not have a chance to connect with, one was a former college roommate, and the other one of my best friends from college, who was also my best man when I got married. They called me to let me know they were coming through Abilene and wanted to see if we could catch up. Their calls got me thinking about our time in college. We were young, we were ambitious, we thought we were going to turn the world upside down. I have not exactly turned the world upside down, but I have been able to do a few things I never thought I would be doing. But still, for a moment or two I could feel the loss of time, the loss of opportunities, dreams, etc. that I will never get back.
Of the friends that I did get to connect with, one was a former boss, and the other a friend who I worked with at a church in Lubbock. I was able to chat with my former boss on the phone for almost an hour. He was really more than a boss; he was another father figure in my life. After our conversation I thought a lot about the many things I was able to be a part of while working with him. But at the same time I also thought about many of the things I was not able to be a part of when I left working for him.
I was able to sit and talk with my friend and former coworker after a long day of meetings in Lubbock. We talked about our kids and our wives. We talked a little about our jobs. He made fun of me because I still cannot figure out all the features of my laptop and iphone. As I headed home from Lubbock I thought about our work together. There were things we dreamed of but never got to accomplish, there were also experiences we never expected that we were privileged to be a part of. But there were many thoughts that hauntingly reappeared reminding me of so many things that never got traction.
I wonder if those who go through a mid-life crisis have some of the same feelings I have had as I reminisced about my friends and our lives together. It really seems I should have done more in my life by now. I have some feelings of anxiousness, sadness, loss that so many things I want to accomplish are no where close to becoming a reality. I think too often life just moves on and we never acknowledge we have experienced a loss. We rarely take the time to mourn, to grieve the woulda, coulda, shoulda’s… This may be because we do not know how to grieve healthily. Too many of us have been raised to stuff our stuff deep down inside, forgetting that our stuff will come out one day and it is usually not very pretty when it does…
We all experience loss. At some time we will disconnect from a friend. At other times it is a loss of a dream or possibilities, or the loss of getting to continue to make our own decisions, etc. We need to acknowledge our losses, we need to grieve them in a constructive way. We also need to remember that of the many things we have lost, not been able to complete or accomplish, there are probably that many if not more things we have to celebrate being a part of, rejoicing that we were a part of something or many something’s we never thought possible.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Waiting
We took our kids to a water park while on vacation this summer. Usually I stay in the small kiddie area with our two younger children while my wife takes our two older children to the big kid areas. My wife took some pity on me and let me take our oldest son to one of the newer slides. We stood in line for about 30 minutes, which I did not think was that bad of a wait for the new slide… However my oldest child thought the line was moving slower than a snail’s pace. I may have had a little different perspective than my oldest child, since just a few weeks before I had been to a different water park with Junior High and High School students from our Church. At that water park there were several slides/attractions that the wait was anywhere from 2 – 4 hours.
As my oldest child and I waited in line I heard myself utter something that only a parent says… “You know you are going to have to get used to standing in line, it’s just part of life.” I surprised myself by saying something so “parent.” But that statement got me to thinking…
While waiting in line is something most of us have to do on a regular basis, we are not very good at waiting. You would think that with all the lines we have to wait in, we would be a more patient people, but the opposite seems true. We seem to be less patient with others. We seem not to want to wait, even though somewhere deep inside we know we have to…
We have packed our lives so full of activities that to wait anywhere throws off our schedule. Even when we take time to relax or take a vacation, we don’t want to wait; we don’t want to be patient. For many of us the start of a new school year is a time we can start new activities/projects or pick up those things we laid aside for the summer. Maybe with a new school year we need to reevaluate what we do and why we do it. Maybe we need to stop doing a few things that for one reason or another, we have been roped into, so that we have more time for those things that are important to us.
We grow to be more patient as we choose to be patient. We are surrounded by those who choose to be impatient, but we can choose to be different, and as we choose to be different we might just be surprised at the difference we make in the lives of others.
As my oldest child and I waited in line I heard myself utter something that only a parent says… “You know you are going to have to get used to standing in line, it’s just part of life.” I surprised myself by saying something so “parent.” But that statement got me to thinking…
While waiting in line is something most of us have to do on a regular basis, we are not very good at waiting. You would think that with all the lines we have to wait in, we would be a more patient people, but the opposite seems true. We seem to be less patient with others. We seem not to want to wait, even though somewhere deep inside we know we have to…
We have packed our lives so full of activities that to wait anywhere throws off our schedule. Even when we take time to relax or take a vacation, we don’t want to wait; we don’t want to be patient. For many of us the start of a new school year is a time we can start new activities/projects or pick up those things we laid aside for the summer. Maybe with a new school year we need to reevaluate what we do and why we do it. Maybe we need to stop doing a few things that for one reason or another, we have been roped into, so that we have more time for those things that are important to us.
We grow to be more patient as we choose to be patient. We are surrounded by those who choose to be impatient, but we can choose to be different, and as we choose to be different we might just be surprised at the difference we make in the lives of others.
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