Too Many Lessons for Me



Did you ever have one of those weeks?  Nothing  bad happened.  Actually, in that regard, it was a good week.  But you keep getting the same message given to you over and over again.  Earlier this week I wrote about catching myself being less than I am.  It's not a pretty picture when you find yourself behaving in these very unbecoming ways.  You apologize to all involved.  You humble yourself to your friends in the hope that they will help keep you on the right path.  You think you're ready to move on and try again.  But everyday, in as many ways as possible, you are reminded again and again and again of what you did and may well be still doing. 

All week I have caught myself being critical and judgmental of another, and then doing exactly the same thing.  I shouldn't expect a co-worker to stop and visit with me after being gone a few days, if I don't stop what I'm doing and welcome him back.  I left work thinking critically of my friend and ready to be angry with him for his what he hadn't done when here I was doing the very thing I was criticizing him for.  In my short ride home, I became aware that I was pointing the finger at him when I should have been pointing at myself.

OK.  So I started the week with a lesson on my behavior and I ended it with the very same thing.  Each day, as I spent my time studying and in quiet, this message was given to me.   What are YOU doing that is better? 

And the answer, obviously, was nothing.  I was so ready to point the finger in his direction but I wasn't even looking at myself.  Oh, I thought I was.  I believed myself to be 'better' than him in these ways. But, as so often happens, God put a mirror in my every path and showed me that I had better 'take the log out of my own eye' before I throw sticks at someone else.

Wow!  What a week!  I've learned a lot and instead of feeling bad, I really feel so much better.  You see, I can't do anything about my friend and his behavior.  There is nothing I can do to remedy that situation, but there is a lot that I can do about my own.  In a time in my life when there are some big issues in which I have no control, THIS I can control.  THIS I can do something about.

And, who knows?  If I change my behaviors, if I change me, others around me just might change too.  Anyway, it's a start.  And I choose to do so, right now. 

Caught You!!!



Don't you just love it when you catch someone you really don't like doing something wrong?  You have the opportunity, either openly or alone, to gloat just a little bit -- OK, a lot -- about them and their misdeed and how you knew all along just how bad they were.  Life is really good for a little while.  And if you can catch them more than once, life is really good!

It even makes you feel a little superior to those you love when you find them in an indiscretion.  Come on now, admit it!  There's that little human part of you that says, "I knew I was just a little better than you."  It doesn't last very long and you only feel that way if the indiscretion is a minor infraction.  It's called being human. As much as we try not to, that old ego jumps right in and there you are!

And then there are those days that you find yourself doing things you neither believe in or intended to do.  But there it is.  Even as it's happening you think, 'Wait!  I shouldn't be doing this!  I should stop this now!'  But you don't.  You let it continue and it bugs you the rest of the day.  You go home at night and sit down to relax and enjoy the evening ... and there it is again.  You've tried to shove it aside all day.  You've told yourself that it wasn't so bad, it was just a little thing.  But it's feeling bigger and bigger.

Then you just know.  You must acknowledge that you were wrong.  Remember the old Happy Days show where Ritchie teaches Fonzie how to say, "I was wrong?"  That word just won't come out of his mouth.  He tries and tries, but he is so accustomed to being cool, to being right, he just can't make the word come out. And then he says it, and not only does he feel better, but so does Ritchie.  And he  says it over and over again, because it makes him feel so good!

Well, that was me this week.  I didn't hit anyone.  I didn't slander anyone.  I just gossiped about an on-going situation in my life with an innocent bystander.  She had no part in anything that happened.  There was nothing she could do about any of it.  All I accomplished was to lessen another person in her eyes; someone she had thought rather highly of.  Someone who has not been unkind to my face but has been hateful behind my back.  My friend was obviously upset when I shared my 'information.'

And did it help me in any way to share it?  No.  Even at the time I was saying it, I knew I should stop.  And afterwards I felt worse.  I knew immediately it was wrong.  I had a sleepless night.  The next morning I faced my friends, who also shared in my indiscretion, and told them that I would be apologizing to our friend for my part in what we had done.  My friend was very gracious and accepted my apology.  She even told me that I had nothing to be sorry about.  But I did, and I know it.  I hope this is another lesson learned!

How easily we recognize when others err!  How quickly we point fingers and accuse!  And just as easily we are in the wrong.  Don't you just hate that!

Proverbs 18:8 – “The words of gossip are like choice morsels; they go down to a man’s inmost parts.”