Get some common-sense please. It's FREE!

My fingernail fell off today (well, part of it anyway). I need to remember that these kinds of things aren’t always exciting for everyone else, but I found it quite exciting. Perhaps it was the anticipation of knowing for the past 3 months that it was going to fall off. & perhaps it’s because I know my fingers are in the very last stage of recovery. It still be a little while B4 my fingernails are back to normal. The fingers are doing good though.

I’ve been reminded this wk about how incredible of a family I have. I think the 1st reminder came in a conversation I found myself in about performance & its relation to self-perception & self-worth. We all know that our culture is a performance-driven culture, & I might go as far to say that it’s simply a condition of the human race as a whole. Well, I have to say I’m not all that performance driven. I don’t find my worth in my achievements. I just don’t. & I don’t think I can take the credit for that either. I have to give the credit to my parents & the way they raised me. They have always praised me for who I am & linked my identity & achievements to God. Praise for achievements did not come B4 that. My parents have always encouraged me & my sibs to be faithful stewards of the gifts & talents God has given us, recognizing that God has gifted each of us in different ways. I think that (mixed w/ sound, biblical discipline) is largely why we haven’t had all that much sibling rivalry. Now of course my parents didn’t ignore my achievements. Special achievements usu. merited a trip to the local DQ for blizzards.

I do have to say, though, that our performance-driven culture still has taken its toll on me in other ways. I think we assume that achievements are an accurate reflection of a person’s inner condition. You know, you see someone who is successful or incredibly gifted, & you think, “Now they, they have it all together.” That kind of thinking is exceedingly flawed. Speaking from someone viewed under that lens, no one has it all together. We are all human. My flaws & struggles are bountiful. So are yours. I loathed stereotypes. Why? Because it doesn’t matter who puts the mold on you, it’s still hard to break out of. & no, I’m not saying that I’m completely innocent of forcing other ppl into molds.

Are you performance-driven? Where do you find your value & self-worth?

While I’m on my soapbox, I have to say that I still can’t believe that a family of meerkats at the Minnesota Zoo were put down because a 9-yr old girl was bitten by one of them. Her parents chose the lives of 5 cats over their daughter having to get rabies shots? Sure, it would be a different story if it hadn’t been the girls fault, but it was her fault. She had to climb over several barriers to even get to the cats. & where were her parents? You go to a zoo w/ a 9-yr old child, you keep a close eye on them. You go to a mall, same thing. Amuement park, same thing. Restaurant? Take a guess. That sounds like common-sense parenting to me. Mom, Dad, thank you for having common-sense. Thank you for laying the right hand of judgment on my seat of understanding. Thank you for not sparing the rod…er, chopstick.