Rearview Mirror

Instead of a new year resolution or a word for the year, I have a vaguely constructed plan to occasionally share life lessons of some of the tough stories I collected over a decade. With intent to hopefully inspire/encourage.

In retrospect, regardless the variety of ways humans can suffer, in particular at the hands of others, that I heard and read multiple times, the worst was the issue of the lingering damage by despairing defeatism and lack of self-esteem, which negatively impacted will to do.

To be clear, there is a huge difference between narcissistic arrogant self-confidence and the willing-to-try-again kind of self assurance.

We are taught to ‘give up self’ to let go and let God. So, how do we parse the difference between needing self confidence to soldier on through all of life’s challenges and also being completely self-less?

Maybe there are two kinds of ‘self’. The self God designed to do positive things and the self that satan uses to do negative things.

Countless ways come together to cause someone to feel hopeless and useless. Most often this is the fruit of rotten seeds planted by someone else. Abuse, physical and/or mental, seems to be an ancient tool used to overpower and keep someone else in an enslaved mindset without hope or will to succeed at anything. Sometimes it is perpetuating. Those who are abused become abusers.

Modern psychology identifies this in specific ‘opathy’ terms. I see it as just another way satan seeks to destroy us - from within.

How do you inspire and encourage someone who has been told that he or she could never amount to anything, was a hopeless fool and a great disappointment?

This is worst case, of course, but the topic is somewhat endemic - in a world where the fundamental drive in humans is to be seen as approved/belonging as the ultimate confirmation of self worth.

We have an inherent need to be acceptable.

Even in ordinary daily life there are subtle ways that humans can discourage others, based in this primitive tribal instinct. Like children who come together as a team and then bully another child.

So many ways we create divisions by judgmental criteria of who is ‘good enough’ to be included - social groups, religion, education level, work status, credentials, titles, income, political views. Social media is a dynamic influence on collective judging.

Keeping it real, we each and all judge others in one way or another - determining who we are compatible with or not. It’s a primitive survival instinct. Birds of a feather flock together.

‘Good enough’, as I see it, is open to a higher interpretation. If only there was a way to instill the life affirming determination that we are each and all potentially good enough for God, we could turn to Him for our inspiration, affirmation and acceptance, depending less on other human opinions.

If we genuinely seek to be God’s will, first and foremost, we can expect to often be out of step with worldly consensus.

While we can and ought to glance back for lessons learned from all the good and bad experiences, we then need to look up and forward.

God always gifts us with a brand new day to try again.

Rearview Mirror