It's Not About Me (Part 2)

So, if you read yesterday's note, you got a peak into the yuck that the Lord is working on clearing out of my life right now. While that note wasn't easy to write, it was much easier than this one. You see, that was about what goes on inside of me when my focus is on me and not the Lord. This one is about what comes out of me when I do that, and that is much, much worse.

Most of you reading this already know that I went to Wisconsin & Minnesota for a while this summer and woke up to find my van submerged in a parking-lot-turned-lake one morning. The truth is, although it was not an easy situation, I was able to handle the loss of the van pretty well. I got a little sad & cried some when I cleaned it out, but that was normal grief over letting go of something that held 8+ years of memories for me & my family. That van had been all over the country & witnessed many miles of both laughter & tears. It was where I worshipped & prayed, and it was my escape when I just had to get away. It brought my kids to church & school & soccer practice & gymnastics & a million other activities. Letting go of that was hard, but I honestly never felt for a moment that God was not in control or that He wouldn't make it right.

The problem came in two very specific things that happened during that time. Since I had never been in a situation like that, I just wanted someone to tell me what to do. John, my new friend from Progressive, did that for me. He was very calm & told me very clearly what was my responsibility & what was theirs. This was good. I can follow directions. (Really, I can ;) ) Those directions, though, never took into account that the horrible apartment managers had a contract with an evil towing company who would take my van away before the insurance company could get there. I didn't have $280 to get it back, and they told me they wouldn't let Progressive have it, either. It all worked out, but that was one of my two break downs. The other happened when they called to tell me the settlement offer and that I only had 72 hours left with the rental car. Just enough time to get back to Tennessee, but not enough to look for another vehicle, which, by the way, they were not giving me enough money to come close to purchasing. Remember, I didn't have $280 to pay the towing company, let alone thousands of dollars to buy a new car. The Lord also worked that out, too, of course, but in my mind it was another area that I had messed up.

There are reasons that these two things hit me harder than anything else. They prey on my "tapes" that tell me that I am stupid, I screw everything up, I will never be good enough. And they attack the area of money, which is my one freak out area (well, that & crickets & trains, but that's another story).

On top of those two things, the kids were out of sorts because they were sad & confused & scared about the whole thing. And we had been on vacation, back to Jackson for four days & then headed north. They were exhausted. And they were behaving horribly. All of them. Which fed into my feelings of inadequacy & failure as a mother. So, you take those three things, and you have the recipe for a perfect storm. And storm is what I ended up with.

I started hearing everything that people said, specifically my mom & my sister, through the filter of the tapes in my head. They would say something simple, just making conversation about the kids or a picnic or a game or whatever, and I heard them saying that I was a failure, I don't do anything right, I'm not a good mom, everyone else is more fun for my kids than me. Did they say any of that? No. Did they mean anything close to it? Absolutely not. But I responded to them as if they did. I got snappy & defensive and hurt the feelings of people I love deeply. Thankfully, they accepted my apology & tried to understand where I was coming from, as wrong as my perspective & focus were.

So how does this fit into the "It's Not About Me" category? Well, I think that's pretty obvious. In the areas that I believed that God would take care of everything & make it right, I could smile & laugh, even in the midst of grief & sadness. In the areas where I was focused on me, the areas I always struggle with, there was no way that I could do anything right. And taking it out on the people around me just made that worse. When I, when anyone, reacts to who we are, or who we think we are, in the flesh, we hurt ourselves, other people, and the witness of Christ.

You may want to know why I have taken the time to write these two notes that allow you to see this ugly area of my heart where I have so much work to do. The reason is that I don't believe I am the only one who struggles with a focus problem. I'm not the only one who, when I take my focus off of the Lord and make life all about me, hurts people. So, I want to encourage you to recognize when your focus is wrong, admit it, ask forgiveness, and cooperate with the Lord in refocusing your heart, mind & spirit on Him. As much as we can hurt the cause of Christ in reacting out of wrong focus, we can help it by admitting our mistakes, asking forgiveness & working to make it right. Won't you join me in the process?