Hey, I’m Addison. You’re reading Bigger Than Me, a newsletter about mastering the skill of compassion. Sign up or scroll to the good stuff.
Photo by Doun Rain AKA Tomas Gaspar on Unsplash
It's fall in Nebraska.
My family and I are at my parent's house for Thanksgiving dinner.
My wife and the rest of the family are in the living room while my uncle and I sit at the kitchen bar top, discussing the latest technology trends and other nerdy interests.
As we catch up, my two-year-old son sits on my lap, happily playing with my phone and eating a snack.
As the conversation continues, my son starts getting antsy and begins fidgeting.
I explained to my son quietly that I'd let him down in just a minute.
I turn back to my uncle and continue talking.
While I'm talking, my son stands up, turns around to face me, and...
SMACK!
I blink a few times in shock as my son glares at me.
My uncle stares in disbelief as everyone turns to see what happened.
Embarrassment begins welling up in me as my uncle (and everyone else that's now looking) waits to see how I'll respond to being open-hand slapped by my son...
Parenting tiny humans is frustrating.
At their birth, we look down and see beautiful, sweet, adorable babies who can do no wrong.
We bring them home, begin raising them and watch them grow up before our very eyes.
Then seemingly overnight, they're mini-people!
No longer helpless infants they begin walking, talking, and taking initiative while exploring the small slices of autonomy we set up for them.
That's when the trouble begins.
Whenever there is free will to make choices, there is typically a "worse" option, and we get a front-row seat to the implications of what it looks like to choose poorly.
Our kids' precious little brains don't fully form emotional control until they're about seven, which means we've got seven years of rampant impulsive behavior, earsplitting tantrums, and full-blown meltdowns to deal with, many of which would get an adult institutionalized if replicated.
The question of "How do we deal with this?" has sold millions of books, seminars, and an entire industry of professional study.
I'm not here to rehash the ground so many have trod before me, though.
I only want to ask one specific question:
Why are we such easy marks for children?
"Parenting tiny humans is frustrating."
Even if you've never raised a child, a few moments spent watching a parent desperately struggle with their kid as they melt into a puddle in the middle of a grocery store should make the sentiment ring true.
The objective fact that raising children is hard still doesn't answer WHY they can so expertly press against every nerve and drive people crazy.
Well, it's quite simple really.
Children threaten our self-perception.
The image we hold of ourselves in our minds directly props up our value systems, beliefs, and confidence in what we do.
Kids, especially toddlers, tend to obliterate self-perception in the most embarrassing and efficient ways possible.
Speaking from experience, there is no more humbling (or enraging) experience than to have your perception directly, loudly challenged in front of a group of people who's opinions hold sway in your life.
The lack of control in a dramatic situation like the one I experienced with my son, leads to all kinds of uncomfortable thoughts:
Am I a good parent?
Am I doing enough?
Where did I go wrong? I thought I had raised them better than this?
How could my child do this to me?
Everyone is staring at me right now, aren't they?
What is everyone else thinking right now?
Are people appalled?
What happens next time I have to correct my child? What will others be thinking? Will I be judged?
Now every time I see so-and-so again they are going to remember this…
And so many more.
These thoughts fuel feelings of doubt, worry, anxiety, shame, guilt, helplessness, annoyance, anger, self pity, rage, and more.
They all get thrown in a blender set to puree, and what comes out of the mixture cuts to the core of central human need:
We end up feeling powerless.
As we've discussed previously, power is the direct or indirect need to control via action or perception.
Being put in a position where an individual, who is quite literally incapable of fully understanding the gravity of what they are doing, can disarm us so easily is a great example of the power dynamics we find ourselves in with many relationships.
If it's not children, it's a parent we want to make proud, a boss who we'd like to notice our accomplishments, friends we want to earn the acceptance of, the list goes on.
Our self-perception, fueled by the opinions of others, drives our life's motivation. It often means being a slave to others' opinions, always weighing it in our choices, consciously or subconsciously.
It's a hard way to live and one I was all too familiar with.
To break this pattern, I had to shift my thinking.
I realized "my truth" was an oxymoron.
Truth cannot be subjective and remain truth. It cannot hinge on a feeling, position, or experience.
In my life, the "truth" of my value would shift based on circumstance, especially around being a parent.
If on certain days my kids were happy and reasonable, especially in a way where others noticed, I saw myself as a good, put-together dad with great kids.
I'd beam with pride.
However, if my kids made bad choices around being respectful or kind, it felt like it was another signal of my failure. The opinions of others noticing the behavior and the struggle I was having with the kids only deepened the feeling.
I'd feel low.
I couldn't have value "just because" I was a person, as that always brought me back to questioning the very reason I mattered.
Taking a position of "I think, therefore I am, therefore I matter" just rang hollow for me.
It always came back to deriving my value from performance and opinions.
It was a losing game.
My self-worth needed the "self" taken out.
To truly live as the parent my kids needed and more broadly the person I wanted to be, my worth had to stop being subjective.
That's where God stepped in.
I learned my worth is a cemented truth, not subject to change based on work, my opinion, or the viewpoints of others.
God showed me my value was written in the image I was designed with, confirmed with the sacrifice I was bought with, manifested in the breath I was given, and lived out through the authority I've been entrusted with.
This was the foundation for unconditional love.
It allowed me to see that my thoughts and opinions of others carried no weight in their true value.
In the wake of that truth, all that is left is to submit my opinions and beliefs of others to the Way, The Truth, and the Light.
This is true for my family, friends, co-workers, acquaintances, strangers, and even those who would harm me.
If I have immovable value, others do too, and they deserve my compassion.
“I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.”
Until next time,
Addison.
Any ‘aha’ moments in this issue?
