BECOMING WHAT WE ARE NOT - BY GIVING WHAT WE DON’T HAVE

Since his traumatic birth (10 lbs 3 oz), my son had exhibited all the symptoms of ADHD with increasing intensity. At four, he began to refer to himself by the adjectives he overheard me use when describing him. “I’m a wild child.” Though his condition provided fantastically entertaining moments, it was heart-breaking. He was not at peace. I was desperate. We were stuck.

None of the well-meaning advice worked for us, and I began to plead with my husband, “Please, if you won’t give him Ritalin, give it to me! PLEASE!” Thankfully, our pediatrician referred us to behavior phycologist, David Coe, at Miami Children’s Hospital whose one sentence changed my life: “He won’t change till you change.”

“What?! Then it’s hopeless! He has the wrong mother,” was my internal explosion. How could I, a free flowing, spontaneous gypsy provide the kind of order and structure my son craved? I didn’t have it in me, and the thought was claustrophobic. But my firstborn, the little man child with so much tenderness trapped under all his impulses, was deteriorating.

The tormenting thought that I was an inept mother for him, utterly misfit for his needs, was carrying me toward a dark place fast, but my man’s sweet, simple suggestion broke its spell. “We must pray to become what he craves.”

Thus began the adventure of becoming what we are not.

Oddly, there’s tremendous freedom in facing that open land where we don’t suffice and God has to fill the gap. Standing there empty handed, makes us openhanded.

By faith we start reaching for what we need to give, one hand towards Heaven and the other extended to people.

“Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace”
I did not have the sense of order and routine that would bring my son peace, nor did I understand how much we all needed it. Searching within myself for resources to draw from was depressing, but looking to our Creator for inspiration breathed life. In His creation, I discovered an artistry woven into His beautiful order which inspires me still to choose peace over chaos, one hour at the time. In giving it away, I receive it more deeply.

Like so many in his generation, a friend I’ve know since he was much younger grew up without any concept of discipline. The pathways that connect goals with the necessary actions had never been formed, so bills went unpaid and projects undone. He shared his wife’s frustration, but felt trapped in embarrassment and utter powerlessness.

His heart for kids like himself makes him a magnet for adolescent boys who find in him the big brother they – and he – never had. In their trust, he grows. Their weaknesses, so similar to his own, inspire him to reach for solutions, and in teaching them, he learns. He is becoming what he was missing.

“Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;”
Injured by the complex, unwritten rules of much female interaction, woman after precious women, cry to me that they feel lonely. Outcast. Married or single, they yearn to be part of a supportive friend-group or to have a best friend. Unaware, they have slipped into a spectator seat where they observe and evaluate (dare I say criticize?) the very people they are longing for, keeping score of each time they feel ignored or offended.

Not surprisingly, those most desire as friends are the engaged ones, those who see past themselves to others. And that is the only cure I know for loneliness: Become what you long for.
When you wish someone would befriend you, look out for someone you can befriend. Please don’t dismiss this as too simplistic; self-pity has a mighty grip, and that is often what resists this freeing approach.

Whatever would keep us in hopeless passivity is not our friend.

Holding on to my sense of identity would have cost my son his. Stepping out of it like yesterday’s clothes, to follow his Maker in this venture not only healed David, but created in me what I was praying to give him.

What do you long for? Give it away.

And as your soul rises in awareness of others, your chains fall off, and you enter the sweetest fellowship where your loaves and fishes are multiplied. Jesus Himself created us such that “The generous soul will be made rich, and he who waters will also be watered himself.” (Proverbs 11:25)

“O Divine Master,
Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled, as to console;
To be understood, as to understand;
To be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.”

“It is more blessed to give than to receive”. – Jesus (Acts 20:35)

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