coagulation of ideas--on not micro-managing our children

did you ever notice how much God just lets us do?  I was thinking about this the other day when I decided to let my five year old mop my kitchen floor for me.  Not have her help me do it.  Not stand over her and direct her how to do it.  Get her the bucket and rag and just let her go at it and see what happened.  

What happened was that she did a good job.  She didn't get the floor as clean as I would have, but it was a lot cleaner that it had been when she started.  Because while I could have done a better job myself, the truth was that I wasn't going to.  Not that afternoon.  I was in the middle of several other things.  It got me thinking about just how much I micro-manage my kids.  How much I want the "right" results.  How much I supervise and direct . . . and how un-God-like that is.

God just lets us do stuff.  The whole world is his a whole lot more than my house is mine--and he simply lets us re-decorate.  Stickers on the wall, climb over the furniture.  Rearrange for the game.  Do all of it.  He lets us fight with our brothers and sisters.  And then, if we ask, he helps us clean up the mess . . . 

the problem of pain is this:  why does God let bad things happen?  I think the answer must be in part, because God lets us make real decisions and take real actions that actually matter.  He lets us explore and experiment and screw up . . . and then forgives us when things inevitably go horribly wrong.  And he doesn't just give this gift to me, or to the people I like.  He gives it to every single one of us--and the results look to us like utter chaos sometimes.  But what he doesn't do is in any way curtail the gift of freedom that he gave us.  He refuses to make us puppets.  He lets our actions have consequences, because without them the world would be a non-sensical farce . . . endings disconnected from the beginning.  

God delights in seeing us grow . . . and it seems that true growth means, sometimes, just finding out with our own two hands what does and doesn't work.  And he seems to mind less than we do mopping up the puddles afterwards.

walking as a realistic form of exercise, or not--

I mentioned in passing, as one of my quick takes, losing some weight during a semester overseas.  It didn't stay off.  The circumstances that went into my losing it were completely unsustainable . . . something I've thought about over the years.  What is sustainable?  What are our expectations with regards to food, exercise, etc.?  A few reflections on that semester:

1.  Forced dieting: Cut intake, will you or nil you.  The cafeteria plan was 13 meals a week.  Breakfast and dinner, Monday through Saturday, and lunch on Sunday.  Mostly, I tried to force feed myself enough breakfast to get me through to dinner, with occasional snacks and fast food for lunch if I got too desperately hungry during the day.  Not a sustainable eating schedule.  In addition, the cafeteria cooking was terrible--even though I was horribly hungry by dinner time, there were times that I really couldn't face eating very much of what they were serving.  I've never been a breakfast person, and four months of making myself eat breakfast when I didn't want to didn't help that.  It wasn't exactly the polar opposite of how I would feed myself, but . .  Conclusion:  Real changes in eating habits have to take into account what and how you could/will feed yourself, left to your own devices.  (xkcd 418).

2.  Exercise I, Time available:   All that walking took a lot of time.  I had the time to spend then . . . I had a light class load that semester, and I had just me to worry about.  My schedule now is busier and more constricted with three little kids.  Conclusion:  I run late.  Shouldn't be, but it is.  Real change has to take into account not just what things ought to be, but what they are.  I have a car available to me, and I'm going to take it.  I can't afford the extra hours out of my day it would take walk everywhere, even it . . .

3.  Exercise II, Cargo:  Three kids, fully loaded diaper bag.  A load of groceries and the dozen hard cover picture books you picked up at story hour.  Couldn't pack it in a backpack.  Don't want to.

4.  Exercise III, Heartrate and Effective workout:  As noted, I was too broke to take the bus.  It was a mile one way from the dorms to where my classes were and I was always running late.  With a fully loaded backpack.  So a lot of the time, I wasn't just walking those miles I put in during the week, I was jog-trotting them, trying to get to class on time.  This provided actual exercise.  Elevated heart rate.  All that.  It's basically impossible to walk at a rate that can provide actual exercise with two or more children in tow.  They simply can't keep up a pace that makes it worth it for an adult.  Conclusion:  The "If I just walked places instead of driving I would get my exercise" line doesn't work for mothers of small children, except for a few hyper-organized ones with double and triple strollers and baby backpacks and grade-schoolers biking while the moms speed-walk.  

4.  Exercise IV, Convenience:  It was a five mile roundtrip trek downtown to church, Sunday mornings.  This being Scotland, a lot of those were in the rain.  On an empty stomach--remember, only lunch on Sundays.  I highly dislike being out in inclement weather.  Under the circumstances, I'm surprised that I actually made it to services most Sundays.  

All in all it was a set of lifestyle changes which were exterior, not interior.  Not worthless for all that though.  They showed that though these were not changes that I would have chosen for myself I was perfectly capable of handling them.  That wasn't something I'd known.  I also had a great time on a lot of those long walks by myself (when it was sunny).  They were time to think, pray and reflect.  Time to dream and notice.  I loved exploring on foot, poking my nose into forgotten corners, dawdling my way through whatever it occured to me to look into.

personality surveys

I think that I may have mentioned the Meyers-Briggs personality typing system before.  It lays out four general and sixteen specific personality  types from combinations of four toggle attributes.  It's a good system, and I think that the researchers got things mostly right.  One of its major strengths is also one of its major weakness though.  David Kiersey emphasizes in his book "Please Understand Me" that people's basic personality types do not change and that it is futility to try to change people into what they are not.  And while he is right that you cannot change a cat into a dog, he leaves unaddressed the question, can a cat turn into a better cat?  Something more in tune with its essential cat-ness?

Fortunately, Kiersey's isn't the only book out there trying to systemitize human nature.  Don Riso and Russ Hudson have spent careers working with the enneagram, and laid out nine personality types.  More interestingly to me, they have laid out for each of their nine types nine layers of functionality--ranging from extremely healthy to extremely dysfunctional.  They investigate the different ways that people "integrate" (become healthier) and "dis-integrate" (become less healthy) and how that looks different for different types.  

These two systems, taken together with a good dose of good theology and discretion seem to me to provide a great base for self-understanding and relationship building.  I have no use for Riso and Hudson's assumption that our personalities are primarily determined by how our relationships with our parents were screwed up as very young children.  I think Kiersey is more right that our general bent is stamped on our DNA.  I agree with Riso and Hudson, however, that while each of us have particular driving fears and weaknesses, that we do not have to accept those as inevitable.  That in fact each of us can "change" and grow in such a way as to become more fully ourselves.  

Of  course, none of these secular psychologists have much use for Jesus, or for sin and redemption language.  But I figure it like this.  God made each of us to be someone very particular.  We can indeed grow more and more into the people that God intended and intends us to be.  The wisdom and recognition and fear-conquering that is necessary for that growth, truly comes through Christ.  Additionally, each personality type will gravitate towards particular areas of sin.  This is a true marker of personality, on the one hand, but it is not a true indicator of who we are supposed to be.  

I highly recommend both Please Understand Me and Personality Types for . . . well, anyone really.  Particularly, I've heard a from numerous people over the past year and more who have looked up after an extended amount of time in churches where there were very specific and restrictive ideas about gender roles and marriage, and have realized that those teachings had done nothing to help their own growth as a person or as a spouse.  In order to love our husband or wife we must first know them . . . if we are to help each other grow into the individuals and body that Christ calls us to be, shouldn't we first understand what will be helpful for growth?

(Side Note / Addendum:  Also valuable for parenting--if nothing else, starting with the assumption that my children are going to be whoever they're going to be, and that it's within my power to break and harm them--but not necessarilly change them--is very humbling, and useful for bringing any number of parenting issues into focus.)

so Google Reader has informed me that it's blog action day

judging from the number of posts on the subject that have popped up on it. has something to do with poverty, and making a difference, and all that. I've read some excellent pieces on looking at addressing the root causes before the symptoms, and to heck with the root causes, but treat a symptom anyway, and prioritizing our church budgets, and what the Epistle of James has to say on the subject. I'd commend them all to your reading. Even a cursory reading of the old testament prophets should clue anyone off that when we don't help those who can't help themselves, it really pisses God off.

that said, I think I'd like to add a quote from my grandfather, who died just over a year ago now. He liked to say, "you can't take it with you, but you can send it on ahead." Increasingly, I'm becoming convinced that money is really just a figment of our imaginations, that if we try to build wealth, that we're really just locked in some sort of psycho attempt to work the system for poker chips. What I mean is this. If you're at a casino, you don't gamble with actual money. You go in, buy chips, and the chips are good at the casino. You gamble for those on the assumption that, before you leave, you can cash your chips in at the register for something of real value. The actual prize, if you will. The thing is, there isn't any cash register for life. Our wealth, and works and lives will be submitted to the fire at the judgement, and that what is good and lasting will be purified, but that the chaff and rubish will be exposed for what it is and consumed by the fire.

We have the opportunity to turn our worthless little chips into things of Real Merit. But to do that, we have to put them to work. We have to use them. Not hoard them. For a limited time, we can do certain things with our money while we are here in this world. They're not any good when we walk out the door of the casino, and do we really know when closing time is, anyway? A biblical understanding of money starts with recognising its truly ephemeral nature. A stock market crash can obliterate it. Thieves steal it. Moths destry it. And it does not do us any good on that day when our soul will be required of us.

All we have to do is be good stewards. To trade value for Real Value, instead of perceieved. Am I using my money to meet real needs, or perceived ones? Am I using my money in ways that is loving to others, or only to myself? Are my actions loving, or selfish? All those nice, easy questions. Jesus is going to obliterate rich and poor in the coming kingdom. We're going to see ourselves and each other as the equals that we always were. Question is, have we clued into the reality of how much Jesus values each one of us, and been busy being his hands and feet in our time here?

Warning: Seriously half-baked thoughts ahead

What does it do to us to do the right things for the wrong reasons? And what are the right reasons anyway? Is it better to build good habits while reinforcing bad motives and attitudes behind them, or is it okay to not pursue something when doing the "right" thing feels like drudgery? What are your feelings about the complex of words like "discipline" and "perseverance?"

I've lately been thinking about this grey territory . . . thinking about the attitudes that we bring to all the things that we're "supposed" to do. About pursuing God, and the paradoxical insistence of much of the church that we do that on our own strength . . . how stupid is that? It is God who pursues us and catches us and purchases at the unimagineable price of Christ's blood . . . it is God who reveals himself to us--and without that, it would be impossible for us to know him? Why do we so often act as if our relationship with him depends on our diligence?

See, we have many things we're "supposed" to do. We're supposed to eat our vegetables, limit our starches, get plenty of exercise. And I know that I, like many Americans, have very mixed feelings about all these things. I want to be healthy, trim, sexy, energetic. I want to feel good about my body. But I also want the freedom to feel good about my body even when I'm tired, overweight and ill. I don't want to get in shape out of guilt, or in order to be good enough. Fortunately, God tells me that I don't have to play the culture's game. He knows that he didn't me a body that would process a bag of Doritos effortlessly into rippling muscles . . . he tells me that I can enjoy the body that I have, and that if I choose to try to honor God with this body, that he will accept the offering and be honored by it . . . I don't have to be thin enough for the culture in order for my attitude to be transformed . . . indeed, for my attitude to be transformed, I'd best start by chucking cultural expectations altogether and starting with the recognition that this is about me and God.

I wonder how many of the same sorts of expectations and church culture attitudes we import into the exercise and growth of Christian life . . . how much of the sovereign specific of "more Bible, more prayer" for not being a "Better Christian" is like saying, "well, if they'd just exercise more, they'd be healthy."

It the thing--one of the worst things that ever happened to my "devotional" life was the unit I had in high school Bible class on "How to Have a Devotional." I was told just how much scripture to read--between 3 and 10 verses. Definitely not more. I'd miss something. Told how to think and pray and feel earnestly about it. How crucial it was to do this Regularly. We were then assigned a week's worth of devotionals to do as homework. That way. To be turned in and graded. And even though, after that week, I never did a "devotional" in that format again, it took me years to shake free of it enough to feel like it was okay for me to get to know God a slightly different way.

I want to read my Bible. I want to WANT to read my Bible. But I don't want to read it in itty-bitty pieces and then attempt to feel earnestly about it. I want to read it in great carking chunks. And yes, sometimes erratically. I want to listen to good music. To pray in the in between moments of my day, and pray while I'm playing minesweeper, and enjoy the long chunk on Sunday morning when I know that I'm not going to get interrupted with the kids. I want to throw great handfuls of all sorts of stuff into the rock tumbler in my brain--and see what comes out.

I want to build good habits to the glory of God. I want to shake free of expectations. I want to not do anything out of guilt. But I want the virtue of perseverance, whatever that means. I want to understand what it is that's shifted in my heart, so that I can start in on an exercise program and really not much care what anyone else thinks or if I lose a pound, though I would like to gain a little muscle and endurance so that I can hike that canyon. I want to teach and encourage my daughters and give them all the tools and attitudes and habits that they'll need so that they can have the lives that God wants them to have.

I want to live the life to the full, by the grace of God.