“Experience is the hardest kind of teacher; it gives you the test first and the lesson afterward.” – Oscar Wilde
Summer is winding down in the Northern Hemisphere. I can feel all the tell-tale signs, the nights that are chilly before we go to bed, and have that cool calm when I get up at 5:30am. The relenting brightness of the sun starts to give away to the softer light of fall. And, we are getting ready for the start back to school.
Last week, my eight-year-old daughter was giving me the breakdown of the third grade teachers that she might get for this next year in school. One yells a lot, one is neutral, and one is nice. As she was talking about who she hopes to get for this year to come, I felt an upwelling of tension surge through my spine. Putting my finger to it, I’d say it’s because of that protective desire for her to get the nice teacher.
But that’s at odds with what I know about life. My lived experience tells me that everything doesn’t always work out the way we want, that sometimes we have to wade through the year(s) of muck to get to the side of clarity, and that sometimes we get the crusty teacher.
For all the resilience I’ve learned about life, I find that my children challenge my worldview. That is to say, my desire to give them a life that was better than my own sets up a tension with the reality of how life unfolds. There is about zero chance that I can root for my daughter to get the mean teacher even though she may learn a lot more about uncovering the gem in the rough if she does.
It reminds me of a letter my dad, who was a Presbyterian pastor, gave me when I was going through my divorce about 12 years ago. It was tucked in the page of a book he was giving me: Know Doubt by John Ortberg. The letter said in part.
I have seen so many people in my ministry going through times of deep change in their lives and it seems that those are also times of deep thought and reflection that have been creative and good for them. You are in the middle of a lot of change these days. There must be some serious disappointment that your marriage has not worked out as you had dreamed and intended. Your life has been the story of one big success after another and you don’t have many things in your life that don’t work out well and so this time must be unsettling. So just maybe this time of change is also a time when you are questioning and thinking about big stuff like faith and doubt and your life-view. If so, I really think this little book might be a good read for you.
Dick Leon
He acknowledges the unsettling nature of life – but that unsettling times of life also lead to creativity and good. Did my dad wish for me to have hard times? Absolutely not. But did he think that goodness was going to come out of it? Definitely.
I wonder if my tension about not wanting my kids, or any of my loved ones, to go through hard times comes across. Maybe as anxiety? It’s way harder to watch others face uncertainty than to go through it myself.
In another sign that summer is coming to an end, my daughter just celebrated her birthday. At the end of the day, she pulled me in tight and whispered in my ear that she didn’t want the day and her birthday to end. I thought “Ah yes, my dear, but finding the magic in all the other days of the year when we aren’t front and center creates the sweet spot of life.” The lessons are harder to find on the days we get everything we want.
I find I can reduce my anxiety about the hard days my kids will have by remembering, as my dad did, that creativity and deep understanding comes on those days, not on birthdays.
Check out my Heart of the Matter post today for a lesson I’m learning about taking a new job in my 50’s: Going with My Gut
(featured photo from Pexels)
Surprised By Joy 