Come one, come all to the greatest blog on the earth! Well,
at least the greatest blog on the block. Well, maybe not on the block, since Mrs.
Nelson in 152 B just started a wonderful blog on canning over at word press. I
mean really! Who can compete with canning?? I know I can’t! Even though Mrs.
Nelson is attempting a minor coo in order to steal my thunder; I do feel, that what
I have to say here in single parent land is important. It may not be as entertaining
as learning about how to pickle okra; but if you give me just a few minutes of
your precious time, I can assure you you will not be disappointed. Well, at
least you will be mildly entertained and perhaps even challenged. I hope.
So, I am pretty sure that everyone who is reading this is a
human being. Of course, if this is still lurking around the World Wide Web a
few hundred years from now, you may just possible be something else entirely.
Perhaps you are a genetically altered intelligent squirrel, or maybe a talking
tree. Really, when you think about it the possibilities are endless. Either
way, if you are currently not a human being you can just skip this post; but
for those of us who do fall under the genus homosapien, I think we can all
agree that life can sometimes be challenging. Ok, it can downright suck at
times. (That’s right I used the adjective SUCK. I know, my vocabulary knows no
bounds.) You see all human beings no matter their class or stature, have had to
face adversity.
So, if all people equally face hardship, than what is that one
undefined characteristic that all successful people have that enables them to
rise above life’s challenges? Honestly, I have no idea. No really, I honestly
have no idea. Wow, I guess this is going to be a short post after all. If you quickly
jump on over to word press you still might be able catch Mrs. Nelson’s newest
blog entry before the government shuts her down for teaching kids how to make moonshine
in their bathtub. (Like she was fooling anyone with her “pickling” blog. We all
knew that “pickling” was really code
for distilling.)
Seriously though, why is it that some people are completely
destroyed by the trails they face in life; but others, seem to rise above every
challenge no matter how difficult? For every victim that life produces, there
is a hero that rises as well. For every France there is a Britain. For every
person who decides to roll over and die; there is a person, who stands up and
says,
“Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing
great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honor
and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently
overwhelming might of the enemy!” (Winston Churchill)
The reality is, those
people who rise above life’s challenges, are those who choose to simply not
give up. My dad always said to me when I was complaining about how hard life
was, “So what is the alternative?” What he meant by that was; the only option in
life other then pressing on and believing God through the struggle, was to simply
lay down and die. That may seem harsh; but, there truly are no other options.
Every human being who as ever lived no matter how great or small has only two options
when facing hardships and trials. You can either choose to be a victim or a
fighter. The situation really is as Master Yoda so eloquently stated it to be in
The Empire Strikes Back, “There is either do or do not. There is no try.”
As a single parent you do not have the option to just roll
over and die. Well, you actually do; but, your children will be the ones who
pay the price. I know that in the new liberal world where everyone is a victim
and needs a safe space this kind of thinking is heresy; but the truth is, that
the only safe space from life’s trials is found through the storm. As a Christian,
however, I do believe that God makes a table for me in the middle of the storm;
but the truth is, that we all still need to sail on and weather the storms of life.
Yes, God will give us the strength to overcome and He has promised to go with
us through the storms of life; but, He never promised that He would remove them
from our paths. Your children are watching you and looking to you for strength
and guidance; and how you handle life’s difficulties will have a profound
impact upon, not only your children’s immediate well being, but also how they
will handle life as well.
You see, your children need you to be the rock and not the
sand. What do I mean by that? I am referring to the parable of the two
builders. One man built his house upon a rock and the other chose to build upon
the sand; and when the storms of life came, the house built upon the sand was
washed away by the rising tide, while the house built upon the rock withstood
the storm and survived. You can make the comparison that the man who chose to
build upon the rock was the man who stood his ground and fought; while the one
who chose to build upon the sand, was the man who chose the path of the victim.
Not only do your children need you to be a rock they can rely on; but, they
also need you to be the one who teaches them to be a rock instead of sand, a
hero instead of a victim.
I will leave you with a personal story; since after all, I
do have a lot of failures you can learn from. For most of my life I had a
victim mentality. (I know! It is hard to believe because I am just so awesome;
but, just go with me for a while.) In fact, it was one of the long lists of reasons
my exe cited when she chose to leave me; and if I am honest with myself, I will
have to admit on this one topic she was right. Whenever life threw me even the
slightest curve, I would curl up into the fetal position and cry. Well actually,
I was very vocal in my protests and was quite the complainer. Honestly, it took
the divorce to finally break me of that mentality. Well, it was not the divorce
itself; but, my two children that finally broke me out of my lethargy. I found
myself 2000 miles from home, alone and completely devastated; but, when I saw that
my children where just as devastated, something inside me changed. I knew right
then and there what road I had to choose. I could no longer be the victim it
was time to be the hero.
Parents, single or not, it is time to rise up and be the
rock your kids can rely on. It is time to throw off the dark cloak of victim
hood and put on the cape of the super hero; or in my case, the green Lantern
ring. You do not have the option to be the victim you must choose the road of
the warrior; if not for you, than for your children. It does not matter what
you have faced or how hard life has been, because there really are only two
choices. Be like the man who built his house upon the rock and not the one who
built upon the sand. Just as I choose not to be victimized by Mrs. Nelson and
her very interesting blog; so you too, choose not to be victimized by life.
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