Proactivity: Mission Less Lame

It’s not just an acme cream.

I’ve been trying to be less lame and more proactive. Got my laptop looked at, bought some work-out gear I’d been needing, scheduled and followed-through with some hanging out so that I’d be happy with a social life. Took initiative at work to be happier and more productive. I’ve spoken up more, and kept silent when I wanted, too.

Mission Less Lame Quasi Accomplished.

Getting priorities right is weird, though. Because I’m happy to do these things, but they’re pretty self-focused, while the world spins on. Palestine’s making its bid for nationhood, and everybody’s hyped about what should happen. And I don’t know what SHOULD be done, but I know it seems wrong for the U.S. to ask people to not show up for the vote. As I sit at a pizza place in Germantown, the manager switched from the military channel WWII war movements analysis to the news because “it’s not good to eat to.” There’s something about terrorists on the news, but before I can find out what, he switches to sports and shrugs.

And just as quick as turning the channel, I start thinking about me again. Because in a random perfume commercial I really identified with the script: “I’m not going to be the person I’m expected to be anymore.”

But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be somebody who doesn’t care – or do anything – about “the bigger issues.”

There’s a group called Plan that I’ve never heard of before. There was a guy doing sidewalk marketing in center city, and I stopped and talked with him a bit. They began in 1937 helping Spanish children during the civil war, but now have significantly broader work around the world, both in war areas as well as with human trafficking victims, etc. It turns out they published Anna Freud’s work “War and Children,” which I started reading online until it wouldn’t let me read more.

Interesting because I wouldn’t fill out the form – had never heard of them before. But I asked a lot of questions to the point of what they do and their success, etc. I’m realizing it’s not enough to care. You gotta be good at what you do – knowledgeable, too.

It’s weird. Someone I know and respect made a rather prejudiced remark the other day about Jews, regarding the stereotype of them lacking generosity. Weirder, still, when it was pointed out by a third party that I’m part-Jewish, because rather than say it was a joke, they explained that it’s really true. I was pretty surprised. I shrugged and said something about there’s always some truth in stereotypes. LAME. Later when they checked to see if I had been offended, rather than explain my surprise that such a stereotype would still be so strongly believed, I shrugged it off by saying I wasn’t real connected with that part of my identity anyways. DOUBLE LAME.

So when I came across Anna Freud’s work “War and Children” on the Plan site, I wished I had known about it before, so I could’ve given her as a counter-example. And it reminded me of Einstein’s role in the creation of the International Rescue Committee, which works with refugees. And I wished I had given him as an informed counter-example.

I bring all this up because it was a learning experience for me. I sucked at something I care deeply about (reconciliation in general, not even specific to that issue). If I had been better-prepared/trained/informed, I could have made fruitful dialogue. Instead, I was worse than a push-over. Which sadly, is quite the stereotype of the warm-hearted person. It’s expected that they’ll also be soft-spoken, and that they won’t be strong-minded (or if they are, it’s to the extreme of abrasive bull-headedness).

SAD DAY. So I’m going to try and be more proactive about…not…being those expected stereotypes. And maybe then it’ll be:

Mission Less Lame Accomplished.

Partly to make myself feel less lame, please respond with learning moments when you were lame, what you learned, and how you are trying to be less lame in the future....

P.S. Before feeling any disapproval for the person in my story about prejudice, STOP. This person is, from my view, quite well-educated, globally aware, sensitive and caring. Not a bad guy in a story, but rather just as much as a reminder as my own role in the story that despite our best intentions, everyone has prejudcies we have to work at getting rid of so as to become less lame. Because that, after all, is the purpose of life. ;)

dream job

"If you built castles in the sky ; your work need not be lost ; that is where they should be. Now, put the foundations under them. " - Henry David Thoreau

I still don't quite know where my castles stand, or how they're laid out. I think I've become too busy trying to build foundations that I've forgotten to look up and dream and let go. I'm trying to, though. Someone asked me what I want a day ago, and it was strange because I hadn't thought in those terms for a very long time. I still don't particularly have an answer to that, or answers in general. But the question helped. My professor shared this quote freshman year, and, like many of his students, it's stuck with me:

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions” - Rainer Maria Rilke

There's so many life questions I use that for, but one most particularly:


God?

The answers I get confuse me. A lot. Today I was thinking about such things, when Micah 6:8 came to mind:

or, put another way,

Although I became familiar with this because of its social justice aspect, it's the last part that I resonate with most strongly. For me, that is my heart. At least, I want it to be. Even the cross is empty of its power if you do not approach it with humility. Today, that is an answer.

And since I'm just a little Sarah, I go back to that first question more just about me and what I'm doing. And I go back to the Rilke quotation about the point being to live everything - both questions and answers. I don't even know exactly what my dream is yet, what castles I want to build, how I want to use my hands to help. But that's good, because it keeps me humble with the interests I do have. I'm kind of all over the place. I might not yet have many answers about what my dream job is or should be. But I believe I can do something good with my hands. Thanks partially to my friend Amber's collaborative art piece With These Hands. Here's mine.

I also remember what godly professors taught me about worship being at the heart of mission, and what vocation we all share, and about goodness, truth, and beauty, and - yes - about walking humbly with your God. I think of all of that when I think about my dream job. And I know I have to be brave. Because I know what I want my answer to that first question to be: