Today being a rainy, cozy kind of day we decided to watch a movie after dinner. The mailman had brought the latest Netflix that we had requested: "Martian Child". I was a bit skeptical in the beginning but it only took 5 minutes of the movie for me to get hooked. Truly a well-made, well-acted movie. Towards the end there came a moment that totally rocked me - the main adult character, a successful writer of science fiction by trade, is chastised by his publisher with these words "why can't you be what we want you to be?"!!
In a flash I was a child again, and then a teenager, and, of course, a young wife and mother. How many times in my life have I heard these words in one form or another "be what we want you to be"? Always they left me wondering - what is wrong with the way I am? Why must I try to conform to an image that is so not me? Is the me I am so unlovable?
I think I have always been a bit of a Martian child. I have always struggled to fit in, but always really felt on the edge of the crowd, slightly outside of the norm, able to don a cloak and fit in the scene for brief periods of time but happier to be by myself on the whole.
Age has brought me, if not wisdom, then at least the ability to be content with myself and no longer so anxious to please others. If only I had been able to be content with myself when younger. (It helps, too, that my nestmate loves me as I am, including oddities and imperfections.)
I hope that my chicks do not also carry this unwelcome baggage through their own lives. God constructs each one of us as unique individuals; we are all lovable just the way we are, for our own special gifts and talents. If God loves us, as He does without question, then it is not for others to withhold their love and approval in an attempt to mold us to satisfy their own needs.
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I think this is something we often do to ourselves as much as others doing it to us. We have a desire to fit in, to be like everyone else. We're encouraged, especially in the work environment, to be like this - in fact, I would argue that the career field is far more damaging in this respect than any parental or authority figure from our younger years because in the career field, we choose to be there and adhere to that. In the end, it really is sad because it tends to stifle the creative and innovative ideas that all companies say they want but never really do - or we come to accept the fact that being "different" within accepted norms, for example casual wear only on Friday, is our way to be unique.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I think in terms of acceptance, it is as much learning to accept ourselves for what we are - that God created us differently we never question, it's just accepting that fact and finding the value in that which becomes difficult, the value of the individual pearl in a land where only the flawless pearls are displayed.