And there was a great outcry of the people and their wives against their Jewish brethren For there were those who said, “We, our sons, and our daughters are many, therefore, let us get grain, that we may eat and live.”
There were also some who said, “We have
borrowed money for the king’s tax on our lands and vineyards. Yet now our flesh
is as the flesh of our brethren, our children as their children, and indeed we
are forcing our sons and daughters to be slaves, and some of our daughters have
been brought into slavery. It is not in our power to redeem them, for other men
have our lands and vineyards.” (Nehemiah 5:1-5)
The parallel I’m going to present isn’t
exact, but when one is pursuing goals, sometimes the focus becomes so closely associated
with reaching those goals that the preferences, desires, and needs of others
get ignored. Those around us become slaves to our hopes and dreams far beyond
what is reasonable. I’m reminded of the character in Bleak House, Mrs. Jellyby, who was so
involved in raising money to send to mission work in Africa that she didn’t notice
that her children were suffering from neglect. The stereotype is that when someone goes on a diet, the whole household is
forced onto the diet. I don’t think I was ever quite that bad, but more than
once, I told my father that if he wanted ice cream, to get a flavor he liked
but I didn’t.
As we consider goals for 2022, we should
be careful that our goals don’t enslave the whole household or go beyond what
the members of the household have agreed to. It might be acceptable to ask them
to forego some of what they enjoy, but never all of what they
enjoy, and ever any of what they need.
Similarly, when we strive to accomplish our
goals, there are other parts of our lives that may have to accept a lower
priority. The challenge is to find ways to meet the needs of those parts. They
may not be the most important thing in your life, but ignoring their needs
leads to burn out.
I tend to have two modes – long-hauler
and 30-second time-limit. I worked on family history for 20 years. I eat
basically the same breakfast, the same lunch, and sometimes for dinner for
months or years. But if the switch that engages the long-haul doesn’t get
flipped, I have no patience, no tolerance, no endurance. Sometimes, it’s
sometimes easy to shut down everything but the goal. Other times, it’s
impossible, and I’m convinced that’s at least partly because the rest of me is
exhausted.
One of our goals as we strive to achieve
our goals should be to learn to do it with love for God, for our neighbors,
family, and friends, and for ourselves.
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