From the mouth of a fictional
character came the best three-sentence summary of who I want to be:
You is kind. You is smart.
You is important.
(Aibileen Clark The Help)
And that those whom I love and treasure
would know they are kind, smart and important.
How much better our mental and
emotional health would be if this is what we believed about ourselves!
It’s easy to encourage those I love
with this wisdom – not so much with those who annoy, frustrate or infuriate me.
I often have difficulty extending to this description to those with whom I
disagree. I don’t think
they are kind, smart, or important!
Yet, the tender resolve with
which Aibileen often spoke these simple truths – a woman who had endured
humiliating cruelty – to strengthen the heart of a little girl whose cowardly
mom inflicted great harm upon Mae, illuminated and illustrated a Scripture I can recite but fail
often to live:
Don’t be selfish;
don’t try to impress others.
Be humble,
thinking of others as better than yourselves.
(Philippians 2:3)
It wasn’t a suggestion – He urged
them, who by the way, were in the midst of hard times, to practice these
principles. J. B. Phillips’
translation puts some flesh on the bare bones of Paul’s exhortation.
Never act from motives
of rivalry or personal vanity, but in humility think more of each other than
you do of yourselves. None of you should think only of his own affairs, but
should learn to see things from other people’s point of view.
Three simple sentences that could
renew our personal well-being; truth that might reawaken and restore marriages, or revitalize
our parenting routines, or help us grow old more gracefully. And just perhaps, this attitude might rescue
the downward slide of political discourse!
Can you imagine how our
conversations around the dinner table or in the US Capitol might change if we
regarded those who frustrate us with the conviction, You is Kind. You is Smart. You is Important.
My Humble Review:
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