The Battles You Choose.
If you’ve lived any length of time, you know that every life, no matter how wonderful it seems from the outside, has its own share of troubles. Some days they are few and far between, and on other days they come at you thick and fast, relentless and merciless.
Those are the times when all you can do is try to keep your head above water, and focus on staying afloat, when everything tries to pull you down.
But in the midst of that madness, you find the battles you choose to fight, even though you don’t have to.
I have an amazing sister-in-law who lives close to us. A survivor of a difficult marriage, and an ugly divorce, she has fought her way back into the light after struggling for a time to find the very core of who she is.
As a single mother of 3 incredible children, she’s wears herself out every day trying to make sure that her kids have a wonderful life.
And she’s doing an amazing job of it.
Sometimes, it’s my privilege and honor to help her out with things. Maybe it’s being knee deep in her pool, trying to clean out the dirty water that has accumulated over the winter, or sitting down with one of the kids and standing in the place of a father figure, helping them to find the truths of themselves under the misunderstandings that they absorbed from the distance of someone who should have been there for them, but wasn’t.
Sometimes it’s holding her as she cries, and giving her the space to lay down her burdens for a moment and find a period of rest to her soul.
Through all of this, she feels like she is a burden to me, and while I can understand why she might feel that way, I think there are things that she doesn’t understand, and maybe you don’t either.
I hope that sharing this truth today might help you understand a little more about yourself, and her understand a little more about me.
Because the battles you choose to fight when you don’t have to, are the ones that help you stay sane amidst all the ones you didn’t choose.
The simple difference is choice, and it’s the most important difference in the world. Fighting a fight that you didn’t choose can make you feel like you have no control in what happens to you. It’s something you have to do, and although it often makes a difference in your life, there’s usually little in the battle that uplifts your soul.
But the battles you choose – they’re usually because it makes a difference to someone else.
That sense of being able to serve, give, love and care for another human being is very often the source of strength that we need to go on when our own battles, the ones we did not choose, threaten to overwhelm us and force us to our knees.
But in serving another, in caring for another, we rise.
So today, if someone is helping you when they seem to be carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders, please understand that the ability to help you may be the very thing that is giving them the strength to keep going, the reason to keep rising.
Because the truest definition of a human being is not what they do when they had to , but what they choose to do when they didn’t have to.
Our self assumed responsibilities are very often the things that give us a sense of purpose, of growth, and of contribution, in a world that tries to make us feel like we have little or nothing to contribute, little or no value to our souls.
If someone has chosen to help you, be grateful and let them serve. Because you may never know how grateful they are for the chance.
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings