Skip to main content

Keeping It Real


Have you noticed how shallow and made up our world can be?  Cover girl, faux finishes, cliff notes, plastic and tweets abound. Vulnerability, courage, character and hard work is too time consuming. 

Relationships tend to happen during commercials and bathroom breaks and waiting lines.

Easy come and easy go.  Safe and sanitized.

Spending a life to get two minutes of fame or a plastic award or shiny medal.  Shoving children in the spotlight hoping for a shot at fame and fortune.   Or at least a chance on the annual Christmas letter. Lessons, clubs and photo ops take up all of our time. (I'm not against all of these things in themselves.)

What drives us to protecting from failure?  When did struggle and risk become entwined with failure?

It reminds me of when I was a young girl and did horse 4-H.  Parents would buy very expensive and highly trained horses and then hire highly paid trainers for the kids plus the coaches to keep the kids on the horses.  The parents washed and groomed and saddled and fed.  The kids stood by keeping their white shirts clean.  When asked a Dad said, "I don't want them to mess it up or ruin it...or get hurt."

 The horses showed the kids.

I was a good rider.  Not because of my "training" but because of my vulnerability, courage, failure and experience that came from pain and hard work.  

Oh yes...don't forget the "safe" factor.  Or the struggle.  Or the pain.  Or the involvement of the parent with the child.  The tears and the failures and the starting all over again.

When my boys did horse 4-H for their limited time they used the horses they were breaking and training with MY coaching.  My kids got stepped on and frustrated and struggled.  I cried.  They cried.  We fought.  A few temper tantrums happened here and there.   

People called us stubborn.

I called it "Keeping it Real!"

I bemoan the lack of courage and truthfully the lack of manhood and womanhood in our world. 

 Old people talk fearfully about this next generation of quitters.  Parents fret and stew over lack of initiative and direction when maybe some of it it is just the struggle. 

Maybe the problem is us.

I want to fix and prod and shake em and move them along because I'm uncomfortable with the process.

I believe with all my heart that kids need us to keep it real.  To keep the routine, schedule, chores and normal everyday family lives happening.  They need us to pull them back or down or lift them up.  

In order to move forward our children need their feet on the ground and muscles in their character.

Keeping it real does that.

 






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Starting a Journey

September 3, 2010 Originally posted How to Begin a Journey 1. Pick a destination or simply start. 2. Plan a detailed itinerary or just take the first step. 3. Pack everything or travel lightly. I am choosing to just begin. To leave behind the baggage, pick up a day pack, and go. Several nights before we moved to Ogallala, I was praying about the transition when I heard that still, small voice of God. In that moment, I knew He heard my Heart's Cry. He hears every whispered plea, every unspoken longing. If I truly sit with that truth, it humbles me. What courage, boldness, passion, and decisiveness I have when I remember: He never leaves or forsakes me. He provides for my every need according to His riches in glory. My hope is to encourage you He hears your Heart's Cry too.
2 comments
Read more

1940 Canned Apple Butter: Family Root Cellar

I loved exploration as a child.  From opening the door and going down the stairs to get something from my Grandma's root cellar or exploring old homesteads while checking cows.  I credit my Mom with teaching us to appreciate those things that represented the people who had gone before us. When I moved with my husband and boys to a house on the family ranch-I began exploring immediately.  This was the house my Aunt and Uncle lived in during my childhood.  My Grandparents had lived there and many other families dating back to 1900 when it was built.   With two little boys in tow, I made my way to the root cellar and found a treasure cove.  Old text books belonging to the original family who had been a teacher, the original medicine cupboard, tools, trash and memorabilia.   I felt like an archeologist sifting through layers of debris representing generations and culture.  And I was.  I hauled truckloads of trash to the dump (some...
4 comments
Read more

Diabetes-Opened to Disease OR Open to Connecting to my Strengths

I've tried living in denial for two years after the big D diagnoses was handed over.  Honestly, I just don't want to talk about it.  Outwardly seemly calm and disconnected from it.  Inwardly terrified. As a plant that is stressed is open to disease, injury and death so to our bodies are.  I opened myself up to this.  Stress, lack of sleep, bad nutrition, overweight and lack of exercise.  For some reason I believed that if I ran fast enough and worked hard enough, I would outrun my family genes.  The tiny room in the back of my brain locked with a key has kept the fear of this disease at bay even though I could hear its screaming when life quieted down. My Aunt died piece by piece to this disease.  First a heart attack and quadruple by-pass.  Then a toe.  Next a foot.  Legs came next along with more heart attacks.  Kidneys shutting down.  She died very young. When I was little, my Aunt Ally gave herself s...
4 comments
Read more