Tag: family

Light in the darkness

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I think I figured out what I want to write my dissertation on: it’s somewhat focused on self-interest, but also on altruism. I’m really curious about if we need to be self-interested or not. Do we need to take care of ourselves? Is it necessary that we worry about our own well-being? What about the people that sacrifice so much for the service of others?

Christmas time has always been a time of service for me. Sometimes I feel weird about it–I’m buying presents for my kids and spending so much money on my own family–but I also want to help other people too. I hear of some people who give all their Christmas money to others, while I find myself giving my children more presents than they really need (or even perhaps want). I wonder if I could be doing more good.

We visit Giving Machines. We contribute to charities. We take tags off the Giving Tree in the elementary school lobby and I have my kids pick out presents for others. I look at service projects in my community and try to sign up–play the piano at a hospital, clean up after an event, volunteer at the food pantry, make blankets.

And then my kids get sick and I have to cancel half of the things I volunteered for so I can stay home and take care of them. I feel conflicted about what is self-interested and what is serving others: did I volunteer just so I felt good about myself? Or because I felt it as a duty, but I didn’t really want to do it? Or did I genuinely care about someone besides myself?

I worry sometimes about the impacts I have on others. I have the biggest impact on my own children. I want them to learn to look outward. I make cookies and bring them to neighbors. I send out Christmas cards, but I am afraid I have forgotten people. I go and visit elderly friends and tell them I will return to visit another time because the visit is never long enough.

I tell my daughter that happiness comes in the service of others. But I don’t think I serve other people in order for me to feel happy. Instead, I serve them because I want them to be happy. And my own happiness comes as a by-product. It may be impossible to make someone else happy without making yourself happy as well.

How much do I need to give? How much do I want to give?

I look at the holiday displays people make and I wonder for a moment if all that money could have been given to charity instead. Yet, if everyone did that, we would not have the light filling up the dark space of December. And I love Christmas lights.

Perhaps there is simply enough to do all of it–to give presents to my children, to donate to charity, to help other people, to enjoy the twinkling colorful lights. Perhaps our time and money are not as scarce as we sometimes believe, and there is more than enough.

But that isn’t quite right, because sacrifice is necessary. Sacrifice is praiseworthy and good and beautiful.

I remember all the stories in my life about sacrifice: My grandma sewing clothes for my mom and surprising her during a meager year. My mom searching to give me a Furby, despite the fact that they are sold out everywhere. My husband buys a friend his only Christmas presents of the year, and even though it is a simple fruit cake, they share it gladly.

When there is scarcity, people give in service to others, even though it requires sacrifice. They prioritize others about themselves. And that is right. That is light.

I hear people on Instagram telling me that I should prioritize myself at Christmastime. That I can ask for presents and spend time for myself. But I don’t want to. I want to connect with others so much more than I ever want to receive for myself.

That connection means that I do receive: I am invited, included. Others wrap presents for me and put them under the tree because they love me. And I receive that with gratitude.

No moment of my life is about myself. It is always about someone else, above giving and serving and helping and maybe, maybe making someone else’s life just a little bit better. Whenever I have pursued my own self-interest just because of my own selfish desires (and it happens more frequently than I want to admit), it has drained my life of purpose and led to unhappiness.

The light that shines in the darkness is that we love each other, and that we are loved. We celebrate Jesus Christ who loved us so much that he gave everything to us. In ever gift I give and receive, I remember the greatest gift, a light to the world.

Quality and Quantity Time With Your Kids

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In church one day, I heard a woman say that quality time mattered more than quantity time. My mom happened to be visiting, and whispered to me that quantity time definitely still mattered.

I was looking at a journal entry when I had little tiny kids, and I wrote that I found it very difficult to sit and entertain my two-year-old every day. I felt too much guilt because I couldn’t always make the quantity time into quality time. I’ve been a stay-at-home mom and a homeschooling mom, and for a white, I spent basically every moment of my life with my children. It was hard, and to be honest, I didn’t love it. But I still think it was valuable to be there, even if I wasn’t always enjoying myself.

Because often the quality times don’t happen unless there is quantity time first. I try to plan out quality family time, but it often implodes on me, and all I get is kids who complain because it wasn’t near as fun as we expected. But then quality time can sneak up when I least expect it. The other day, I discovered an impromptu dance party in my living room.

There isn’t a tradeoff between the two–they work together, and to maximize quality time, I maximize quantity time first. But I’m going back to school full time in the fall and I won’t be home as much. My kids will all be in school full-time. We also like running around to various sports and activities. How do we keep spending time together as a family?

First thing: turn off screen time and increase green time. The impromptu dance party only happened because it was a no screen day. Many studies show that screen time can have a negative impact on mental health and green time increased mental health outcomes. So going outside more, particularly as a family, is really beneficial for all of us.

Here are some other ideas:

  • If I’m not physically home, I can put up a camera that allows me to check on home and talk to those that are there.
  • I can write and leave notes for my kids.
  • I can wake up earlier and get ready before the kids are away so that I’m present before the kids go to school.
  • I can use the random minutes here and there. Car rides together. Late evenings. Intersections. Cooking dinner and doing dishes.
  • And I can involve my kids with what I am doing and what I am thinking.

And instead of looking only at days, I can look at weeks and months (I got this idea from Laura Vanderkam). I’m not maximizing time spent with my children on a daily basis; I’m maximizing it over weeks and months and years. I may not spend six hours with my kids every day, but I can spend three hours with them on the weekdays and 10 hours with them on the weekends. We can make up time with each other by going on vacation during summer break and using weekends for family time.

What are your ideas to maximize quantity and quality time with your kids?

Loosing and Finding Home

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I moved when I was five years old, and then I lived in the same house until I was twenty. I had the same bedroom for over a decade. Home was very much a specific place that I could rely on.

And then I moved out and I moved again and again and again.

We haven’t ever found a singular place to call home. The house I have lived in for the majority of my life still sort of feels like home in a way, but I’m now a visitor there.

For a while, my husband and I wanted to find someplace to call home. With all our moves, we knew that we hadn’t landed yet. We hadn’t found a place where we could settle down and live for years on end without thinking about moving again.

But more than that, I wanted a feeling of home. I wanted that place that was constant and unchanging. A place that felt reliable. A place that was always there. A place that felt more familiar than anything in the world.

I wanted a place where I could always feel like myself. A place I never had to pretend in. Somewhere where it was safe to laugh and safe to cry. Somewhere that would always forgive. A foundation to my life that never shifted.

Going home when I was a child was safety and peace. I was taken care of at home. I didn’t want anything more or less. I was happy.

I wanted that feeling again.

And after years of being an adult, I have realized that that feeling of home only exists when you are a child. Nowhere will ever feel like home quite like it did when you were young.

Because part of home was the fact that I had a mother and a father to take care of me and to take care of the house. Now I’m in charge.

So I’m worried about housing markets, interest rates, insurance, and bills. I’m worried about paint colors and furnishings. I’m worried about what’s for dinner and what I need to clean up next. I can’t ever sit and be completely still in my house again. Home is a feeling that doesn’t contain worry.

I can’t ever be completely at home because I am the one making the home. I am the one providing safety and peace. And while I can enjoy it in some ways, it will never be the same.

But that isn’t a bad thing. I am so grateful that I got that feeling of home when I was younger, because some people never have it in their lives.

And I know that my kids can feel how I did. That makes me happy–a different sort of happiness.

Home is different now. But different isn’t bad.

And I know that when this life ends, I’ll be able to find that feeling of home again, just like I felt as a child. Because I think that what I was feeling when I was kid–that feeling of safety and security and love–that was heaven.