We've all heard the tongue in cheek joke about the doctor who gives the most simple advice to the patient, right? "It hurts when I do this", "then don't do that!" Thanks. That kind of advice doesn't help much and boy can it be expensive as you rack up the medical bills. I've begun to notice how much I've been doing that in my own life, and again the cost is too much.
I have somehow been fortunate to basically land in the therapy world (I had no idea that was where God wanted me when I started out), and one thing we hear a lot is self care, you can't take care of these kids if you aren't taking care of yourself. OK, I can handle that; bring on the self care! But it's hard in this world, we are encouraged to keep going and keep taking on more, because success is measured by how heavy your burden and not by the quality of your life. And if you don't have success by these standards then you can't claim to be anything, to have done anything, to have any meaning. Discouraged? Me too! And then add on the scary task of child rearing and the responsibility that comes along with that; I almost want to throw in the towel.
And that's why I go to the "it hurts when..." in my life. It hurts when my son talks back to me so I simply don't give him a voice. It hurts when people reject me so I simply don't give them a chance. It hurts when I fall short so I simply don't ask for help.It hurts when I fail so I simply don't try.
I could go on and on with the hurts and the way I avoid it all, but if I go to the doctor and he tells me simply, don't do that, I'm going to feel cheated; why do I continue to cheat myself out of good medicine for life?
At work this week we had an assignment to do at case management. Write a prescription for life. Be specific. I had to come up with 3 things I needed to feel happy. Wow what seems so simple was incredibly hard. I wanted to be honest and not just add things like: lots and lots of chocolate would make me happy! But when I get down to it I'm not sure what 3 things I need. That's why I make a mess of things. How can I make Marty happy if I can't even figure out what makes me happy? That's exactly the point, I have to fix me before I have the skills to help anyone else! When you visit the doctor you ask for him to heal what ails you so that you can continue your life. I'm in desperate need of healing, we all are, I personally know I need to visit my personal physician God. His prescription for my life isn't always the easiest medicine to swallow, but I always seem to feel better.
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| God's prescription for life was definitely the blessing of this great kid! |
In case you were wondering my RX for life is :
Connect with my closest friends once a week (call, email, write a letter/card, plan coffee, do lunch)
Connect with God several times a day (pray, read Bible, tell Marty about God, show gratitude)
Find
alone time once a day (run,
read, go home for lunch, take a walk at lunch)
Check in with Marty
at least twice a day (car ride home, dinner time, school ride, take a walk with him)
Write once a week (blog, journal)
(I've added more than 3 as we were told that we should keep adding as we figure out more about what makes us happy, also I was even more specific by describing how to take the medicine)
Whatever the prescription make the choice to not accept a simple don't do that, avoiding the problem doesn't heal it!
