A Different Perspective

What defines you? What defines a nation? In my parent’s lifetime, World War II offered many significant events. Would you define yourself by the tragedy at Pearl Harbor or the success of Normandy? Or maybe the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

As a nation, we seem to be defined by 9-11 right now, because as a whole, we choose to be defined as victims. Victims react out of their pain and suffering. The old adage “hurt people will hurt people” comes to mind. The tearing down of the Berlin Wall, the dismantling of the Soviet Union… these are events occurring in most of our lifetimes. But as human beings, we make icons out of tragedies more readily than our successes. I remember where I was when the shuttle blew up (the first one) and where I was when I found out about the towers, but I can’t tell you what I was doing when news of the Berlin Wall came my way. It will not be easy to move the U.S. out of “victim” mode, but it needs to be done.

Personally, I can see myself also defined by tragic events more readily than my joyous occasions, of which there have been numerous in my life. For about six years I’ve had an under-the-surface feeling that my life has been stolen from me. In September of 1999, everything changed. My wife of a very short time walked out on me. I returned home from an evening service to find a typed letter informing me of the life altering event lying just ahead, divorce. I had plans, which I thought were shared, I had a vision, goals, and to be completely honest, I believed I had been destined for greatness. With some poor business decisions as a late teen aside, most everything I did ended up bigger and supposedly better. Since that September 1999, successes in the traditional sense have been further and farther away.

I like many things about my current life, and the things I learned about myself, my faith, and about relating to God could not be traded for anything. Yet there is still this nagging feeling that someone switched the tracks for my life’s train and I’ve veered off course. The train tracks analogy matches my feeling, because there’s no right or left turns to get back on track. I don’t feel the analogy matches the way I should feel, but it is the way I feel. Part of my problem can be a cognizant choice to allow myself to be defined by the divorce, while other factors go beyond my will to choose. Experiences in life form who we are as persons, and there’s really nothing anyone can do about that.

But what I can control is what I focus on when I think about who I am. I can tell you, I need to take less time thinking of myself as someone whose life was irreparably altered and more as someone on a journey where a right path is available to me, and I may even be on it.

What defines you? Are you being defined by a death, a divorce, or maybe a church split? Getting fired? Have your life altering events, especially those beyond your control, given you a feeling that your life is not your own? Your living something not meant for you? It’s not true. It’s just not true. Take the value in the tragedies you’ve experienced, learn from them, and then move on.

The moving on is certainly a process (one I thought I went through long ago). If you choose to be defined by tragedy, you will never truly move on. You will be like Lot’s wife looking back, sans being turned into a pillar of salt. The problem with always looking back? You create more tragedies because you don’t see the dangers ahead of you.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 25th, 2006 at 8:39 am and is filed under Faith, Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.