When my kids get along and treat each other with kindness and refrain from doing the things they know will irritate each other and bite their tongues when they want to say something that will make them sound smart but is not kind, the world is a better place. Yes, I mean the entire world. Because you know that annoying ringing you sometimes get in your ears? Or the sudden migraine that swoops in from out of nowhere? Yeah, that’s the sound of me going ballistic when they intentionally instigate each other.
‘Cause I’m super good at setting an example, I tell ya what.
So they know they can get along, and they know how do it, and they’ve agreed that their lives are easier and better when they do. Yet there they are, fighting. Putting fairness ahead of love. Putting pride ahead of peace. Pursing those lips so an accidental smile doesn’t ruin such a glorious tantrum.
“You’re choosing to be miserable. It’s crazy. You have the knowledge and the ability to be happy and you’re turning your back on all that for…for what? For some imagined glory? Who cares if you’re the winner of whatever this ridiculousness is? Why does it even matter?”
And there it is. My own words are like a not-so-delectable slice of humble pie, waiting patiently to be eaten. Because at every glorious tantrum I throw, at every ridiculous grab at imagined glory, at every pursed-lip march down the hallway, God shakes His Head. He sighs. And He wonders why I’m choosing to be miserable.
It’s crazy, He says.
You have the knowledge and the ability to be happy, He says.
Don’t turn your back, He says.
So I won’t.
I’ll try harder to put love ahead of fairness. To put peace ahead of pride. And to remember that being kind is so much more important than sounding smart.
Especially if it means the kids will quit fighting, ya know? That scene is gettin’ old real quick.
