Is life just one test after another?
Names below have been changed.
Now that my youngest child has hit adolescence, I seem to be harvesting the fruits of telling her since she started school that grades are not important to me. She’s testing my resolve… occasionally deciding that an assignment is not a priority. I’ve mostly stuck to my resolve, reminding both of us that there are more important things in life than 6th grade language arts.
Recently, I confided my struggles to a casual friend, Jenna, and a most interesting conversation ensued. Our tone was lighthearted, but the conversation revealed different ways of relating to life.
KR: So, I’ve always told my children that learning is very important to me, but grades not so much. Unfortunately, it seems that Molly was listening all this time.
Jenna: I have not given Rianne that message… not at all. I tell her that she’s being graded and tested and judged all the time. At school, at home, out in public. You don’t do what you’re told – you’re being graded on that. You have a school assignment – you’re being graded on that. You have an interaction with someone you don’t know at a restaurant – you’re being graded on that. We’re always in every situation being tested.
Is Jenna right?
Of course she is. Human brains are sorting, difference-measuring, weighing-up machines. Making decisions about people and situations is what we do. It has kept our species alive for many millennia. And we also recognize that we’ve all had experiences when we are told in ways both direct and subtle that we don’t measure up. We’re just not ___ enough. Not good enough, not smart enough, not handsome enough, not thin enough, not athletic enough, not conforming enough. Our post-modern, hyper individualistic, youth- and wealth-worshiping society doesn’t exactly encourage us to accept ourselves and others just as we are. We do feel as if we are always being tested and being found deficient.
If I had more time in my conversation with Jenna (and if I had been thinking quickly on my feet), I might have said, “Yes, we feel the weight of others’ judgments. But we don’t have to take every opinion with equal weight. We can walk away from expectations and judgments. And more importantly, we need to share with our children the heart-deep conviction that their worth does not depend on the ‘grades’ given by others – EVEN IF those expectations and judgments come from someone they love and respect.”
Also recently, I’m diving deeper into Nonviolent Communication. At the heart of NVC is the idea that every human person has dignity and innate worth and personal agency. Our needs are both important and shared. When we interact in a way that honors human freedom, connections can be made that serve life.
This is an easy connection to my faith. We are called in ways large and small to freedom.
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit. (2 Corinthians 3:17-18)
What does this mean for Molly’s ‘History of Me’ social studies project due this next to last week of school? I don’t know, but I know that she will carry with her this idea that she is of tremendous value NO MATTER WHAT far longer than she will care about her 4th quarter grading report. And for this assurance, no matter how frustrating I occasionally find it, I am grateful.
Finally, what’s an alternative to Jenna’s worldview? How can we relate to the way life is, if not as a gigantic classroom with high-stakes testing? Maybe life is a garden where those planted can simply grow. Maybe Mary was more right than we thought… when she thought Jesus was the gardener (John 20).
Spirit of Life, Spirit of Love: we confess that often we don’t know how to relate to our own freedom or the freedom of others. We confess that sometimes our interactions with our fellow creatures don’t serve this freedom. Help us – open our eyes. We so want to live in grace and abundance. Guard in our hearts this vision of open futures and faith-filled garden paths. We pray in faith and gratitude. Amen.