"Yeah, But..."

I was thinking this morning while chopping vegetables for my son's omelet, that he and my younger boy are right: I'm hard to satisfy.

Let me backtrack quickly. I'm delighted when they bring home a good report card. I'm thrilled when they buy me a Mother's Day gift, no matter how ill-conceived (though they usually choose well). And it tickles me pink when they take my advice (a rarity, but still).

What I noticed, though, as I hacked up yellow squash, is there's this part of me that always wants something I don't have.

What, you may well ask, does fixing an egg have to do with one's satisfaction level?

It's important to understand that my son is 19 years old, and pretty much knows what he likes and doesn't like. He's not a toddler that I have to play airplane with to get food into his mouth. In fact, he has a reasonably adventurous palate and eats a wide variety of items that would probably make the USDA's food pyramid stand on its head (or should I say point?). Furthermore, he had already agreed to a veritable cornucopia of greens, including onion, green pepper and tomato, in his omelet. To these I had added mushrooms, since he's relatively indifferent to them, and I figured he could pick them out if he wasn't in the mood today. So there was really no need for me to spruce up an already vitamin-laden breakfast with yet another veggie.

Still, I couldn't resist the urge to introduce something new, to embellish what he had asked for, to - let's face it - impose my will onto his stated desires. I wasn't at all sure he would eat the squash, and even considered the possibility that this last minute add-on might ruin the meal for him. Sure enough, he lined up every yellow cube nice and neat on a patterned napkin, complaining as he did so.

I once heard a well-known author and radio personality describe the phenomenon this way: you can't have hair flowing down your back at the same time it's in a braid. It can't be done. It's either tidily constrained or cascading freely. You can have either one on different occasions, but at the same time is ridiculous.

Yet, I am the master of "yeah, but."

"I'm doing my homework, Mom."

"Yeah, but why are there dishes in the sink?"

"I'm going on a date with a girl who's polite, hard-working, and goal-oriented."

"Yeah, but have you written that thank you note yet?"

I think this tendency is part of what keeps me from doing what I was born to do: write. Part of it is just plain old laziness and procrastination, but another factor is, if I'm clicking the keyboard I can't be cleaning the kitchen or checking email or having coffee with a friend. One thing has to be put aside in order to accomplish the other. Sometimes I have so many things tumbling around in my head that I get exhausted before I even begin one of them.

So ultimately, I guess it comes down to the "c" word - contentment. If I have two healthy, caring children who aren't striving to be Nobel Prize winners, I can choose to be content with the wonder of who they are.
If I spend two hours outlining a book proposal but the floor isn't washed, I can choose self-esteem over self-flagellation.

Because, when you get right down to it, Christ chose to give up His heavenly throne room - temporarily - in favor of a carpenter's shop.

"Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross." Philippians 2:5:8

For more like this, check out: Morsels for Meditation...: "Yeah, But..." Part 2