We can well describe the person we want others to think of us as.
Wise, compassionate, patient, fun, witty, and a great friend are a couple descriptors we would readily select. However, if we are honest in our assessment, this describes more our best self than our whole self. We admittedly forego mentioning several traits or layers that may be less desirable as we rationalize those are more exceptions than the rule.
But who are you really? When your chips are down, or at 3 am, or in the midst of an awful day do you more closely reflect those positive traits listed or the ones skipped over? Or the even more difficult question to ponder: which list is more truly you? Such is the focus of our discussion this week: remaining the person we want to be regardless of circumstances.
“Go ahead, examine me from inside out,
surprise me in the middle of the night—
You’ll find I’m just what I say I am.
My words don’t run loose.”
In this Psalm David describes achieving the objective outlined above by remaining true to his ideals and faith even in the ‘middle of the night.’ We often take this statement as merely an expression, but what if we instead took it as fact? The question we would be naturally arrive at is how did David achieve this? The answer is choice.
We don’t get to select our circumstances, but we can always choose how we react to them. For it is easy and natural to be happy and thankful when things go our way, but it something remarkable when in the midst of adversity we witness someone exude those some qualities. Like anything worthwhile in life, this achievement is accomplished by us being both deliberate and disciplined in our approach. Choosing each day, and sometimes each moment, to react in a manner that supports our character goals vice satisfying our fleeting feelings. Only when we transcend our capricious daily feelings and the storms of life can we consolidate our gains. The German writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe captures this sentiment well:
“I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming. ”