You Are Not Your Accomplishments

"If we make our goal to live a life of compassion and unconditional love, then the world will indeed become a garden where all kinds of flowers can bloom and grow."

-Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, Late Author of On Death and Dying

Several things this week have had me thinking of “unconditional love”—specifically regarding our children. This week I heard someone refer to their child in terms of their accomplishments rather than who they are. Isn’t that just one of the areas where this whole parenting thing gets hairy?

I read an article this week http://www.faithit.com/5-things-your-kids-will-remember-about-you/ about what our kids would remember about us when they are grown. When you think back to your own childhood, you will probably agree these things are true. What an enormous task we have as parents to not screw up our kids! When I think about how not to screw them up, I always go back to that four letter word…L-O-V-E. 

When I picked my youngest son up from school yesterday, he was a nervous wreck. After delving deeper, I quickly learned that he “got an 83 on his math test.” That normally wouldn’t have caused such alarm, but his teacher informed the students that the test grade would probably pull their six weeks' grade down a letter grade. He was absolutely frantic because he couldn’t remember if his mid-six weeks' grade was an A or a B. We chatted. I asked him if he was struggling in that area. I asked if he was not understanding something. I asked if I could help him with something. He told me that he had made a silly mistake and mixed up the addition and subtraction and that is what caused the lower grade. I told him to stop worrying about it. I told him that we all make mistakes and it would be just fine. He continued to pace the floor looking for his mid-six weeks' report. I went downstairs to fold a load of laundry and within minutes, he raced down excitedly to tell me that he remembered that the only B he had on his mid-six weeks' report was social studies and it was only a point away from an A. He said he remember talking to Dad about how he would pull that up. He was so relieved! He was relieved because he was terrified of making a C on his report card and being “kicked out” of gifted and talented (his words.) Ah!

The same day, my oldest child, who is taking college classes (as a junior in high school) vocalized his frustrations with his Statistics class. As someone who took this same class a few years back (and BARELY passed…and I mean "69.5 rounded up to a 70" barely passed), I understand how difficult the course is. He is planning to get a tutor to try to help him make more sense of the course. If he doesn’t maintain his grades, he won’t be able to continue to take these college courses.

Now. I’m not a participation trophy kind of mom. I’m a work your butt off and earn it kind of mom. Make no bones about that. People who can handle things and maintain excellence are the people who should get the jobs and get the bonuses and get the accolades. I am totally down with that.

I have three children who do pretty great with academics and athletics. I’m proud of them for those things. I truly am. When they work hard for something and achieve it, that makes me proud.

The thing that I want them to grow up knowing, however, is that THOSE THINGS DO NOT DEFINE THEM. Yes I will push them to LEARN THINGS (notice I said learn things, not “get good grades”—they aren’t the same thing.) I will push them to try their hardest and give their all at whatever sport or activity they engage in.  You don’t know what you can achieve unless you push yourself and put in the time and effort!

At the end of the day, however, if you are an All-American or if you rode the pine all year...if you go to an Ivy League school or you go to the local Community College…as long as you know you have done your best…that is all that matters! 

You are NOT defined by your achievements to those who truly love you!

You are YOU! And the most awesome parts of you are not the parts that you list on a resume or a college application. The most awesome parts of you are the things that not everybody gets to see everyday—like the times you used to take a jacket for the kid at school who didn’t have one, or the times you stood up for the kid who was getting bullied, or the time you got to know the quiet kid who had a rough home life.

And that will always be more important to me than any test score.

-lightning Bug