Imperfectly Yours

If society practiced the term... "If you don't have anything nice to say, say nothing at all", we would live in a peacefully quiet world. From the news to the water cooler, there's a lot of negativity waiting for someone to jump on the bandwagon and join the parade. Very few people would survive having their lives, words and behavior, put under a microscope, as is evident from the huge number of ordinary people who have found their destruction in reality television. Gossip is nothing short of footage that has been spliced, diced, edited and repeated at the gossipers discretion, and it's hurtful. If someone will talk negative to you, they will talk negative about you (what you see is what you get). It's hard to know what's truly going on in someones life, or what has shaped someones choices unless you have walked in that persons shoes... Regardless of how similar your journey may seem, no two paths are exactly the same. My view of the world around me is colored by my life experience, as is others. Two people looking from the outside in can have two very different perspectives. I don't believe people intend to be negative or are intentionally mean spirited, but I do believe it's a trap that is easily fallen into and one that's not easily escaped. Nothing will bring you out of the rut like a life changing experience that could make you the target of idle gossip. If you've ever had a skeleton fall out of your closet, you become more compassionate about the skeletons of others. I had a conversation about hypocrisy with my son a few weeks ago. He was having a difficult time reconciling the actions of others in relation to their confessed beliefs. I tried to explain to him that humans are imperfect by nature and we are constantly at odds with the spirit vs. the flesh. Saying one thing and doing another doesn't necessarily make us hypocrites, it makes us human. I want to be the type of person who errs on the side of grace rather than to jump to conclusions about something or someone I know nothing or little about. My daily prayer is... "Lord, Put a guard at my lips and bridle my tongue and when I fail to be all you created me to be in you, I'm still imperfectly yours."