You know, so much of any circumstance relies heavily on our perspective.
We react to a situation based on how we percieve it. And that perception can sometimes be skewed.
Take for example the recent debate (or lack there of) on the new Health Care Bill. Most people I talk to see this bill as an attack on their God given freedom to choose their health care provider and how they will pay for it. Still others view this bill as a much needed overhaul of the insurance industry.
Two completely different perspectives on the same issue.
I look at the current healthcare bill as an amazing opportunity for this country to turn from a reactive approach to health, to more of a proactive approach. It’s an opportunity for individuals to start taking their health more seriously by incorporating better fitness and nutrition practices into their lifestyles.
So, what kind of perspective are you looking at circumstances with?
Could you benefit by stepping back and looking at things differently?
I would say yes, and you have that kind of power over any situation you encounter. The glass is either half full, or half empty. And sometimes it helps to look at it from both the top and the bottom of the glass.
This past week I had the opportunity to go on a mission trip to Mexico. With all the recent news about the drug cartel violence, I had every reason to back out of the trip. But I’m glad I didn’t because I would have missed out on a pretty amazing experience.
There was 17 in all going on the trip. We left on Wednesday evening about 5:30 after an exhilarating work day. For me Wednesday started at 3:30 am (my normal wake up time) to allow myself time to eat breakfast and do my devotional before leaving to run boot camp class at 5:30 am. Followed that up with men’s group at 7:00 and then ironed out some details at the studio the rest of the morning in preparation for my absence.
The drive to Brownsville took us about 13 1/2 hours with all the stops, which put our arrival there at 7:00 am Thursday morning. Needless to say I didn’t sleep very much, if even at all. Personally I have never done well sleeping in a car (or on a plane for that matter).
My dad lives in Weslaco, Tx which is just 20 minutes from Brownsville, so I got to meet up with him and talk with him about an hour or so before we went across the border. A quick stop for supplies and food at Walmart was the final task before we made our way into Matamoros, Mexico. Once we were across the border we drove about 30 minutes west of the city to the Matamoros Children’s Home where we would be living and working for the next two days.
We barely unpacked the van and we were put to work. At this time it’s about 10 am, so I had already surpassed the 24 hour mark. Some guys were assigned to working on taping and filling the drywall in one of the newly built cottages and some others started working on building the fascia around the roof. Myself and 4 other guys were assigned to demolition!
One of the older cottages was being renovated so we simply had to gut the place. There was a leak coming from one of the pipes in the bathroom so there was some wood rot in a lot of areas, but the termite damage was by far the worst I have ever seen. The wood crumbled in our hands and sounded like Ritz crackers being crumbled up. We filled up a huge trailer…twice! We thought, or at least it felt like, we had been working all day. It felt like the day should have been over, after all, to us we had already surpassed a complete day.
I was feeling extremely exhausted by this point. Real fatigue…not the kind of fatigue when you’ve put in a “hard” day at work and you don’t feel like doing the dishes or folding laundry when you get home. No, this was weak legged, hard to focus on anything fatigue!
Since we couldn’t do anymore demolition in that cottage for the day, we decided to head back to the missionary dorm to eat something and refuel. Along the way we noticed a couple of swings on the swing set were broken. We stopped to see what we could do. And I have to admit I wasn’t thrilled about it. Fixing stuff isn’t really my thing anyway. And now I felt like I was going to fall asleep standing up. We were tinkering with this and that, trying to make it work with what little we had. We got one side fixed, but the other one had the chain wrapped around the top cross bar. We tried throwing the swing over but to no avail. So, I climbed up one of the poles and got the chain unwrapped so we could fix the second swing.
Where was this strength coming from? More on that in a bit.
After that we finally ate some lunch and sat in the air conditioning for a bit… and that did me in. I could have easily put my head down and called it a day. But there was still some work to be done and I felt I should press on. And I wasn’t the only one, we were all tired. For the next 3 hours we helped pour a concrete driveway. Mostly shoveling gravel, lifting 5 gallon buckets of the gravel into the mixer, and filling the buckets again. Over and over, for hours. Since I was doing something and moving about, I felt energized. Then some of the children that live there came over and started to help which was nice, and eye opening at the same time.
My energy (strength) could have only came from one place…God. What other explanation is there? There isn’t one! We went down to Mexico to do His work and after being awake more than 36 hours, which consisted of some of the hardest manual labor I have experienced in recent memory, it was obvious that the power/strength/energy was not of our own doing.
You know, when those children came to help us work it made me realize something…this small community that we were there to help was displaying what a community is really supposed to look like. Everyone there contributes, in one way or the other. Some of the men who live there with their wives help raise 10 orphan children at a time, as well as their own. Everybody has chores and they do them willingly, not for money, but rather the betterment of the community itself…each other.
Everyone there was smiling…truly enjoying life. There are no deadlines, no statuses, no crime. They live as if today is the most precious gift they’ve ever been given. That is something I would like to learn. I wonder how much better my day would be if I really took joy in what I was doing every minute of every day, living thankfully, instead of always looking ahead, planning for the next move in order to get ahead (or stay ahead).
I’d like to think I caught a little glimpse of heaven. Who knew I’d find it in Matamoros, Mexico?!
Awesome!