Let me just lay it right out here today. My life is a fairly even split between “What in the love of all that is holy is going on in this world” with “Oh my goodness, what a time to be alive.” Is that just me? It’s like we’re living in an Dumpster fire but at the same time we live longer, we’re safer and have access to more than ever before. Sometimes it’s hard to wrangle all that.
One day a couple weeks ago my husband and I were looking for something particular we wanted to watch on TV. We now have a variety of streaming services so that we can have access to exactly the things we want. I don’t think we’re saving any money at this point but the idea is that if we’re going to pay good money for it, we should be able to watch what we want at least. After much searching we learned that this particular station, which we have for sports viewing purposes, is no longer an option for us. We contacted numerous outlets and ultimately it appears that all the answers are no.
This makes me irrationally furious. Logistically, it’s 100 percent possible to give me access. I’m willing to pay. Still, no one will provide it to me. This has been rolling around in the dusty corners of my brain for a few days, and it occurred to me that this is symptomatic of a bigger problem. I don’t mean television – nothing hangs in the balance if I don’t get that station. However, I’m growing increasingly guilty of living an ‘a la carte life.
I mean the “What a time to be alive” days are fueling this attitude that I can and should live a type of life where I if I don’t like the regular meal, I should just randomly start picking the individual things I might want. Pardon me, friends, but I think this is fueling the fires.
For starters, this is making us completely self-centered. God didn’t make the world to revolve around us. But we’re living in a time where it’s becoming easier to create a life that makes it seem that way. This is creating a deeper and deeper division in our relationships with people that I find disconcerting. The world can’t revolve around more than one person, so there’s bound to be trouble brewing.
Go with me a minute. I can set up television viewing to only watch the stations that I agree with. I can easily skip over anything I don’t want to hear or see with the push of a button or even a voice command. I can set up my social media feed to block everyone I disagree with. I don’t even have to physically go inside a store anymore and interact with people or wait in a line. While I appreciate the levels of convenience of our modern world, we are losing some key abilities by living this way all the time.
Friends I was mad because I didn’t get the answer I wanted with the television channel. I’ve gotten accustomed to easy access to so much of what I want. I don’t like how short my fuse has gotten. I don’t want to be a person that’s causing the fires. That’s just not healthy for me or the world. If it’s not easy maybe I’ll just quit. I’ll go somewhere else. I’ll find new people to surround myself with. I’ll just believe something else. It’s life ‘a la carte to make it exactly to my specifications. It can’t always be that way.
I frequently joke about making my children eat the school lunches because they need to learn how to cope with disappointment. I’m only partially joking about that. I do want my kids to learn coping skills. I want them to understand that the world doesn’t revolve around them. And I want them to realize that sometimes the answer is no. What will they do? Will they give up? Will they learn and try again smarter and stronger? Time out to say I don’t care if you pack your kids’ lunch or not. It’s not about that.
There is a time and place for these things. I don’t mean that some level of choosing the life we want is fundamentally bad. In fact, I believe some of it is fundamentally good and very much needed. I’m not saying stick around in a toxic or dangerous environment. I’m saying we need to be careful because too much of this is making us weak, hot-headed and divisive. We’re separating ourselves from anything we don’t like, whether we have a good reason or not. I’m afraid we’re creating generations who aren’t equipped to handle struggle and suffering that God promised will come. I can feel myself becoming that way if I’m not careful.
Colossians 3:14 says, “But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection.” Another translation says “Above all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.”
If we choose too much of an ‘a la carte life and bypass all the things we don’t like, not only do we cheat ourselves out of learning how to handle those situations, we lose the interactions and relationships with other people that help us develop empathy, compassion and love. We run the risk of losing proper perspective on life. We’re here to love God and love people – not to assume that we are 100 percent correct about everything and expect the world to revolve around us.
I see it more and more with my own life. When it becomes too easy to curate my ideal circumstances, I get more and more agitated if it doesn’t play out that way. And it doesn’t always – no matter how badly I try to make it. Primarily, I see it when technology doesn’t work the way it should, when what I thought I wanted isn’t really what I believed it would be, and I see it when life doesn’t move at the pace that I want. Many of us can see it when we are forced to have conversations with people we don’t agree with. We don’t even know how to do this anymore because we’ve forgotten how to disagree and still love each other.
Let’s don’t lose sight of the value of trying the whole meal instead of just picking and choosing only items we know we love. Enjoy some ‘a la carte selections by picking what works for your life but don’t narrow yourself so much that you lose the benefits of the full experience. Just like exercising a muscle makes it stronger, exercising how to handle disappointments, disagreements and less than ideal conditions makes us better equipped to handle them in the future.
It also helps us learn how to truly love people as God commanded, have a fuller life and unite in our common humanity. It might also help prevent some Dumpster fires.
