Un-sunny Sundays

While in church, I wrote about a state that I find myself in sometimes when I am trying to be effective. I seem accomplish a great deal in this state. I make quick decisions. I often find creative solutions. I burn through my to-do lists. I get a ton of work done.

However, I do not like who I am while I am in this state. I am impatient, bossy, focused only on my objective. I am often rude and overbearing. Any appearance of tactfulness is a struggle to maintain.

Picture this state as a fire, that once lit, if not controlled, can burn everything that is close by.  In this state, I feel the tickling edges of a fury that I have never shown. It is as though I am powered by frustration and hate for where I am now.

Not a very pleasant person to be.

This is a side of me that I try to hide from those who like me. If I let this state show itself, then I would watch friends run for the hills

As always, the ones that are closest to me seen the most of this secret state. My poor mom and son and co-workers... With my son, he experiences it when time is short, or problems are obvious. There has to be a way to achieve significant progress without this frustration boiling up in me.

As if on torturous queue, the message today was about how when tested by life, what we do tells us who we are. I don't like what I see in this mirror. I have never accepted this side of me in my self-definition.

Then, for illustration purposes, while working at home in the afternoon, I found myself entering this state. As usual, I fought it, but this time I also stepped back and looked at it. I remembered that there is a difference between responding and reacting to a situation, I fought my-frustrated-self and tried to engaged Adam in a different way.

Normally, in this state, when doing something with Adam, I simply give him directions and demand that that is the only thing he does. I realized this is approach is flawed. In the right situation, it may be appropriate. but most of the time it is not. I am not giving him a chance to express himself. For an autistic person, communicating is hard enough without my foul mood exasperating it. So, this evening, fighting my state, I took the time to tell him what I needed him to do, and then helped him do what he wanted. It was good. The final result was better than anything I would have accomplished by simply enforcing my will.

It is the Third way. Not my way. Not his way. But a better way. It is how I aspire to be all the time. And you should have seen the affect. We got done what needed to be done. But instead of my noxious mood squashing communication, the avenues were wide open. He was bubbling with thoughts and ideas. He knew he was being listened to and understood. We got so much more accomplished than just what I wanted. 

Maybe I have taken the another step in learning how to continuously nurture and discipline his spirit, instead of occasionally squashing it.

May God help me retain this new lesson.