Stop planning and live in the moment

As a wife and a mom and now grandma it’s easy to get tempted to become the one who lectures my tribe. After all, mother knows best right? It’s easy to take on that role when your kiddos are little. It’s good to teach them right from wrong and lead them as they grow. Once your children are adults though your relationship changes and the last thing they need from their mom is one more lecture! This also goes for the wives reading this post. I don’t know a single male that gets excited about a lecture or “told you so” from their wife! How would our lives look differently if we could model our savior, Jesus and “invite them up” rather than beating them down? The world does plenty of that already. What are some ways we can invite people up? We can find the gold in them, we can point out where they are inspiring and impressing us. We can love them. I’m not just talking about a feeling here, I’m talking about love as a verb. Love is action. Each person and scenario is going to be different here and it takes some intuition and imagination to show love to each different person in your tribe and circle. Maybe to my husband I can show him love by shutting my mouth! Maybe to my adult son I can show him love by encouraging him or reminding him about Gods grace for him. To my adult daughter maybe it’s being her biggest cheerleader. To my grandchildren maybe showing love is getting on the floor and wrestling with them. I can tell you this, nobody ever went higher in life by being beat down and criticized. Not any real or lasting changes anyway! In order to be this person you don’t even have to like or agree with some of your loved ones choices. If your end goal is to model Jesus to them, which mine is, then maybe it’s time to start acting like He did! Remember, he ate dinner with the sinners. He hung out in their homes. He met all their needs. He inspired them to come higher! He lived by example with plenty of love and patience to go around. He lived His life according to His convictions, not the people around Him. Imagine a world where all the moms were inspiring their tribes to come higher. Can you envision it? I can! Let’s all commit to being this version to our families and friends.