Affirmative Action


 One thing that I would like to do for people I have relationships with, is to give them a unique compliment as a gift. A compliment that would reflect how much, I have put effort to know them, one that they can save for later and think about. There is such an impact that positive words have on us humans, and to be such an impact to those around me is one of the many missions I want to carry out on this earth. 

It's a peculiar matter really, how we get elated over receiving kind words. In some cases a kind word of support can change your mood. It's almost magical. I for one, know that I have over come some insecurities, thanks to a companion expressing their appreciation of some of my attributes. I try to keep in mind those things that they say about me, in case I start to doubt myself, and I find myself in need of some convincing.



When I look around, it does feel like we're living in times of, everyone getting awarded for the bare minimum. I think that there may not be enough merit in giving everyone certificates of participation, to justify giving everyone trophies for showing up. There's an unneeded sensitivity to appease everyone's desire for affirmation. Could it be, because of the increase in ease of being able to compare our lives thanks to the internet. Reflexively, we get all these hormones released when someone likes, or comments, or mentions our handles. As a result, there is a tendency to chase after the little kicks we get from online interactions.  

There is often a relation that is built, between love and affirmation. Out of what many call love languages, there are words of affirmation, which is expressing or receiving love through saying or hearing things, that assert their value in their eyes or the eyes of another. So the relation comes rom the assumption that, if you love a person you will affirm them. On the contrary, you could extrapolate from that, and also say that if you do not affirm a person you do not love the person, you could even go on to stretch it, and say that you do not affirm the person because you hate them. The predicament, however, is that a lack of affirmation is not always a lack of love and vice versa. 


It leads me to wonder, how one can show love and not affirm a person at the same time. Not everything should be affirmed, because that would not really be loving, especially if one has the knowledge of how detrimental affirming certain matters would be for said person. How this looks like in reality, is something I'm still trying to paint out. I find myself thinking over this, especially when practicing the Christian faith, on one hand there is a call to love others, and on the other hand there is the obligation to follow God's word. The latter usually has me clashing against a lot of values and culture that I encounter in my everyday life. It's really is a pickle because a lot of relationships can be strained over such matters.

During my short-lived  career of  high school debate the term non affirmative, often meant your opposition when you are on the affirmative side. This creates a schism where the non affirming and the affirming are at loggerheads with each other and animosity is formed. To diffuse that, I can bring to you a definition of love found in the Pauline epistles,   

Love is never happy when others do wrong, but it is always happy with the truth.

1 Corinthians 13:6 ERV

According to this, to love a person is to not condone that which is bad in their life. This means that I love you and also want what is best for you. I may not always agree with you, but I will always love you. 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

While I've been away

Image
 Today marks the anniversary of the last time I physically saw my mother. Some of the last words she said to me before I went through the boarding pass, were to not look back. I would like to beg for her pardoning because I am about to get retrospective now. A lot has changed since I last saw her, on a global scale as well as a personal one.  Leaving my mother that summer evening, was my departure from the nest going into the big wide world full of the unknown. I never felt that I was quite ready to step outside of what I knew to be home. I think my bravery was partially because others my age were going through the same transition. I guess I was not immune to peer pressure. More than that, I just had the conviction in me that it I was time that I go.  Could it have been youthful naivety, because I had this faith that everything would fall into place, even though I was stepping out of my comfort zone. Falling is perhaps a loose way of describing it. Rather I wa...
Read more

Internal conflict

Image
 It's a Tuesday morning, I am running late for a final exam. I had stayed up all night preparing for it since Monday evening. Towards the early hours of Tuesday morning, close to about sunset, mental fatigue started to get the better of me. I caved in and considered taking a power nap since at this point, I could not absorb any more information. I remember closing my eyes and laying down, then springing up at half past eight. My exam was at nine o'clock, and commuting to the venue of the exam would take me an hour.  If ever there was a case of self sabotage in my life, I was convinced that this was it. All the questions were going through my mind about how I got myself into this situation. I went through the twelve stages of grief in twelve minutes, due to the fact that I was running late and I was low on time. It was really one of those mornings that I couldn't wait for to end.  As I was convening with myself, I found it so tempting to call myself...
Read more

Do the hard stuff

Image
  David Goggins once said, ''You have to build calluses on your brain just like how you build calluses on your hands. Calluses your mind through pain and suffering. ''. I do not completely subscribe to his philosophies, but there's just something that I cannot deny, about how he goes about issues to do with grit. We often make commitments in the heat of the moment, without counting the cost. It could be that you were up late, and a sudden burst of inspiration leads you to want to prepare for a marathon. I applaud such convictions, but what lies between you and the finish line is discipline and consistency.  I've found myself in a similar situation, there's a somewhat herculean task I have set before myself. This is a PSA (public service  announcement). I am embarking on a challenge. I have coined it blogtober. I will be undertaking a writing exercise where for everyday of the month of October I will be publishing a blogpost. Much like trying to run a maratho...
Read more