Putting on Your Own Oxygen Mask First
For the greater part of my adult life, I always knew when my next flight was. The summer before my senior year of college I took my first trip overseas to Izmir, Turkey. From the anticipation of that trip in 2000 until the summer of 2014, I was in a state of perpetual anticipating of the next flight. Those years of jet-setting every few months saw my life morph from a single college girl to a married working woman to a seasoned missionary and homeschooling mother of four.
As a mother, I always thought the announcement at the beginning of every airplane ride was pretty unrealistic. What mother really puts the oxygen mask on herself first while her kid is sitting there struggling for breath? I always tried to picture myself doing that, and it always seemed wrong. I really do understand how badly things could go if mom passes out, but I never could wrap my head around that mental picture of just taking care of myself first.
But.
When it comes to educating our kids, I think this picture of putting on my own oxygen mask first looks a little more valid. Education is so not just academics. Education is learning to live. It's not about getting the test answers right. It's about the expansion of self in community. It's about the pursuit of wisdom and virtue. It's about the perception of truth and the growth of the soul as we behold the glory of God, the Logos, Jesus Christ, radiating through all we study. Certainly we want that for our kids. How can we not want that for ourselves?
How often have I heard the phrase, "We become what we behold"?
What are my children beholding as they gaze at my life everyday?
Irritation. Frustration. Short-termperedness. Franticness. Distraction and escapism. Disengaged. To-do lists. Get it done.
Is this really what I want for them? What do I want them to remember?
I want them to remember me reading to them. Studying my Bible. Smiling at them. Doing chores with a smile. A soft encouraging voice.
I also want them to remember me being a student. Digging into things they're learning to understand it myself. To pick something that I want to study and grow in, maybe even master, that's a part of their education as a way of sharing something with them. To see me working at something hard for me, like a piece of music on the piano, a crochet project that's a challenge, getting a garden to grow. To see me regularly bringing harmony out of chaos, creating beauty as an act of worship and adoration of Jesus, the master harmonizer.
I want to model being a zealous student and living fully. I want to inspire them to wonder and inquiry, not because I handed them a book said so, but because I showed them how by reading with curiosity alongside them.
We genuinely cannot give our kids something we don't have and don't want for ourselves.
We need to put our own oxygen mask on first.
As a mother, I always thought the announcement at the beginning of every airplane ride was pretty unrealistic. What mother really puts the oxygen mask on herself first while her kid is sitting there struggling for breath? I always tried to picture myself doing that, and it always seemed wrong. I really do understand how badly things could go if mom passes out, but I never could wrap my head around that mental picture of just taking care of myself first.
But.
When it comes to educating our kids, I think this picture of putting on my own oxygen mask first looks a little more valid. Education is so not just academics. Education is learning to live. It's not about getting the test answers right. It's about the expansion of self in community. It's about the pursuit of wisdom and virtue. It's about the perception of truth and the growth of the soul as we behold the glory of God, the Logos, Jesus Christ, radiating through all we study. Certainly we want that for our kids. How can we not want that for ourselves?
How often have I heard the phrase, "We become what we behold"?
What are my children beholding as they gaze at my life everyday?
Irritation. Frustration. Short-termperedness. Franticness. Distraction and escapism. Disengaged. To-do lists. Get it done.
Is this really what I want for them? What do I want them to remember?
I want them to remember me reading to them. Studying my Bible. Smiling at them. Doing chores with a smile. A soft encouraging voice.
I also want them to remember me being a student. Digging into things they're learning to understand it myself. To pick something that I want to study and grow in, maybe even master, that's a part of their education as a way of sharing something with them. To see me working at something hard for me, like a piece of music on the piano, a crochet project that's a challenge, getting a garden to grow. To see me regularly bringing harmony out of chaos, creating beauty as an act of worship and adoration of Jesus, the master harmonizer.
I want to model being a zealous student and living fully. I want to inspire them to wonder and inquiry, not because I handed them a book said so, but because I showed them how by reading with curiosity alongside them.
We genuinely cannot give our kids something we don't have and don't want for ourselves.
We need to put our own oxygen mask on first.
Comments
Post a Comment