What is it with me? I can't quite figure it out. Whenever I step out of my comfort zone and write what's in my heart, somehow it doesn't turn out the way I had hoped.
A couple of years ago, I wrote a blog talking about how people treat one another. It was basically how today's society doesn't seem to really care about others anymore. You can go here to read it. I wrote another post the following day trying to explain my point a little better....click here if you want to read that one. In general, if you really look at today's society, everyone is in it for themselves. Compassion and mercy seem to be almost nonexistent.
So anyway, someone that I was an acquaintance with read that particular blog and because of some unfortunate events going on in their life that I knew nothing about at the time, assumed that I was writing that blog about them. And publicly decided to trash me, my husband and my children. My hair was even attacked! AHHH! I was hurt very badly and couldn't quite understand how someone who basically knew nothing about my life except through gossip could so easily disregard mine and my family's life and feelings. Sadly through that ordeal, trust was lost and relationships were heavily damaged all because of me opening my heart on an issue that I felt like writing about. Most people would have retaliated and believe me, I wanted to, but my mom prayerfully advised me to just be quiet and even though the human side of me wanted to hurt those people just as much as they had hurt me, I chose not to. I did try to explain myself when confronted but it fell on deaf ears. I'm so thankful that my mom always taught me to be the bigger person (even though it is hard sometimes) and to let my actions always be honoring to the Lord. Thank you mom!
I don't like confrontation period. And the thought of it literally makes me shake, get extremely flushed and nervous. I think you can understand that I just don't have the type of personality that normally vocally disagrees with someone unless it's David (LOL). I don't usually on a day by day basis make it a point to cause a ruckus just for the sake of an argument.
Well yesterday, a friend of mine posted a link about the recent massive Graco stroller recall (StrollerGate 2010~HAHA). I took the time to read the article and even read an extra article that was also referenced. The article was written by someone who was basically saying that the parents of the children who were now deceased due to the strollers must have not read the instruction manual. Well, I disagreed with the article. I went through and read all of the comments that other people....moms....were leaving about the article. The comments were just hateful. I thought it was sad and really thought about if I should say something about the link that was posted. As I said before, I don't like to disagree or be confrontational but I decided to start writing anyway and ended up with a paragraph. Waay out of my comfort zone. I wasn't ugly at all. I didn't feel angry or anything like that as I was writing my comment. I just wanted to post a different viewpoint of the article.
In a very short version of what I wrote, I stated that I didn't think it was right for people and especially other moms to call the parents of the children who had died, stupid and irresponsible. I'm pretty sure the writer of the article had not contacted each of the individual parents to get their play by play of actions regarding the death of their children, so to assume that these parents didn't read the safety/instruction manual was wrong. Those of us that are moms all love our children with a love that is unexplainable and most of us would never purposefully hurt our children or put them in a position to be hurt and certainly not killed. NO parent is perfect and we have ALL made mistakes but that doesn't make us stupid and irresponsible parents.
My friend deleted the whole link....all comments included. I thought...Wow. Here I go waaaay out of my comfort zone and actually disagree with something (in a nice way) and it gets deleted. You can understand why I'm hesitant to express my feelings. It's ok though. I had to laugh. I actually wasn't mad that she deleted it. It's fine. It was her post. I'm not going to get all in a tizzy about it. I was just surprised, that's all. She's still my friend and it's ok that we disagree.
But I will tell you this....I don't think it's ok to call other moms stupid. We have one common goal and that is that we are moms and we love our kids with our whole heart. We may disagree with how each mom handles different situations, but it is never ok to judge someone and assume that they are not a good parent. We are all doing the best we can with whatever life situation God has allowed us to go through. We should be encouraging to each other and not tearing each other down.
So maybe I should just stay quiet you think? Seems as though when I really have something to write about, the outcome is almost not worth it. LOL! :)
2 comments:
I know how you feel. I find myself giving REAL opinions about less and less - at least publicly in social media. You just never know who is reading, who won't take what you say in the way that you meant it, or who will blow it out of proportion. But then I feel conflicted that I'm not really being myself, so it's a lose/lose. Unfortunately, I don't have any answers for you!
As someone who loves to write, particularly about my opinion, let me throw in here a little.
A couple of weeks ago I made some comments on facebook that upset a lot of people. It was so bad that I got a lot, and I mean A LOT, of messages in my fb mailbox from people I didn't know; people from all over the country.
At the same time, I offended an entirely different classification of people, on the entirely different side of the scale.
The thing I've learned is that to post opinions and beliefs in a public setting requires tough skin. People who are hurt will say anything to reciprocate that pain. I was called a bigot by the gay community and my salvation was called in to question by the Christian community, and many, many personal insults were thrown my way.
Strangely, all of this didn't cause me to question myself, my opinion, or my humanity. I certainly didn't enjoy the abuse, but it didn't cause me pain either. I had made the decision that I was no longer going to censor myself, or walk on eggshells in what I write, in order to appease people, or to avoid hurting feelings. The abuse that followed was a direct result of that, and I knew what I was getting into. If my friends list gets dramatically smaller as a result, so be it. In the meantime, God may use what I say to plant a seed in someone's heart that could turn into a complete revelation for that person.
It takes a special person to be able to handle the abuse that comes along with being outspoken. Maybe a heartless person, such as myself ;). But even if the adversity does affect you, if God puts something on your heart, you have to be obedient.
The only advice I would give is to be certain that He is where your motivation comes from.
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