Lesson 2: Beyond Freedom

Exercise: The Best Advice

Wow. This was such a timely lesson. Just yesterday I was talking with Habiba and a powerful memory came up about something I was told over and over in my childhood. It never dawned on me until that moment how it had affected every aspect of my entire life--I got chills thinking about it!

Then today I opened up my Beyond Freedom and read about how what you have been taught by others and the advice you have received from them throughout the years affects your life today.

When I was a kid, we had a rule. When we would go into any kind of store, my mother would repeatedly say, "Remember, if you don't ask for anything, you might get something when we're done."

I honestly can't count the number of times I have heard that in my life. Even now, my mother says it to my children.

As you might guess, the reason she always told us this was because she hated hearing the constant "can-I-haves" that you hear so often from children. If we were good and kept our mouth shut, we might be rewarded with a treat.

Oh, how I hated this rule. I remember thinking, "But if I don't ask for it, how will you know what I want?"

Eventually, however, I learned to accept it, and I didn't ask. Sometimes I got a treat, and sometimes I didn't. I learned to accept that, too.

It wasn't until yesterday talking with Habiba that I realized that what I learned as a rule for the store had come to govern the thinking patterns of my whole life--including my failed businesses!!!

I never asked for anything, and then I hoped I would get a reward at the end. I never asked for the sale! When I was working a job, I never asked for a raise! No wonder I never made any money!

And it was true with my spiritual life, too. I never asked for what I truly wanted and just "hoped" that I would get my reward!

And yet, Christ clearly told us, "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive. (Matt. 21: 22) That's ALL things that you ASK for!

One of my favorite parables is that of the unjust judge. A widow kept coming to him and pleading for him to help her. At first he ignored her, and then he said, "Though I fear not God, nor regard man; Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me." (Luke 18:4-5, my emphasis). Christ goes on to say that if this judge, who felt nothing for this woman helped her merely because of her much asking, how much more so will our Father in Heaven, who loves us, bless us?!

Beyond Freedom asks us to evaluate the advice we have received--was it good? Was it bad? How has it affected your life?

Well, after thorough consideration, I have concluded that this was terrible advice!! And I am DONE keeping my mouth shut!

Right now there is a song coming into my mind from Baby, one of my favorite Broadway musicals, by Richard Altby and David Shire. Three women--two of them pregnant, one of them trying to get pregnant--are sitting in a doctor's office discussing the choices that women face. As they think about what they may have to give up when the baby comes, they all come instead to this conclusion:

I want it all!
I want it all!
I want adventure! Love! Career! Kids large and small--I want it all!
I want the quiet simple life and some glory.
And Steven Spielberg filming my first story.
I wanna be Gloria Steinem, Janice Joplin, Annie Hall.
I wanna be Kathryn Hepburn, Connie Chung, Madame Tussaud
I wanna be Mother Theresa, Sally Ride, Lucille Ball--I want it all!
...
I wanna be Donna McKeknie.
Donna Sommers!
Donna Reed!
I wanna be Margaret Sanger!
Margaret Thatcher!
Margaret Mead!
I want it all! I want it all! I want to find a way to break through every wall. I want it all!
I want Tahiti!
I want a Grammy!
I want a pedicure!
I want dill pickles!
I want a Lear jet!
I want a string bikini!
I want the Nobel Prize!
I want to make totem poles out of fruit cans.
I want it all! I want it all! I want it all! I want it all!

Of course, this raises a whole new challenge for raising my children. Like my mother before me, I too, I grow weary of their continual asking. But that's a discussion for another time.