Last week was a wild ride and my best intentions to continue the relate series were overcome by . . . well life. So, we’ll pick back up this week! Remember if you want email alerts when I post, just click the button to the right.
When I first got married, I just knew I could convert my wonderful new bride into a world-class house-keeper. This wasn’t because I had a patriarchal sense of expectations (wife: clean, husband: hunt). I wanted Audra to appreciate the joy of a clean house as much as I did. Cleaning the house was something we could enjoy doing together. I thought that surely with a little work on my part I could make her into the person I thought she would want to be.
Turns out I was wrong. Horribly. Terribly. Miserably wrong.
Audra was Audra. Not the Eddie-version of Audra. And as much as I tried to shove her into the mold I had in my mind for utter and complete wifely perfection, she somehow managed to wiggle free. Instead of becoming what I thought she should be, she became something better: the person she was created to be.
Here’s what I’ve learned along the way: People are not projects. Our role in their lives is not to fix them. This goes for spouses, friends, siblings, parents, cousins, and co-workers (and anyone I managed to leave off of the list). This is very often the hardest lesson to learn in our relationships. We want (our version of) the best for them and we try in different ways–directly and indirectly–to manipulate them or force them into the molds we have in our minds for them.
So, in subtle (leaving the cleaning supplies on beside the bathroom sink) and not-so-subtle (“Audra, I am not cleaning your bathroom for you again!”) ways, we attempt to change behaviors, political opinions, religious views, or habits. Do some of our loved ones habits and behaviors need to change so they will be healthier and happier? Probably so. But so do some of your habits and behaviors need to change so you will be healthier and happier? Probably so. I know it comes as a shock to you, but unless your name is “Jesus Christ” you’re not perfect. As much as you’d like to change someone else, chances are they see plenty in you that needs fixing, too.
We can discuss changes that might be beneficial with others. We can encourage and inspire, but at the end of the day, we cannot change, fix, or modify others. They get to make the decision about who they want to be and how they want to live.
So, whenever you have the urge to fix your spouse or way-ward sibling remember these few things:
- Love who they are, not who you wish they were. In every situation, you have the choice to love them for who they are—imperfections and all. Because here’s the secret: they’re loving you for who you are. That’s what you want, isn’t it? If you love people for who they are you’ll get to be around to discover who they will become. If you see them as a project, then chances are you won’t be around to see them grow and change through the years. In every relationship you can make the choice to love the other, or you can make the choice to end the relationship. It’s that simple.
- Control what you can control: you. You don’t like when your friend smokes around you? You can control that. By stepping away when they smoke. Don’t want your uncle to curse around your kids? You get to set and enforce those boundaries. Setting boundaries might be uncomfortable at first. But when you set boundaries you are intentionally caring for the relationship by determining what is good for it and you. Boundaries allow you to be you and others to be themselves.
- Pray for them. If you know someone is living in a way that you don’t agree with or that is hurtful to them or others, turn it over to God. Who knows what God might do in their lives? Who knows how God might open their eyes? Or (and here’s the kicker) who knows how God might change your heart in regards to your friend or family member! Maybe God needs you to take the plank out of your own eye first.
Eighteen years into our marriage, Audra still doesn’t clean bathrooms (and at this stage, I don’t have very high hopes that it will ever happen). When I removed my expectation for how I thought she should act, though, I discovered Audra brought other amazing gifts to the marriage that I didn’t even know I needed. Maybe there are gifts that you’re missing in someone else, because you’re blinded by your attempts to make them into who you want them to be. Maybe its time to stop treating the people in your life as projects and treat them as what they are: people.
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