Affirmation

All through elementary school and high school, I loved my teachers. They encouraged me and gave me interesting things to do when my assigned work was completed. I remember "writing a book," illustrated with pictures I had drawn or cut out of magazines. I was in the 8th grade, I think, and the story was a recap of the long historical poem "Evangeline" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. I was engrossed in that project for a long time, and so pleased with my finished work—because the teacher was pleased. I was not accustomed to such response. I realize now that she thought to create "busy work" for me, but in reality she was feeding a sensitive spirit and a busy, creative mind.

Mother Teresa declared that there is more hunger in this world for love and appreciation than there is for bread. She saw real, terrible hunger in Calcutta, and yet she saw a need for something more than food to sustain the human spirit. How do we get the affirmation we need?

One of the truths Jesus taught—I'll venture to say it is a spiritual principle—was "Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you." (Luke 6:38) So what we want to receive, we must learn to give. "If you wish your merit to be known," an Oriental proverb says, "acknowledge that of other people." Too often, we fear if others receive notice or praise or reward, we will have to do without. That's not true! Affirmation, appreciation, encouragement, validation—these are "renewable resources" in the personal sense. It is not as though there is only so much of them in the world, and if someone gets a lot, you and I may not get what should come our way!

We sometimes mistakenly expect our affirmation and appreciation to come from those whom we choose. Ideally, perhaps, it would have been my own parents who encouraged my abilities. But they had little opportunity to identify them, and few resources to further their development. Jesus' words about receiving just as we have given say nothing about the source of our benefits. Those do not necessarily come as a direct return. They will likely come from another person, from God Himself, or even from our own sense of satisfaction, at another time, and in another place.

Sometimes we write for people who don't read or make music for people who don't listen. We cook for people who don't sit down to eat or rear children who turn out to be ungrateful. Well, we may be looking for appreciation from the wrong people! We might try somewhere else: sharing our story with a writing group, singing or playing our song to another person who makes music, creating that special dish for the folks at work, being the classroom mother who can be counted on. There's nothing wrong with wanting affirmation. We just have to learn where to look for it.

Marjorie

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright©1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved

Quotations at http://quotations.about.com/cs/inspirationquotes/a/Appreciation1.htm