Forget Yourself

My "ah-ha!" moment happened yesterday.

I was sitting in the park enjoying the most glorious sunshine and reading a book called "My Left Foot"by Christy Brown (a most fabulous book by the way, I suggest it for reading to anyone). The story is basically an autobiography of Christy Brown's life. He typed the whole book on a manual typewriter, one letter at a time with the pinky-toe of his left foot since that is all he could really move. Truly inspiring book.

Anywho...

For some time I have been pondering on what it means when Christ promises "whosoever will lose his life for my sake, shall find it" (Matt. 16:25). I know that's the key to true happiness and joy in life. Pondering, pondering on what losing my life for His sake means. I kinda had an idea that it referred to service, but I had tried just doing service and I didn't find the happiness that this verse promises.

Then, I read this passage in the book:

"I had come to know myself better because I had learned to express myself [through painting]...Yet it wasn't just painting that made me so happy; that in itself would not have been sufficient. It was the fact that I painted, not just to please myself, but to please someone else: the feeling of being useful, of painting my pictures for somebody..." (pg. 62).

WHABAM! Like a hammer on a nail my epiphany hit me! That was it! The idea is to use my talents and abilities to please others, not myself. It's more of a direction of focus than an act or periodical occurrence. Like Christy states, "I was changing. I didn't know it then, but I had found a way to be happy again and to forget some of the things that had made me unhappy. Above all I learned to forget myself" (pg. 56).

The idea is to spend more time in my thoughts end efforts paying attention to those around me and their needs, focusing on what I can do for them, making them smile the goal of each day. That's how I'll find my life, and the happiness that comes with it. If I can work so vigorously on learning something so that I can please others and brighten their day, that is when I will have life. I won't find myself, or happiness, if I spend a majority of my time thinking about myself, what classes I'm taking, when I'm going to graduate, where I want to work, how I'm going to get my homework done, what I want to do for the rest of my life, where I want to live, etc.

I will find my life when I learn how to lose it for Christ's sake; when I spend more time thinking about what I can do to help __(insert name here)___ be happy, more confident, and feel appreciated. That's my goal, starting now and working through the summer. I'm going to spend at least 65% of my waking moments with my thoughts focused on what I can do or learn so that I can help brighten someone else's day.

I think that is what Christ meant when He said "whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it."