I'm not sure anymore how to draw lines around those two words that can be agreed upon by those who matter most in my life. I do not know how to appease my conscience either. But mostly, I do not know how to help people around me.
I am no longer naive enough to believe that I can fix people and make them better. I have been there, and it is somewhere I hope to never be again when I am most honest. It costs too much for no lasting benefit to anyone involved. Yet, I am not ready to pack up and announce that it is every man for himself.
I will not do more than the person is willing to do for themselves...but we can do so much more with the help of those around us.
The last year especially has really tested where I stand when I have to put flesh on all of these thoughts and go about living in a less than idealistic world. Once having decided that it is still good, despite the abuses of people in the past, where do you go? Mainly, what does one do when the rules suddenly change? When people begin talking out of both sides of their mouths...asking you to help them be 'better' and then dismissing your every attempt and intervention as caustic judgment, which apparently is akin to betrayal on a most fundamental level...what then?
Do you listen to who they were when they first asked for accountability?
Do you listen to them when they elaborate on your close-mindedness and faulty judgments?
Do you get any points for trying?
I think I will fall back on my usual "do what you can...and then let go because you aren't responsible for what you can't do."
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