Playing the Losing Game

  Good Morning Friends!  Have you ever become so entrenched in your own struggles that you forget for a time that other people are struggling too?  I believe we often get tied up in our "woe is me" attitude, and we block out the fact that other people might be going through the same things and could use our help.  The other day my son told me the he and his friends were having an argument about which of them has the worst life.  (Insert eye roll here.)  Now, none of these boys has a bad life... not even slightly.  But my son was angry because his friend had told him "Bad stuff happens in everybody's life."  Basically a nice way of saying, "Get over yourself."  And although we can all shake our heads at a few boys tossing around their problems as if the world rested on their shoulders, don't we as adults do the same thing?  How often when a friend tells us about a situation they are experiencing do we jump in and begin to "one-up" them with what we are going through.  Essentially, we are playing the "who has the worst life" game without even realizing it.
  You see, my son's friend was right.  We all have bad things happen in our lives.  We all have hurts and losses and disappointments.  But we also all have blessings, good things we can be thankful for, and things to celebrate.  Maybe it's time we started reminding each other of the victories in our lives instead of keeping score of the losses.  We are never too busy to give a friend a hug and some words of encouragement.  We should never be so focused on ourselves that we can't reach out to someone else.  Now, maybe you aren't able to fill their exact need right now.  Maybe you can't write a check that will cover their need, but you can send a card with Scriptures to lift them up.  Maybe you don't have time to go cook or clean for someone who just had surgery, but you can send a gift card for a pizza delivery service.  There are all kinds of ways we can be a blessing to someone, even in the midst of our own struggles.
  I'm not saying our own problems aren't real.  Believe me, I know.  I have recently gone through a time of heartache where it was all I could do some days to get out of bed.  And during those days, I can tell you that I wasn't thinking much about other people's hurts, but I can tell you that the little ways people reached out to me.. a message on Facebook, a gift card to take my family out to dinner, looking out for me and checking in when they knew I wasn't doing well, meant the world to me as I wrestled with my own hurts.  And as I started to recover, looking for little things I could do to lift others up went a long way towards healing my spirit as well.  If you are in the midst of a great struggle right now, my heart aches for you, because I know how much life can hurt, but I also want you to know that you are not alone in the valley, that you will come out on the other side, and while you are in the desert, take a look around... you might find there is someone who needs you to take their hand and walk through it with them.  I love you very much, and I cannot wait to see you succeed!

~K.W.