It all starts before coffee
Most mornings find me in a coffee line at one of my favorite stops. Inevitably as I receive my coffee the barista will ask, “So how’s your day going so far?”
I am sure it never crossed the minds in corporate head office when they mandated the greeting that each time it is asked it causes a deep personal dilemma for me. Should I answer honestly or fake it? Should I answer based on how I want my day to go or on how it actually is going?
Those are pretty deep issues to face before the benefit of my first sip.
The bottom line is that the question forces me to choose my perspective. How I answer has much more to do with my attitude than it does with how things are actually going.
One morning things were going horribly. It reminded me of the children’s book, “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.” It was cold, windy and raining and I could not manage to get the canvas windows zipped into my old Jeep. I wound up with skinned knuckles, dirty dress pants and was running 15 minutes behind time. Does that constitute a bad day? I’m sure any one of the hundreds of patients in KGH would gladly trade places with me. Any of the people who can’t afford a vehicle would laugh at the very thought that having difficulty zippering windows into a fun vehicle means life is tough. Nevertheless, as I stood in the coffee line with bleeding knuckles and dirty pants I was tending toward a negative response.
Contemplating my answer reminded me of an old parable I came across years ago.
“A farmer lost his best stallion one day and his neighbor came around to express his regrets. The farmer just said, ‘Who knows what is good and what is bad.’ The next day the stallion returned bringing with him three wild mares. The neighbour rushed back to celebrate with the farmer, but once again the old farmer simply said, ‘Who knows what is good and what is bad.’ The following day, the farmer’s son fell from one of the wild mares and broke his arm and injured his leg. The neighbour came by to check on the son and offer his condolences. Yet again the old farmer just said, ‘Who knows what is good and what is bad.’ The next day the army came to the farm to conscript the farmer’s son for the war, but found him with a broken arm and damaged leg, unable to assume military duty. By this point the neighbour had it figured out. He showed up and offered his observation, ‘Who knows what is good and what is bad.’”
Often the tendency is to respond to life based on the immediate circumstances. We engage with a superficiality ascribing goodness or badness to the situation based on the momentary appearance of things which we really don’t understand.
Perhaps a longer and deeper view is warranted. Austrian physician and holocaust survivor, Victor Frankl, provided an intriguing perspective. Reflecting on his imprisonment in Auschwitz he said, “The one thing they couldn’t take away from me was the way I chose to respond to what they did to me. The last of one’s freedoms is to choose one’s response in any given circumstance.”
St. Paul clearly shared a similar perspective when he offered encouragement to some of his friends who were experiencing challenging times. He said, “Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” Really, in all circumstances? Yes, really. He is saying we all have the opportunity to carefully choose our response to circumstances, remembering we don’t really understand them anyway. It all started before my first cup of coffee. “How’s your day going?” It’s nothing more than a polite greeting. But if you let it, it can lead to some very deep thought.
Tim Schroeder is pastor at Trinity Baptist Church in Kelowna. This column appears weekly in Okanagan Weekend.