August 7, 2010 at 12:16 pm, by Carl

How are you doing?  Living Well?  For me, sometimes the biggest issue is getting over myself and actually live well by giving generously to others.  Now, perhaps I’m too hard on myself–I do think that I am in a constant state of sharing with others.  Yet, that sharing often is only intellectual sharing–that’s valuable, but not necessarily the same thing as physically “being there.”


This past week, after furiously grading finals to hit the deadline, I then hopped a plane to Tennessee in order to minister to my mother.  Mom just had knee replacement surgery and had come home to continue her rehab.  The previous 3 weeks she had been in a full-service facility, but now she was going to be at home.  Its tougher than you think to minister to people that you know–past relationships, mental gymnastics of emotions, considerations of payback all play havoc with the simple act of giving.


With Mom, I needed to clean her feet, put on her socks, help her up, work on her exercises with her, encourage her and many other things, most of which have not been in our relationship.  I mean, she’s “Mom”–she takes care of me.  Even when I’ve tried to care for her, when I come home, she loves to “wait on me.”  Nice, but come on, I’m turning 46 this week–kind of time to let me take care of her.  It was a nice turn, though I know she’d have wished to take care of me instead.  When I left, she was as sad as usual, but I know she really was happy that I helped her, though briefly.


So, I flew back late on Friday night, getting home around 9:45.  Today, Saturday, I was back up at 7:45 to get ready to go to downtown Orlando to do a simple ministry to the homeless.  One of the guys in my church has really felt a desire to minister to the homeless in a pretty simple way.  Now, he’s already an expert in the act of service, the simple concept of helping another, so now he is leading our church to push out of that comfort zone in order to take “living well” to the realm of “generous living.”


I took my middle daughter, met a few of our friends, and we wandered around downtown handing out food gift cards.  While the food concept is useful, what was really cool was how we had wonderful conversations.  We were able to “be the hands and feet of Jesus” in touching another, giving a hug, listening.  It was so nice, simple and kind.


I know I use this blog to expand upon my life’s work of teaching others to “live well.”  Its what I do.  And we talk about various aspects of life success.  Yet, at the end of the day, you can do a lot of good in progressing towards a rich and rewarding life by actually just getting out there and doing something generous, doing something for which you will get no compensation in return.


So, that’s the challenge.  Get out there.  Put down the “to-do list.”  Let the pen stop writing more goals, stop thinking of more things for the bucket list.  Quit sharpening the saw for a while, and just go love on someone.


You’ll be glad you did!