I started a class on Christian morality this month and yesterday I was doing the reading for this week. At a time like this when I am closing a chapter in my life with the end of my current job, I found the explanation on the "right to work" to be hugely comforting. When I meet new people the first question I get asked is, "what do you do?" So much of our identity can be attached to our profession - that for the longest time I thought that my vocation meant the career that I was choosing to do. I agonized when choosing what I wanted to do with my life and felt like I better choose wisely since it was a decision that was heavily tied to God's will for me. With my bipolar diagnoses my life took a turn and after finally deciding what I was to do with my life, I was forced to leave and found a job that I never prepared for. Over the past ten years I have been comfortable working in an office setting earning a living. Would I call that my vocation? In all honesty no. It's a job that provided for my bare necessities, small luxuries and gave me time to devote to my family and faith.
Here's the thing, even though I know that I am leaving a job that did what a job is supposed to do, I can't help but feel like I am losing some of my confidence along with it. I keep thinking what will I say when I get asked, "what I do? " Will people judge me thinking I am lazy because after today I won't have a job? Yesterday, I was feeling so discouraged that I played Gregorian Chant and just was still waiting for God to speak to me. It wasn't long before I started thinking that my insecurity still stems from a conversation I overheard when I was a small child. During school one day, I over heard two teachers speaking one was telling the other, "I just don't understand these girls (referring to the Mexican students in his class) you ask them what they want to be when they grow-up and all they want is to be housewives and mothers." By their tone I knew that in their mind it was wrong to want to be those things - so at that moment I decided that I was going to be a professional. Years later, I heard that statistically Hispanic girls had a higher rate of getting pregnant in their teens and again I fought to not become a statistic.
Am not sure who I have felt like I needed to impress by my professional success, but you know am tired. Am tired of living feeling the pressure to not be what isn't acceptable. As I was reading the right to work in one of my books it says that "a society driven solely by individual self-interest makes us all competitors." Work is important to our livelihood , but whether we do that work outside of the home or in the home doesn't make one more valuable than the other. In both we are serving and working for the good of the other. We put salaries and levels of importance and sometimes those achievements cloud us from seeing each other as brothers. I am going from a salary to working at home without the comfort of a steady income as I look for another job. But am reminded of the that parable that always confused me about the workers in the vineyard. Some men began working at the beginning of the day, others later and still others when it was almost time to clock out- surprisingly the master pays them all the same amount. This causes great anger in those employees who worked all day and boy do they complain to the master only to hear him say, "it's my money, can't I do with it what I like?" And see the thing is that God understands that the people who started working at the beginning of the day had peace-of-mind; they weren't worried like those that got employed at the last hour. The last to get hired had all day to worry about whether they would earn a days wages to put food on their tables. I tell you I would rather work a full day than worry all day about not having a job.
Work is one of the ways we develop ourselves as persons, we are able to express and fulfill ourselves in addition to contribute to society, but as I am being laid off (again) I realize that all work does that not just the work that gives us a monetary check. I received so much when I volunteer as a Catechist, or when I clean my house, when I help my parents, when I study. Thus, though I am losing my job I am not losing my ability to be efficient. I am still me! As I sat there listening to the religious music, I felt peace knowing that I am not losing my identity nor my ability to contribute- now I just have an opportunity to change courses and understandably while change is difficult it's not impossible. Thus, I am going to enjoy my time off because eventually I will be employed again (smile).
Am not sure who I have felt like I needed to impress by my professional success, but you know am tired. Am tired of living feeling the pressure to not be what isn't acceptable. As I was reading the right to work in one of my books it says that "a society driven solely by individual self-interest makes us all competitors." Work is important to our livelihood , but whether we do that work outside of the home or in the home doesn't make one more valuable than the other. In both we are serving and working for the good of the other. We put salaries and levels of importance and sometimes those achievements cloud us from seeing each other as brothers. I am going from a salary to working at home without the comfort of a steady income as I look for another job. But am reminded of the that parable that always confused me about the workers in the vineyard. Some men began working at the beginning of the day, others later and still others when it was almost time to clock out- surprisingly the master pays them all the same amount. This causes great anger in those employees who worked all day and boy do they complain to the master only to hear him say, "it's my money, can't I do with it what I like?" And see the thing is that God understands that the people who started working at the beginning of the day had peace-of-mind; they weren't worried like those that got employed at the last hour. The last to get hired had all day to worry about whether they would earn a days wages to put food on their tables. I tell you I would rather work a full day than worry all day about not having a job.
Work is one of the ways we develop ourselves as persons, we are able to express and fulfill ourselves in addition to contribute to society, but as I am being laid off (again) I realize that all work does that not just the work that gives us a monetary check. I received so much when I volunteer as a Catechist, or when I clean my house, when I help my parents, when I study. Thus, though I am losing my job I am not losing my ability to be efficient. I am still me! As I sat there listening to the religious music, I felt peace knowing that I am not losing my identity nor my ability to contribute- now I just have an opportunity to change courses and understandably while change is difficult it's not impossible. Thus, I am going to enjoy my time off because eventually I will be employed again (smile).
No comments:
Post a Comment