but I’m an accountant and it’s just not that exciting
or
What does any of this have to do with being a mom?
About ten years ago I was speaking at a conference and I decided to sit in the audience and listen to the speaker who spoke before me. He began his talk by saying that there are two types of people in the world: numbers people and art people. He explained that some people are born with creativity in their blood and so they do creative work and some people aren’t—they’re the numbers people—and that’s fine because they can do other things.
I sat there listening, thinking, That’s total rubbish.
Take accountants, for example.
Accountants work with numbers and columns and facts and figures and spreadsheets. Their job is to keep track of what’s being made and where it’s going and how much is available to make more. That structure is absolutely necessary for whatever is being done to move forward. It is a fundamentally creative act to make sure things have the shape and form and internal coherence they need.
Obviously, bureaucracies and institutions and governments and finance departments can be huge obstacles to doing compelling work, but ideally—in spirit—the person who gives things their much needed structure and order is playing a vital role in the ongoing creation of the world, helping things move forward. (Which is an excellent litmus test for whether the work you’re doing is work that the world needs: Does it move things forward? Because some work doesn’t. Some work takes things in the wrong direction. Some things people give their energies to prevent other people from thriving. Some tasks dehumanize and degrade the people involved. Perhaps you’re in one of those jobs, the kind that sucks the life out of your soul and you can’t see the good in it. Stop. Leave. Life is too short to help make a world you don’t want to live in.)
And then there are moms. I’ve met moms who say I’m just a mom …
Just a mom?
What!?
Could anything be more connected to the ongoing creation of the world than literally, physically bringing new human beings into existence and then nurturing that new life as it’s shaped and formed?
All work is creative work because all work is participating in the ongoing creation of the world.
But what about the things that happen to us that we never wanted to happen? What about tragedy and loss and heartbreak and illness and abuse—that list can be long.
What about all of the things that come our way that make us feel powerless and out of control, like our life is being created for us?
When I was growing up, my dad would come into my room every night before I went to bed and tell me that he loved me, and then he would stand in the doorway before he turned out the light and he would say, You’re my pride and joy. He coached my soccer and basketball teams, he took us on vacations, he made my sister and brother and me pancakes on Saturday mornings, he helped us with our homework. When I left home to go to college, he sent me handwritten letters every week, never failing to remind me that he was cheering me on.
I tell you about how present and involved my dad was in my life growing up because when he was eight, his uncle picked him up at his house to take him somewhere. His cousin was in the backseat of the car, and when my dad asked his cousin where they were going, his cousin said, To the funeral home—don’t you know? Your dad died.
That’s how he found out his dad had died: from his cousin in the backseat of a car on the way to the funeral home. His dad, whom he hadn’t known very well because his dad was gone during the war, had cancer and died at age thirty-four.
When my dad was fifteen, his mother became very sick, and he and his brother thought she was going to die. He once told me that while his mother was in the hospital, his brother clung to him through the night, repeating over and over with terror in his voice, Are we going to be all alone in the world?
She eventually recovered, but then a year later my dad’s brother, who was his best friend and constant companion, died unexpectedly in an accident.
How does a person bear that kind of pain?
How does a heart ever recover?
How does a young man make his way in the world when he’s experienced that much suffering?
Somewhere in the midst of all that pain and loss, my dad decided that someday he would have a family and he would be the father that he had always wished he had. And so that’s what he did.
How we respond to what happens to us—especially the painful, excruciating things that we never wanted and we have no control over—is a creative act.
Who starts cancer foundations? Usually people who have lost a loved one to cancer.
Who organizes recovery groups? Mostly people who have struggled with addiction.
Who stands up for the rights of the oppressed? Often people who have experienced oppression themselves.
We have power, more power than we realize, power to decide that we are going to make something good out of even this …
There’s a question that you can ask about the things that have come your way that you didn’t want. It’s a question rooted in a proper understanding of the world, a question we have to ask ourselves continually throughout our lives:
What new and good thing is going to come out of even this?
When you ask this question, you have taken something that was out of your control and reframed it as another opportunity to take part in the ongoing creation of the world.
Death. Disease. Disaster. Whatever it is, you will have to grieve it. And maybe be angry about it. Or be in shock. Or shake your fists at the heavens for the injustice of it.
That’s normal and healthy and often needed.
But then, as you move through it, as time does its healing work, you begin to look for how even this has potential. Even this is a blinking line.
I once watched a doctor hold my newborn son upside down by the ankles and give him a shake.
I was shocked.
What? You can do that to a baby?
Because up until that moment I was under the impression that babies were incredibly fragile, like a high-grade combination of porcelain and glass. But the doctor handled him when he first entered the world like he was made of rubber. He did this, I quickly learned, for a very specific reason: He was trying to help my son take his first breath. Because if you don’t take a breath in those
