What If It’s Not All About Me?

Someone has surmised that being a narcissist must be the most stressful job in the world. Because it’s so hard to keep the universe revolving around oneself!

There's a bit of Narcissus in each of us.

You know the story of Narcissus, don’t you? He was the fantastic-looking guy in Greek mythology who caught his reflection in a pond one day; Mr. Handsome became so captivated by it, he couldn’t look at anything else. He wasted away while acting as his own mutual admiration society. Seems our own society is infested by lots of Narcissus wannabes.

Years ago we heard a lot about the so-called “Me Generation,” which many have identified as the Baby Boomers. (That’s my generation, by the way.) Out of this arose the mantra, “It’s all about me,” leading to a subsequent generation known as the Millennials that has sometimes been termed the “Me Me Me Generation.” Today, doting parents – many of them products of this mindset – are overindulging their children, leading them to believe they comprise the center of the universe. 

Now we’re hearing about college students staging protests, or requiring “safe zones” to protect them from anyone invited to speak on their campuses that espouse viewpoints differing from their own. It doesn’t take long watching TV commercials to see the focus there, too, is often on “me.” We’re told we should have things, ranging from cars to lavish vacations, because we “deserve” them. The question is, what exactly is it that we did to be so deserving?

Do you remember how, in his inaugural address in 1961, President John F. Kennedy famously stated, “My fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country”? As a nation, it appears we’ve drifted a long way from that kind of thinking.

We even find this narcissistic/”Me” philosophy insidiously infiltrating churches and worship services. I’m not opposed to contemporary praise music, but if you listen to many of the songs’ lyrics – after you get past the endless repetition of phrases – they sound a lot like, “God and me, me and God, God loves me….” If these are worship songs, are we certain about who’s the object of worship?

Sometimes we act as if Jesus said something like, “Greater love has no man than…to immerse himself in self-love.” But of course, that’s not what He said. Not even close. He did say, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends” (John 15:13). Then Jesus proceeded to provide the ultimate example of this by surrendering His own life on the cross for our sins.

Before Jesus stepped into the public arena, John the Baptist had attracted quite a following. People thronged to see this curious fellow dressed in camel’s hair and eating locusts, making bold statements about the coming Messiah. He probably appeared on the cover of Jewish People magazine numerous times. But once Jesus appeared, John quickly recognized he no longer needed to be the center of attention. “I indeed baptize you with water…but He…will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire” (Matthew 3:11).

When someone asked Jesus what was the greatest commandment, the notion of “it’s all about me” was conspicuously absent in His response. Instead, He replied, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matthew 22:37-40).

Jesus wasn’t condemning a healthy esteem for oneself. If we hold a low view of ourselves, it’s hard to express much love and concern for others. As the apostle Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, “After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church” (Ephesians 5:29). 

But if we’re truly following the Lord, our focus should be outward, not inward. Not, “What’s in it for me?” but rather, “What can I offer to others?” As we’re told in Philippians 2:3-4, “Do nothing from selfishness or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

It’s not wrong to appreciate God’s goodness and faithfulness to us, or to rejoice in His loving care and provision. I could never recount how many times and the many ways my family and I have experienced those things from Him. But as we read the Scriptures, it seems the model for praise is to concentrate on who God is, with worship, wonder and awe, and consider what He wishes to do through us – not just to marvel at what He can do for us.

Jesus declared, “By this all men will know you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). The world continues to insist, “It’s all about me!” But we can truly stand apart and reflect Christ’s work in us by demonstrating our conviction that it’s not about me (or us), but instead, about serving God and caring for the people with whom we can have influence and a positive, meaningful impact.

Fascination With Youth

Have you ever found interesting things while looking for something else? You’re digging through a drawer, searching for a receipt, screwdriver, or spool of thread, and find a totally different item you misplaced long ago. Maybe you forgot about it – until you found it.

Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon did something like that in the early 1500’s. It’s said he was searching for the “Fountain of Youth,” hoping to cure his aging. He’d heard stories of vitality-restoring waters, so he went looking for the rumored reservoir. Instead, de Leon discovered what’s now known as Florida.

The Fountain of Youth remains the stuff of folklore, but thanks in part to the adventurous explorer, millions of older people have found in Florida a place to go after their cherished youth has faded. Kind of a newer wrinkle on the old quest.

Ponce de Leon died nearly 600 years ago, but our fascination with youth lives on. The entertainment world exalts youth, trotting out new, fresh-cheeked stars and starlets every year. Actress Jennifer Lawrence, just 23, currently stands tall among celebrated young thespians. This is her day in the sun. Tomorrow, who knows?

My grandfather, Samuel Tamasy, passed
away when I was a boy. I still wish I
could learn from his insights about life.

In the sports world, champion gymnasts rarely compete past their teenage years; swimmers typically hang up their Speedos in their 20’s; football and basketball stars risk being perceived as relics upon entering their 30’s.

Even in the news media, with the onset of gray hair and age lines, veteran broadcasters and commentators find themselves deferring to younger replacements. Youth must be served!

It seems the modern Church isn’t immune either. Recently I read about an unemployed worship leader who was passed over, apparently because a congregation wanted a younger face leading music and directing the choir – someone more appealing for attendees in their teens through early 30’s. In a separate account, older church musicians were displaced by younger performers better able to connect to the teen and 20-something “market” their congregations were targeting.

As an early enlistee of the so-called Baby Boomer generation, I understand drawbacks of aging. Aches and pains don’t go away as quickly. And you discover aches and pains in places you didn’t even know you had! But I think youth is considerably overrated, sadly wasted on the young.

Recently I found encouragement in author Brennan Manning’s view:

“Youth is not a period of time. It is a state of mind, a result of the will, a quality of the imagination, a victory of courage over timidity, of the taste for adventure over the love of comfort…. A man grows old when he deserts his ideal. The years may wrinkle the skin, but deserting his ideal wrinkles his soul…. You will remain young as long as you are open to what is beautiful, good and great; receptive to the messages of other men and women, of nature and of God….”

I like Manning’s observation that not only is youth a state of mind, but also a product of the will and imagination, courage winning over timidity. Energy may ebb, but zeal for those things that fire our passions can be as strong. We might not be as physically resilient, but can strive to remain mentally agile. Ideals can stimulate and motivate.

As Proverbs 20:29 says, ”The glory of young men is their strength; gray hair the splendor of the old.” We’ve lived hard, worked hard, played hard. We’ve survived adversity in its various forms. Gray hair is like a crown, a badge of honor. We’ve earned it.

One of the drawbacks of youth is you can’t teach experience. We older folks have experience galore – perfect for sharing with those who lack it. And one of the best things we can share is what it means to walk consistently with God. Psalm 71:18 states it this way: “Even when I am old and gray, do not forsake me, O God, till I declare your power to the next generation, your might to all who are to come.” The wisdom and insights we’ve gained through the years aren’t to be hoarded – pass them along and let others benefit as well.

We’re all going to get old if we live long enough. The alternative is to do what Marilyn Monroe, Elvis and JFK did, die relatively early. They found a “fountain of youth” of sorts – they’re perpetually young in historic photos and videos, and in our memories. But none of us would favor that approach for retaining our youth.

How about this idea: Rather than the elders staring at the young with envy, and the young viewing those older with disdain, why not strive to learn from one another? We all have much to offer each other. And when the young become old, they’ll also have something to offer the next generation.

Our Greatest Vanishing Natural Resource

Retirement might include rocking chair time, relaxing and enjoying
the moment, but it can be so much more than that.

We express concern about the environment and the importance of preserving valuable natural resources – fossil fuels, animals, plant life, our rivers and oceans, the atmosphere. And rightfully so. We’re not permanent residents, just sojourners; wouldn’t it be good to leave this place in as good shape as it was when we arrived?

But there’s one steadily vanishing natural resource most people are overlooking. As I noted in a recent post, every day on average 10,000 Baby Boomers are retiring, leaving work and careers that consumed much of their lives. The great question for many of them is, “What now?” Or, “How will I spend my remaining years?”

Boomers have been a controversial generation. We were the most numerous. We’ve also been the greediest, turning consumerism into a way of life. But this generation has also left a huge footprint in many positive ways – innovation, hard work, determination, creativity, imagination. Does retirement mean taking all our experience, wisdom and insights acquired through the years, throwing them in a closet, shutting the door, padlocking it and throwing away the key?

Good stewardship calls us to make our experience and wisdom available to those that come after us – and if they have any sense at all, they’ll take full advantage of what we have to offer.

That doesn’t mean keeping up the breakneck pace we maintained while forging careers. We’ve earned a chance to reap fruit from our labors and slow down a bit, stopping to smell the flowers we used to speed past. But to not avail our successors with lessons life has taught us would amount to extreme selfishness.

Years ago I met a young man looking for someone to mentor him. “Why do you want to be mentored?” I asked. “So I can learn from your mistakes,” he replied without blinking an eye.

That’s good thinking: Someone has said wisdom is found by learning to make good decisions, and the trick to making good decisions is learning from bad ones. Why make all of your own mistakes when you can benefit from ones others have made?

The Bible often speaks positively about the “elders.” These were people that had traveled down life’s road quite a distance and had experienced their share of successes and failures. The apostle Peter, for example, offered this exhortation:

“To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder…. Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, serving as overseers – not because you must, but because you are willing…not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock…. Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because ‘God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble’” (1 Peter 5:1-5).

One way of investing our “natural resources” of wisdom and experience is mentoring – not in a condescending, overbearing manner but relating to another person as a “mentoring partner” (a term David Stoddard and I coined in our book, The Heart of Mentoring). We “old dogs” can still learn new tricks from the younger people we mentor, just as they can learn from us.

We also can volunteer, enlisting to serve and help with causes we feel strongly about. Even though I work full-time, I’ve spent several years volunteeringonce a week at a local hospital, visiting patients that have just undergone open-heart surgery, a procedure I experienced myself more than six years ago. It’s been one way to “comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God” (2 Corinthians 1:4).

Someone once asked me, “If money were no object, what would you love to do?” Yes, we can take vacations, go fishing, play golf, or just sit and read a book without fretting some deadline. But wouldn’t it be meaningful to dedicate some of your time and energy to worthwhile causes?

In the process you could be doing yourself a big favor. Dr. Patricia Boyle, a neuropsychologist and researcher, in a Wall Street Journal article recently stated people that maintain a purpose in life show substantially slower rates of cognitive decline and enjoy longer, healthier lives.

Do you fear suffering from Alzheimer’s or dementia in your latter years? Dr. Boyle says studies show setting goals and having a sense of mission give continued meaning to life, and cognitive brain functions are greatly enhanced. Who’s opposed to that?

So find a way to help others – using the gifts and talents God gave you – and at the same time, help yourself.

Retirement: Friend or foe?

What will your retirement years be like:
Spectacular finale, or sputtering fizzle?

Retirement. Seldom has one word evoked such delight and fear at the same instant. For many in my Baby Boomer generation, that’s the case. And every day an average of 10,000 Baby Boomers are retiring.

How did you feel when you read or hear “retirement”? Excited? Confused? Filled with anticipation? Filled with anxiety?

Last week a friend told me about a man who confided that the prospect of imminent retirement filled him with dread. “How long does it take to die?” the man had asked him in earnest, implying once his working career came to an end, so would his reason for living.

What a dismal perspective: Work your tail off for 30-40 years, apply for Social Security, gather up whatever retirement savings you’ve managed to accumulate, buy an annuity, and then curl up in your bed, waiting for your heart to cease beating.

There seem at least two central problems involved:

1) For many people, life and work seem synonymous. When asked, “What kind of work do you do?”, we interpret that to mean, “Who are you?” Careers and vocations often shape our sense of identity.

2) Retirement has come to mean you stop working; you no longer have anything to contribute; or like it or not, you must commence a “vacation” that lasts the rest of your life.

In actuality, none of these is true – or at least shouldn’t be true. Work consumes many of our waking hours, and if we’re fortunate enough to enjoy it, work can give fulfillment. It also can enhance our sense of purpose. But it shouldn’t define us to the point that the end of work amounts to the end of meaningful life.

Although it would seem as if “retirement” should appear somewhere in the Bill of Rights, the idea of retiring – at least as it’s known today – hardly existed prior to the end of World War II. I know, that’s a long time ago. But for most of recorded history, people continued to work until no longer physically able. Idyllic retirement notions of rocking chairs, shuffleboard, steering a Winnebago cross-country, and day-after-day golf were unimagined by our ancestors.

This isn’t to say some kind of transition isn’t in order as we age. Getting older typically means reduced strength and stamina, but that doesn’t mean we must stop working entirely or no longer have anything of value to offer society.

Interestingly, the Bible says little about retirement. The only reference, as we use the term today, concerned Levites, the Israelite priests: “but at the age of fifty, they must retire from their regular service and work no longer” (Numbers 8:25). Even then it adds, “They may assist their brothers in performing their duties…but they themselves must not do the work….” So even after retirement, the priests were to mentor and consult with their younger peers.

Hopefully soon I’ll start collecting my well-earned Social Security benefits. These days the Federal government calls this an “entitlement,” and I agree in one sense: I and my employers over my more than 45-year working career have paid many thousands into my account under the Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA). So I’m entitled to start receiving what I’ve set aside. But that doesn’t mean I can no longer work – or no longer have worth.

In a future post I’ll suggest ways retirement – the rest of your life – can become the best of your life. But for now, instead of envisioning your retirement years like a fizzling firecracker, imagine them like the grand finale of a fireworks show. All that’s gone before is just preparation for a big, spectacular finish.

My Take on Retirement

Recently I read an article in which experts speculated on how much a person will need to retire and still live comfortably. What struck me was they weren’t talking about people in their 60’s or 70’s. They were projecting the requirements for a person to retire at age 35!

Holey moley! Imagine going to college, earning only a bachelor’s degree, and then actually working at most about 14 years (excluding any part-time work during high school and college). Who in good conscience could work just that short duration and being content to sit back, engage in distractions for the next 35-50 years, and cease making a meaningful contribution to the world around them? Perhaps that seems like heaven to you, but I can’t fathom such a non-productive existence.

It would be nice to be financially secure, not having to fret the next paycheck, but there must be more to life than pursuing a point of continual self-gratification. Not that work should be the primary focus of our lives, but vocation is one way we contribute meaningfully to society.

On the other hand, I also read Germany is contemplating upping the national retirement age to 70 – and its citizens are grousing. The German government’s rationale is the low birth rate (meaning those retiring would leave an unfilled void in the labor pool); longer life expectancies, and the country’s already overburdened welfare system.

Now 62 and an older Baby Boomer, I know many of my generational counterparts eagerly anticipate kicking back from the daily work grind. I understand aging takes a toll on energy, strength and stamina. But for people to retire completely while able-bodied and able-minded seems terribly wasteful.

Interestingly, the Bible addresses retirement only once. Numbers 8:25-26 says, "at the age of fifty, they (Levites) must retire from their regular service and work no longer. They may assist their brothers…but they themselves must not do the work.” So Levites (Israelite priests) were to perform formal rituals between 25 and 50, then defer to younger men – but even then they were encouraged to assist or even mentor their successors.

In Genesis 1, we read God established work and gave mankind stewardship over His creation. He gives everyone different abilities, skills and gifts, not only for livelihood but also for serving others. We often hear about conserving natural resources – and I agree that’s important. But what can be a greater “natural resource” than the wisdom and experience of older workers – accountants or plumbers, medical practitioners or sales people, carpenters or teachers?

As we get older, we might need to transition into less-demanding jobs requiring fewer hours, but suddenly ceasing to offer our talents and capabilities for the benefit of others, in my view, is both selfish and irresponsible.

Boomers and Retirement

While Baby Boomers have advanced relentlessly toward retirement, the muddled economy has befuddled many of them. With 401k plans shrinking worse than wool sweaters in hot water, the word “retire” suddenly provokes anxiety.

For many “Boomers” – the oldest born in 1946 – this means foregoing long-anticipated retirement dreams to remain active members of the American workforce. Disappointing? Perhaps. But not necessarily bad.

We often hear discussions about preserving our natural resources. But one resource we seldom consider is the cumulative experience and expertise of veteran workers, sometimes too eagerly replaced in the corporate world by cheaper, fresher, more tech-savvy personnel. You can educate, but you can’t teach experience – whether it’s for safe driving, raising children, or successfully carrying out job responsibilities.

That’s why we somehow need to learn how to tap into this growing reserve of workplace experience slowly phasing itself out of the workplace. Colleges and technical institutions may teach the “what” of work, but often only time and experience can teach the “how” and “why.”

The Bible addresses retirement in only one scenario. Speaking of Levitical priests, who handled responsibilities of ceremonial worship, it says, “but at the age of fifty, they must retire from their regular service and work no longer. They may assist their brothers in performing their duties . . . but they themselves must not do the work” (Numbers 8:25-26). Other types of work have no such stipulation.

Without question many workers deserve, even need, to ease out of full-time work. But it’s a matter of stewardship: After 30, 40 or more years of productive work, senior workers have much they can teach their successors, whether through direct training or mentoring. Sixty-somethings have forged a rich workplace legacy – worthwhile practices, values and traditions for others to preserve and add onto for future generations. We can’t afford to lose that.