The Construction of We

What We Carry, What We Choose to Let Go

Admittedly, I walk around the holidays fairly oblivious to what others receive. But the card my oldest daughter gave to my wife on Mother’s Day caught my attention.

The card read: I’m Turning Into My Mother and I Couldn’t Be Happier About It.

The first few times I read that line, I thought about my daughter and the ways she is becoming like my wife. As an outside observer, it’s easy to see the characteristics they share.

But the card kept resurfacing once we got home. One day it was on the planning desk, prompting me to read it again. Another time, it had made its way upstairs to the hallway floor, and again, I read the line. I assume the card was slowly migrating toward the nearly full hope chest, where twenty-five years of our children’s artwork and writings are stored. On one hand, this slow, meandering journey may simply be how things move from Point A to Point B in our house. On the other hand, maybe the words were beckoning me to linger with them—to pay closer attention and reflect more deeply.

We are, in so many ways, products of those around us. And I’m not sure we always recognize this. Occasionally, someone may say they see our parents, grandparents, or another relative in us. But I wonder how often we stop and meditate on what that really means for us—both for better and for worse.

Seeing the best of our loved ones in ourselves honors their lives and legacy. We honor their best qualities—their love, their wisdom—while keeping their legacy alive in how we live and care for others. By recognizing the positive values they have instilled in us, we carry them with us through our lives, sharing their love and wisdom with future generations. That is one of the greatest and most beautiful gifts we can offer.

But we must also give equal attention to the unhealthy traits we’ve absorbed from those closest to us. The truth is that we can move through life with very little awareness of the accumulated baggage we carry. And unless we take the time to look within and identify what’s unhealthy and needs to be shed, we risk passing on patterns that don’t serve us. We perpetuate the negative cycle.

Honoring and shedding are essential practices for us all. Honoring perpetuates the best of what we’ve learned, while shedding puts to rest what was never meant to endure. My hope for my children is that they embody the good I’ve passed on to them, while letting go of any baggage I unintentionally imparted.

Question

Which parts of me are echoes of those who raised me—and which of those do I want to carry forward, and which do I need to lay down?

Peace,

Brandon

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