Snapshots from El, Inc.

On being grateful and happy..

Editor's note: For those who want to skip my chiong-hei-ness, you can skip to the bolded main point. =p

Aight, I think it's time that I put some of my own thoughts up here. I was reading David Myers' Psychology Through the Eyes of Faith (a general psychology primer + relevant faith perspectives) tonight, and was reminded of one thing that Social Psychology says about human nature: our judgments of our states of being are relative.

To a point, relative judgments are warranted and based in objective reality. Take income and purchasing power for instance. In middle-class America, if I pocket $1200 a month, I'm pushing the floor of the middle class. In middle-class Malaysia, if I pocket $1200 (approx. RM4k) a month, I'm comfortably above the midpoint of the middle class. If I pocket that same amount a month in, say, Indonesia, I'm filthy rich. $1200 a month living in Palo Alto, California might very well put me in the poverty danger zone.

But when it comes to judgments of happiness, numbers are only a small part of the equation. Here's where the relative factor really comes into play. I remember my parents, and countless others from their generation, telling of how they looked forward to and enjoyed so much the rare occasions when they would be able to eat meat at a meal. Days without meat were endured, or perhaps passed over, as ordinary. I imagine myself in their shoes and conclude that my pre-meal prayers would be especially fervent and grateful if there was meat on the table. Compare that to my present: I take it for granted that I'll get to eat meat everyday. If I don't get to eat meat for a day, I don't get unhappy necessarily, but I definitely expect to eat meat the next day. If that doesn't happen for a while, I'll probably consider myself a little unfortunate, and might find my happiness level a little down. Granted, this example might not strike a chord with everyone.. I love food very much, so that was the first thing I thought of. =p

Here's another one. I am often struck with unhappiness over the quality of music I can make. This used to happen a lot more, back in the day when I would watch video after video of drummer/pianist/bassist prodigies blowing me out the water with their mad skills. I would daydream and ask God why I didn't have perfect pitch/perfect rhythm/a better bass/a better voice, yada yada yada.

Wow. I'm ashamed to admit it, but I do get depressed sometimes, when I'm "not playing well." Imagine that. For crying out loud, I can make music! There's no doubt about that. I'm not boasting here - God deserves the credit for the gift he's given me. You know how genes work, right? We have zero control over our genes. In future, our parents might, in which case we could thank them in addition to God for whatever talents we had, but.. even then, there would be no cause for boasting in talent. So I boldly proclaim that I am gifted musically, and give God all the credit for that.

But I digress.

Last Sunday, I heard a voice pierce through my complaining mind, reminding me that there are many people for whom hearing pleasant sounds issue from a musical instrument under their conscious control is an alien experience (which is Joel-speak for "some ppl can't play music wan!!!" =p).

And I was grateful. And happy.

So that's kind of how it works. If my current position can be compared favorably to another position, then I can be happy. At least that's how it works according the "relative rule" (I made that name up).

Now, to my main point. What I thought of and wanted to share was this: Christians should be the most grateful and the most happy, because we know that we deserve nothing but wrath and spiritual death, and anything seems better compared to that. If I know that I deserved hell, it becomes possible to be thankful for anything. Wahhh so absolute??
I stand by it. Think about it. Eternal torment vs irritating flies. Which one is worse? Eternal torment vs bad grade in class. Which one is worse? Eternal torment vs death of a close friend. Ouch. That was a low one. But the comparison still holds for me. The point is, I ought to be thankful in everything, just as the Bible commands (I Thessalonians 5:18), and I can do this because the Holy Spirit and my experience of grace helps me to see what was coming to me (Death), and everything that actually does come to me seems infinitely better than that.

Make sense?

Labels: For the spirit, Musings

posted by Joel Chan @ 5:02 PM