If you watch marketing, especially that which is promoting something you would enjoy – something that would incite pleasure – the appeal comes in the form of reward: You Deserve This.
The weekends away without work, the delights of delicious foods, a good night’s sleep under an expensive but beautiful velvet bedspread: they all arrive to us packaged as rewards. You deserve this.
Because I’m firmly placed at the intersection of the health/wellness and spirituality industries, I have some concerns.
To imply that because of *this* (whatever *this* is), we deserve something, also implies that there are moments, people, and situations that do not deserve that something. A reward means that goodness is attached to behavior. Your worthiness becomes something that is earned.
Such a line of reasoning, based on the notion that there’s an authority deciding on your worthiness, also leaves you, the earner, constantly wondering: is this enough? Is this enough to get the prize? If I just… X, will I finally be enough to get… Y?
It’s that wondering, that constant, pervasive concern that you aren’t enough that will keep you on the treadmill of earning, earning, earning. But here’s the real punch in the gut: everything you earn won’t be enjoyed in the same way. Its flavor will be tinged with entitlement.
As long as we operate in a scarcity mentality, that the world is a big pie and we have to elbow our way to the biggest piece, our striving will be met with rewards that will never feel enough to satisfy.
The business will never be successful enough. The house will never be big, clean, and full enough. The marriage will never be fulfilling enough. The kids…. (oh, goodness, let’s not talk about what happens when there are kids involved.)
This is the awakening that turns the poison of entitlement into banquet of thanks.
Jedidiah Jenkins, Like streams to the Ocean
I think this is why Paul wrote to the Ephesians that it is “by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that on one can boast.”
I won’t dispute that actions have consequences and each decision we make will take us in a particular direction, potentially closer or further away from something we ultimately want for our lives. Our own volition is a gift.
And that’s the thing: it’s all a gift. All of it. Not just the “prize” at the end, the thing you think you earned because you happen to find pleasure in it. The path leading you there is also the gift. Each step toward it: gift. gift. gift.
That cookie you eat after a 5-miler may taste extra sweet, but it’s not because you paid the 5-mile price. Those miles were their own gift. The cookie is grace upon grace.
When you free yourself from living as if it all has to be earned, you’ll find the grace in the 5 miles. Just because you don’t enjoy it as much doesn’t mean it’s not a grace. It’s like I tell my kids when I make a dinner that’s anything other than pizza: just because this isn’t your favorite dinner doesn’t mean it’s not a good one.
We’re not living amid a big balance sheet of life, computing debits and credits and hoping to end our lifetime in the black. Each experience in this world is a credit. We enjoy some credits more than others, and that’s ok.
Pleasure – enjoying something for what it is – isn’t a reward. Rest isn’t a reward. Renewal isn’t a reward. These gifts were given before you set out to give efforts. These are grace, upon grace, upon grace.