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| “Simba and Mufasa—seems like just yesterday!” |
“I’m Just Sayin’”
by Alan P. Scaglione
Picture it!
Mufasa lifts up his newborn son Simba above his head and says “all that you see will someday be yours, my son!”
It’s the perfect picture of parental pride, the age old connection between father and son.
Every father who has one son, just one son…knows… that sense of legacy.
I felt it.
Picture it!
9:41 am on February 21st, 1985, the doctor lifts my son into the air, having just performed a C-section,
And says, “It’s a…” at the same time, my son decides to spray his new world, and I say, “yes, I see!”
And it begins…
Your sense that someday, “all I have, all I know, all I value…will be passed on to you, my son.”
You spend years trying to share lessons of life that you’ve learned, so…he will not have to re-invent the wheel!
At some point you realize-- this kid just wants to learn it all on his own, do his own thing and make his own mistakes.
In other words, he wants to figure it out himself, by himself, with no help from you.
This is not about holding on, it’s about letting go.
My son and his bride just moved into their brand spanking new house. Jett has a home!
It’s beautiful—4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2 car garage.
It’s everything you would want for your child.
I told him this past week, “Well, it’s official. You are all grown up now. It wasn’t the getting married or the becoming a father that did it. No, now you have a mortgage—It’s official, you are a member of the middle class. We owe, we owe, so off to work we go!”
We both laughed.
But somewhere in the laughter, I realized, my son really had grown up, and now…it was his turn.
It was time for me to let go…
It was time to pass the baton…
To go from leading the race to…standing on the sideline, cheering him on as he now ran “his” race!
The race to work, to school, to home, to soccer practice, to cub scouts, to basketball games, to school events, to award ceremonies, to all the firsts he will experience as a parent, to graduation, to packing up the car as his son goes away to college(note to self-do NOT pack the laundry detergent in the same tote as you pack his X-box! It will NOT bode well!)
The race, the one you ran, the one you won!
Now, it’s his turn!
The Bible talks about running a race. The race of life.
“Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us!” Hebrews 12:1
We who have run the race before him know...it’s a race of endurance; a marathon, not a sprint.
And the sin which so easily besets us? I have always found it to be - indifference. When we cease to care, we cease to live!
Remember when you taught him to ride his bike? You took off the training wheels and ran alongside him, holding on to the seat until…
Until that moment when…he was so excited about being able to ride and balance it all…he didn’t even notice that…
You had let go and he… was on his own!
Well…this time….he hasn’t noticed in a while and you have finally… let go!
And he’s doing just fine!
He’s learned to balance on his bike —his life!
It’s not just like yours, it’s his. He may not do things the way you taught him or showed him,
But they are his decisions to make and lessons to learn.
Remember, they are never mistakes as long as we learn from them!
As I walk into his brand new house, with his possessions, his way of doing things, his “home”…
I am overwhelmed… “my” Simba is now the King of “his” jungle!
And…there’s this sense of pride that only a father feels when he knows…he did a good job and, it’s okay to let go!
After all? Who ever saw an adult riding around with training wheels?
I’m Just Sayin’…
Brother “A”
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