Investments

Last night I was sitting at a bar talking with a well respected professional friend of mine who is a new found follower of my blog. We were talking about the entry about Lent, where I talk about sacrifice. He said to me, "What I always think is that it's not so much about me GIVING UP something but more about me INVESTING in something."

It makes sense as I started to think about it. A parent makes sacrifices all the time for their children, however it isn't so much that they are giving something up, but rather they are investing, so that the child can have a better future. Sacrifices that we make during Lent can be an investment in our relationship with God. Sacrifices in relationships are investments in a better, more solid love between you and the other person.

Perhaps even in the rest of our lives we can see places that are investments. Like a job we may think is pointless can be an investment in a future with another company down the line. Or a past job that we hated may have assissted in where we are now, in a different place. Maybe thats what people mean when they talk about learning from thier mistakes. We make mistakes along the way in all areas of our lives, but they make up who we are today...all investments.

Typically a sacrifice is an unselfish act that we do for another person. Yet an investment is usually something we do for ourselves in the future. But is there really such a thing as purely unselfish act? To sacrifice in a religious setting is more for the purpose of gaining merit with God, so that isn't actually unselfish. Eating fish on Fridays in Lent, a Catholic tradition, is observed by most of the faithful due to a fear of Hell...much like most of organized religion. It is the fear of damnation, the threat of hell, that inspires one to follow their religion's decrees. They are investing in salvation.

So what is a purely unselfish act? Buying a drink for someone at a bar (Unless of course your trying to sleep with them) would be an unselfish act. YOu want to do something nice for this person, maybe you've been sitting next to them and you engaged in conversation, etc. Religiously speaking, any sacrifice, or action that we do and then talk about loose merit because they are made public, but if merrit was a concern to begin with, it's not really unselfish.

So then maybe during Lent its best to focus on the small random acts of kindness. The truely unselfish, pure, extentions of ourselves to someone else with no hope of reward of any kind. Sacrificial investment is a part of life, and a part of relational duties but eually important are those small things, that perhaps may even go unnoticed by the recipient.