Only stick with something if you like it

There's an interesting post over on Segullah about piano lessons and whether or not to allow your kids to quit taking them.

I play the piano, although not much more than hymns. I was ward organist for a couple years, mostly because no one else could play, not because I was that great. (I used the bass coupler rather than playing with the pedals, although I did take an organ class to try to learn to play with my feet.) I think it's a life skill to play the piano. You tune other instruments to the piano. You accompany people singing and other instruments with the piano. You learn the notes, many styles of music, and possibly more than that - a little bit of discipline.

I do wish I was better at music theory and being able to do things like play jazz or make up songs on the fly or transpose music into another key on the fly. But I'm okay with being able to play most of the hymns and learning a song if I need to. I actually only took lessons for maybe 3 years. I don't remember wanting to quit or asking to quit or how lessons ended. It might have been a financial deal, as we didn't have a lot of money. I'll have to ask my parents. I just didn't take lessons anymore but kept up on my own. The first Sunday I turned 12, I was playing piano in priesthood meeting. Preparing a hymn and prelude for priesthood meeting was something that drove me to practice, because I needed to be able to play. I wasn't just practicing some scale for a piano teacher.

My wife quit when she was young and wishes she could play better. A lot of people feel that same way. I know a lot of people quit and don't feel bad. A lot of people don't quit and do feel bad, because they hate music and their parents for it. Everyone is different.

That said, I wonder about the culture that seems to be growing across the country, within and without the church to just embrace who you are and not try to push yourself to be something you're not. I get it, that we need to love ourselves, although not in a prideful way, and love others and accept them for who they are. That is great. But you can love and accept that you're not musical and still learn to play the piano. Whatever happened to seeking earnestly the best gifts? In 1 Corinthians 12 Paul lists a ton of gifts and points out that not everyone has same gifts, but then finishes up by recommending that we develop the gifts we don't have.

I don't pretend that piano is the be-all and end-all and that everyone really has to play, as my favorite line from Mulan goes, "Well, we can't all be acupuncturists." But back to the culture thing, the comments in the blog post I linked above are as telling as the post itself. One comment in particular says:

Why on earth would you force your children to do anything like that (music lessons, sports, whatever) if they don’t want to do it? Have them try different things and only stick with something if they like it. And you’re wrting about piano lessons as if every child takes piano lessons. That’s a rather odd thing to think.

No, not everyone takes piano lessons. All the more reason to be the person who does. Seek the best gifts. Be the one who steps up where others have been afraid to. On my mission, in one area I was teaching our branch president how to play the piano. My parents bought a little learning how to play kit the church had in the distribution center and sent it to me, including a simplified hymnbook, and I left it with him when I left the area. He played one verse, one hand of a very simple hymn in sacrament meeting and completely slaughtered it, but he was learning. I could have played most hymns much better, but I would be gone in a few months, and who knew if the next elders who came would be able to play.

The more disturbing part, however, is the first thought. Only do something if you like it. What if you don't like reading scriptures? Just stop reading them, I guess. What if you don't like cooking? Hope you marry someone who cooks well or get a good enough job you can afford to eat out all the time, I guess. What if you have a stubborn child who doesn't like doing anything you ask of them? Just stop asking them to do things, I guess.

As much as I disliked the old lesson manuals and rarely taught from them, one thing has stuck with me from one of the lessons. I'd have to search to find which manual and lesson it was, but the idea was that young children may not be experienced enough to be able to understand spiritual promptings. (Sometimes they're more in tune than we are, but that's a different discussion.) But as parents and leaders of youth, our job is to help guide and direct those in our care in the same way the Spirit should be guiding and directing us. That way the youth learn to seek and find answers and follow the guidance they are given from someone they trust, eventually being able to transition away from listening to us and towards listening to the Spirit.

Maybe it's the piano or maybe it's something else. Teach them to sacrifice and do things for others. Teach them to serve. Teach them a foreign language. Teach them to cook and clean up after themselves. Teach them to garden. Teach them to push themselves. Keep in mind, however, that your example is as important as what you're telling them. You practice the piano yourself, whether or not you already know how to play. I have a personal policy to not ask someone to do something that I'm not willing to do myself. Let them see that you're doing hard things, too, so they don't think we're just trying to live out our broken dreams through them or that we're being lazy and making them change a diaper just because we don't want to.

If we don't try to push them to do something that would be good for them, what they'll learn is that they don't have to stick with anything they don't like because that's just how they are. When the Spirit prompts them to do something they don't want to do, they will have learned from us to ignore that prompting, as it will eventually go away like our promptings did. That’s a rather odd thing to teach.

Eagles and Driver Licenses

I can't imagine my boys not earning their Eagles or my daughters not earning their Personal Progress. I would like my boys to earn their Duty to God, although I'm not as worried about that.

I don't think it's appropriate to hold something like a child's driver license over earning such an award.

I like the idea of teaching our children correct principles, modeling those principles in our own lives, and then giving them enough rope to either be productive or hang themselves. Not literally. Obviously at some point you step in and take drastic steps to avoid major life changing issues.

Children who are rebellious, lazy, doing poorly in school (I'm thinking really poorly, not just like B average poorly, but to the extent where they are being irresponsible), bad drivers, or otherwise not deserving of a driver license should not receive their driver license. That's probably not the real list but rather one I just made up right now and am not going to think much about. The point is that each child is different, so when it becomes time that it is an issue, you work it out with each child individually.

I can see daughter #2 coming straight out and telling us she doesn't even want to drive even if deep down she is desperate to. If there is something she is worked up about related to some award she doesn't want to be pressured to get, everything else in the entire world, good or bad, can be stacked up on every side, and she will retain her laser focus on not wanting to earn the stupid award. She will even be convinced herself that she doesn't want to drive. Until she wants to, at which point she will forget that she just told us 5 minutes ago that she doesn't care if she can drive.

Daughter #1 will have her Personal Progress earned the first day it is possible to have it whether or not there is any external reward for it.

The kids will be expected to help shuttle their siblings around as part of earning the privilege of driving. My parents didn't make me pay for my portion of the car insurance, but I think it's a good idea for them to understand at a deeper level that the cost of a vehicle is more than just the gas you put into it. Better grades and no tickets means lower insurance costs. You have to find a job and balance your time wisely in order to keep your grades up and earn the money you need and still participate in family and school activities.

I want my children to be responsible. If they are, they will probably earn their oh-so-important awards anyway just because they are responsible. If they are not responsible, not earning their awards may be a sign of that. They may also be very responsible but simply have to make decisions about what is important to them and the Eagle or Personal Progress may not be that. With the kids in my troop, I can tell within a few weeks of working with them whether or not they will get their Eagle. I think I know my kids a lot better than that so there should be no surprise to anyone if they earn it or not.

Changing or Cheating

Some ward members started a fitness challenge, and I'm joining in. I do much better at keeping myself in shape when I have someone other than myself that I'm accountable to. The chance at winning cash doesn't hurt either. I've done well at a few of these challenges done through work or with family.

The funny thing is that I see the same behavior in some participating in this challenge as I've seen in previous ones. The behavior I'm referring to is nitpicking the rules of the challenge.

The point of a challenge like this is to spend a 2-3 months following more healthy practices with the hope that you'll stay in the habit after the challenge is over. So it's strange when a challenge barely starts and everyone starts immediately looking for ways to bend the rules.

The rules are things like eating fruits and vegetables, exercising, not eating late at night, drinking lots of water, and laying off the sweets. It's pretty simple.

One good brother justified his willingness to bend the rules and eat things he shouldn't, because he claims that cutting out certain foods simply isn't sustainable. I'll give him that. Making a change for a few months and then picking the habit back up after it's over is probably less than useful. On the other hand, going cold turkey and dropping something that you never thought you could forgo can actually show you it's possible and reduce your cravings for that particular food or drink.

I know, because I've done it myself, going a year without carbonated drinks just to see if I could. I drink them occasionally now, but not near as much as I used to. If you're so hooked on a food or drink that you don't think you could ever give it up, that's probably a signal that you do need to give it up.

I'm okay with him cheating, though, because it's less competition for me as I go for the big prize.

The Law

I was in a class on Sunday where the teacher was talking about obedience and the line between following the spirit of the law and the letter of the law.

We started out by listing a few items that were obviously letter of the law things. Thou shalt not kill was put there, although it was pointed out that for Nephi, there was a bit of an exception made. We listed several more items, and the last item mentioned just as we were about to move onto another topic was the Word of Wisdom.

This is the one the teacher was looking for. The obvious letter of the law part to the Word of Wisdom is the no coffee, tea, drugs, tobacco, and alcohol component. But the question is where eating meat only in times of famine or the other "be healthy" components of this law fit in. Of course, if you ask Gramps, he'll say that D&C 89 is being misinterpreted, and that a rogue comma renders verse 13 exactly the opposite of its original intent. I don't want to get into that issue too deeply. We eat meat without having our temple recommends taken away.

The teacher's point again, though, was that we need to get away from having a line drawn between the spirit and letter of the law. We just need to be obedient. Our stake president recently gave a talk where he urged us to use the spirit of the law to make ourselves more obedient, not to creep over the line into the letter of the law portion of obedience. That is, you don't use the spirit of the law to justify breaking the letter of the law a little bit, as long as you had the right intent.

The spirit of the law should make us more obedient. That is, we should be avoiding food with lots of fat, sugary soft drinks, caffeine, and anything else that is obviously bad for us, while exercising more. As we were discussing the Word of Wisdom, I mentioned something about how it says we should "run and not be weary and walk and not faint". A large brother in the class countered that that statement is a blessing, not a commandment. I didn't want to get into an argument with an overweight member of the class about whether he was breaking the Word of Wisdom, so I just backed off.

The more I think about it, though, I don't see the difference between this being a commandment versus a blessing. The Lord commands us to avoid bad food, eat good food, and be obedient to the commandments. If we do that, we'll be healthy, gain knowledge, and run and not be weary. You can take the word "run" either literally or figuratively, but either way, again, it's the same. The Lord wants us to eat good food, exercise, gain knowledge, and otherwise be well prepared to carry out his work here on this earth.

I'm sorry, but if you're morbidly obese, I believe you're breaking the commandments. You cannot run and not be weary; you can barely walk without stopping for a breather. You cannot go visit the sick, because you are the sick. You cannot go on a mission if your BMI is over 37. You cannot go on many Scouting high adventure activities if your BMI is over 30. The Lord will not bless you to be able to run if you have not done the things that make that physically possible.

The Word of Wisdom here is just an example of one law, so I don't mean to harp on it too much. The principle of obedience applies to any law.

It was brought up in class that there are certain things that will keep you from getting a temple recommend, where many other things may not. You can also get into Elder Oaks' explanation of the difference between disobeying a law that is simply a legal prohibition versus one that is an inherent wrong. But again, drawing the line at what will keep you out of the temple or breaking laws like speeding that are only legal prohibitions and not inherent laws of nature, are not in line with the spirit of the law and will prevent you from being an effective servant of the Lord.

By fully committing oneself physically, spiritually, and otherwise, we will be more blessed and available to do the Lord's work better than someone who just does the bare minimum.