Beware the vibes of "but"...

It may appear to be an insignificant, unimportant little word, but...I wonder if you can guess where I'm going with this?

This little word has the power to crush, destroy, wound, hurt and generally cause untold misery. I grew up in a loving, caring home, but...I often felt that what ever I did simply wasn't good enough, any praise was automatically followed with a but...

Decades later I could see the loving reasons behind the negativity; the desire to encourage me to work harder, do better, to strive, but...it didn't work, my personality didn't rise to the encouragement, it conceded defeat so my response was to not try, to not work, to tick by and do the minimum, I passed eight GCSEs, three A levels and a degree in teaching, even an advanced diploma in teaching children with special educational needs, but I passed, I didn't do as well as I might have done if I'd put in even a little serious effort. My irrational thinking was that if I didn't pass because I hadn't worked I hadn't failed.  

But doesn't have to be about the big things to hurt, the little "buts" mount up, the times when a little child washes up, makes their bed, puts make up on, tidies their bedroom and receives a thank you, a well done followed by a but if you'd done it this way or that way it would have been better.

It seems to be almost a default setting, as a parent our instant response can so often be well done, but...it's not intentional, it's not meant to be critical or confrontational, it's meant to help encourage our children to do better.

This can be detrimental to a small child but how will it affect a teenager, confrontation is almost their reason for living, challenging, pulling away, finding their own way. A judgemental sounding "but" is going to have the same effect as lighting the blue touch paper on a firework!

It is not easy, it is something that  slips off the tongue without thought, our only intention that of helping and encouraging, we may not even notice the physical clues that we have hurt our child.

This made me think about Father God, Abba, when we whisper our first hesitant, rambling prayers He doesn't respond with well done but.. next time do it this way. He doesn'tlook at our journaling pages and ruffle our hair and say well done, but.. next time make your writing clearer. Our Heavenly Father sees the heart attitude, He sees the desire to spend time with Him, to grow to be more like His Son, Jesus, our Saviour, to draw closer and closer to Him, to serve Him, love Him and please Him.

When we do anything for God, rooted in love and a desire to serve, please and bring glory to His Name, even when we get it wrong and fail I'm sure that His response is well done, don't worry, it didn't go the way you hoped but... I love that you tried, you did your best, try again, let's do it together.

This is a message for me, I know how often I respond to Ben with a  that's great, but... I'm going to count to three (hundred, thousand!) before I answer or comment, I'm not going to leap in with a but; maybe when needed a gentler, that's great, it's hard isn't it, shall I show you how I  do that?  Even better, maybe a that's great, show me how you did that!