Let all the earth fear the LORD;
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!
For he spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm. | Psalm 33:8–9
I was at the store the other day and I passed a little girl wearing a shirt that said: BE AMAZING TODAY, and I instantly felt bad for her. This had less to do with her sense of fashion and much more to do with the fact that her shirt was setting her up for disaster. The burden to be amazing every day sounds like a good goal based in positive self-esteem. Instead, I believe that it is the basis for the stress and despair that we all strain under.
While I think this is true for all of us, I believe that this is especially true for children. For children, the pressure to be amazing is intense. Part of this is because no matter how amazing kids are, there are thousands of people more amazing than them posting about their accomplishments online (I use the term ‘more’ here as how it feels, not my reading of their value). The truth is, the accomplishments of our kids are read in relation to far more than ours ever were. Not that we should be comparing our amazingness to others, but we do. For it to be held up to Youtube, Instagram and Facebook will always make our kids good seem small.
It is more than just HOW amazing they are; it is also what amazing means. To the modern identity it means everything. It used to be that for the family to function, the kids would have to do chores and fulfill household responsibilities. They were useful; there was a limited amount of time to be amazing. We have streamlined life to require less and less, and even when there are things to do, we see it as a burden on the kids. We have stripped them of almost all burdens in attempt to help them; we have left just one thing for them to do: BE AMAZING.
This has different iterations. For some kids this is about sports. For others it is about art, or good grades, or music, or theater. Maybe its just about being cool and having friends. No matter which, it is an unachievable goal. No matter how good you get at something, no matter how amazing you are, there is always a nagging feeling that you aren’t good enough. David Foster Wallace addressed this issue in his famous commencement speech at Kenyon College, saying:
If you worship money and things-if they are where you tap real meaning in life-then you will never have enough. Never feel you have enough. It’s the truth. Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you. On one level, we all know this stuff already-it’s been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, bromides, epigrams, parables: the skeleton of every great story. The trick is keeping the truth up-front in daily consciousness. Worship power-you will feel weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to keep the fear at bay. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart-you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out. And so on.
Being amazing sounds good, but it is a burden we cannot bear. David Foster Wallace discovered this; though he was an acclaimed author, he took his life at the age of 46. I don’t want to underscore the number of factors that play into a decision like that, but at the center is the pressure to be amazing today. The overwhelming burden to prove yourself over and over and over again. The reason why this is consuming is because it isn’t what we were created for. We don’t have the ability to be enough, no matter how much we try to convince ourselves that we do (and that others around us seem to be doing it!). In his speech, Wallace even referenced this need to be amazed, not just be amazing:
Because here’s something else that’s true. In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And an outstanding reason for choosing some sort of God or spiritual-…-is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.
As people, we are amazing, but it must not end there. The only way to be content in our limited amazingness, is to be amazed by God. Being amazed by God allows us to not just be comfortable with our limits, but it allows us to find joy in all of the tedious burdens that used to feel like they were keeping us down.
Being amazing will crush you; being amazed allows you to be free to fail, be plain/below-average, and to find you joy in the fact that in spite of all of this: GOD LOVES YOU!