motivational appearances

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about motivations and appearances. I think we all tend to do things we know we can get away with. For instance, even if the motivation for our actions isn’t necessarily on the up and up, we don’t concern ourselves with that as long as we can get it to appear harmless. I recognize this as one of my weaknesses. I do this in incredibly small matters—things that even if you knew my motivations you wouldn’t fault me considerably for them. However, you aren’t my judge. God is. Lately, I’ve been thinking that if the motivation isn’t good and pure then it must be negative. If nothing else, it doesn’t originate with God so therefore it must be something worthy of changing. Recognizing this, I need to endeavor to stop doing things for which I question my motivation even for a second. It’s simple really: are you making this change in your life for the attention it will bring you from the outside world? Or are you making this change in order to better yourself and bring yourself closer to God? I want to endeavor to be who I appear to be. I don’t want to be worse than what I appear; I want to be even better than what I appear. I want the things that I do to build others up rather than tear them down. I’d rather be the butt or your joke than make you the butt of mine. Imagine how we could change the world with that attitude. My grandmother personified the sawdust versus plank in your eye parable not along ago with my dad. She told him that her New Year’s resolution was that we should all learn to be nicer to each other. My dad chuckled and said, “yeah and it should start with you.” She said, “well you need to do your part.” You cannot expect of others what you do not do for them. This being the case, I want to be the person that if others emulated me, I would want to hang out with them.