won·der
- a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable.
Have you had the chance to watch the 2017 American comedy-drama film, Wonder? If you haven’t – run to the nearest Blockbuster (if only), Netflix, Hulu, Prime …wherever you need to get this movie and take it in as a family. When I say take it in, I mean really take it in. Breathe it in deep. There are many thick congested messages to choose from that pollute our airwaves nowadays — messages of hate not hope. The message of this movie, however, is simplistic yet beautiful, hard but raw, painful yet kind. It’s worth the watch.
What do I love most about this movie?
The beauty of how my 8-year-old boy loves it. I mean, runs downstairs like it’s Christmas morning loves it! This movie grips him in a way only kindness can. Every day he rises, asks for his Thick and Fluffy Eggo Mini’s, snuggles up on the floor with a blanket and picks up right where he left off just before bed.
Something about this movie touches his tender 8-year-old heart. I wipe tears away each and every time Auggie’s sister Via goes from understudy to star of the show; or when Daisy, the beloved dog, doesn’t make it home from the vet. Or how about when Auggie’s mother sees another child befriend her son with Treacher Collins Syndrome for the very first time? I tear up every time I watch “Wonder” with my eldest boy.
The tears always come because kindness matters. Love matters.
Deep down, this is who we are and if it isn’t, it’s who we ought to be.
In the unfortunate way of Auggie, I recently experienced playground bullying myself, at the ripe age of 41.
My child was bullied too, but that wasn’t enough. This mom was desperate for corporal punishment due to my naughty child’s negative response to her sweet child’s wrongdoing.
Bullies make bullies.
Bullies don’t see their part in the sad saga. This mom and I later hugged it out and worked through our differences, but that’s not the typical scenario. The response — days, months, or even years later — is more playground dramas broadcast on very wide screens for all to see. And yet, we still gawk at bullying the exact same way today. We turn it up on our TVs. We watch intently. Our ‘smart televisions’ replay ‘stupid broadcasts’ of everything that goes against our humanity and the way of kindness.
I was bullied once in high school. It was terrifying! In fact, my first day of school I distinctly remember an extremely violent encounter between two older teenage girls. I witnessed bullying regularly, it was my adolescent goal never to bully or to be bullied. I decided that very first day to keep my blinders on, to walk forward with little to no involvement with anyone or anything. I’d keep these eyes facing forward and blend in to the crowd as best I could, so that no one would truly see me. But as Via states in the movie,
“Don’t try to blend in when you were born to stand out.”
I’ve never been good at blending in, and if there is one thing that attracts a bully it’s being different.
I’ve gotten better at how I handle bullies in these mid-life years, but it still breaks my heart that we can’t treat one another with common decency. Honoring one another’s differences as our differences can actually make us better people.
Y’all it’s so important to just love each other. We bully each other daily, and I’m not talking about our children! We adults glance judgmentally at one another deeming each other unworthy because deep down we actually believe we are doing it right. Whatever ‘it’ is. How arrogant!
It is my hope and prayer this holiday season that we will all be a bit more like Auggie, embracing our own and one another’s disfigurement with a big heaping dose of kindness. The thing about kindness … it’s not a gift you have to return but it sure makes a difference when you do. Kindness is a gift that keeps on giving. When you’ve received just a small measure of undeserved kindness, it lasts much longer than expected. The impact is far reaching.
Just as bullies make bullies, kindness begets kindness.
So perhaps this holiday season, the best gift we give may very well be the gift of our authentic self. If we really begin to see one another and the burdens we each carry and if we are challenged to respond in kindness (bearing one another’s burden, lightening one another’s load instead of casting judgment), what a difference that could make.
This holiday season put on love and re-gift the gift of kindness.
Love well. Be kind. And may you never lose your sense of wonder.
