Aunt Mawia! YOU SAID!!!

I was having a sleep over with 5 of my nieces and nephews recently, ages 8 and under. After telling story after story in the tent, it was a somewhat unanimous decision to go inside, make a big pallet on one of their bedroom floors and commence with story time, night prayers and then "sleep" (I say "sleep" with parentheses cause let's be honest who actually gets much sleep on a sleepover; especially with little ones!

 After a little craziness with getting everyone settled down again, "Aunt Mawia" in the middle with 5 little ones cuddled in around me, one of them asked, "will you wake us to say bye before you leave in the morning?" (Cause they knew I had to leave really early to work with a training client), smiling I said  "yes I will!" Though it wasn't 60 seconds later that I thought hmm, I wonder if I should add a clause in that 'yes I will statement' adding that if they look sound asleep I may NOT wake them. But I didn't end up adding that in.

Early the next morning, I looked down from the bunk bed I had crawled into halfway through the night to soothe a crying little one who had moved up there from the pallet and I started having second thoughts about waking the sound asleep children who were laying there so peacefully.. All of a sudden one of the kids got up quickly and said to one of the others in a distraught voice  "hey! Where is aunt Mawia?!! Did she leave??!"  The other one said confidently "No she must still be here, cause she wouldn't leave without telling us bye! She said she so!"




I laid there for just a few more minutes as the importance of what just happened set in. It struck me the importance of being a person of your word; whether to a little 2 year old, a teenager, an adult, or an elderly person. Your word should be worth something. That vote of confidence the kids had in me was because I had been consistent in following up the words I spoke with the correct actions to match those words. But how close I had come to breaking that trust because I thought I knew better--that sleep would be better for them more so than honesty in that moment. How easily trust can be broken. Mmm...Maria, always be a woman of your word; of integrity, that your words AND actions may mirror one another.

I've taught swimming lessons for many years and one thing I have noticed is how often the hardest part of teaching swim lessons in the first few lessons is getting the kids to trust your word; when they are going to jump or swim to me and I say that I'll catch them, or not back up further than they can swim, I have to be true to that. I even had a 9 year old who was petrified of the water tell me she didn't trust anyone because people didn't do what they said they were going to. When I asked her what she meant, she said she had a swim teacher who told her that she would catch her when she jumped in the deep end and she didn't; that experience left her struggling to trust adults on so many levels. Mmm...Maria, always be a woman of your word; of integrity, that your words AND actions may mirror one another.

We may not get it right 100% of the time. At some point we are all hypocrites, but it shouldn't be all the time. Sure we can make mistakes, welcome to the human condition, but do we correct those mistakes as quickly as possible and ask forgiveness for those we wounded because of our actions and or/words? Now days, our words frequently don't mean anything, people make promises and don't keep them-- I would venture to say the majority of the time. People confide in us, we tell them we won't tell anyone and then we go and tell people...We tell people we love them and yet our actions speak the very opposite. We are in a tight spot and to save face we tell a 'little white lie' cause 'it's not a big deal'...and yet...those 'little deals' end up being big deals...it's a compound effect. How we do ANYTHING is how we do EVERYTHING...how we treat ANYONE is how we treat EVERYONE... Mmm...Maria, always be a woman of your word; of integrity, that your words AND actions may mirror one another.

After all these thoughts ran through my head, I got up, went over to each of the little ones, woke them gently told them I was leaving and kissed their soft cheeks. Each of them, though groggy gave a smile and reached up hands for a hug and whispered a sweet 'Bye Aunt Mawia.'

That day I learned an important lesson...ALWAYS. ALWAYS. ALWAYS...be a woman of my word, of integrity...of honesty...Words and actions go hand in hand...


Oh the things I learn from little people...and elderly people...and everyone in between....

Be blessed~