Strict or Lenient

I’m watching, as I imagine we all are, our world at odds, and it makes me sad. I can’t help but look back and try to figure out how we got here, and how I believe we should move forward. I believe God gave us free will so we can choose love and peace. He gave us rules, not to be mean but because he knows life is better for us with order, but it is best if we choose order. The most important rule, though, is to love Him and love others. We struggle with following any of the rules, even though they are the basis of human morals.

God, in his goodness and kindness, knows that our lives will be better when we follow those rules, but the beautiful thing is that he is full of grace and mercy. And many times we take advantage of his grace and mercy, that’s another blog for another time.

I’ve seen classrooms where the teacher wanted to be friends with the students, he/she didn’t want to enforce the rules. Eventually, that classroom became so disruptive that students were not learning, and in some cases, it was unsafe. I’ve also read many articles about children who need structure and rules to feel safe and loved. Without being held accountable, they feel anchorless. Feeling anchorless as a child or adolescent can lead to misbehavior and poor choices. I’ve seen it in schools and families, including my family. Gentle parenting has been a thing for a while now, and although I completely agree that we should be cautious with how we speak to our growing humans, they still need to know that no means no and that there are consequences for not following the rules. Most importantly I believe we need to teach respect for others again, sadly I don’t see that very often in our world.

As I study our world, I decided to look up leniency. I read several articles that confirmed my viewpoints. According to these articles, unchecked leniency can lead to poor decision-making and unclear boundaries.

So here we are living in a world where so many don’t believe that the rules are important or that they should get special treatment. And as to that, I believe that we should run our government like we would run our home. We need to mind the budget, not be wasteful, help people, yes, but I must take care of my family first, we must lock my doors at night, help my neighbor, but not let them run in my home without being invited. If a person doesn’t run their home like this, they won’t have a home for long; others will use it and abuse it.

One house I lived in had a pool. I had a neighbor kid who thought he should had free access to my pool anytime he wanted. The people who lived in our house previously were lenient with their space. I had to set the record straight. I have the right to have a quiet space, without having to watch someone else’s child. And if I hadn’t taken this stand that I’m quite certain he and his parents weren’t fond of, he could have gotten hurt on my property, and then I would be held liable.

I’m sure I’ll have people who disagree with me, and that’s okay. I don’t run the world, thank goodness but I do have the right to my opinion. Nevertheless, I still want to be friends, even with differing opinions. I hope we return to a time when we can disagree without losing respect for each other as humans. But I think in order to get there, we need to stop being so lenient, but there starts the vicious circle.

A quote attributed to Leo Tolstoy may be relevant to my observations. "The wicked become even worse when they are tolerated.