Holiness and Work; Friendship

Do you remember when I said I was going crazy in an office without a window? That was a Wednesday; on Thursday I mentioned it to my team leader. Friday afternoon he and the other guy we work with came to me and said, "So, you want a window..." Sean traded with me that very afternoon. Much, much better. And Sean says it's probably better for him, too. Having the cubicle against the wall may help him focus.

Even with the pleasure of a new cube, I'm trying to take Wednesdays to be away from the office and write. No, not to blog (!) but to work on my long, on-going projects like these 50-, 70-, 100-page cultural descriptions and strategy reports left behind by research teams in various states of publishability. Quite a few of them are nearly ready for distribution. I'm hoping to create a new pricing structure and distribution system this year and have all of them (old ones and new ones) available as PDFs for sale by download. Most of these have a small but highly interested audience. The work we do is priceless - if we can get it into the hands of those who need it most. You know how it is when you are doing something you love; it's OK if nobody notices, or at least it's OK with me - I can live on the personal satisfaction. Ethnography is that way for me, I guess. But there's so much more that can be done with it if we are willing to do what it takes to get it into the hands of others. Right now that task falls on me.

In the fall I worked on one from a couple teams we had in Southern China, including research done by three different teams over several years. This spring I've been working on another China project, this one not quite as extensive.

Some of these writing days have turned out really well, others, not so much. I seem to find so many other things to do with my time. I forget, too, what a huge difference something as simple as pulling out my journal first and laying the whole thing down before the Lord can make in how my day goes: how much I get done, clarity of mind to set good goals and priorities, and the will to set aside distractions, as well as peace of mind during breaks.

Big editing projects also pose challenges in the area of attitude. Another reason to take it outside the office! As satisfying as it can be to make good things better, editing big projects is hard work. I can get pretty cranky reading one sloppy paragraph after another, with all the fuzzy thinking (including my own) that shows up in the early drafts, especially when there is no one to go to for clarification. I get snarly. I want to give up. I find myself wanting to throw a lot of it away. And that's the best thing to do with some of it, honestly. Vigorous slashing, rearranging and rewriting is often necessary.

But it's better to approach my task with a constructive attitude, so if I throw stuff away I know why, and can do so without being bitter or dismissive to other people just because their work doesn't 'work.' And it may just need some tweaking... So: Editing days are a good time to pray - that I might know the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control of the Holy Spirit in this process!

The other thing that prayer is good for is to remind me not to just lay myself and the work before God so he will bless it, but to lay myself and the work before God so he can bless it OR push it aside. His presence, his plan - way better. If a project doesn't get done on my time-line, but is something I'd surrendered to him to expedite or dismiss according to his good pleasure, I can be at peace. I need not feel guilty or ashamed, need not fall into the trap of being addicted to short-term gratification. I want to do it his way. Thy will be done: on earth as it is in heaven.

Of course, I'm lucky; blessed. Most people don't have employers that are particularly interested in the will of God or the power of the Holy Spirit. I do. That is amazing, isn't it? I don't want to take it for granted. It's definitely something to be grateful for at this stage in my life; someday God may move me into a situation that's quite different. Even then, I hope I'll keep praying "Thy will be done..."

Today I was editing a bit about how members of this Chinese minority group look on friendship. It's a pretty big deal, and in a different way from in the West, where 'being friends' and 'being friendly' are about the same thing. In so many of the non-Western cultures I've studied, friendship is not entered into lightly. When you are someone's friend they expect you to help them when they are in trouble. That's often the number one thing that shows that a friendship is the real deal. A good friend is someone you can always to go for help. And in the culture I was writing about today, to call someone a friend means they are closer than family.

In America we don't want to burden our friends, do we? It's quite different. We think it is better to be independent, to solve the problem yourself, take it to a professional, or to pay someone to help you - rather than to go to a friend or the friend of a friend, which would be the natural response of so many people I meet in other cultures. When I've been in some of these places I have felt this at the gut level more than once when someone asked me (or offered me) a huge favor. It seemed - wrong, weird. I think this traces back to our core values of self-sufficiency, individualism, and freedom. Not bad things, but they send all kinds of waves out through the culture, affecting almost every aspect of how we think and interact.