Nurture without Attachment
My oldest son has been working at a job he doesn’t like. I don’t know if “doesn’t like” are the appropriate words. The work he was hired to do is fulfilling and challenging. The people in the workplace are kind and encouraging. But the pay isn’t quite enough for him to live on. Additionally, many of his co-workers have agreed with this financial challenge and they have left the company. So the business is short-staffed, and my son is spending his time filling in for other activities and not doing the work he was hired for. He is frustrated and depressed. He decided to look for a new job.
After a couple of months of looking, my son was offered an interview to be a supply chain manager for another company. I was so excited to hear about this opportunity. My son would be managing the inventory of glass items and crystals. Glass and crystals? Two of my favorite things. He told me that during the interview, he suggested ideas on how to manage the inventory. He shared ideas about indexing the crystals by color, size, crystal type, etc. My mind was going at 1000 miles a minute. I thought of other ways to index. What about chakra? What about healing properties? What about geographic source? I held my tongue. My son hadn’t been offered the job. He was just in the interview process. In fact, this wasn’t even the last interview. He had to pass through the next level to be one of the top 3 candidates to get to the next interview.
With luck, great interviewing skills, and valid experience, my son made it to the third and final interview. Then...he was offered the job! He was so happy. I was so happy. When he called with the news, we celebrated virtually. If we had been together I believe we would have danced. After the phone call version celebration of the announcement had settled, I revealed that I had some ideas for other ways to index the crystals. I told my son that I hadn’t shared these ideas with him early on because he didn’t have the job yet. I didn’t want to create unneeded sadness by bringing something up and then having the job not happen. When my son heard these words he said, “Oh, I get that. It’s like one of those 4 Noble Truths in Buddhism that you talk about.” I thought about the 4 Noble Truths. These philosophies deal with suffering. Did he really mean 4 Noble Truths? He spoke some more. He said, “You know. It’s when you don’t want to connect to something because you are clinging to something that isn’t for sure.” “Oh!” I said. “I think you mean non-attachment.” “Yeah!” He said. “That’s it. I mean non-attachment.” I smiled and agreed. We continued on with our conversation.
When I hung up the phone, I had to chuckle to myself. Was I really practicing non-attachment? I had made a point of thinking about the job opportunity. I had come up with a number of additional indexes for the crystals. I had remembered them so that when my son was offered the job, I could share the details with him. Did he really need my help?
My son is a smart man. Even without my being his mother and having strong prejudices toward him, I know my son is a smart man. So why would he need my help setting up the indices for his crystal database? I mean, he got the job offer without my giving him my suggestions. But yet...I want to help. I want to be there for him and give him the tools he needs to be successful. To me that is part of the unconditional love that I offer.
But is it? I need to let my son be a success on his own. Honestly, the day he left my body was that day his journey began. I no longer need to make sure he is wearing socks without holes in them, help him with his homework, or drive him to school with his giant science project that won’t fit on the bus. When he starts building his crystal database, I will stand back and let it happen. If he asks me for help or feedback, I will kindly chime in. But otherwise, I need to let go of my attachments and let him do his job. That’s how I will do mine. Really, I’m not quite sure which one of us has the more challenging job.
