Proud
Within twenty-four hours, each of my daughters took a small action that left me filled with pride.
One daughter - with a minute left in her lacrosse game - came sprinting across the length and width of the field to stop an attacker from scoring. The determination and effort was particularly noteworthy given the score. Her team was losing by ten goals.
Another daughter - with just a few months left before graduation and her college admission secured - stayed up past 1:00AM that same night completing several assignments including a video project on the Spanish Flu’s impact on World War I. She resisted the temptation to use ChatGPT to complete any of the work as she suspected several classmates had done. Saying she wanted to complete high school the right way - with integrity.
My third daughter - rushing to get ready for school on the opening day of her school’s play - put her nerves aside when I knocked on the bathroom door before running off to catch my train. Saying, “Can you hold on until I get dressed, so I can give you a hug goodbye?”
Proud is from the Latin term “prodesse,” meaning “to be of value.”
The definition of “proud” has evolved somewhat to “feeling deep pleasure or satisfaction as a result of one’s own achievements, qualities, or possessions or those of someone with whom one is closely associated.”
Increasingly as a society we seem to place more value on pride associated with achievement or possessions, while the pride brimming from our qualities is relegated to the background.
Three small actions by my daughters displayed qualities of determination, integrity and kindness that trump whatever was on a scoreboard, a report card or a stage.
If it seems like I’m just bragging about my kids or virtue signaling, perhaps I am. But I’m also hoping to spark a conversation about where we place our pride and what stories we choose to share about it.
A society that places too much pride in the accomplishments and possessions in our children, ourselves and others perpetuates the pursuit of them - often to the detriment to the qualities that in our heart of hearts we value more.
It is perhaps how we end up with people who believe the ends justify the means or why we treat others as less than if their accomplishments or possessions are themselves less than others.
I, myself, have done all I suggest above. Actions that once bred pride, I now look back upon with some level of embarrassment given the focus of my pursuits. Many of which I did in an attempt to make my own mother proud.
As a parent myself, I can now see that she too was always less concerned with what I accomplished or my possessions gained and more about my qualities and how they manifest in the world around me.
To that end, I hope she still feels that same type of pride in me as I do in my daughters.
Recommendation of the Week: Check out the new movie, Project Hail Mary. Despite an existentially harrowing context, it shows what we are capable of when we mix humility, humanity, humor, sacrifice and some good science.
Share this with someone and tell them you’re proud of a specific quality of theirs that was on display this week.