Coloring

            It was Sunday morning, during Liturgy. I had left the service to get some tissue from the cry room, in the back of church. Two tiny girls were seated at one end of the room. The pages of a coloring book lay open before them on the white folding table, and each girl was working on one of the two facing pages.

These three-year-olds are typically seen together, so I knew they were friends. That’s why I was surprised to hear their exchange.

The first girl suddenly exclaimed, “I beat you!” It seemed like a strange thing to say when you’re coloring. I surmised that she was referring to finishing first—not that either of their pages looked colored-in-the-lines at all, and I wouldn’t have called either picture finished!

The second girl sounded aghast. “No, we both win!” And she repeated herself as if to ensure that her declaration was accepted. A moment passed, and then this same girl, apparently forgetting her comment of the moment before, was announcing, “I beat you!”

The first girl hung her head in shame—apparently she accepted defeat. I paused and considered for a moment, then, wanting to encourage her, I said, “You guys, it’s not a competition. Don’t you both want to make a pretty picture?”

            My first internal reactions to this exchange were, “But they’re too cute to be mean!” and “I thought they were friends!” It also seemed like such a childish argument. Then I thought, “But don’t I compete in similar ways, even though I might keep it in my head instead of announcing it? And aren’t I competing even with my friends?”

It can be so tempting. I notice the ways that those around me have (or seem to have) what I don’t: higher incomes, better cooking skills, nicer homes, greater contentment, or (the toughest one) babies. Sometimes I even tell myself that people who don’t have these things now will certainly have them before I do.

            The girls and their coloring book gave me a vivid illustration of the way I don’t want to approach life. Why would I want to view life as a competition—especially with the people I love—when we can all focus on making our own uniquely beautiful picture for God?