I’m one to believe that we all (or at least the vast majority of us) have these “rules”, if you will, that we abide by. Think of these as guidelines, or for the visual learners out there, the bumpers along the bowling alley that keep your ball from veering off into the gutters.
High, high level, they’re what keep us aligned to our morals and values. Like stealing. You were probably (hopefully) taught not to steal. Or to kill. Or to lie. The common ones, ya know.
Which are easy not to do. You usually don’t find yourself debating whether or not you should steal. It’s pretty obvious that stealing is wrong, and if you’re caught doing it, you’ll have to bear the consequences.
But then I was presented with a situation that challenged my notion that “stealing is wrong”.
Picture this:
You have a family— a partner and children. Those children depend on you to put food on the table. They expect to eat and to be nourished at least three times a day in order to sustain their health. Your sole job is to feed those kids no matter what.
Imagine it’s the end of the world (dramatic, I know, but just imagine it). There are no more grocery stores. No more restaurants or cafes. No more farmers harvesting crops. There is no more food that is available for you to buy.
But, your neighbors have a house full of food. They stocked up 100 refrigerators and pantries with endless amounts of food in their “in case of emergency” corner of their basement, and it happens to be all the food left in the world. They also will NOT sell or lend you a morsel. That was made very clear. But regardless, their stash is piled high with nourishment, and your kids are growing hungrier by the second. The clock is ticking.
Do you:
A) Believe so strongly that “thou shall not steal” that you won’t, under any circumstance, steal?
Or
B) Believe that feeding your children takes precedent over anything else?
There is no right or wrong answer here. It’s a personal decision; however, there are some golden nuggets of info hidden within this dilemma.
When I think about this scenario, my personal decision is very clear. If I had children who depended on me to feed them, I would do whatever it took to feed them. Although I would like to say I wouldn’t steal my neighbor’s emergency supply of food, you bet I’m devising some midnight plan of attack to stealthily sneak in and steal loaves of bread and peanut butter.
If I feel even the slightest amount of love for my children that I do for my dog, then I know what it feels like to love something so much that you would quite literally die for it. My neighbors think a padlock is keeping me out? I’m coming in guns blazing to steal food so my kids can eat. End of story. I’m stealing.
So, after being presented with that scenario and making the decision that I would in fact steal, I felt the need to reassess the bumpers on my bowling alley.
I asked myself, “Do I really think stealing is wrong?” Can I add an asterisk to the end of “I believe stealing is wrong”, and proclaim that the only exception is if it’s the end of the world and you’re my neighbor who hoarded food in the event this exact situation transpired? Seems to me that if I add that extreme asterisk, I have to add many more.
I was a little perplexed by the idea that I could be so flip floppy with my “rules”. How do I justify some actions and not others? What’s my threshold? What if that threshold continues to change? The idea that I didn’t have an “all or nothing” mentality with the “rules” I’ve set in place for myself felt wrong. I started to question my own morals.
That’s when I realized that I have “rules” and “guidelines” that I follow on a day-to-day basis. They help me navigate what I feel is morally just and what isn’t, but I also have overarching values that will trump any rule, if I see fit. “If I see fit” is really loose and fluid. It’s a whole asterisk on its own, and that is simply how it has to be.
What I’m trying to get at with this entire post is that we all have these “rules” for ourselves. In a lot more realistic setting, they’re something like:
I would never cheat on my significant other.*
I would walk away from a job that’s unfulfilling.*
I’m a caring friend who makes it a point to make my friends feel heard, seen, and valued.*
Those are really good guidelines to live your life by. In the most perfect scenarios, and even in the less perfect ones, you can definitely stay true to them. The same goes for stealing. You wouldn’t normally walk into a store and just start filling up your cart with a bunch of stuff and then waltz on out. Your moral compass would probably steer you clear from that.
But there is an asterisk at the end of each one of those sentences above to denote that life is not always perfect. There are a million variables being factored into each decision you make, and sometimes, you end up breaking your “rules” because something else takes precedent. Does that mean your moral compass was wrong or off? No. It means you have overarching governing laws that are the guiding principles of your life, and even then, some governing laws take precedent over others depending on the situation.
Although I’m pretty well acquainted with the “rules” I live my life by, I’m not sure that I’m aware of all my governing laws just yet. As I find myself in more complex situations the older I get, they will reveal themselves in due time, and I think that’s both the beauty and ugliness of life. To learn more about who you are at your core and what you truly care about. To reinvent yourself and rewrite your “rules”. To find out what you absolutely swear by and what you’ll let slide through the cracks. It’s all a journey about self-discovery, and it will all change and morph the older you get.
At the end of the day, what matters most is that your governing laws make sense to you. Because if it’s the end of the world, your kids are starving, and your neighbors have stashes of PB&Js in their basement, it doesn’t matter if they think you’re the worst person in the world for snagging some of their food. Your kids will think you’re the best, and if family is your #1 overarching governing law, then being known as “thief” when your title is also “mom” is worth every stolen slice of bread in the world.
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