rules

Rules are a means to an end. Rules (laws, commandments) provide the perimeters of good and decent behavior. The hope is that as we keep the rules, good and decent behavior becomes our habitual way of being and we reach the point where we don’t need the rules to be good and decent, we just ARE good and decent.

We run into trouble when we lose sight of the role of rules, when we get caught up in the letter of the law and forget the spirit of the law. Too often, keeping the letter of the law prevents us from exercising the compassion and understanding required by the spirit of the law. Then the “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts” become chains that can actually keep us from the good and decent they were meant to create in us.

We all experience this distinction many times in many ways throughout our lives and what we choose in these situations tells us a lot about ourselves. One such incident happened when my daughter was in 4^th grade. One day out on the playground the class bully was picking on some girls, trying to make them fall from the monkey bars where they were swinging by their legs. Hannah saw the problem, danger of them falling on their heads, and without giving it a second thought, gave him a swift kick in the shin. It stopped him, but she was caught, a report was written up in her permanent record, and she was made to formally apologize for her infraction of “the rules”. I reassured her that she had done the right thing, the good and decent thing, even though the school officials didn’t see it that way. Several years later she received a letter in the mail from her fourth grade teacher saying, in part, how proud she was that Hannah had stood up to the bully. School policy required the reprimand she had received, but in her eyes, Hannah had been the hero that day.

One of my favorite movie quotes is from “The Rainmaker”. It is “You’re so full of what’s right, you can’t see what’s good.” Rules are merely a means to an end and sometimes the end is best served by bending the rules. Whether it is yielding in traffic even though you have the right of way, relaxing the curfew for extenuating circumstances, or that occasional dessert before supper, let’s not sacrifice what is good for the sake of what is right; it can be a heavy price to pay.