Earlier this week, as I drove from patient to patient, I was consumed with the worry of being a parent. Seeing your children, adult or young, struggle with life is the most emotionally painful thing I have ever experienced. I just want to solve everything for them…make life easy for them. Unfortunately, my children and life often have other ideas.
We all have bad habits or tendencies. Some of them are benign and fairly inconsequential. Others may border on the malignant side in their effect on our lives. How do you and I identify those propensities in ourselves? How do you and I remove them and thereby improve ourselves?
There is a debate among foodies who love sticky rice. The kind that is a staple in Asian cuisine. To wash or not to wash…which is the proper technique? I am always on the side of washing the rice before hitting the start button on your rice cooker. This was one of the first things I learned from the other missionaries sharing our small apartment in Yamagata, Japan. “Always wash the talc powder off the rice before cooking,” my senior companion instructed. “It will taste better and stick together for using chopsticks.”
In Japan, the morning ritual is to put on a slow cooker of rice much like some brew a pot of coffee. This cooked rice will then be used throughout the day for all meals. I rarely had rice with a meal growing up. After all, this is Idaho, we had potatoes from the garden everyday. If Mom ever did serve rice, it was Minute Rice, which is NOT real rice. I returned home with a love of rice and have become fussy if it is not prepared correctly.
With many things in life, you cannot achieve the magnificent until you master the mundane. So it is with rice. Washing the rice makes it magnificent instead of just average. It only takes a minute or less to rinse and stir the uncooked rice. Doing it several times is best until the water becomes clear and clean. Use a slow, purposeful motion with your hand to stir the mix so as to not break any of the grains. Then fill up the pot with clean cold water to about an inch above the level of rice. That will bring the desired result of a fully cooked yet sticky, consistency rice. It will then soak up the curry sauce or soy sauce without becoming a mess of single grains impossible to pick up with chopsticks.
I have tried my best to teach this principle to my children. If I cannot be their teacher then the world will be. And no doubt a harsher task master in comparison. How do I continue to do that now that they are full grown adults? They have children of their own. They are experiencing the burdens of a mortgage, job change or no job, and the maintenance of nurturing their own personal relationships. Did any of my attempts succeed? Did I teach them how to better themselves? Did I teach them to “wash their rice” in the never ending performance of life duties?
An epiphany of sorts came to my mind as I cruised down the highway deep in thought. I should have already known this fact, but I needed the reminder. If the value system and core beliefs I have are true…despite the despair I often feel now as a helpless dad…today’s and tomorrow’s worries will be temporary. Eventually, everything will be OK! Like a kidney stone, this too shall pass!
In the meantime, I will keep “washing my rice” and encouraging my children to do the same. Removing those impurities from the rice is my metaphor for abandoning the habits that hold me back. It might be the procrastination of those daily chores that I find to be mundane. It might be my tendency to overthink most stressful situations. It definitely involves removing toxic and unsupportive people from my life. Seems laborious and time consuming when you are hungry and want that meal prepared as soon as possible. But as a frequent consumer of those tasty little white morsels, trust me, it will be worth the effort. Then we may get to hear the words…JOB WELL DONE. For both a eupeptic meal and a rewarding life.