Giving Grace

Today I had a conversation with someone about migraines.  They told me their history and I told them I hadn't had one since leaving the field of Human Resources.  We agreed that stress can play a major role in getting them.  What I didn't talk about is how I used it as an excuse once for calling out sick when I wasn't sick at all.  For the record, I have untruthfully called out sick twice in twenty years (yes, I know, two times too many from the standpoint that I lied).  This first time was because I had an opportunity to make extra money.

At the time I was 24 years old and worked as a data entry clerk in HR Information Systems making $7.50 an hour.  I was living on my own and trying to save money for wedding expenses.  I had an opportunity to deliver circulars door to door for a landscaper at $10 per hour so I did it.  Stupidly, when I called out sick I said I had a migraine.

When I got to work the next day my boss called me into her office and said that I never mentioned a history of migraines, that she didn't believe me and that if I called out sick again without being sick that it would be an issue.  And then she told me to get back to work.  

Gratefully she didn't first ask me all sorts of questions about my symptoms so that I didn't dig a bigger hole for myself.  I would say that she gracefully let me off the hook.  I felt awful the rest of that whole day, but then I just got back to work.  When I finally did have a migraine about 10 years later, I wish I had never said I had one.  I guess it was karma, and not the good kind!

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Now for the reflective questions which you can journal about or if you'd like to share your story, I'd love to hear from you and the community would love to hear from you!  Your comment could have a major impact on someone else; most likely it will be just the right thing at the right time for one of the readers. For me, God* wanted me to know that helping even just one person is wonderfully impactful.

Reflective questions:

1.  Do you give grace when it would be just as easy not to be graceful?

2.  Do you feel guilty about being given grace or did you just "get back to work"?

3.  What does God* want you to know about this (ask directly, God, what do you want me to know?)

* I use the term God as a universal term.  You may decide that Great Spirit, Allah, Higher Power, etc. better suits you today.  It is not for me to decide.

Picture from Wikipedia, mourning dove.