It's Got To Be Me

There was once a snail that was in the market for a new car. He arrived at the car lot and was met by a crab that had been selling cars for a very long time. The crab attempted to interest the snail in a variety of cars that the crab knew his boss was trying to unload. The snail, however, was persistent in what he wanted. Finally, the snail eyed a bright pink Cadillac in the back on the lot and told the crab, “That’s the car I want”. The crab was relieved as the snail had been shopping for over 2 hours (snails move pretty slowly you know). But before the snail would purchase the Cadillac, the snail requested that a huge “S” be painted in bold dark black letters on both sides of the car. The crab couldn’t believe that the snail wanted to destroy this beautiful pink Cadillac, but the crab ordered it to be done as the snail desired. Not being able to resist any longer, the crab said, “I just have to ask you, Mr. Snail, why in the world would you want to paint bold black S’s on the sides of your new pink Cadillac?” The snail smiled at the crab salesman and said, “You see, when I drive past everyone, I want them to see me, and say, ‘wow, look at that S-Car-Go’”.

Yeah, pretty corny, yet one of my favorite jokes. But if you look at the story closely, you can see that this snail needed to be noticed, he needed to destroy a beautiful new car so that people would see and recognize who he was. How often in our own life’s do we fall into that trap, looking on the exterior, the job, the status, the money, so that we can get our wants met, to be noticed by those around us, while the interior continues to be fearful and insecure. How many “Cadillac’s” have we destroyed, whether they are relationships, jobs, reputations, self, values, body, mind, spirit, just to be noticed? It is so easy to buy into the notion that to be, we must be important in the eyes of those around us, who will forget our names, or who never knew who we were in the first place, or even worse, completely forget our existence as time goes by.

The snail was made to be a snail, nothing more. We are made by our God to be who he has designed us to be. Do we spend the same time being noticed by our Creator as the time we spend to be noticed by others, our fellow creations. To be, we must understand, and to understand, we must open ourselves up to the reality of the One who created Reality, and to open ourselves up, we must submit to His will, to being what He declared, to find our importance in the King of Kings, nothing else. It is good to be accepted, loved, and appreciated, and today, spend more time looking towards God for this than towards man.


(The writings in this post are random thoughts and observations and are NEVER intended as professional or personal advice. Take what works and leave the rest. For information on mental health and/or substance abuse help, visit http://www.rodneyvalandra.com and refer to the links page.)