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Competing Love Claims

I got called un-Christian today.

Now, I'm purposefully going to conceal the details of the person and situation because I do not seek to shame him, but I still tell this story because I learned a big lesson today that I think we can all learn from. (I will share that this was not a work-related situation, and I only share that in case my employers read this post.)

This person approached me about doing two tasks for his benefit that I personally did not think are all that important. He actually pulled me away from another important task I was he saw me working from (for my wife) to explain his concern. The conversation quickly devolved into an argument where he accused me of being un-Christian.

I'm not going to lie: I did not handle that situation the best. At the time, I was infuriated, and while I didn't fully backlash on him, I was definitely not nice about it. To that end, I do regret how that conversation went. I wish I would have kept in mind what I'm about to share below.
I was really hurt by his accusation of being un-Christian. I have really strived, especially lately, to elevate everybody around me. While he and I are not close by any means, I have no ill will toward him. I have always treated him kindly in our minimal interactions.

As I dwelled on the conversation the rest of the morning, I was reminded of what my old professor at Lincoln Christian University, Eric Teoro, used to tell me. He talked about this idea of "competing love claims". To summarize, we as humans only have a finite capacity to love people. I can't (nor should I) love another woman more than my wife, nor will I ever love another child as much as I will love my baby girl about to be born.

Teoro stressed, then, that because we have this finite capacity to love, then we should be aware of our competing love claims and act upon them justly. In other words, I should not feel guilty about devoting more time to doing things for my wife than for this person.

With this in mind, I can now approach the situation differently. He asked me to do two tasks. Let's analyze the time it would take to complete the task versus the value added.

Task 1
  • Value added to me and my wife: Low to medium
  • Value added to him: High
  • Duration to complete task: 20 minutes
Task 2
  • Value added to me and my wife: None (arguably negative value instead)
  • Value added to him: Low
  • Duration to complete task: At least one full Saturday of work
Looking at it this way, I can definitely do task 1, and hopefully he'll be happy with that. On the other hand, I definitely don't have the time for task 2, and since it doesn't add any significant value to anybody, I shouldn't feel guilty about not doing it.

The part that's sad to me is that the damage is already done. I don't think there will be any mending to that relationship, and that has seriously bummed me out all day.

I genuinely wish I could go back and do the situation over again. I know he probably still would not have been happy with the outcome, but I at least could have walked away knowing that I did all I could to help him.
I hope this idea adds value to you. It is something I definitely hope to keep in mind myself if I find myself in this situation again.
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