Some Days Are Courageously Different

A beautiful friend told me to be sure to catch Angelina Jolie's acceptance speech. The speech was at the Nickelodeon Kid's Choice Awards.  Ms. Jolie won "best villain" for her role in Maleficent. My friend thought I would love the message.

It was easy to find the video online. By the time I checked it out, it was viral.

Her message was to young people. Ms Jolie said "different is good." She went on to share that, when she was young, she was told she was different. This was not said to her as a compliment. Quite the contrary. She explained that she was "too loud, too full of fire, never good at sitting still, never good at fitting in." Sounds like several children I know and love.  These are very amazing children.

Ms. Jolie's advice to kids was to not try to fit in. "Don't ever try to be less than you are, and when someone tells you are different, smile and hold your head up and be proud."

Such an inspiring message for children. It seems almost uncanny, the developmental need for most children to be the same as everyone else. A minor example: if your hair is curly, you want it straight. And then, if children are different due to physical, mental, emotional, racial, economic reasons, they struggle and hurt and hide and fear. Or they learn to be brave and dare to live into their differences. Such courage.

Such an inspiring message for us big children as well. We all struggle in some ways and to varying degrees with differences. We gravitate to our own "tribe." We fear differences we do not understand. We call differences flaws or even worse we call differences sin, giving us permission to live in willful ignorance and judgment.

God grant me the courage to accept differences in others, the love to work to understand those differences, and the wisdom to stand up and speak out.

From the Nickelodeon Kid's Choice Awards 2015