At the beginning of the new year, I saw a great question asked, “What have you changed your mind about?” Today I am going to write about some of the things I’ve changed my mind about. It was hard to think of answers for this until I asked myself to fill-in-the-blank: “I used to think ______.” After thinking of it this way, it became much easier to answer. Below are my thoughts.

1. I used to think that all kids had equal footing at the science fair. This is untrue. You can tell whose dad is an engineer and whose dad is a poet. When my kid won a Crazy Hat Contest with a working train chugging around the brim, I knew that as long as Greg had anything to do with it, the other kids were toast.

McGregor s Crazy Hat

2. I used to think I was a good parent and that if I did things right, the children would do the same. I thought Monkey See-Monkey Do applied to my good behavior. Turns out, they yell at other bad drivers from the back seat but they don’t mimic how sweet I am to the checkout lady.

3. I used to think Michael Jackson was cool. My very first concert was to see the Jacksons on their 1984 Victory Tour. They sang Beat It, but due to some technical problem, they didn’t sing Thriller. If you are wondering what the very best Jackson song is, it is Billie Jean. It all went downhill from there, which admittedly, was a long way down.

4. I used to think that court judgments meant something–that if the court ordered a person to pay, they had to pay. I thought you could take a cop with you or something and turn him upside down to empty his pockets. Call the IRS. Get a lien. (Good luck if he hides all his assets.) Turns out, the thief can just decide not to pay, and it’ll cost you big bucks to collect on money you will never see. It’s called throwing bad money after bad money. But that’s all I’m going to say. If I talk about it, with my luck I’ll end up in jail for 90 years. In the meantime, the thief will continue living it up on my dime. Welcome to this life.

5. And so, as a follow up, I used to think life was fair.

6. I used to think if you were a good mom, you’d nurse your baby. (I was 21.) As it turns out, there are good moms who feed their babies from a bottle. You can do all sorts of uncrunchy behaviors and still raise God-fearing people.

7. I used to think economics was complicated. Nobody listened to me in 2005 when I said the housing bubble wasn’t sustainable because incomes and rents didn’t rise proportionately. It was too basic, too obvious. The sad part, though, is that I didn’t listen to me either. The moral of the story is that I’m dumb.

8. I used to think you get what you pay for. However, I tried out Zenni Optical, and for thirty bucks, I got rimless prescription glasses shipped to my door in about two weeks.

9. I used to think I’d be really happy with a babbling creek on my property. Turns out, I’m right. We bought our property during the worst drought in memory, and so we didn’t know we had running water. This video was taken last week. Take a look:

10. I used to think textbooks were bad and “living books” were good. I still think that, but turns out, I had to use Bob Jones DVD’s to save our homeschooling for the time being, and I like it. The kids enjoy it, too. I hope to do a complete review sometime.

11. I used to think in terms of black and white. Now that I’m older, I see in shades of gray but that doesn’t make me a relativist. The Bible talks a lot about wisdom and the spirit. There will always be people who foam at the mouth about their particular pet issue, and it is OK to just let them.

12. I used to think that it was more important to be right than to be liked. The problem with this is that if you’re annoying, being right won’t get you far. (There are exceptions.) Nobody will listen to you and what good is that? Don’t let the messenger distract from the message and all that. Be kind.

13. I used to think that a person needed a lot of friends. Just one loyal friend is hard to find, so count your blessings if you find him/her.

What have you changed your mind about?