Alina's Lamentations

Alina: I'll never be an artist!!

Me: Why do you say that?

Alina: Because I've been practicing for more than a year and I still can't draw like Miche or Cri! (teens she knows)

Me: Yes, a year is a long time, but practice makes perfect.

Alina sobbing: I don't have any talents! I don't know what to do on my free days, which are Saturday and Sunday because I don't have school, because I don't have any talents. I try and try to think of something to do, but I can't do anything! (she continues sobbing ... quite heartbreaking)

Me: Well, we can come up with ideas of things you can learn how to do during your "free days".

Alina: But I still don't have any talents! I want to be able to do everything! (continues sobbing)

Me: But you already know how to do so many things and you're getting quite good at them. Even if you can't draw as well as you'd like to doesn't mean you can't do anything. Look at me! I can't draw for the life of me.

Alina: Bob, look, I'm already 5 and I don't have any talents! (for the hundreth time ... tears continue)

Me: Most people only discover their talents or gifts when their older. People like Mozart are an exception (she'd recently read about him).

Alina: But I wish I already had my talents!

I proceed to tell her the parable of the talents and explain how she should just be faithful with the gifts God's given her, etc., and in time she'll find out which talents she has. It doesn't help much, but we end up striking a deal to discuss this in depth when she's 14 because she's still too young to be worrying about this, sigh.

The kind of trials she goes through! I don't even want to think about what her issues will be when she's a teenager, ha!