Leave it to Beaver was a popular television series, that aired from 1957 to 1963. Those who watched the original programs or reruns may recognize the outside of the Cleaver residence. Nice house for the day.

The truth about the house is that the outside was just a movie set front for the Cleaver residence. There were no actual rooms inside. No places for children to explore. It was a made-for-TV front. Nothing more than a house’s front, that had no place to enter and enjoy.

People’s lives are like houses. The body is the outside, hiding the real person on the inside. The outside roof may be well designed and insulated, but I wouldn’t want to live on it, would you? There may be beautiful windows, allowing light to shine in on the interior, but outside windows fail to convey how charming the inside rooms really are.

Getting to know the inside of a person is like coming to appreciate the interior of a beautiful home: the inside-not the outside-should be the focus. Instead of living and dining rooms, kitchens, and bedrooms, the “rooms” in people contain dreams, aspirations, gifts and talents, as well as hopes for the future. All worth knowing and appreciating.

As with houses, our focus on people should be them, not the outside of the “house” they live in. Sometimes changes to our outside cause some peoples’ focus to be on that, rather than what’s on the inside. No matter how much “paint” or changes are made to ones outside it’s just that-the outside. 

Over time a house’s front may undergo many changes. The same is true concerning a person yet, like a house, the person’s real value is found in getting aquatinted with and appreciating his/her “rooms”-those things of great value which make that person special in the eyes of the beholder. 

The inside of a house-and person-is what really matters to those looking for real value. The fake fronts, the facades? Let’s leave them to Beaver.

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