The Changing Place

What creates change?  That is the question of the century.  If we think about politics, dieting, mental health, personal development, spirituality, social inequality... essentially, that is the question we ask.  I've been reading a lot recently, and though I don't claim to have the answer for this question figured out, there has been a theme that has been repeated in my literary encounters that has spoken deeply to my soul.  I see it in Henri Nouwen's Reaching Out, Curt Thompson's Anatomy of the Soul, Sue Johnson's Attachment Theory in Practice and Richard Rohr's Falling Upward. I thought I'd share.

Common strategies for change:
- Advice
- Force/violence
- Guilt
- Intellectualization
- Self-knowledge and inner peace

Think back to a moment in your life when there was something you desperately wanted to change but over and over again ended up repeating the same pattern, the same mistake or the same pain.  Think of all the things you did to try to change.  I know I've tried them all!  I read self-help books.  I talk to people who can give me the five steps to change.  I chide myself hoping  that if I just hate the sin enough and want the change enough it will happen.  I try to disconnect from my emotion thinking that if I just don't feel this way, my behavior will change.  Or if the problem is the feels, it makes sense to just turn off the feels!  My favorite strategy though is analyzing myself unceasingly hoping to have some internal insight that will enable me to change.  Lastly, I disconnect from the world, knowing that my only chance for peace is to disconnect from everyone except myself and God.  That moment of peace at least will get me through the next day.  Or minute.  The problem is... the problem always returns.  None of these things have worked long term.  This is the theme I have noticed in all of these writings I mentioned before.  The irony is that the source of change is accepting myself in my inadequacy, feeling that acceptance from others and receiving compassion from others, myself and God in that place.  This compassion in the place of pain transforms my view of myself, my sense of being loved by others and fosters a rock solid connection to God.

This is truly counter cultural.  And counter logical.  How can acceptance of my limitations make me able to transcend them?  This truth is humbling to my core, but oh, it is true.  Experiencing this kind of radical grace is truly transformational.

When we really think about the source of sin and pain though, it does make sense.  Essentially, sin is hiding.  It began this way even in the garden, when, instead of taking her doubt and concerns to her creator, Eve turned her distrust of God towards the serpent and her husband.  That negative cycle of mistrust then was off and running.  Both Adam and Even then hid their sin and began the blame game to deflect their feelings of shame and fear.  They still were not trusting that they would be loved even in their shame and doubt.  What would have happened if Eve had heard the serpent's lies and turned to God to help her with her doubt?  What would have happened if, after their disobedience, they had turned to God and each other in vulnerability about their shame and fear?  It does make me wonder.

Think of just about any sin.  Lying, pride, gossip, infidelity, greed...  At the core of all of these is an insecurity.  A feeling of "I am not acceptable, lovable and secure as I am."  The sin is a turning to self-protections in order to feel secure or avoid rejection.  It makes sense then that the cure for the sin is not more guilt, more rejection, more telling me to do things I can't seem to do.  That is like telling a drowning person to swim.  It is what they need, but it is the one thing they cannot do.   The cure is a tangible experience of acceptance, compassion and love in the place of our greatest fears and insecurities.  We all long for this with the deepest parts of our beings.  We all know it to be true.  But we also all know it has not been true for our own hearts.  In our place of pain and fear is usually where we experience even more rejection and abandonment.  We receive the messages over and over again, "you are not enough" or "you are too much," and so the cycle of pain and self-protection goes on and on.  Only grace can stop the cycle with a radical experience of love from God, others and ourselves.  I continue to experience this grace over and over again, and it has been shockingly, overwhelmingly, absolutely transformational.