What's Driving My Bus?
What’s driving my bus now? Do I act and feel at peace with God’s creation, or am I still fighting the bus-driver?
Often my growth has been frozen by the “either-or” paradigm. I’ve been seduced by an overpowering urge to dichotomize. However, as I mature I have begun to appreciate that to the extent that I regard God’s entire creation from such a basic two-valued orientation, my perspective is limited, my viewpoint judgmental, and my arrogance risks becoming pathetically transparent. If I can get my self-centeredness out of the way, I must concede that most things are seldom either totally black or white, short or tall, easy or hard, approvable or disapprovable, right or wrong, true or false, even good or evil. There are grays.
Accepting this multi-valued orientation causes me to cerebrate, to reëvaluate, to expand my horizons, to understand life in many spheres as infinitely more complex than I prefer. It also requires some degree of humility, because no longer may I cling to the comforting assurance that my opinions are the only correct ones, and therefore everyone else is automatically wrong. It is truly sobering to realize that others may have as good a handle on Pilate’s “truth” than that of The Great All-American “I Am.” Or at the very least, “their” way just might be as valid, workable, or productive. And the real biggie for me: does this wider horizon apply to any of the sacred cows of inviolable biblical injunctions?
My former world-view may not always have been conscious, but as long as I were to cling to it, that’s what would drive my bus. When I interiorize and begin to work with the broader perspective, however, there are new consequences. I become automatically more tolerant of others — ALL others. I lose the anxiety—the drivenness— of always having to be right, and the tyranny of needing to be error-free. Then old absolutes will no longer drive me to distraction or threaten my very sanity, because I see them in their absurdity and no longer fear being sucked back into my old prejudices.
What to do? Stay aware.Talk with others on the same path. Seek spiritual counselling. Keep open my mind, soften my heart, and busy the direct prayer-line to the Creator of all. Is this an eiphany?
Often my growth has been frozen by the “either-or” paradigm. I’ve been seduced by an overpowering urge to dichotomize. However, as I mature I have begun to appreciate that to the extent that I regard God’s entire creation from such a basic two-valued orientation, my perspective is limited, my viewpoint judgmental, and my arrogance risks becoming pathetically transparent. If I can get my self-centeredness out of the way, I must concede that most things are seldom either totally black or white, short or tall, easy or hard, approvable or disapprovable, right or wrong, true or false, even good or evil. There are grays.
Accepting this multi-valued orientation causes me to cerebrate, to reëvaluate, to expand my horizons, to understand life in many spheres as infinitely more complex than I prefer. It also requires some degree of humility, because no longer may I cling to the comforting assurance that my opinions are the only correct ones, and therefore everyone else is automatically wrong. It is truly sobering to realize that others may have as good a handle on Pilate’s “truth” than that of The Great All-American “I Am.” Or at the very least, “their” way just might be as valid, workable, or productive. And the real biggie for me: does this wider horizon apply to any of the sacred cows of inviolable biblical injunctions?
My former world-view may not always have been conscious, but as long as I were to cling to it, that’s what would drive my bus. When I interiorize and begin to work with the broader perspective, however, there are new consequences. I become automatically more tolerant of others — ALL others. I lose the anxiety—the drivenness— of always having to be right, and the tyranny of needing to be error-free. Then old absolutes will no longer drive me to distraction or threaten my very sanity, because I see them in their absurdity and no longer fear being sucked back into my old prejudices.
What to do? Stay aware.Talk with others on the same path. Seek spiritual counselling. Keep open my mind, soften my heart, and busy the direct prayer-line to the Creator of all. Is this an eiphany?
posted by Bill Stecher at 9:46 AM
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