Exploring Our Stories and Deep Discipleship
I have this friend (and let’s say, for the sake of argument, that I’m not using “friend” as a euphemism for myself) who is fond of sharing how emotionally unaffected he is by certain people.
When talking about someone who has wounded him, he’ll say something like, “Well, what they did no longer bothers me,” or “It’s no big deal.” However, when he talks about these situations, his speech rate and volume increase, and he becomes physically animated. It’s obvious that what he considers “no big deal” is actually a pretty big deal.
Jessica and I had a friend who came from a verbally abusive home. When talking about her narcissistic father, our friend would insist she had moved on from the abuse and was no longer impacted by her father’s continued degrading treatment. She would express her firm belief with exaggerated hand gestures, a wild look in her eyes, and a tremor in her voice.
I’ve had a few buddies who are workaholics. They will say the work energizes them and that they successfully manage the perfectionist and one-sided lifestyle…until the anxiety and panic attacks start.
I wouldn’t describe any of these people as pathological liars or even remotely misleading. When they say they aren’t bothered by past abuses, current stresses, or toxic relationships, they mean it. Yet their hearts and bodies are communicating a different message. They just aren’t dialed into what their hearts are sharing.
The Intersection
Again, we find ourselves at a crossover point between the first two primary problems we’ve been exploring: the discipleship dilemma and the formation gap.
To become more like Jesus, we desire to know Him more intimately while growing in our understanding of ourselves. In fact, our capacity to know God closely depends on our willingness to know ourselves deeply and vice versa. Sadly, the concept of increasing self-knowledge or self-awareness is largely ignored or derided today, thus our dilemma.
Virtually every intentional human formative experience involves five critical elements: time, habit, community, intimacy, and instruction. Modern Christianity, however, tends to overemphasize instruction and undervalue (if not ignore) many of the others. The Christian faith is certainly instructive, but that isn’t the entire story.
In fact, story is one intersection point between our struggle to know ourselves and the time involved in becoming more like Jesus. While it’s helpful for our formation to soak ourselves in God’s meta-narrative, spending time in our stories and dealing authentically and emotionally with what we find is a critical part of our discipleship journey.
Authentically and Emotionally
Those two words, “authentically and emotionally,” are easy to write but not always easy to embrace.
Dealing authentically with our stories means revisiting negative memories, people, and events, and applying accurate terms to them. Our hearts often translate difficult situations into less painful languages and images, particularly when we are children. This is an understandable defense mechanism of our supple, innocent hearts.
If wounded by someone we love and trust as children, we tend to anesthetize the story and brighten the image. We also tend to normalize our stories, assuming every other kid shares the same experience.
But as we grow older and our perspective of people and the world broadens, we may be confronted with a difficult thought: what happened to us may not have been normal or good.
This may not involve something as severe as physical or sexual abuse. Perhaps we were loyal to a loved one who didn’t defend us when treated unjustly. Maybe we realize people close to us had little interest in pursuing our hearts. Perhaps we were useful and helpful, but not desired.
Few children (and perhaps few adults) are conscious of the injustice, longing, and harm caused by relationships in which those we love don’t seek our goodness in return. And, years later, we may still struggle to put words to what are often dim, tense disconnections between our hearts and heads.
Revisiting formative memories, people, and events and applying accurate terms to them (abuse, betrayal, abandonment, neglect, triangulation, manipulation, and so on) may be painful. It may tempt us toward self-condemnation or even guilt for calling a spade a spade. But if we recognize something about Jesus, it is that He calls a spade a spade—a brood of vipers or a white-washed tomb.
It’s as if our hearts know the truth about our wounds and are pleading with us to confront them as they were and are. Our hearts want our heads to label memories accurately so we can reintegrate around what is true. Because that is the path toward healing and wholeness.
Sadly, our tendency (perhaps more so inside faith communities than outside them) is to stress the importance of “pressing on towards the goal,” “going and making disciples,” and “laying it down at the foot of the cross” while not allowing ourselves the time, space, and safety to clearly identify what we are to be laying down in the first place.
Feeling the Feels
While it’s vital that we assign accurate terms to the memories, events, and people who have shaped us (for better or for worse), we must also allow our hearts to express the appropriate emotions.
This only makes sense. If our hearts are crying out for the rest of us to be truthful in remembering our most formative moments, they also beg us to validate our statements with the appropriate emotion: joy, gratitude, sadness, grief, anger, or rage.
Here again, we often find tension between what is truly good for our hearts and what is expected of us in various Christian settings.
Jessica suffered a miscarriage between the birth of our two sons. It’s been over two decades, but the memories of the night it happened still burn in my heart today. We were struck with grief in the days, weeks, and months that followed, though, about three weeks after we lost our baby, a close family Christian friend looked at us incredulously and asked, “Why are you guys still bothered by this?”
We had apparently expressed our sadness beyond the proper statute of limitations.
This is a problem for a Westernized version of Christianity that is constantly pushing us outward (and ignoring the journey inward) and not-so-subtly communicating the message that to love others means to ignore ourselves and to “get over it.”
Yes, I’m fully aware we humans tend to wallow in self-pity. We can let ourselves be so overcome by our stories and experiences that we remain stuck in the past, often using our suffering as an excuse for all manner of nonsense.
But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about allowing our hearts to express, in clear and valid emotions, the injustices and wrongs that have been done to us (and those we love) and those we’ve inflicted on others.
If you experienced a sibling who routinely bullied you and no one came to your defense, that’s wrong. You should have been angry. And if you were never allowed to express righteous anger, you have every right to express it now.
If your husband routinely cheated on you, yet you were expected to “tow the line” and “suffer in silence” because of his position in a church, that’s wrong. Anger, sadness, and grief are appropriate emotions. Your heart expects and hopes you express them with trusted friends in appropriate contexts.
If you lost a dear friend suddenly and way too soon, it is wise, appropriate, and good to allow your heart to express shock, anger, grief, and confusion – even to God. Perhaps especially to God. I’m pretty sure He can take it.
Sharing Your True Story
It seems that the path to a more abundant, peaceful, and deeper life involves the head reconciling what the heart already senses: something is wrong with the world. Acknowledging this and assigning the correct words, terms, and labels to wounds and those who cause them is healthy and good, even if it means revisiting our stories and nudging difficult memories toward a greater truthfulness. Even if it takes time. Even if it makes us a bit uncomfortable. Even if we experience and express emotions that we thought long-muted or disallowed.
Your story matters. It weaves together all sorts of elements: the highs and lows, joys and sorrows, sufferings and triumphs. As we gently, compassionately, slowly, and safely explore our stories, intending to identify key moments authentically and emotionally, we find that, over time, our hearts move towards a position of calm acceptance and peace about both our light and dark formative influences.
This journey into greater self-awareness (and thus deeper discipleship) is not exactly rocket science. It’s based on the simple practice of gently and courageously asking ourselves why we think, act, relate, and love the way we do. Beyond our amazing personalities and gifts, it involves exploring the rooted causes of our outward behaviors and expressions, which are generally bound up in our stories.
It’s central to increasing our capacity to love God, others, and ourselves the way Jesus does.
