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“You are going to feel like hell if you never write the stuff that is tugging on the sleeves of your heart — your stories, visions, memories, visions and songs. Your truth, your version of things, your own voice. That is really all you have to offer us. And that’s also why you were born.”
Anne Lamott

“You are going to feel like hell if you never write the stuff that is tugging on the sleeves of your heart — your stories, visions, memories, visions and songs. Your truth, your version of things, your own voice. That is really all you have to offer us. And that’s also why you were born.”
Anne Lamott

Category: Heading out or Holding On

Heading Out or Holding On – Dynamic Stability

George 0 Comments

This post concludes the Heading Out or Holding On series with some final thoughts and observations on dynamic stability. If you are not familiar with the concept you can read an excerpt HERE from Thomas Friedman’s book “Thank You for Being Late” which introduced the idea to me.

At the conclusion of my previous post I wrote: I have chosen to head out. Making that decision has not exempt me perils of the journey, ie rapids. Dynamic stability becomes relevant to those negotiating rapids or riding a bicycle. 
Having failed as promised in my previous post, my next post will explore dynamic stability in more detail and what it looks like for me negotiating the turbulent waters of these days.

The events of 2020 and now 2021 have created a maelstrom in our lives. For many it has been like negotiating class 5 rapids. The past year has been exceptional, but reality is we often encounter rapids in our lives. The difference in the past year is we have been constantly fighting dangerous rapids with little or no relief. It is difficult to maintain stability in such circumstances. The lessons of dynamic stability can be helpful keeping one stable, assuring survival when difficult times are encountered.

No matter if you are kayaking rapids, riding a bicycle or following Jesus, holding on is not a viable option. To do so assures failure. Holding on is an intuitive response to fear. Kayaker, fearful of whitewater drags his paddle and is quickly overturned. The youngster learning to ride her two-wheel bike, propelled by a starting shove, fearfully drags her feet and falls. Life circumstances overwhelm a Christ follower, consumed by fear, he doubts and grasps his bootstraps.

Confronting fear is key to maintaining stability in dynamic, rapidly changing or unexpected circumstances. For kayakers and cyclers fear is overcome by training and confidence through experience. Understanding and employing counterintuitive principles of paddling and peddling to maintain momentum builds confidence. Ultimately their survival depends upon self-discipline.

Life’s rapids are “…a never-ending series of moral challenges and choices. And you don’t get a moment off. There is no halftime or time-outs. Act or refuse to act, each decision determines your destiny, the moral arc of your life. The darkness is always close at hand, and we fight it off, hour by hour” [Beck], self-discipline will not sustain us.
Life’s challenges are a fearful reality. At this point, Christ followers should rightly proclaim the answer to fear lies beyond us, an infinite loving God whom we can trust to save us. Unfortunately, our disenchanted age renders God irrelevant, making Christ followers’ proclamation nonsensical to the disenchanted.
Christian’s proclamation is further diminished when Christ followers grab their bootstraps rather than trusting God with our fear. Grabbing our bootstraps, holding on, occurs when we co-opt prayer, spiritual disciplines, worship, pietistic actions as means to our own ends rather than tools to engage God. A biblical illustration, that comes to mind, is the people of Israel’s fearful impatience which prompted to them to worship a Golden calf (Ex.32). Doubting God’s promises they chose to worship false gods.

Like it or not, living life is about navigating dynamic waters… from gentle ripples to raging whitewater, There is no turning back. We can never know for sure what we will encounter around the next bend in the river. The challenge is maintaining stability when we hit the whitewater. If faith is an abstraction, it will not suffice in times of crisis. Confronted by undeniable reality, we desperately grab for a life preserver, what we trust the most…ourselves. In doing so, our fears are confirmed, we cannot save ourselves.

Fear is the enemy of dynamic stability. Fear takes hold when reality strips away illusions of immortality, invincibility, infallibility and self-righteousness. Gut wrenching fear overwhelms when we realize we cannot save ourselves. This is the malaise of our secular society, God has been removed and all we have in His place is ourselves. Confronted with our inadequacy and God’s absence, fear dominates our lives.

Sometimes [fear] can have no face at all. If it is successfully avoided, it leaves almost no trace of its presence. And so those of us who are good at avoiding our sources of fear may come to conclude that fear has no part in our story. But we are mistaken. Fear—though not experienced—is still present and a source of bondage. (*)

Maintaining stability when encountering life’s dangerous whitewater depends on our response to fear. It is my belief that fear can only be overcome outside ourselves… through an infinite, transcendent God who created us and loves us.
There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves torment. But he who fears has not been made perfect in love. 1 John 4:18 NKJV
Such belief does not, as Timothy Keller said when faced with a terminal cancer diagnosis, “…automatically provide solace in times of crisis. A belief in God and an afterlife does not become spontaneously comforting and existentially strengthening. Despite my rational, conscious acknowledgment that I would die someday, the shattering reality of a fatal diagnosis provoked a remarkably strong psychological denial of mortality. Instead of acting on Dylan Thomas’s advice to “rage, rage against the dying of the light,” I found myself thinking, What? No! I can’t die. That happens to others, but not to me. When I said these outrageous words out loud, I realized that this delusion had been the actual operating principle of my heart.
Death is an abstraction to us, something technically true but unimaginable as a personal reality….our beliefs about God and an afterlife, if we have them, are often abstractions as well.
I realized that my beliefs would have to become just as real to my heart, or I wouldn’t be able to get through the day. Theoretical ideas about God’s love and the future resurrection had to become life-gripping truths, or be discarded as useless.

I know what my head says:

When fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My comforter, my all in all—
Here in the love of Christ I stand.

The question is are they real to my heart?

Still on the journey


Getting Back To …

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News and data regarding coronavirus is encouraging. An expression I hear often is: “I will be so glad when we get back to…”. I understand the sentiment but I’m not so sure it is a realistic expectation. Sure, there will some things that we will “get back to”, eating out for example. However, what eating out looks like in the future most likely will not be what we experienced pre-covid. If our mindset is “getting back to”, we are going to be disappointed and frustrated.

I do not believe the events of 2020 and 2021 are temporary interruptions, but are irreversible change, there is no “getting back to”. Responding, personally or organizationally with a strategy to “get back to” is short sighted. As Richard Rohr says in the quote below, we need to “go to a new place”.

The word change normally refers to new beginnings. But the mystery of transformation more often happens not when something new begins, but when something old falls apart. The pain of something old falling apart—chaos—invites the soul to listen at a deeper level, and sometimes forces the soul to go to a new place.
We will normally do anything to keep the old thing from falling apart, yet this is when we need patience and guidance, and the freedom to let go instead of tightening our controls and certitudes.
While change can force a transformation, spiritual transformation always includes a disconcerting reorientation. It can either help people to find new meaning or it can force people to close down and slowly turn bitter. The difference is determined precisely by the quality of our inner life, our practices, and our spirituality.
In moments of insecurity and crisis, shoulds and oughts don’t really help. They just increase the shame, guilt, pressure, and likelihood of backsliding into unhealthy patterns. It’s the deep yeses that carry us through to the other side. It’s that deeper something we are strongly for—such as equality and dignity for all—that allows us to wait it out. It’s someone in whom we absolutely believe and to whom we commit. In plain language, love wins out over guilt any day.
Richard Rohr

Although Rohr’s focus is spiritual, his counsel is profoundly practical. We are at a critical juncture. As individuals or leaders, choosing to “get back to” is not a viable option. It is the responsibility of leadership to to help people find new meaning, encouraging and leading them forward in a new reality. Equally, it is the responsibility of each follower to embrace new realities and resist demanding “get back to”.

These unwanted moments when we cannot change the reality we face offer the most profound possibilities of true life change. It may be precisely because the situation cannot change that everything else can change.
J D Walt

The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”
Exodus 16:3

Still on the journey

Heading Out or Holding On (4)

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DYNAMIC STABILITY

Today’s post is the last of this “Heading Out or Holding On” series.The subject has not been exhausted, but I am. I want to conclude with some general thoughts and observations about dynamic stability.

Dynamic stability is oxymoronic, paradoxical and counter-intuitive. I think Jesus might have liked the idea. Using metaphors is always risky, they are powerful teaching tools but ultimately break down under the scrutiny of disenchanted, either/or reasoning.
As I have continued to think about dynamic stability, in particular…what is the [spiritual] equivalent of paddling as fast as the water or maintaining dynamic stability? 
Then the conflicting idea of anchors comes to mind. I recall much emphasis in my religious heritage about having a solid anchor…

Will your anchor hold in the storms of life
Will your anchor hold in the storms of life,
When the clouds unfold their wings of strife?
When the strong tides lift, and the cables strain,
Will your anchor drift or firm remain?

We have an anchor that keeps the soul
Stedfast and sure while the billows roll,
Fastened to the Rock which cannot move,
Grounded firm and deep in the Savior’s love.

That song, deeply embedded in my soul, is the essence of holding on. I remember countless sermons on anchors, steadfastness, solid rock, et al. The objective of faith as I was taught was to grasp and hold on… firmly. As I remember those years, it occurred to me what a radical contrast the idea of heading out is compared to holding on. Holding on is clearly a biblical concept, as is Heading Out. Our inability to reconcile them reflects enlightenment thinking which requires either/or. I have come to understand the importance of embracing paradox…the ability to hold lightly apparently contradictory truths.

Allowing paradox to exist without trying to explain it away or simplify is a sign of a mature faith. It seems to me that a great deal of heretical thinking begins with a discomfort with tension and a need to simplify, clarify, and reduce complexity. Paradox, like harmony, elevates each distinct idea without calling for a compromise. 

Jen Pollock Michel “Surprised by Paradox”

I am increasingly convinced choosing to hold on or head out is a critical juncture in one’s spiritual journey.

[Writing this post has made me realize, my decision to make this the last post in this series was premature , too many side trips to explore . Sorry for the detour today]

I have chosen to head out. Making that decision has not exempt me perils of the journey, ie rapids. Dynamic stability becomes relevant to those negotiating rapids or riding a bicycle.
Having failed as promised in my previous post, my next post will explore dynamic stability in more detail and what it looks like for me negotiating the turbulent waters of these days.

Still on the journey.

Heading Out or Holding On? (3)

George 0 Comments

When encountering crisis, or navigating rushing rapids, holding on is not a viable option. As recognized in the previous post, holding on is a natural instinct, avoiding immediate disaster but insufficient for ultimate survival. Our amygdala induced response to crisis overrides rational response. In a previous post, I wrote about dynamic stability. I think the concept is helpful in trying to understand what it means to head out.
Dynamic Stability
When so many things are accelerating at once, it’s easy to feel like you’re in a kayak in rushing white water, being carried along by the current at a faster and faster clip. In such conditions, there is an almost irresistible temptation to do the instinctive thing—but the wrong thing: stick your paddle in the water to try to slow down.
“Why ‘Keep Your Paddle in the Water’ Is Bad Advice for Beginners.” Have you ever stopped to consider what the phrase “keep your paddle in the water” actually means? If you did you wouldn’t ever recommend it to a beginner whitewater paddler. The paddlers and instructors who give this advice are well intended and what they are really expressing is: “Keep paddling to maintain your stability through rapids.” When beginners hear “keep your paddle in the water,” they end up doing a bad version of a rudder dragging their paddle in the water back by their stern while using their blade to steer. This is a really bad position to be in … To enhance stability in rapids it’s important to move as fast or faster than the current. Every time you rudder or drag your paddle in the water to steer you lose momentum and that makes you more vulnerable to flipping over.
The only way to thrive is by maintaining dynamic stability—[a] bike-riding trick …But what is the [spiritual] equivalent of paddling as fast as the water or maintaining dynamic stability? 

Kayaking rapids is an appropriate metaphor for our experience of chaos in 2020 and our immediate future.

Heading Out… responding faithfully and creatively to change, dangers and opportunities of chaos.
Another way to illustrate holding on and heading out in crisis is driving an automobile. A treacherous experience driving can occur when you drift to the side and your wheels suddenly drop off the pavement. The immediate, and sometimes fatal, reaction is to jerk the steering wheel hard left to get back on the road. [Hold on] . Survival depends on a resisting panic and using proper techniques to avoid disaster. [Head Out]

What is it that keeps us from succumbing to panic and reacting in dangerous ways? Despite instruction and warnings.
Heading Out… is the equivalent of …firmly grasp the wheel, do not hit the brakes, slow down and carefully return to the road…”

Although the idea of Holding On or Heading Out when faced with crisis, is applicable to everyone, my concern is for Christ followers.
How Christ followers respond to crisis is shaped by our view of faith.
Some, like myself early on, view faith as finite and bounded, something to be achieved and defended. Richard Rohr describes this view of faith well:

“If you surrender to the fear of uncertainty, life can become a set of insurance policies. Your short time on this earth becomes small and self-protective, a kind of circling of the wagons around what you can be sure of and what you think you can control–even God. It provides you with the illusion that you are in the driver’s seat, navigating on safe, small roads, and usually in a single, predetermined direction that can take you only where you have already been. For far too many people, no life journey is necessary because we think we already have all our answers at the beginning. ‘

For them, …holding on… is the only option. There is no capacity to see opportunity, only danger. What results are outcomes described in the previous post. HERE

…holding on… is the only option. There is no capacity to see opportunity, only danger.


Over the course of life I have come to view faith differently, I wrote previously:

I believe our lives are a journey. A healthy life is characterized by growth and change. Each day holds the prospect of adventure and discovery. Life is not defined by seeking a safe place and hunkering down insulated and protected from the world around us. Each of us possesses a deep longing to go home. To find our way to that place that we were created for. The pathway we take is not always pleasant and there are dangers to be dealt with. But, there are many beautiful experiences along the way. Wonderful relationships with people. Beautiful sights and sounds and smells.
We do not travel alone. Our creator leads us and watches over us. He gives all that we need for our journey. We meet many people along the way. Some of them join us our journey. Some we encounter briefly. Some encourage us and offer provision of our journey. Others do not understand and become enemies bent on disrupting our pilgrimage. No matter what happens to us along the way, we continue to travel toward our destination because we trust our creator who loves us and will not abandon us on our journey. He has promised us life.

…thinking about life as a journey reminds me to stop trying to set up camp and call it home. It allows me to see life as a process, with completion somewhere down the road. Thus I am freed from feeling like a failure when things are not finished, and hopeful that they will be as my journey comes to its end.I want adventure, and this reminds me that I am living in it. Life is not a problem to be solved, it is an adventure to be lived.
John Eldridge 

It is easy to be deceived into thinking Holding On keeps us safe, but life is dynamic.
Since Adam, when we, God’s created beings, rebelled and lost our home in God, we were destined to be restless wanders searching for a homeland. A thread that runs through the history of God’s dealing with mankind is the reality of their status as restless wanders in this world. 
Jesus said, “Follow me”. As he carried out his ministry, he wandered about, without house or home. “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”
Jesus did not say he was “the place” but  “I am the Way”

As followers of Christ we have not arrived. We are people on “The Way, we are no longer restless wanders but are pilgrims bound for the homeland. As pilgrims we are “Heading Out”. Restless spiritual wandering becomes a spiritual journey following Christ. 

In 2020 and now 2021 we are navigating dangerous rapids. These are times that expose the character of our faith.

The next post will examine the idea of dynamic stability for Christ followers in the rushing waters of our chaotic society.

Still on the journey.

Heading Out or Holding On (2)

George 0 Comments

In my previous post, reflecting on my sermon from 2004, I realized how relevant it is today. Although circumstances are different, 2004 and 2020 each have brought crisis into our lives. As my good friend reminded me:

…for CRISIS… the Chinese term for that has 2 characters…
– danger; – opportunity! (Thanks Eva)

In 2020/2021 crisis brings great danger and great opportunity. The question is how will we respond? In my experience, when crisis arises, personally or organizationally, our default is to hold on. To choose otherwise depends upon our ability to discern both danger and opportunity in our crisis.
To hold on, is a natural response … necessary for survival. However, without any vision for opportunity, holding on paralyzes, delaying the enviable. Referencing my sermon notes this post will examine what I believe it means to hold on and some perils of choosing to do so..

In the twilight of my career at Ford, I attempted to mentor a promising young manager. My usual greeting was, “How are you doing?”. His repeated response was, “Surviving!” Without much success, I tried impress on him, surviving doesn’t bode well for climbing the corporate ladder. Perhaps we don’t think of our response to crisis as holding on as much as surviving. To hold on or survive is a difference without distinction. Neither bode well for the future. The following are outcomes of choosing to hold on… survive.

  • Denial.– Emotional disbelief, “This can’t be happening”, can morph into irrational “This isn’t happening.” and, for some, becomes unassailable truth. In any case, denial assures one of two outcomes: destruction or irrelevance.
    Denial is like stopping your car on a a busy freeway with traffic going 70 mph.
    For organizations, denial is a Blockbuster strategy.
  • Hunker Down – A panic response to inherent danger. Seemingly, rational, in retrospect its flaws are revealed. Think of “Heads Up” when dangerous objects are descending, or “Hit the Deck” falling spread eagle on the ground making oneself at better target.
    For organizations it is “circle the wagons”.
    Biblically it is the one talent man. “… I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground.”
  • Avoidance– Relocate and yearn for what was.  A “Jonah” response.
    “The word of the Lord came to Jonah [crisis]…’Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it …’ But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed for Tarshish.” …”I’m out of here!”.
    For those with nowhere to go, it is “sticking your head in the sand”.
    Organizationally it is the urban church that relocates to the suburbs when faced with societal crisis.
  • Despair – toss in the towel and admit defeat . Elijah: “Lord, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars; I am the only one left, and they are trying to kill me”
    “Whatever”…”What’s the use?” … “You can’t believe anyone.”…
    Hopelessness is a child of failure to perceive opportunity in crisis.

In these times of unprecedented crisis, I have recognize these outcomes, to varying degrees, in both myself and others. This is troubling because I believe God does not want me to Hold On but, Head Out, responding creatively to crisis with its dangers and opportunities.

The next post… Heading Out.