“But, You Don’t Understand…”
I have had the pleasure of being mentored by some wonderful men and women, including my wife who has mentored me in developing curiosity and imagination. The people who have made significant impact on my life are the ones who are accomplished at being curious about those moments when an in-congruency between who I say I am committed to being and how I am showing up is revealed.
However, I have noticed I employ a powerful strategy to protect the romantic sensation, flattering view or grandiose sense I have of who I am. It starts with me saying, “You don’t understand…
- I didn’t mean what I said
- I’m not like this with my friends, wife, pastor, any others
- I’m not like this at work, home or anywhere else
- I’m not like this in other circumstances
- I didn’t understand what was going on
This strategy protects me from exploring my inconsistencies, being humbled even humiliated and getting acquainted with how my ways of being actually keep me from living as my word. C.S. Lewis offers a very sobering insight into what is being exposed when I do this:
“Surely what a man does when he is taken off his guard is the best evidence for what sort of a man he is? Surely what pops out before the man has time to put on a disguise is the truth? If there are rats in a cellar you are most likely to see them if you go in very suddenly. But the suddenness does not create the rats: it only prevents them from hiding.” C.S. Lewis – Mere Christianity
I found your blog on google and read a few of your other posts. I just added you to my Google News Reader. Keep up the good work. Look forward to reading more from you in the future.
Stacey Derbinshire
Dan
This post reminded me of a quote from Kierkegaard:
“Do you not know that there comes a midnight hour when every one has to throw off his mask? Do you believe that life will always let itself be mocked? Do you think you can slip away a little before midnight in order to avoid this? Or are you not terrified by it? I have seen men in real life who so long deceived others that at last their true nature could not reveal itself; … In every man there is something which to a certain degree prevents him from becoming perfectly transparent to himself; and this may be the case in so high a degree, he may be so inexplicably woven into relationships of life which extend far beyond himself that he almost cannot reveal himself. But he who cannot reveal himself cannot love, and he who cannot love is the most unhappy man of all.”
It’s powerfully enchanting to me how we all are imposters. Being fellow imposters opens up all sorts of possibilities of being in relationship with each other and becoming friends.
To be my friend, I’ll make you scramble for it. You’ll have to get after me, and probe and often be willing to dig deep.
I promise that I’ll resist you. You will have to be persistent in your pursuit of me. There will be tears.
I also promise that I will come around and humble myself. We will keep falling in love. There will be loads of laughter.
How ’bout it? Is it a deal?
P.S. What will you do when you see my “rats in the cellar”?
I know how I react when my ‘rats’ are seen. I scramble just like them. I am learning to trust others who have confronted me as if they’re giving me a precious gift. It really is.
Wow. Another good piece Dan.
I know one thing. We can not compartmentalize our behaviors to fit certain communities in our lives. Sooner than later, my pretentiousness will show itself. I say I can’t stand fake or inauthentic personalities. But truth be told, the reason I see it so clearly in others is because it lives in me. I care too much about what you think about me and how I look to be fully present. This I believe is why in life, when we are the most broken and facing death around us or in us; this is when we have the opportunity to allow the stripping away to draw us authentically closer. The tragedy is that too often it takes death to show us true life. The opportunity is that I don’t need to wait for death to give myself fully and freely to others. My hope is that over time I will at least starve out a couple of my “rats in the cellar.”
Dan,
i thank you for shining the light on our “automatic” behaviors by giving us the list of “excuses” we have to keep the lights off!
survival is so “automatic”, thank you for helping me slow down to see my “automatics” that keep me away from the community i desire!