awareness

How Not to Say or Do the Wrong Thing

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I chaplain friend of mine passed this article along from the LA Times:

How not to say the wrong thing

It works in all kinds of crises – medical, legal, even existential. It’s the ‘Ring Theory’ of kvetching. The first rule is comfort in, dump out.

Susan Silk and Barry Goldman

April 7, 2013

When Susan had breast cancer, we heard a lot of lame remarks, but our favorite came from one of Susan’s colleagues. She wanted, she needed, to visit Susan after the surgery, but Susan didn’t feel like having visitors, and she said so. Her colleague’s response? “This isn’t just about you.”

“It’s not?” Susan wondered. “My breast cancer is not about me? It’s about you?”

The same theme came up again when our friend Katie had a brain aneurysm. She was in intensive care for a long time and finally got out and into a step-down unit. She was no longer covered with tubes and lines and monitors, but she was still in rough shape. A friend came and saw her and then stepped into the hall with Katie’s husband, Pat. “I wasn’t prepared for this,” she told him. “I don’t know if I can handle it.”

This woman loves Katie, and she said what she did because the sight of Katie in this condition moved her so deeply. But it was the wrong thing to say. And it was wrong in the same way Susan’s colleague’s remark was wrong.

Susan has since developed a simple technique to help people avoid this mistake. It works for all kinds of crises: medical, legal, financial, romantic, even existential. She calls it the Ring Theory.

Draw a circle. This is the center ring. In it, put the name of the person at the center of the current trauma. For Katie’s aneurysm, that’s Katie. Now draw a larger circle around the first one. In that ring put the name of the person next closest to the trauma. In the case of Katie’s aneurysm, that was Katie’s husband, Pat. Repeat the process as many times as you need to. In each larger ring put the next closest people. Parents and children before more distant relatives. Intimate friends in smaller rings, less intimate friends in larger ones. When you are done you have a Kvetching Order. One of Susan’s patients found it useful to tape it to her refrigerator. Continue reading →

Works and Grace

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This morning I was having breakfast and skimming through the latest Christian book catalog that came through our mail when my son noticed the title of one of the books was on learning to “pray better”.  He asked, “How do you pray better?  Don’t we pray good enough already?”

I think this question goes to the heart of a lot of the problems we face as Christians, and maybe especially as Americans.  We have such a tendency to find ourselves, no matter how much we talk about grace, looking at our faith as a matter of how much effort we put in to it.  Sometimes that work is actual “work” – penance, good deeds, giving financially or of time. All these things in themselves are good, but we can easily fall into the trap of seeing these things as preliminaries and prerequisites for God’s grace to happen.

The Protestant mourns for his fellow Catholic brother, whom he sees as “works based” regarding salvation. Yet Protestants are just as trapped by the need to “do more” and “do better”. A glimpse through any Christian book catalog or bookstore shelf of popular Christian “inspiration” will prove my point. So much seems to be about doing more, doing better, gaining and striving. I think this comes out also in theology with the insistence that one’s theology be “right”. I remember growing up that faith wasn’t just about knowing Jesus, but knowing Calvin. You had to know the right things in the right way – not just Biblical truth but the correct interpretation of Biblical truth.

This, I think, is just another form of works. Grace is something we accept without any merit on our part, and to make that grace beholden to anything we do (and I think belief can be a form of works as well) negates that.

Can I pray better, read more, give more? Surely. I stink at all of these. But I gave up worrying for Lent.

What are You Fasting From?

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Ok, maybe my grammar is a bit sketchy title-wise, but I like it.

I never fasted in my life, save for bloodwork or the occasional operation. Most of this came from my Presbyterian/Calvinist upbringing, which saw fasting as something a bit too “Catholic”, which is code for works-oriented. It was spiritually good but unnecessary at best, idolatrous at worst. Lent tends to be interesting at times because, as I’m the hospice chaplain in a secular company, I’m seen by some as this pillar of sacredness. Especially by our Catholic staff. It freaks them out when on a Lenten Friday I pull out a ham sandwich and dig in. It has provided some opportunites to teach what I know about grace and works.

But I’m rethinking things a little this year. Not so much about abstaining from food or drink or whatever. I understand why fasting from things that are pleasurable is supposed to connect us with the suffering of Christ. However there have been plenty of folks who, rather than fast from something, try to increase the good that they do. I think that’s a good way of looking at things and not quite so self-centered. But I was thinking today that if I’m going to fast, I’d rather fast from the things that pollute my life…worry, fear, self criticism. Life without chocolate only promotes misery and desire. But life without worry for 40 days? Hallelujah! What would it be like to not be afraid for 40 days, or critical of myself or others, or anxious? What can be more enriching and spiritual than that?

So I’m going to fast from worry. What are you fasting from?

Dealing with Anger

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One of the challenges some chaplains face, myself included, is the need to be liked and avoid conflict.  We want people to feel good and comforted, and this is what often leads us into the profession.  We’re the Rogerians in the room: providing that unconditional positive regard to all comers. Trouble is that when conflict takes place, it can feel like failure. So when conflict is on the horizon we dodge it. I can talk myself into twists trying to avoid or minimize whatever the problem is. Which tends to make the problem worse. Then when that conflict does erupt I tend to look at myself as the cause of it, as if conflict and anger are wrong and my fault. In doing so I take responsibility for their feelings and reactions, which isn’t healthy or logical.

One of the harder parts of my own development as a chaplain is raising that emotional boundary between myself and others. It’s easy in the caring professions to open one’s self up too much and to care too much for the other person, which neglects ourselves. This isn’t just chaplains but nurses, social workers, and on down the line. Sometimes this self-neglect takes the form of taking on what the other person needs to do – the “fix-it” or “savior” mentality, an outward focus that neglects the self’s boundaries. However I also see that this self-neglect can be inward focused as well, where I don’t try to fix the other person as much as make their problem my own – their problem is a bad reflection on me, so I take it personally. This can happen a lot with handling anger. This still avoids the problem though, and all I end up doing is taking their anger and internalizing it because it’s directed at me.

What I fail to do though is see that even though it’s directed at me it is still their anger, their emotion. How they choose to express it is their issue, not mine.

Calling

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The term “calling” is a serious topic, both for ministers and the people who call on them.  It implies not simply a “hiring”, but an endowment of purpose beyond what the minister and the congregation have.  It brings in a third party, the Holy Spirit, who acts as the one who inspires and confirms the direction of this person to that place for those people.  It’s pretty strong stuff.  It often brings up a lot of reflection and anxiety on the part of clergy: “What am I called to do?”  “Is this my own desire or God’s?”  “How can I be sure?”

Perhaps the most troublesome is the question that occasionally comes up after a call to a position of ministry, “did I just mess up?”

After I graduated from seminary I was “called” to a position right away.  It seemed ideal – it was a church I knew, where I wanted to work, doing what I wanted to do.  It was like a gift was just dropped in my lap.  To confirm my call the senior pastor and dozens of others laid their hands on me and prayed over me.  It was  a spiritually and emotionally charged moment.  I felt like everything was right.

However very soon I discovered that everything was not right.  I immediately was bashing into other leaders in the church who didn’t want to hear what I had to say.  I felt marginalized.  I found myself not in agreement with how things were done but had no outlet within the church to hear me out.  After a while, it got so bad that my wife actually quit attending the church where I was an assistant pastor!  I remember thinking, “did I mess this up?”  I wondered if I had mistook God’s calling for my own desires.

Looking back at it now I can see that I was called to that place for that time, but that the calling wasn’t what I expected it to be.  I don’t think that God makes mistakes, nor do I think that this was somehow out of God’s plan.  I was called to be there, but I think it was to show me that I was called to do something other than what I intended.  God used me, and when that particular call was over He called me back out again to hospice ministry.  That doesn’t invalidate the prior call at all.  In fact, I don’t think I would be doing what I’m called to do now if I hadn’t been called into that mess.

I faced a similar paradigm shift last week.  I found myself really struggling, both in CPE and my job.  I felt stuck, frustrated, tired and emotionally drained.  When I started CPE over a year ago, someone asked how long I was going to do that.  I thought I could do it as long as I could foresee.  I didn’t see any changes on the horizon, and didn’t really see the need to change.  However as I began growing through CPE, I found myself getting worn out with the status quo at work.  I wasn’t “feeling it” anymore.  I still had passion for my work, just not passion for that part of my work.  Like I told the group, “I’m just tired of all the ___ dying.”  One member of the group later commented that it looked like I was in mourning.  Indeed I was!

With the help of my CPE supervisor and the group I was able to see that I really was just stuck in this corner, unable to turn left or right.  I needed to see that I had lost my passion and needed to refocus.  In the past my instinct was just to try harder and push through.  However there was no more pushing through.  I had to back out and try a different direction.  In doing so, I was able to see a new focus for ministry: the people I work with.  I’d already moved into much more of a managerial role, and needed to cut loose some of what I was holding on to.  When I did that, I found renewed energy and depth.

Had my calling been wrong?  Absolutely not.  God put me there for that purpose for that time.  And I could not be doing what I am doing now if I hadn’t been there.  My calling changed, and now I can even see that it is not a huge a change.  The hard part in making that adjustment was seeing that I needed to make it – I couldn’t try harder, it was done.

Grace

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In my church we’re doing a study of Timothy Keller’s book/DVD series “Gospel in Life: Grace Changes Everything”.  I’ve only just started but I’m hoping that this will be a strong influence in my walk right now, as grace is a major issue in my life.

I’ve had a very hard time really believing in God’s grace.  At first I wanted to say understanding God’s grace, but I rewrote that.  I think I understand it fine.  I don’t think that I apply it though.

I think that this is a major problem for a lot of Christians, and Keller identifies this as Christians being religious and Chrisitians being gospel to themselves and the world.  I think most of us can give the nuts and bolts of what grace is, quote the appropriate verses and authors, and make it sound as if we have it completely together.  Yet we understand grace but so often fail to live it and experience it.

I am having one difficulty with Keller though.  Maybe it’s not as much of a difficulty as it is something just not jiving with my own experience.  Keller often states that Christians tend to fall into moralism and works in order to credit their own salvation.  While this certainly can be true, this doesn’t ring true to me.  When I think about my own salvation and need for forgiveness, I do tend to fall sometimes on the need to make myself feel worthy of God’s grace.  But when I think about why I strive for approval, try to gain acceptance and feel worthy, it doesn’t feel as much about earning my salvation to me as it is about self-worth.  Perhaps my bigger issue with grace and accepting it as the free gift of God is how little I apparently cherish it.  I strive so much more for the approval of others that I ignore the free gift in front of me.

I see many areas in my life where I have sought that blessing – from family, from work, from achievements, from parents and so on.  And when I have that blessing it isn’t enough, because it still isn’t God’s blessing.  So why chase so much after approval and the blessing of others when God’s approval and blessing have already been given?

Know, Be, Do

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The biggest part of CPE is the process itself.  It’s not a matter of learning something new and then showing that you’ve learned it, as in a typical classroom.  You are the classroom and you are the textbook.

In fact, CPE and chaplaincy depend very little on knowledge.  Rather it depends on wisdom, developed over time and only through experience.  Many enter in to CPE thinking that either it will be like a college class or a small-group devotional.  In my experience, that couldn’t be further from the truth.  The CPE group develops in a dymanic way, with each member of the group giving and taking with the ultimate goal of building pastoral identity and wisdom.  That wisdom is not gained easily though, not just through navel-gazing or drum-beating.

John Patton in Pastoral Care: The Essential Guide writes “Pastoral wisdom involves our knowing, being and doing.”  Sound profound?  Yeah, did to me to.  However it’s true, but here’s how I understand it.

Knowing involves not simply knowing a fact.  In pastoral care, this knowledge is not just knowledge of scripture or doctrine.  It is the knowledge of your self – strengths, weaknesses, history, pain, story, shames, successes and so on.  CPE involves a great deal of this self-identification, which is sometimes easy and sometimes hard.  I think lots of folks have experiences in CPE because they try hard to maintain false selves while the group or supervisor try even harder to tear that false self down.

Being involves accepting those things we are aware of through self-knowlege.  Too often self-awareness leads to self-rejection, I think.  The hard parts of my life are just a part of me as the good parts, yet I find I tried for so long to judge those hard parts as things to be set aside or avoided.  I reject negative parts of myself as not really me, but that only sets up a false knowledge of who I really am.  However when I accept my past and my self and my past without judgement I can use them both to work with others in the midst of their own story and pain, and also help them to see their own true self without judgement.  This is not saying that sin isn’t sin or that “I’m all good”.  It involves seeing myself as I truly am, not how I view myself or how I want others to view me – it is how God sees me.  And in Christ, God sees me without judgement.  I think that’s what grace is.

Doing is the acting upon that knowledge of who I really am, putting my self fully into interaction with others.  This is the essence of pastoral care, but it can only happen after the knowing and the being.

Awareness, Part II

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I wrote already of awareness in terms of being aware of problems and issues in one’s life.  However this time I’m thinking of awareness in terms of simply being aware of one’s self in the world.  Yoda’s basic criticism of Luke came to mind:

“All his life has he looked away… to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was! What he was doing!”

I’ve been reading Thomas Merton’s journals and one thing I find is that every day is not filled with some kind of inspirational masterpiece or heavy thought on life or whatever.  Often it’s simply what’s going on:

“The sun, the clear morning, the quiet…” June 3&4, 1963

“Brilliance of Venus hanging as it were on one of the dim horns of Scorpio.  Frozen snow.  Deep wide blue-brown tracks of the tractor that came to get my gas tank the other day…” Jan 5, 1968

When I started CPE I saw awareness as being aware of what was going on with me at that time.  And that’s fine, but I’m seeing more that awareness involves not a narrow focus on me, but on me in the world.  I’m getting used to not putting on the iPod when I go out for walks.

I’m even a bit self conscious as I write this, knowing that this sounds a bit like navel-gazing or flaky or something.  But I’m appreciating the experience.

Awareness

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I see more and more that simply being aware of something isn’t enough.

CPE is a lot about finding your weaknesses as as well as your strengths.  I think most people find that it’s about their weaknesses and “issues”.  But CPE is just as much about uncovering your strengths.  For me it’s been an experience of uncovering both and accepting both.  However, simply being aware of something is not enough.

Awareness of an issue involves acceptance of it, but that only gets you so far.  That’s the starting point, not the end.  You then need to decide what you are going to do with your issue.  Realize that any particular issue has two sides to it – not just all bad or all good.  Then look at how you are going to use this issue in a positive way while trying to limit the negatives.

For example, I tend to be extremely hard on myself at times.  The upside of this is that I tend to work hard and set high standards for myself.  The downside is that I can set the bar too high and then beat myself up for not clearing it.  Awareness is being able to say that I’m hard on myself, but the problem is that I’m still overly hard on myself.  I can stop there and learn to live with myself, or I can change the downside of it.  Thankfully this is what I’ve been doing, and I’m so much the better for it!

I know someone who has gone through four units of CPE, which is pretty advanced.  She’ll talk about her issues as if she has mastery of them.  Yet these issues still continue, and there doesn’t seem to be any movement to do anything with them or change them.  Any change involves a loss, and a fear of what that loss will cost.  And when that loss is part of what we sense to be our selves, that change can be very intimidating.  Better to live with the devil you know than the devil you don’t, especially when you’ve been living with that devil for 40-some years.

Sin works in the same way.  To simply be aware of sin is one thing, to turn from it is another.  And God calls us ultimately to turn from sin, not just be aware that we are a sinner.  We fall into the same traps however.  We fear change, we beat ourselves up for failing to turn from sin, or we feel that change is impossible so why bother.

Change does not need to be complete right out of the gate. Turning from sin – or our issues – is a lifetime event.  It is done, and constantly being done.