Todays Garden of Eden

I love my blog sometimes because I get some great feedback (even from anonymous people) that make me laugh, think, or just plain pump me up. Well, I'd like to thank an anonymous commenter who gave me the link to a speech given by Dr. Brene Brown. It was so thought provoking that I'm going to do a separate blog about it.

The topic was vulnerability. Now, let's face it... when we hear the word vulnerability in relation to anyone, isn't the first reaction to clamp up inwardly and say "ohhh" (with squenched up face). Vulnerability seems to be synonymous with disappointment these days. Dr. Brown hit it on the head. She said that we are a generation that automatically predicts the worst of situations, which is a defense mechanism to guard against vulnerability.

Let me give you a little test... just to prove this point. If I were to start a story by saying... "It was a beautiful day. My friends family was driving on the freeway, all singing to songs on the radio, headed to go to the beach for a day of body surfing and sun tanning..." how would you finish the story.

[pause for your answer]

Yep, I answered the same. She said that most people vary on the story but ultimately it is some sort of doomsdayer ending, like "when they got sideswiped by a drunk driver, rolled off the road, and were killed." But think about it... why would we say that? Is it because of the media? Our own personal life experiences? I'm fascinated.

She said that the reason people do this is to beat fate to the punch, so that they don't get hurt and can prevent vulnerability. In the dictionary it defines vulnerability as "open to attack"... is that the whole of the definition? Ok, now she's really got me thinking...

Let's see how that has played out in our society. We are the most obese, in debt, medicated generation of adults ever on this planet. We are funneling our emotion into unhealthy pits to help aid in the cover up. 

Another fascinating thing to note about our society is that as a whole we seem to be mostly faithless. Dr. Brown states that faith without vulnerability is extremism. Wow... I've never thought of it that way. In many cases several of us try to have faith, but since we are avert to vulnerability we cannot ever exercise the intent of the word, and as a result abandon God. But she's right on... true faith is being vulnerable to God's design and believing that although "open to attack," despite the wounds that may ensue, that God does answer prayers, and does guide us regardless of where our path is directed. I can see why our society doesn't submit to that notion, because faith has to be one of the most elite practices of theology, while at the same time most foundational. Something, despite a life time of trying, I'm still trying to get right.

But what saddens me most is when Dr. Brown said that people are starting to live a life of disappointment because they don't want to experience the emotion of disappointment. What an odd, seemingly opposite reaction to what you are trying to hide from... but yet it is so natural. Ironically, the main point that Dr. Brown really drove home was that you can't selectively numb emotion. Let me say that again... you can't selectively numb emotion. Meaning that you can't say I want to numb disappointment but not joy... they go hand in hand. When you numb emotion you numb the good with the bad, and live a life of numb pacificity.

If you think about it, this is a classic Garden of Eden scenario. Which do we choose, a life not affected by emotion and without drama, or do we pass through sorrow that we might know joy? I think Eve got it right folks. I'm not saying it is easy (heaven knows my struggle with it), or that I like being a glutton for punishment (see how I just tried to by-step vulnerability), but how can we ever have happiness without allowing vulnerability (and in turn sorrow) to be apart of our lives. We can't... which begs the next question, how do we change, and allow vulnerability back into our lives after years of fighting it.

And that is where I'm going to have to leave you my friends... because I don't have the answer yet. Tell you what... let's think about this together.