As I set out on my 2011 plan to clean up the ashes of my life, I had one major question, “Where do I look for answers?” I wanted to know what healthy looked like and how I could move in that direction, but I didn’t know where to go.
I Didn’t Trust Myself
While I’ve heard many people say that we should trust ourselves and go with our intuition, and while I’m the kind of person who often acts based on my gut feeling, I also knew I could find a way to justify just about anything.
This isn’t to say that intuition is all bad, or that I never trust myself, I just knew I needed other voices in my quest for answers.
Where I’d Already Looked
At the same time, this wasn’t the first time I’d asked these kinds of questions. In the past, I’d gone to pastors and other church leaders, counselors, books, conferences, and just about any other source I could think of.
The problem was, I was only given prepackaged answers that ignored both my situation and my questions:
- You’re a man with marriage issues? Well, that must mean that you have a problem with porn, a worldly standard of beauty, and anger issues. So put software on your computer to block sex sites, get an accountability partner, and be more loving.
- You feel completely alone? Well, if you’d just be more broken and humble then things would get better.
- There’s a temptation to get affirmation from others? Well, if you’d just learn to balance receiving strokes from a variety of sources, it wouldn’t make you so dependent on one person.
While I knew my questions and their answers didn’t connect, I held the belief that they saw things more clearly than I did so I blended their advice with Ephesians 5:25:
Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her … (ESV)
The result was trying to convince myself that my questions and the hopes, wants, dreams, feelings, and relational needs that went with them, didn’t matter. A strategy that completely failed me.
So, I didn’t trust myself, and I didn’t trust sources I’d gone to in the past. So what options remained open?
My New Plan
I decided that I was willing to try anything that others suggested, with one criteria … they had to actually listen to my story first. Unless they were able to show genuine listening, and link their solution to what they heard, I wouldn’t follow through on their advice.
In the months that followed, I ended up brushing off a slew of people, but there were also a number I listened to. I’ll share more about this on Wednesday and Friday.
Your Turn
What has been your strategy for seeking out a place that offers helpful answers to your questions?
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