a work in progress 🚧
construction, deconstruction, reconstruction, demolition, etc. 🏗️⚠️🦺
I am currently surrounded by construction zones. Everywhere that I want to drive, I am met with orange cones, flashing lights, piles of dirt, and pipes awaiting their new underground homes.
And as the new year rolls around yet again, I am reminded that we are all works in progress.
Profound, I know.
When you have a career where you deal with large numbers of the general public on a regular basis, there is an inevitable deluge of small talk that comes with each passing day — and it’s seasonal. After spending the months of November and December hearing about everyone’s holiday plans, we’re now into January where people inevitably want to talk about that frightening word, RESOLUTIONS.
Something I’ve learned about myself is that I’m not great at making resolutions. If I were to set out to make a resolution, it would be inspired by an attempt to prepare myself for what this year holds, which turns into me trying to forecast all the hard things that might happen this year, which causes me to spiral about how vastly unprepared I am.
And so, I find it much easier (and less overwhelming) to use the New Year to look back at the year behind me. Rather than choosing what to aspire to in 2024, I tend to reflect on what 2023 brought me.
🚧 In reflecting on this past year and thinking about the “under construction” sign that perpetually hangs around my neck, I picked up on a few ways in which I have worked to move this little construction project along.
If you knew younger me at all, you may have witnessed the frustrating indecisiveness that plagued my early years. Unable to choose which tennis shoes I was going to wear for the new school year for fear of choosing the wrong ones. Waiting until the last night of summer break to choose which high school I was going to be dropped off at the next morning. Making an insane spreadsheet of prospective colleges, and yet again waiting until the last possible moment to choose. Spending two years in a non-committal major because I couldn’t pick a major or settle on my post-grad plans.
29-year old me is less indecisive, to be sure. I’ve had a lot of life experiences since then, and I’ve done a lot of work on myself (thank you to the enneagram) to learn how to trust my own ability to make sound decisions, without having to ask 23,893 people for their opinion and frantically exploring every possible choice and outcome.
But when it comes to BIG decisions, I think some indecisiveness can be helpful; like many things in life, it’s a spectrum. A little timidity can keep us from diving headfirst into something we haven’t thought through all the way. It can keep us from doing damage to ourselves and other people as a result of not adequately thinking through the consequences of our actions. And so, I keep one foot in that indecisive, contemplative, researching camp — for the big decisions in life.
There’s so much talk in the church about praying over decisions, seeking wisdom, waiting for the Lord, etc., but a lot of those phrases have remained too theoretical for me for most of my life. I asked God for wisdom, but how was I supposed to receive it? I would struggle to find applicable texts in the Bible. I had too much church baggage and authority issues to trust church leadership. I’ve spent a lot of time wondering where that wisdom I was promised in James 1 was supposed to be found.
“If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.” James 1:5
Something that I’ve tried to do this year, is take those big decisions, those things that I am seeking wisdom about, and hold them up to any filter I can think of that might be obfuscating truth or wisdom.
I want to run that decision through the sieve of pride, and try to identify any ways in which I’m acting from a place of pride. So, I read a couple books about humility. I talk to a trusted friend or mentor about where I feel pride creeping into my heart. I think about how my choices or my words might come across, and wonder if I might seem arrogant or condescending. I pray for God to show me the ways in which pride is skewing my vision or hiding truth from me, I make adjustments as needed, and I continue to sit under that bright, blinding light until I feel like I’ve removed as much pride as possible (humbly acknowledging that I’ll never find it all).
Then, I sit and see what else stirs in me as a potential tripping hazard. I might see bitterness as something that could be growing underneath this decision, and so I start to search for the root of the bitterness. Beneath bitterness, I find unforgiveness watering that seed and fertilizing it with anger and resentment. I interrogate that unforgiveness and try (yet again) to learn the capacity for forgiveness that continually evades me.
Although running my decisions through these types of filters certainly can’t clear out all my ill intentions, it has at least been effective in helping me identify some of my own motivations. And by being aware, I can try to act less selfishly, less out of anger, less out of fear, less out of shame…and more out of love, more out of a desire for peace, more out of a desire for reconciliation, etc.
But, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 4, I can’t even judge myself. “My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me.” What I think I’m learning is that “it is the Lord who judges me” is not a threat. It’s not supposed to make us perpetually fear the hammer dropping. It’s supposed to remind us that we require guidance when it comes to interrogating our own conscience and motives.
Of course, in the infamous words of Steven Covey, “we judge ourselves by our intentions and others by their behavior.” Much to my chagrin, I cannot control how I am perceived or judged.
Billie Eilish has reminded me many times through her song, “Not My Responsibility,” that the perception that other people have of me is, in the end, not my responsibility. I am responsible for my own choices, I am responsible for interrogating and reconciling my intentions, but I am not responsible for how they are received. That is unfortunately something that is entirely out of my control, despite my best efforts.
All I can do is try to act with good intent, try to communicate those intentions effectively, and apologize and seek forgiveness (from myself and others) when I fail to do so.
Maybe that can be my New Year’s Resolution.
Cheers.
-Ben
Music:
Billie Eilish - Not My Responsibility
Everything That Rises - Sufjan Stevens
Thank you! So many gems here to think about. Love your integration of visuals! Stick with the writing if it serves you! Reading it is serving me, and I’m excited to hear more.