So many of us grow up with the vision of changing our world, yet all too many of us end up threatening to destroy ourselves in the process.
Let me explain.
Many people I know and many people that I’ve counselled, have had such an urgent purpose in themselves to achieve in their short lifetime. There are so many good drivers in people to want to do this, yet many of these good drivers are also driven by our brokenness, and a purpose built on brokenness alone leaves a person susceptible to temptation.
So many have entered careers, in fact, that have sought to do that very thing, to make the difference in this life while there is breath in their lungs. “My life must stand for some good,” they’ll say.
Anyone reading this is motivated by doing something good with their life—we identify.
What attracts many counsellors and pastors and nurses and doctors and social workers, among so many, to their professions? It’s not generally altogether altruistic. It’s usually because there’s a difference to be made because of some hole inside us that seeks to be filled. At least that’s part of the reason.
But with the purpose to make something truly worthwhile of one’s life, coupled with the difficulties inherent in achieving such a noble goal, the goal often becomes a burden, and pressure builds due to the cognitive dissonance of not being able to make the difference you thought you would. This usually strikes home in the mid-thirties to mid-forties and explains many a midlife crisis.
What occurs on the way to our living our purpose, to the achievement of our dreams, amid the pressures of life, is temptation—generally because we need to medicate ourselves.
Now, you probably don’t need me to tell you that medicating yourself is always a slippery slope.
But it is. Whether it’s an ever-increasing need to drink or falling for the drug of your ‘choice’, or it’s internet pornography, or gambling, is a moot point. So very many people fall into these modes of self-medication because of the tremendous unrealistic pressures they place on themselves to achieve what they see is their purpose, and to fill that hole that no amount of achievement can fill.
Indeed, it’s the striving to achieve something under such enduring pressure that leaves a soul destitute, often having achieved exactly what was set out to be done.
And addiction is a slippery slope because steadily you need more of your ‘drug’ while there are just as steadily significant diminishing returns in terms of ‘medicative’ benefit. You need more to get the same effect, and with that ‘more’, the threats to your health increase and the sustainability of your secret life becomes even more untenable. Fragility becomes the identity.
If it’s drinking, you’re drinking far more now and far more often than you ever thought you would. If it’s drugs, you simply cannot believe your own form. It’s the same with internet porn and gambling—with each day it seems, you sink to new lows. You’re driven to medicate, but as soon as you do, you die a new death of anxiety and shame. And you repeat this a thousand times, always promising that tomorrow will be different, yet not for one moment trusting your ability to reform from the habit.
At a subconscious level you live in the conundrum that your initial intent was good. You started out to help people, but now you feel like the biggest phony in the world, and your hypocrisy only drives the shame that keeps you in such a compulsive, impulsive cycle.
Nobody is beyond this cycle, but I know what it’s like to mistakenly think you’ve got the self-control to master the good and ward against the evil. YOU DON’T. Back in my AA days, there were many little sayings to help you recover—one of them was Y.E.T. i.e., You’re Eligible Too.
The moment a person says they’ll never fall for the temptations of life, is the moment that person is immediately susceptible to them—because they don’t realise that every soul demands peace.
Why do we medicate? Because we need to reconcile certain things—the pain within each of us insists it will be heard. Face the pain and deal with the feelings, or be pursued all your life by the pain (your truth and need of healing) that simply demands a hearing.
Living out our God-given purpose ever runs in tension with the burdens of life that build and threaten to derail us amid the common temptations we may all underestimate.
Very few people set out to become a hopeless alcoholic, a crime-fuelled drug addict, a porn addict (and think of the destinations THIS addiction can take you too!), or a gambling addict that sees you squander a hundred thousand dollars.
We’re all eligible for the temptations of life, and the wise person reconciles all demands of truth.
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