Herrington: Getting Over It All

Since it is very difficult to transform in front of others, we tend to sabotage or abandon our relationships as we go through major overhauls. This is never more true than when we are attempting to make changes in our behaviors, values, or patterns of thought. The reason for this perceived need for distance and privacy is that others often expect us to feel the same as we always have. We categorize each other in terms of our emotions. We impede progress by objectifying others, and so they have to abandon us in order to reinvent themselves in spite of us.

Well, really they believe that we believe that they will never change. And in many cases this is true, for the naïve who desire to control things in order to solidify and objectify their environment. We know that change is the only constant, and yet in our high school yearbooks we write, “Stay just like you are.” This is really a reflective, “God, don’t let me grow up.” And this is further a fear laden embedding, “Don’t ever let me grow old.”

We really can avoid some things, I give us that. We have it down to a science. An art form, really! And we do it with spiritually foundational faith in the process of denial. Altogether that creates a religion, or a cult of denial. With only specific science, art, spiritual, and practical values laid out, we can create an entire cottage industry around an avoidance mechanism. And once we finally come to the end of ourselves in light of that mechanism, we have lost faith in it and must transform ourselves, and that means unconverting all those whom we have so successfully bullied or manipulating into expecting us to act and think in certain ways. And then we go to rehab. We become reformed. Or else we become heretics. Or we ourselves convert to a new religion. We no longer support our old sports teams. We give up that lure that we have fished with since childhood. We decide that after decades of being persuaded as to the efficacy of a given opening in chess that this alternative is the most powerful opening in all history.

In short, whatever it is that we are abandoning has lost its flavor, and it is time for a new stick of gum. When we do this, we want to do it in such a way that we do not really cause alarm or gain notice. Now, true, some people will spit their gum out in the water fountain. We wonder why. There is not going to be a gum police come by and clean it up for them and if everyone did it, the fountain would over flow and they are just hoping no one else will do it too. This kind of thinking is mind boggling. What are people thinking when they mess up a toilet seat? They could have lifted it, but, oh, no! But most people do not make a public spectacle of their goings on.

In one field of endeavor, there is an odd phenomenon, the before and after picture on the Internet. This is me, before and after losing 100 pounds. This is her, before and after meth. This is America, before and after gridlock. Sometimes the pictures are quite astounding. Here she is in a moo-moo; here she is in a string bikini. Here he is with teeth, and here he is without teeth. Here we owe trillions and here we have a surplus that is not used to provide welfare to the lazy, the greedy, or those who otherwise feel they are entitled.

Mostly though, it is difficult to change and transform ourselves at all even with no one looking. We have set patterns, expect things to continue, and want our old comforts just as they were. 2 packs of cigarettes per day. 4 cups of coffee as usual. Driving to work and taking the same old roads that have become a comfort. But, a heart attack or retirement or construction or any one of 10,000 things can mess us up.

So, we conclude that we need to go cold turkey, not take anyone’s advice, walk our own path, lay a new sidewalk, and finally belly up to the bar of life and take the bull by the horns. We just don’t want any kind of discouragement. No big questions. No negative associations. No backwards or back tracking thinking. No expectations that things will go right back like they were. “We are never getting back together,” the radio blasts. I mean it this time. I have had it with this. And then the questions begin.

Are you on a diet? Trying to get rid of the old spare tire, eh? Stopping smoking? Whew, tough stuff! Have you tried…and the suggestions come pouring in from all of the arm chair quarterbacks. Everyone is an expert. Everyone has the magic cure. Everyone is going to tell you what no one else will tell you. You did not hear this from me, but……………..And so it goes.

And so, we get alone, work it out, get passed the experts, avoid the traps, saunter around the negativity, and evade detection by the distraction police who only want to maintain the status quo. Have you seen Bob? He has lost weight, quit smoking, started back to school, left church, joined a team, started a band, framed up a new wing on his house. We all know how Noah must have felt. Looking like a nut, working out your process.

You go on, and you do it all by yourself, or with another nut friend. And you transform yourself. And then that becomes the new expectation. Bob had a beef sandwich the other day at Butcher Boys. Yep, so much for that vegetarian gimmick. Yeah, you can’t fool mother nature. Where’s the beef? Hehehehehe….Gimme a cigarette. Oh, I quit those things, they will kill you. Says who? You don’t know that. Meet me in the stair well? Yep.

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