LIFE ON THE ROCKS
When my family and I were in Liberia years ago visiting relatives, they took us to an ocean beach on the coast. Being a Minnesotan who was only familiar with how lakes behave, I underestimated the strength of the waves and the undertow and I got out too deep to stand up even though it was only knee-deep for my six-foot, two-inch husband, Steve.
As the waves hit on the top and the undertow pulled at the bottom, I started to go down. Instinctively, Steve grabbed my arm to try to steady me and I grabbed on to him hoping he could rescue me from drowning. The waves pushed me off of my feet and with him still holding on to me and dragged me over the rocks where I got badly cut up and bruised. Steve thought he was helping me, but I had to scream at him to let me go because he was causing so much more harm by hanging on to me. My flailing and harsh rebuke also injured him. We did not get out of the conflict until we let each other go and I was able to stumble back to the shore on my own. His love for me compelled him to act, but it was the wrong thing to do for the situation.
Personally, my goal in any conflict is to work toward understanding and as much as possible, reconciliation. I work hard to fight against fear and move toward love wherever I can. Unfortunately, this desire also makes it easy for me to try to pull people back in out of a “fear of abandonment” and a desire to keep people close at any cost, even when they want to leave. Sometimes, I acquiesce too much to demands from them or expect compliance in behaviors I find unsettling, with a goal of staying connected to them, even while both of us are getting injured by the rocks as the waves and tide drag us over them.
What I am slowly learning through my training and through life in 2020 is that when we act out of fear, we cannot act out of love. The fear of abandonment cancels out the act of love and keeps us tied to people in a destructive way. The fear of abandonment most definitely has torment! In light of that fact, it turns out that sometimes the most loving thing we can do for a person is to let them go if they are determined to separate from us. When we try to hang on, we risk great injury to everyone.
At this particular time in history, I am seeing that people, in general, are more divided than ever. We (admittedly, including myself here) are deleting friends and family off of FB and canceling them out of their lives for any and sometimes no reason other than they cannot agree on the meanings of terms. It is all so very sad, and may not be reversible for some relationships. The divisiveness of “cancel culture”* is as rampant and unrelenting as those waves and tides were and we are all getting chewed up on the rocks on a regular basis.
While it is unlikely the ocean will ever relent, stumbling out of the water on our own to rest on the beach may help us stop injuring each other for a time. Honestly, right now, it is tempting to just stay out of the water altogether. Controversy and conflict hurt people. I don’t have a good answer for all that is happening in our world today. I have tried to add differing perspectives on Facebook and in personal conversations to help people see the “other” side and I don’t know if that has been helpful or hurtful, but I know that I need to get out of the water myself for a while. There is no end to what we can argue about just as there is no end to the currents that bring the ocean down upon us.
If what I am talking about matches up with your lived experience, may I suggest that you stumble to the shore with me to give it a rest for a while? Calm down and let go of people you are trying to save or be saved by. I know that is what I need to do, anyway.
My prayer is that someday when the water is less turbulent we will be able to play on the beach or even in the shallows together again.
