Ministerial Meandering

Courage to be human

Do you have what it takes to truly be yourself?  Perhaps you do, and perhaps you’re pretty proud of that fact.  But do you also have the courage to be honest with other people about who you are?  This does not mean sharing your most intimate secrets with any old person, or proclaiming your addiction to Sandwich Spread or pickled onions to all the world - but it does mean sharing your vulnerability, your human capacity for error.

Although we’d all like to think we are never wrong, never make bad decisions, always know the wise choice - that is fantasy world.  Even for me - though you would be forgiven for finding that hard to believe!

One of the most comforting things I have found as I grow older, is just how many of my friends also are finding the release and relief of letting go of their previous invincibility and omniscience.  It is such a darned strain to have to keep up the act of pretending that we either know everything (leave that to your teenage grandchildren), or that we have never made mistakes.

Surprisingly, you will gain far more respect and acceptance from your family and friends if you can admit that sometimes you just don’t know the answer, or that you were wrong.

The problem is that it is really rather embarrassing, isn’t it?  I can remember times when I knew I had made a bad decision, but I couldn’t find it in myself to go back and speak to the person I had wronged, apologise, and set things right.  I was just too proud.  And too stupid.  Because now so many of those people that I would like to have made amends to have died, and the opportunity has gone.  I can only hope that my belated prayers will be heard and that their spirits will know of my intention,

But I left it too late, because I didn’t have the courage to admit my humanity, and the possibility that I was wrong.  This is an existential trap, and not one that is in any way comfortable, because we will be judged on our actions, not on our intentions.  This raises a question in my mind; ‘What would I say to the 25-year old Philip if I had the chance?  (Please substitute your own names!)

I can remember well my mother and father quoting the old adage from Polonius to Laertes in Hamlet; ‘This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.’

Unfortunately, it is only true to an extent; Shakespeare lived in a time when dissembling was a social art, and seems to have been almost valued to some degree.  It had not become the crude and vulgar display of arrogant politicians that it is today.

To follow Polonius’ instruction would only make us ‘true to ourselves’, and not necessarily true to ‘any man.’  To be that requires an openness and honesty that demands significant courage, which few of us either possess, or wish to express.  Sadly, that would put us in the Pharisee camp and not that of the tax collector.  Remember, the Pharisee, when praying, preened himself and said, ‘I thank you, God, that I am not like other men,’ (and then listed all the showy, ‘good’ things he had done) ‘and particularly not like this tax collector here!’  The tax collector, however, when praying, just beat his breast and cried, ‘God be merciful to me - a sinner.’

Ask yourself, ‘Does it really diminish me to admit my mistakes - or do I grow through humility?’  Humility is not - as you might think, a grovelling obsequiousness - but simply an ability to keep learning.  

I think I’ll go with that - if I have the courage.

 

 

Philip+

 

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