Some of us are hard wired as control freaks. I used a sense of control as my sense of security. The two words for me were synonymous. Lord loved me enough to absolutely strip me of all the things I hung my security on horizontally so I would learn to ultimately go vertical and cling to Him (Hebrews 13:5) as opposed to the things in this world that can be seen, shaken and taken. Things that will ultimately fail me as I will fail others, because we live in a broken world where we fail each other. People, relationships, self, identity in success, etc… He shoved me out of my nest of security and comfort like a mama bird shovin’ a little one out. Hardest best thing that ever happened to me. Emphasis on hardest. Emphasis on best.
Have you ever been shaken to your core? Like a 10.8 Richter scale earthquake-the construct of your world absolutely decimated, not-one-stone-on-another kind of shaken. Shelves emptied, glasses crushed, water, spices, plants toppled, everything demolished kind of shaken. I have a friend whose little corner of the world experienced an unimaginable loss of life a week ago. Several law enforcement officers doing their very dangerous job in order to protect others’ lives, taken. Families with huge losses, their community grieving. Everything shaken, changed in an instant. Their families might have thought it was just another day, leaving for work with a dinner plan for later when their spouse was due home. A daughter all dressed up anticipating a date night with daddy when he gets home. Maybe a son sitting on the front steps, waiting to play ball with dad after his shift. In another corner of the world, in a ‘routine’ medical procedure something goes terribly wrong and you wake up from it shaken, because you have no control as you lay there on the bed unable to move, searing pain, no one listening to you, no one helping you, terrified. Your sense of control gone in an instant. Across the way, a young parent that has been relatively healthy and fine, one day has a stroke and is left debilitated-altered and gone within a week. Didn’t see it coming. Somewhere else, a husband tells his wife that in a couple weeks he is leaving her and the kids for another lover met online, packing up and moving across country. Shaken. Tragically this stuff happens every day.
So what happens when you are a very capable, driven person who trusts in self when you are at someone else’s mercy, competency, character, and they fail you? What then? What happens when someone you have relationship with has gossiped about you with others with whom you also have relationship and you have been thrown under the bus? That feeling of being in control is instantly stripped. What do you do with that?
Well, if you are a control freak like I was/am, (not that I’ve arrived but more often than not, I have radically changed my approach by the grace of God) you will try to control the outcome of your interactions with your relationship issues or circumstances of your life. You might spend a bunch of time rehearsing a conversation ahead of time-in a manipulative way to control the outcome of the interaction. Imagining all the ways the other person will respond or react and coming up with a controlling counter response. I have done this. Or perhaps if you are at the helm on the job and the master of the ‘circus’ you may be controlling in your behavior towards others, micro-managing them-instead of offering encouragement and empowerment tempered with accountability. Maybe you become a helicopter parent not allowing your kids to appropriately grow and take measured risks because of your fear for their safety. It’s understandable, and a natural reaction when you have suffered loss.
The thing is, we are more liable to do the relationally wrong thing in the face of trying to maintain control that isn’t either attainable or ours to have in the first place. Think white knuckled grip. We punish, manipulate, have unhealthy anxiety, lose sleep, seek revenge, micro-manage, lose our appetite or/eat the fridge (we all respond differently but usually one of those two-lol). In a word, we can become a little neurotic.
(This is not speaking specifically to the precious community in Kentucky who lost their officers this past week. That scenario is folded into the conversation at large. My heart goes out to you and I grieve with you and am lifting you in prayer).
So what do you do with it when the tender terrain of your heart has been irrevocably altered? What is your pattern when your world has been shaken? Until a friend of mine pointed it out to me I didn’t even realize that I would spring into action and clean-neurotically. It was my self-soothing method of choice. I am not saying that going into some sort of action is bad in the short term to get the energy out, blow off some adrenalin-but not to the point that you mask grief indefinitely. We have to grieve the grievous things, we can’t circumvent grief and remain healthy. We can’t stuff that negative energy and hope that it won’t effect us. We can’t drink the poison of bitterness and expect the other guy to die. Well, we can but it won’t work.
I heard it said a few years ago to overcome grief, you need to make your legacy bigger than your grief. To me that was one of the most profound things I have heard and embraced. Make your legacy bigger than your grief. It will give you a goal to focus on-a purpose with meaning and intention.
Meanwhile, do the very necessary thing of grieving the grief. First things first.