We Are the Problem
Why Neither More Performance Nor Possessions Can Save Us From Ourselves
I have this nagging feeling there is more to life. Like I’m experiencing about 50-60% of it but there is more to be had.
It's always there deep down inside. Sometimes stronger and sometimes it's barely noticeable.
But it's always there. The truth lurking in the background of this very busy life I live.
It doesn’t make sense.
Ive got a great family, a meaningful job I can throw myself into, good health, and a wonderful community.
But the feeling of incompleteness is always there.
I try to ignore it by incessantly scrolling on my phone, going from one meeting to another, or buying something that I pretend will temporarily satiate my desires and hopefully stifle the feeling.
None of it works.
The videos aren’t real, the meetings come and go, and the things I buy aren’t nearly as perfect as I hoped or as their companies advertised.
The Real Problem
The uncomfortable truth is the problem is not out there - it’s in here. The problem is with me.
I know I will be here and gone tomorrow. The shortness of my life is ever present around me. I can’t ignore it and that revelation plays games with my mind.
I know I’m here for a purpose beyond accumulating possessions and satisfying my bodily desires. But isn’t that what life is all about? It feels like it if you listen to what’s being incessantly pumped out there via social media and advertisements.
I know there is more to life than what I can calculate, consume, create, or control. In fact, this is exactly why life is worth living and is so special.
I know all of these things in my head like I know what two plus two is. That is, I know it cognitively but I don’t know all of it experientially.
I knew that when I was going to become a father that it would mean so many things like being able to have an excuse to carry snacks with me everywhere I went, that it would mean losing some sense of personal freedom, and that I'd likely be late almost everywhere I went for a period of time.
I cognitively knew and could anticipate those things would be a part of my life.
But I didn’t know how hard being a father would be until I experienced it: that my flaws and shortcomings would be magnified and clearly seen in the mirror my children presented to me on a nearly daily basis, that my own challenges from my childhood would come back to life in unexpected ways, and that I am not as loving, honorable, disciplined, nor as sacrificial as I thought I was. Marriage has had the same affect.
There are more ways of knowing something. We can know something in the cognitive sense and not really know it until we experience it.
The Solution?
We aren’t drowning in a sea of knowledge, but are dehydrated in a desert of will.
I know a lot of things.
And yet I do the opposite to what I know.
The apostle Paul captures the sentiment better than anything else I've come across:
For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.
(Romans 7:15-20 ESV)
But the problem here is not that I don’t have enough will. After all, I have more willpower, pain tolerance, and discipline than most. Playing varsity sports in every year of high school, over a decade of serving in the Marines, and getting through multiple advanced degrees tells me I’ve got enough willpower.
No, the problem isn’t the quantity of will, it’s the quality of my will. That in fact, what my will desires is actually the problem.
So much of our experience and world tells us the opposite. They sell us on the quantity problem.
We just don’t have enough....
- will
- focus
- money
- discipline
- energy
- status
- followers
But the truth is we are people overflowing with possessions or programs that deal with the symptoms of the human experience but all of it is found wanting.
It may temporarily satisfy but inevitably we need more. We want more.
The problem is not in the things we consume but in the containers we fill it in.
We are the problem.
And we cannot fix the cracks and the imperfections of our life container any more than a jar can repair itself.
But that reality doesn’t make for good marketing or for selling the next thing or course.
The problem is not out there but in here.
No amount of scrolling, meetings, and buying will change that.
The Truth
The truth is we cannot lift ourselves up by our bootstraps. At least, not for solving the quality problem.
No, the bootstrap myth reinforces the lie of we need more and to do more.
Neither performance nor possessions can save us from ourselves.
Quality is truly more important than quantity in this case.
The quality of the container of our embodied experience will always be less than what it can and should be. And for that, we need something outside of us to lift us up. Not by our bootstraps but through the spirit that lives in us.
We must live as the tripartite beings that we are: body, soul, and spirit.
Most of us serve the body, starve the soul, and stifle the spirit.
But we “are spiritual beings having a human experience”.
We need to stop or at least decrease living like we are just material responding to our environment as if we are machines.
As we do, the quality of life will improve because the quality of the container of life will improve. And, much to our chagrin, it will have nothing to do with how much we stuff it with possessions or performance.
Questions
Do you feel the feeling of “incompleteness”? If so, how does it manifest in your life?
Do you identify as a spiritual being? If so, how does that impact the way you live? If not, why not?
What is your relationship with performance and possessions?