16. There are many obstacles that keep me from knowing myself.
(Before looking at the questions below, take a few minutes to think about this statement. Invite Jesus to speak to you about what He would like you to notice.)
HOW MUCH TIME, IN A TYPICAL DAY, DO YOU PAUSE AND REFLECT?
OF THE THREE BIG ENEMIES TO A LIFE OF PEACE--HURRY, WORRY, AND FEAR--WHICH IS MOST COMMON FOR YOU?
IF YOU LOST YOUR CELL PHONE FOR A WEEK, HOW WOULD IT AFFECT YOU?
We may recognize that there is much about ourselves about which we are unaware, and we may truly desire to know what we don’t know. However, acquiring self-awareness and developing reflective capacity still is not easy. Our lives are often deeply influenced by a culture that creates many obstacles to self-awareness.
Perhaps the greatest hindrance to self-awareness is the abundance of distractions we encounter in life. It has been said that “we live in a world filled with weapons of mass distraction.” Self-awareness and reflective capacity require us to make space for reflection, typically a quiet space with minimal external distractions where our anxious thoughts can have time to slow down and fade to the background.
Silence, solitude, and lots of it, are typically necessary for self-awareness. Next to distraction, and closely related to it, hurry is a major impediment to self-awareness. The pace of life and the speed at which we live and interact can be detrimental to self-awareness. Technology has rapidly increased the speed at which we can acquire and send information, entertain ourselves, and move from place to place. In this fast-paced environment, our minds are trained to act quickly, our bodies resist any lack of stimulation, but our hearts grow weary and dull. In this over-stimulated, sleep-deprived, hurried life, self-awareness and any form of reflection is nearly impossible.
Another obstacle to self-awareness is our cultural obsession with the material world: the world of things, possessions, titles, appearance, and status. Self-awareness is a journey into the non-material world, the world of inner thoughts, feelings, desires, and disappointments. If our priorities are filled with material things and world-based worries we will struggle to access the spiritual, the non-material spaces of self-awareness. Another obstacle to self-awareness, one that is more recent in our culture, seems to be an absence in truth in what we hear and read. With advertisements that give only partial truth, news that is admittedly biased and at times even “fake”, social media that is highly opinionated, and often adversarial, we are being trained not to trust anything or anyone. To even trust ourselves and our inner thoughts can be difficult.
The result of this distrust is an ongoing sense of fear. And in an environment of fear, it will be difficult to available to our inner voice. Finally, to all of the previous obstacles, we can add the work of the enemy. (Some people may attribute all that has been mentioned to the enemy, which in some sense is likely true. Others may question whether there is a real enemy called Satan.) Jesus spoke of this enemy in John 8:43-44 where He says, Why is my language not clear to you? Because you are unable to hear what I say. You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. (NIV).
However we imagine the enemy, it seems reasonable to admit that to become more self-aware, we must overcome spiritual resistance. Certainly, many of our negative and destructive thoughts and tendencies come from our own diseased, distracted, and exhausted self. But sometimes the opposing voices we hear come from outside of us, not from God, but from a source that makes self-awareness and reflection difficult and confusing. To grow in self-awareness and to develop our reflective capacity requires a determined and disciplined soul that can confront these invasive obstacles.