Arrested Development

The feeling is often the deeper truth, the opinion the more superficial one.
~Augustus William Hare and Julius Charles Hare, Guesses at Truth, by Two Brothers, 1827

Years ago I read this book about God, written by a Christian theologian. I forget now what the over all focus of the book was, but I do remember throwing the book at a wall after reading about how the author believed that feelings and emotions came with the Fall of Man—when Adam ate the forbidden fruit. To his way of thinking, God is a Spock-like Vulcan. This may explain a lot about why some Christians suffer from severe cases of Arrested Development: rather than working on developing emotional maturity, they are determined to simply kill all emotions.

Come on man … Jesus wept at the gravesite of his friend, Lazarus. Were those tears signs of a depraved nature or weakness of character or an appropriate response to what had happened? +

In preparing to audition for the School of Music at Samford University as a piano major, my instructor, Thom Cooper, had me working on a piece composed by Rachmaninoff. After finally being allowed to play the entire piece without interruption – get your palms up; no, no, no, your fingering is all wrong there; etc. – Mr. Cooper told me that while my playing was technically “adequate,” it lacked emotion: “the piano is to be an extension of your soul, Monte.”

That next week I came in all prepared to play with heart and soul. The problem, however, was that, at 17-years old, I had as yet to learn the difference between being dramatic and playing with heart. Anyway, when I had struck the final chord, I could hear Mr Cooper muttering, “No, no, no …”

Me: What do you mean, ‘No, no, no …’ You told me to play with feeling. I did! That’s how I feel it.

Mr Cooper: (Laughing hysterically) THAN YOU ARE FEELING ALL WRONG! +

I wonder how many children grow up hearing this, grow up believing that their feelings are all wrong, bad, evil, or ________. (Fill-in-the-blank with something pejorative.)

Or what of the parent that, rather than ascertaining the child’s talents, capacities, and such, he, instead, cajoles and presses the child toward endeavors that are actually contrary to his physical and psychological makeup, leaving the child frustrated, angry, and bewildered, which, in turn, brings on a parental harangue about bucking-up and ignoring those stupid or, at least, irrelevant emotions.

So what do children treated like this do? Many of them simply begin shutting their feelings down, choosing to be numb. After all, their experience of consciousness is predominately one of pain. Why? Because, rather than teaching children to identify, accept (not the same as “approving”) and then discharge their feelings, they are simply told by the words and demeanor of the adults in their worlds to ignore, to suppress, and to subdue them, communicating a kind of disdain for emotional responses of any kind: especially so-called negative emotions.

Sure enough, early on in life we need to learn certain disciplines. For example, I hated math, which to my mom and dad was absolute heresy. No matter how loudly I yelled or bitterly I wept over homework, there was no way my parents were going to let me get away with not learning my lessons. Got it. Monte needs to learn to add, subtract, multiply and divide. However, for my parents, given that my emotional reactions were irrational, immature and, ultimately, irrelevant, they were to be ignored. What did Monte learn? Ignore your emotions, do what you are told regardless of what you feel. Good lesson? Sure, on some level ... However, the main lesson I learned was that, most of the time, emotions were either irrelevant, stupid or evil; so if you can’t turn ‘em off at least ignore them, choosing to be unconscious and unaware. And this is not a Good Lesson.

I think, rather than ignoring our feelings we need to identify and analyze them. Most of the time this only requires a few moments. Some of the questions we might ask ourselves:

What do I need here?
What do I want?
What am I feeling about the various choices of behaviors I am considering?
How do my present feelings align with my core beliefs, values and goals for my life?
What am I feeling about my observations?
What am I feeling about what I am feeling? Why?
How am I appraising what I am observing?
Are these emotional responses appropriate or inappropriate, healthy or unhealthy, mature or immature … and how do I know?
In this specific context, what weight should I place on the information my emotions are conveying to me?

Being raised as a Fundamentalist Christian, my psychological model was a jumble of conflicting principles masquerading as biblical Truths. For example, to many of those members of my Tribe, emotions are packed with sin, while the brain/intellect is God’s direct path for Objective Truth.

Emotions=Bad
Intellect=Good

Our theology may assert that the whole person is tainted by sin, but our actual practice asserts that this only applies to our physical senses, NOT to our brains. Trust your intellect: distrust your emotions. God only reveals Himself through the intellect: our emotions are the Devil’s playground. Etc.

Is it any wonder

That so many Christians live their entire faith out of their heads?
That love for God and others is thought to be solely about intellect and will power?
That many of us see “thinking” (Good Guy) and “feeling” (Bad Guy) as perpetual adversaries, when in fact they are not?
That all too often when we speak of the redemption of the Whole Person in Christ, we only think in terms of beating down or denying our five senses and our emotions?


Question: What if God reveals Himself through all of our senses, through our brains and our emotions?

Copyright, Monte E Wilson, 2009