ISBC 21 - Trauma = Pain + Confusion
Chapter 21 of Hope: A User's Manual
To paraphrase Daniel Pink, we’ll choose false certainty over genuine ambiguity any time.1
I adore Christopher Nolan’s movies. I love the way that he crafts his stories and how so much in his films is not about certainty, but about ambiguity. This is evident in Memento, The Prestige, Interstellar, Tenet, and especially in Inception. Without going into all the craziness that is Inception, the movie ends on an incredibly ambiguous shot. A zoom-in of a top spinning and the tiniest hint that it is about to stop. Here’s the video of it (video starts without showing what comes before for those who haven’t seen the film)
Some people HATED the ending because it is so ambiguous and things are not neatly wrapped up at the end. I’m one of those who loved it. I love the openness of it and the ways that it opens up more questions than gives firm answers. I have shared many times in recent years that, in the 30+ years that I have been actively trying to follow the way of Jesus that I feel more secure and solid in my faith today but I allow myself to sit with far more mysteries and unknowns today.
I know I am going a bit away from what MaryAnn writes in this chapter (a bit of out-of-context taking of the quote above) but this is something that I think is so important for us to grow into. It is comforting in some respects for everything to fit into simple a-or-b, this-or-that categories but it feels more and more like that’s not the world that we live in. The world is so much more of a spectrum and things fall along those spectrums. We ask big questions of God, the universe, and of others and often we find that the answers are “this is the best understanding we have right now.”
That may feel unsettling but I find hope in that. I find hope in that there’s more to understand, more to experience, more to see, more to learn. There is more truth, wisdom, and beauty out there for us to receive, chew over, integrate, and share. Some may think that this is a new idea, especially within the church but, in fact, it has a long history within the realms of Christian mysticism such as the anonymous writing known as The Cloud of Unknowing or the visions of other mystics such as Methchild of Magdeburg, Julian of Norwich, Catherine of Siena, or Hildegard of Bingen. It has been picked up in recent years by people such as Fr. Richard Rohr, Watchman Nee, and Teilhard de Chardin.
Maybe that’s why I love the fog so much when I’m out in the mornings. I love the times where there is the small wisps of fog but I really love when the fog is so thick that you really can’t see a whole lot ahead of you. I love the mystery of it and the unique beauty that arises out of it. I love the way that the sun can interact with the fog in ways not possible on a clear morning and that you can see the sunrays as the light is filtered through the fog and the trees.
I don’t disagree with the quote that MaryAnn shared from Daniel Pink, but I do think that our personal and spiritual growth best moves us to a place where we find ourselves with a growing peace with the mystery and the ambiguity - being ok with the top still spinning and wondering whether it is about to fall or not.
How is your comfort with mystery, with the unknown, with ambiguity?
Grace, Peace, Love, and Joy,
Ed
McKibben Dana, MaryAnn. Hope: A User's Manual (p. 96). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.. Kindle Edition.
I’m getting better with ambiguity as I get older. Our world now demands it, but I find I’m getting “more ok” with it. Sometimes even excited about what lies ahead. We have so many opportunities to learn and grow.
The quote from Plink reminded me of something that I heard Garrison Keillor say at an event once that has stuck with me for almost twenty years now:
"God prefers honest doubt to false piety."
This chapter connecting trauma to hope reminded me of the Gospel of John with its theme of flesh. When she was talking about how our body remembers, even Jesus'resurrected body held the scars of his crucifixion. As the title of the popular book on trauma says, the body keeps the score. But the body can also experience resurrection.