I'd be curious to tease out if there are spaces or times of life in which you feel in control of the topic space, and others in which you haven't.
I suspect that in your roles as blogger, professor, speaker, author, and Bible study class leader, you enter a lot of conversations in a position of topical control; if a subject comes up that threatens the coherence of the community, you have the power to change the subject, and if there's no way to find common ground, it is unlikely that you will be the one ejected from the room.
Are there other times of life or environments in which others control the topics discussed, and you feel more disposable? When you're spending more time in those spaces, do you find yourself reacting differently?
I know that I can be reactive in ways that trouble me, but I connect that to experiences in which I have found myself to be a disposable member of a community, and therefore have a heightened awareness about whether _this_ is the discussion that is going to start cutting the ties that bind again...
I'm not really thinking about my reactivity in spaces, but in relationships. Having a friend or family member share an opinion on social media or during a Thanksgiving gathering. Seeing a political sign in a friend's yard. Having someone at church tell me who they are voting for. I'm describing my sympathetic stress response in those moments.
Thanks for the chance to clarify. I intended to ask whether your reactivity in relationships has changed at all based on the communities/spaces in which you spend your time.
To get specific, in times where I spend a lot of my community energy in algorithmically-driven online spaces, I tend to develop a feeling of precarity. I might enjoy my time there, but my connections are tenuous, based around close alignments of interest and opinion. In such times, to give the benefit of the doubt to a friend, family member, neighbor, or someone at church might feel more threatening, because what if my online community rejects me? My overall sense of whether I am secure in my community infects my one-on-one interactions.
Unfortunately, I have also experienced in-person faith communities in which precarity is also real, with similar results.
In other times, where I feel that I have other spaces where I can be myself at least along certain dimensions, and so my feet are more firmly planted, I can feel more free to give more heed to differing political alliances; it's not my whole community belonging that feels like it's at stake.
I find this framing helpful, because it allows me to add to the question of "how can _I_ become less reactive" the question of "how could _we_ create communities where currently reactive people can be grounded and safe?"
I appreciate this but I disagree about one thing for one reason. It's the "white...middle class" comment. The angriest people I encounter are white middle class people.
I appreciate you opening up about the variables in your political reactivity. I've been teasing this out for myself, too. This is a worth will study! I think also about the collective/societal dysregulation and lack of felt safety and how people respond by going to fight, flight, fawn, or fog. I also think about what I've learned from you and attachment theory. Like you, Richard, I do confess a bit of removed objectivity I can carry bc of my privilege as a white, educated male. One concern I have is how we just can't seem to listen to one another in nuanced, compassionate, productive ways. But even that perspective exposes my nonviolent, peacemaker leanings. Just this morning was reflecting on Paul's words to the Corinthians: Jews demand signs, Greeks wisdom, I proclaim Christ crucified. There's a word for us in this as it relates to how we hold and display our political theology.
Maybe your are more blessed, not walking around with the moral injury I have as I see what free-market neoliberalism does, the inequality, those in my urban city that are so self-absorbed, and now the push to fascism that reflects extreme cruelty. Yes, we have no party that is going to remedy this free-market destruction, and I have always tried to be tolerant but mine only goes so far in terms of watching people and the planet be so beaten down. How should we react when people support someone that will do so much damage? I may be quiet or polite, wanting to keep the relationship, or sensing that it won't matter what I say, but my body does cry out.. and sometimes I now sense there is a numbing.. and that is probably worse.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts Dr. Beck! And I bet your classes are popular on campus. People don't learn what a teacher has to offer unless they believe themselves to be in a safe place. After reading Camp's Scandalous Witness, I tend to lean toward the idolatry diagnosis. Is that passing judgment? Or is it inspecting fruit?
I'd be curious to tease out if there are spaces or times of life in which you feel in control of the topic space, and others in which you haven't.
I suspect that in your roles as blogger, professor, speaker, author, and Bible study class leader, you enter a lot of conversations in a position of topical control; if a subject comes up that threatens the coherence of the community, you have the power to change the subject, and if there's no way to find common ground, it is unlikely that you will be the one ejected from the room.
Are there other times of life or environments in which others control the topics discussed, and you feel more disposable? When you're spending more time in those spaces, do you find yourself reacting differently?
I know that I can be reactive in ways that trouble me, but I connect that to experiences in which I have found myself to be a disposable member of a community, and therefore have a heightened awareness about whether _this_ is the discussion that is going to start cutting the ties that bind again...
I'm not really thinking about my reactivity in spaces, but in relationships. Having a friend or family member share an opinion on social media or during a Thanksgiving gathering. Seeing a political sign in a friend's yard. Having someone at church tell me who they are voting for. I'm describing my sympathetic stress response in those moments.
Thanks for the chance to clarify. I intended to ask whether your reactivity in relationships has changed at all based on the communities/spaces in which you spend your time.
To get specific, in times where I spend a lot of my community energy in algorithmically-driven online spaces, I tend to develop a feeling of precarity. I might enjoy my time there, but my connections are tenuous, based around close alignments of interest and opinion. In such times, to give the benefit of the doubt to a friend, family member, neighbor, or someone at church might feel more threatening, because what if my online community rejects me? My overall sense of whether I am secure in my community infects my one-on-one interactions.
Unfortunately, I have also experienced in-person faith communities in which precarity is also real, with similar results.
In other times, where I feel that I have other spaces where I can be myself at least along certain dimensions, and so my feet are more firmly planted, I can feel more free to give more heed to differing political alliances; it's not my whole community belonging that feels like it's at stake.
I find this framing helpful, because it allows me to add to the question of "how can _I_ become less reactive" the question of "how could _we_ create communities where currently reactive people can be grounded and safe?"
Hope that clarifies!
I appreciate this but I disagree about one thing for one reason. It's the "white...middle class" comment. The angriest people I encounter are white middle class people.
> I am also to see,
"I am also able to see"
timely and helpful
I appreciate you opening up about the variables in your political reactivity. I've been teasing this out for myself, too. This is a worth will study! I think also about the collective/societal dysregulation and lack of felt safety and how people respond by going to fight, flight, fawn, or fog. I also think about what I've learned from you and attachment theory. Like you, Richard, I do confess a bit of removed objectivity I can carry bc of my privilege as a white, educated male. One concern I have is how we just can't seem to listen to one another in nuanced, compassionate, productive ways. But even that perspective exposes my nonviolent, peacemaker leanings. Just this morning was reflecting on Paul's words to the Corinthians: Jews demand signs, Greeks wisdom, I proclaim Christ crucified. There's a word for us in this as it relates to how we hold and display our political theology.
Maybe your are more blessed, not walking around with the moral injury I have as I see what free-market neoliberalism does, the inequality, those in my urban city that are so self-absorbed, and now the push to fascism that reflects extreme cruelty. Yes, we have no party that is going to remedy this free-market destruction, and I have always tried to be tolerant but mine only goes so far in terms of watching people and the planet be so beaten down. How should we react when people support someone that will do so much damage? I may be quiet or polite, wanting to keep the relationship, or sensing that it won't matter what I say, but my body does cry out.. and sometimes I now sense there is a numbing.. and that is probably worse.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts Dr. Beck! And I bet your classes are popular on campus. People don't learn what a teacher has to offer unless they believe themselves to be in a safe place. After reading Camp's Scandalous Witness, I tend to lean toward the idolatry diagnosis. Is that passing judgment? Or is it inspecting fruit?