Monthly Archives: September 2022

“Getting Over the Attachment to Feeling Good”

On September 2, 2022 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“It’s strange how I know that discomfort and suffering always passes, but when I’m in it, it really feels like all that exists and ever will exist is discomfort. I need to work on my attachment to feeling good. It’s dangerous for me. But everything passes, and I think the real “goal” is to just accept it all. Don’t wait. Turn away nothing. Welcome it all.” (Anonymous 12-step friend. Used with permission.)

We are probably created to feel good. There’s nothing wrong with that desire—except when there is. Like all desires, the desire to feel good can overflow its banks, and become a raging river that sweeps away everything in its path. Eventually, our desire to feel good can destroy us.

The word “attachment” is crucial in my 12-step friend’s sentence, “I need to work on my attachment to feeling good.” Feeling the desire to feel good—and actually feeling good—are not the problem. The attachment is. My problem is that I get attached to feeling good like a fly gets attached to a spider’s web. Eventually, the desire to feel good drains the very life blood out of all my goals and dreams, my values and good judgment.

So, what is to be done here? Should I just feel a low-grade depression in order to avoid the spider’s web? No, that is another web that I don’t want to get enmeshed in. So, what do I do??

What works for me (when I actually do it) is to feel what I feel. Feelings are like small children. They need positive, loving attention. But also, like little children, feelings change very rapidly. Feelings have feelings too, you know. If my feelings feel felt and seen and heard, they will be okay. And then, I need to let them go and run along.

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“The Process is the Miracle”

On September 2, 2022 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“Miracle is simply the religious name for event. Every event, even the most natural and usual, becomes a miracle, as soon as the religious view of it can be the dominant. To me all is miracle.” (Friedrich Schleiermacher, On Religion: Speeches to its Cultured Despisers)

(Source: https://quotepark.com/quotes/1723576-friedrich-schleiermacher-miracle-is-simply-the-religious-name-for-event-ev/, accessed 09-01-2022)

For me, process is itself a miracle. Let me explain.

I do believe that sometimes God interrupts the natural course of things and does something extraordinary. However, God has set the universe up as a place where things generally work according to regular (and fairly predictable) processes. Again, I am not saying that God doesn’t or can’t do miracles. I am simply saying that God doesn’t routinely do miracles. If God did that, we wouldn’t call it “miraculous”. We would call it “chaotic”.

In my case, process is the miracle. I am a fairly chaotic person. I am impulsive and sometimes downright lazy. I don’t like of to think my health in terms of diet and exercise. No, I’m not fond of processes at all!

So, when I actually go through a process—consistently and successfully—I call that “a miracle”. And it may well be a miracle. Even God may be amazed when I stick with a process.

Now, I am not opposed to praying for miracles, but maybe you are like me. Perhaps you too need to pray for the miracle of process.

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