Stay and Grow
A wise man introduced me to a book called “Dedicated” by Pete Davis. I got the audiobook version and listened to it this morning on my way to work. I am captivated already! He zooms in on something he sees as a defining characteristic of our day and age: Keeping one’s options open. It comes down to a refusal to commit. He describes it as a “liquid modernity” we all seems to suffer from. Especially younger people don’t want to be tied down by a career. They therefore hop from job to job…but also from partner to partner and place to place. Everybody seems to seek out a big adventure to live rather than what they consider the ordinary, run-of-the-mill kind of life.
And yet…the people we admire most seem to be the people that did the very opposite. Our heart warms when we read about a couple that stayed married for 70 years. We erect statues of people that committed their lives to causes and communities (and yes tear them down if something comes to light that shows they were not as committed as they seemed to be). The less people believe and refrain from committing to a local and organized form of religion, the more they seem to want there to be people that still really believe and practice faith. I have experienced this firsthand. When I occasionally wear my clerical collar out in public, the most admiration and respect I get is from people like atheists and those unaffiliated with a church. Even though they do not know the content of my faith (or perhaps disagree with its truth claims), they respect the commitment involved in identifying with a faith tradition publicly.
I most certainly recognize myself in what he is describing. Especially in my younger years, I moved around a lot. The idea of sticking with one group of people in one place for a full life time scared me beyond words. I would nitpick examples of people in communities that are stuck and resentful and use them to justify me having to move on. I feared stagnation. Stagnation is a real possibility when one stays put but so is growth, relational depth and reward. I turned a blind eye to all those.
Now entering the second half of my life (arrogantly and hopefully assuming I have half of my life left) what I once avoided has become what I aspire to. “Fabulous last words”, I can hear my wife say who bravely and sometimes reluctantly jumped places and even a continent with me. But I am going to try. I don’t want to go to the other extreme. A commitment to stay at all costs is too simplistic and problematic. Sometimes circumstances beyond our control can make the current places we find ourselves at dangerous ones to stay put in. Sometimes a commitment to a singe cause or organization requires you to move to different places. A commitment to stay must be complimented by a second one: to grow. I have met people who stayed but ceased to grow and I secretly wished they moved so that they could grow. I have also met people who grew but never rooted that growth in a community where it could bear real fruit and benefit those around them. The best people I have met were people that stayed put but grew as strongly as they were anchored. I want to be ambitious, or fool hearted enough to strive for both anchors and growth.
A Rolling Stone might gather some fans, but a rolling stone does not gather moss. Moss is good. Moss grow, cools and makes beautiful. To what place, cause, trade, people do you commit to? What do you do to stint liquid modernity?
Gabriel J Snyman
June 18th 2021