Today I want to address the issue of bringing congruence into our lives. Striving for congruence is closing the gap between who we are and who we will really like to be. It is striving to live in keeping with our inner values. It is striving to lead from above the moral line. As a human being, I am sure that you have a desire to be good and to be seen to be good, even though you may be engaged in activities and behaviours to the contrary. We love to protect our supposedly good character and we have a tendency to take umbrage at any one who dares to tarnish our character, even when their observations may be true. Every human being is blessed with the innate capacity to be good and has a strong desire to be good. We have an inherent understanding that a moral line exists and we have a desire to be above that line. However, the life we are living may be in contradiction to the life we will like to live.
Often, we try our best to project an image of perfection to the world around us even when we know that our behaviours and our actions are not in keeping with what we truly want for ourselves. In other words, there is a lack of congruence between who we are and who we will like to be. This lack of congruence brings on feelings of discomfort, discontent, guilt, shame and embarrassment and generates much internal turbulence. We sense and feel this inner confusion and it drains us of our confidence and the extent to which we can trust ourselves. In a sense, we are disappointed in our own selves because we know we can do better; hence, we frequently make resolutions such as at the beginning of the year or when we participate in religious services. And, as we are all aware, many of these resolutions, if not all, can remain unfulfilled throughout most of our lives. We genuinely want to be otherwise and we continue to make promises to ourselves to change for the better.
We are frustrated when we revert to our old behaviours and habits, and it is not that we want to be bad or evil but because we lack the inner strength to be the person that we feel we can be. When we fail at being who we will like to be, we often resort to pretending to be that better person anyway. We pretend to be better than we really are to our children, to our friends and to all with whom we interact. Our whole lives can become one big, fat lie. Thus lying becomes an entrenched habit. And sadly, despite the obvious, we can fall into a state of self-delusion in believing that our character is not all that bad. The consequences of existing in this state of self-delusion can be disastrous to our emotional health. We live in fear that the truth of our lives may be found out especially by those who are dearest to us, such as our children, our spouse/partner our close friends, our boss and our employees.
This fear, when combined with our feelings of guilt and shame, takes away our peace of mind and makes it impossible for us to find contentment and happiness in our lives. Further, we can become highly stressed and develop severe health complications. When we live our lives with fear we are vulnerable to being exploited by others which further adds to our feelings of insecurity. We are more prone to look externally to find our joy and happiness and can fall victim to alcohol and drugs and can engage in irresponsible sexual behaviours. We can feel our lives slipping away and despite our intent and resolutions to take corrective action, we can fall into a state of helplessness and hopelessness. We have an obligation to ourselves and to our families to free ourselves from this internal torture and to find our inner peace so that we can live more healthy and fulfilled lives. When we bring congruence into our lives we live truthfully and better command the respect of our children, spouses, friends and colleagues. Thus, when we defend our character we are defending the truth of ourselves and not the lie.
Sometimes we even go to great lengths to justify our more obvious negative behaviours. Two common justifications are: "I have no choice" and "Everybody is doing it." Implied in the statement "I have no choice" is our wish to be able to make better choices. In other words, we are doing things that we know are wrong and not in keeping with the values by which we will like to live but we lack the moral courage to be the person that we will really like to be. In such situations, we want congruence but we lack the inner strength to make the moral choice. The statement "Everybody is doing it" is giving leave to the great human beings we will like to be and becoming part of the crowd although in our hearts we dislike the behaviours that we see.
Again, we quietly long to have the moral courage to do otherwise.
Failure to live by our intended values is not an excuse to give up trying because with every effort to become better we advance along the path of bringing greater self-control into our lives. Regular introspection puts us in closer and regular touch with our inner selves. It serves as a constant reminder of the values by which we will like to live. Introspection helps us to strengthen our commitment to live the values that will help us to be the persons of great character that we treasure and intuitively seek to protect. Introspection helps us to find moral clarity, to know a moral line exists and to know that we all have a desire to be above that line. The programme Leading From Above the Line seeks to help us to find greater clarity in our lives and to achieve congruence between our inner values and the life that we live from day to day.
Dr Theodore Ferguson is the developer of the Leading From Above The Line programme. The next free one-day Introspective Retreat is on Sunday 3rd October 2010 at the Asa Wright Nature Centre. For further information, please visit: www.theoferguson.com or call Hyacinth at 662-5967 or email to retreat@theoferguson.com