Psychobabble

Lately I have come to see a trend in the Psych/Helps world. In the ever-so busy, too-much-on-the-schedule world that we live in, we are encouraged to draw boundaries so that the life will not be sucked out of us.

This has always been a foreign notion for me that we should guard ourselves from overcommitment. As I've learned to say "no" and to establish boundaries, I have found that I have been able to live more freely. But I think that I'm beginning to see that others may advocate taking boundaries much too far.

The latest example is in a small group where a new member shared that she felt isolated from the group and she began to tear up. The woman close to here mirrored her feelings as she expressed that she was sad that unbeknownst to the rest of us that one of our members felt this way. She shed a tear with the hurt woman and told her how she knew and hated the feeling of isoloation as well and she wanted to know what we as a group could to help. I turned to the group leaders to check in on how they were feeling. From experience I know that leaders can take too much guilt on themselves and would also need a helping hand. But oh that was not the case. On of the leader's announced that she "healthily" felt no ownership or sadness over the event.

I was terribly appalled! Yes, we should not beat ourselves up over hospitality, but we should at least be sensitive to others. I would argue that being so out of tune with others is a sign of unhealthiness. We can not go about living our own lives demanding "connection" with other people yet we refuse to empathize with them. We are not called to become Jesus, but we are called to carry one another's burdens. Scripture is clear on this point.

Another aspect that Scripture is clear about is that love of neighbor is supposed to stream from a connection with self. We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. The Scriptures that the New Testament verses come from are all in light of God's mercies toward us. Therefore our love of self and love of neighbor are meant to be channeled through God's love toward us.

As the Church, we must be diligent to notice when non-gospel wisdom begins to infiltrate our our world and even within our own theology.