therapy

My value is not contingent upon my usefulness

I have a friend who frequently calls me to tell me how overwhelmed he is and, ironically, I allow this to overwhelm me. This is one of the challenges of being an empathetic person. I feel what others are feeling and often have a difficult time separating their feelings from my own. I call this being emotionally porous.

I’m learning to look for the space between other people’s feelings and my own, however. I’m starting to understand that, even if I can feel what they feel, I am not obligated to take action, to offer advice, or to try to solve every problem within my vicinity. But this has been a long, painful process. 

After much reflection and discussion with people more well-equipped to understand these things than I, namely my therapist and my spiritual director, I have found there are many reasons why, in the past, I have felt so driven by some overwhelming invisible force to try to fix every problem presented to me. All of these reasons point back to one thing, however, and that one thing is fear. 

For whatever reason, I have a deeply seated fear that, I am only worthy of love to the degree that I am able to fix everything and everyone around me. It’s not my essence or my nature as a human being that makes me lovable. Rather it is my ability to solve other people’s problems. 

This belief that I am only lovable to the degree that I am useful, I have discovered, is at the root of much of my restlessness, anxiety, and insecurity. While this self-belief seemed, in the twisted way that an abusive relationship seems to be normal when one is in the midst of it, to serve me for some time, for most of my life in fact, when it started causing me more problems than it was solving, something had to change. 

But change of this sort is rarely, easy. To stop doing something one has done for most of one’s life doesn’t usually happen all at once. It’s a slow, arduous process. Along with therapy, spiritual direction, and prayer, I can honestly say that the most profoundly perspective altering practice I have ever taken up in this regard has been meditation in the form of centering or contemplative prayer. 

While therapy has helped me to understand why I have these unhealthy tendencies, spiritual direction has helped me to see that other people’s problems are neither my fault nor my responsibility, and prayer has brought me into a relationship with a God who can and wants to change me into a healthier, happier version of myself, centering prayer has created the space within my heart and mind to make growth possible. 

The fascinating thing is that centering prayer, or any form of meditation, does not address the issue directly. Instead, through regular practice, it simply gives one more internal space, a buffer of peace if you will, between stimulus and response. By regularly practicing silence and non-attachment to my thoughts and feelings, I don’t always feel the overwhelming urge to respond to the problems presented to me like I once did. 

Of course, my old habits and patterns still come up. They are rooted deeply in my psyche and those roots are difficult to dig up. When they do, however, I can better see them for what they are. That is to say, I am able to see that these thoughts and feelings are just thoughts and feelings. They are not who I am. 

As a result, my relationships are starting to feel healthier. I can listen to problems without making them my own and without feeling the need to solve them or give advice. Not only that, but I no longer feel guilty about letting someone else have their own problems. As much as I am not my own thoughts and feelings, I am beginning to realize that my value is not tied to my usefulness to others. 

My value is God-given, as I am a child of God created in God’s very own image and likeness. It is not what I do, what I think, or how I feel that gives value to who I am. There are no conditions on God’s love for me. I am his child, his creation, and his beloved, and my very existence is a divine gift to be cherished and appreciated for the very fact that it is from God. I am not lovable because of what I do. I am lovable because I am. 

Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity

To read my poetry and shorter writing, please visit Meditations of a Gentle Warrior and subscribe to receive my daily meditations in your inbox. 

Grappling with mental, emotional, and spiritual health issues

In Brazilian jiu-jitsu, a martial art most well known for specializing in ground grappling, the goal is to pin and control your opponent and then submit them with either a joint lock or a strangulation. John Danaher, who many consider the sport’s greatest coach, describes it as “The art of control that leads to submission.” Greg Souders, another prevalent voice in the sport, describes jiu-jitsu as “The game of immobilization as it leads to strangulation and breaking.” 

However one chooses to describe it, the general idea of jiu-jitsu is the same: take your opponent to the ground and, using superior angles, positioning, and leverage, make it difficult or impossible for them to escape. Then, isolate and attack their arm, leg, or neck, and apply sufficient force to either break said arm or leg or cut off the blood or oxygen supply through the neck until your opponent taps in submission. 

Of course, this is all easier said than done. Every advantage must be earned when dealing with a fully resisting opponent or training partner. The person you are trying to pin and submit is also trying to pin and submit you. It’s a constant struggle. It’s a battle of wills as much as it’s a battle of skill, pride, strategy, and athleticism. Everything in jiu-jitsu matters, and nothing in jiu-jitsu is easy. That’s one of the reasons it is such a rewarding practice to participate in. 

With this in mind, a shared joke in jiu-jitsu is to yell, “Just stand up!” When someone is pinned and struggling to escape, it’s simple advice but often quite difficult to act on, especially against a resisting opponent and the force of gravity working against you. For this reason, “Just stand up!” is often said with sarcasm and received with scorn or laughter, depending on the recipient’s mood. 

Much like “Just stand up!” in jiu-jitsu is absurd advice to give someone who is pinned under a resisting opponent, “Just get over it!” is ridiculous advice to give to a person suffering from grief, depression, anxiety, trauma, addiction, or some other psycho-emotional ailment. While it may seem like helpful advice from the onlooker’s perspective, it is often less than useless for the person struggling with whatever issues they are experiencing. These usually well-intentioned comments can even exacerbate the recipient’s mental, emotional, or spiritual health issues by diminishing their seriousness and making it seem as though it is merely a lack of effort that is preventing them from being overcome. 

Like jiu-jitsu, our mental, emotional, and spiritual health is complicated. Many forces are working against us as we try to persevere through this thing we call life. While those of us being pinned by another jiu-jitsu practitioner would love to “Just stand up!” and those of us grappling with mental, emotional, and spiritual health issues would love to “Just get over it!” there’s usually more to it than that. As hard as we are fighting, our opponent is also fighting back, and sometimes we are outmatched. 

Sometimes, our opponent is bigger, stronger, faster, or more skilled than us, and we cannot escape our difficulties alone. Sometimes, we need help. This is true in both jiu-jitsu and in life. No one ever became a jiu-jitsu world champion without a coach, or several coaches, and a variety of skilled training partners. If you are struggling with mental or emotional health issues, don’t assume you can do it alone, either. 

When I was at my absolute lowest in my addiction, I had to come to accept that I could not overcome my problem by myself. I needed help. My parents helped me get into rehab. The rehab facility helped me get into a halfway house. The halfway house helped get me in touch with people who could lead me out of addiction and into a spiritual experience that would solve my problem. It took the proverbial village to raise me from spiritual, emotional, and psychological death. 

Likewise, many years later, when I finally admitted that I was struggling with anxiety and depression, I didn’t simply “muscle my way out of it.” I couldn’t. I couldn’t “Just stand up!” and “Just get over it!” I couldn’t do it alone; once again, I needed help. I needed my wife’s support to work through my issues; I needed friends who had been through similar problems and who could recommend good therapists; I required the therapists themselves, and finally, but most importantly, I needed God to guide me through all of this as I found my way back to him. 

Whatever you are grappling with, whether it is another person or your demons, know that you are not the first to struggle with this issue; you won’t be the last person to do so, and you are not alone. Countless other people have had whatever problem you are having and are willing to help you. Don’t waste your time trying to “Just stand up!” or “Just get over it!” You can’t. I couldn’t. We can’t. 

We all need help, and we all need each other. I love you, and we love you. Please do not give up. You are truly not alone. 

Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity

To read my poetry and shorter writing, please visit Meditations of a Gentle Warrior and subscribe to receive my daily meditations in your inbox.