Finding Safe Expression to Think and Feel

“We have to find a way of cussing without cussing.”

— Eugene Peterson

In a conversation between Peterson and U2 front man, Bono, at Peterson’s house in rural Montana, both are absorbed in discussing the Psalms; the realness presented in the Psalter by the protagonist writers.  There’s an honesty presented in the Psalms that warms humanity to the realness of God who is really aware of the realness of our pain.  And the Psalms do one more thing; they give us agency, which is the licence to cuss without cussing.

We must find safe expression for the violence
that boils away within us.

God wants us to find our way to healing by our thinking, breathing, feeling and being.  He doesn’t want us to pretend all is well when it isn’t.  If all is not well, it’s up to us to find a way of expressing the violence we feel we need to communicate.

If we don’t find expression for our violence, we will exact violent retribution over others.  Not that they’ve been party to making us violent; but they will suffer our wrath if we’re not aware of what we need to do.

We ought to pray that we become aware
of our need to find safe expression.

To think is to reflect with time and space and freedom.

To breathe is every human being’s prerogative, but too many of us are too stressed to breathe anything close to well enough.  We must find stillness of soul to breathe.

To feel is to feel every not-so-good emotion in the core of our soul.  We must give ourselves license to sit in the excrement of discomfort, and give safe expression to our truth.

To be is so underrated.  Being is so incredibly sophisticated.

When we give ourselves permission to feel,
we find God has already blessed us to feel.

© 2016 Steve Wickham.