I actually caught myself this morning arguing with myself about how my meditation technique was better than a friend’s. Then, a moment later (of course), I was worried that his might be better than mine. Unbelievable!
Preferences are fine if I wear them like old tennis shoes, placing no value in them aside from their comfort, willing to trade them in for newer, or shinier, or just different preferences whenever necessary. Or just when it's fun.
But the minute I think a preference IS ME, I’m in for trouble. Big trouble. The minute I think my preference for shoes is
Better or Nicer,
Truer or Holier,
Smarter or More Kind,
than his or hers or theirs, I have stepped out of my shoes and into God’s.
You will find this is not a good place to be.
From shoes, let us move into areas more and more charged with dangerous implications. For example, notice how our preferences in:
Neighborhood,
Sports Teams,
Food,
Economic Strata,
Profession,
Politics,
Sexual Orientation, or
Religion, seem to get more and more “important” as the list advances.
Again: preferences seem inevitable: I gotta choose one car over another when the old Chevy dies, right? But it’s my investment in them that has to be monitored. If I chuckle about my car or my church preference vis‑a‑vis my neighbor’s, that’s okay. But if I envy him because his job seems more glamorous than mine, get depressed because "my life doesn't make a difference," it’s time for some homework.
Here's the homework.
And if you ever do a survey,
you’ll find that people prefer
illusion to reality; ten to one.
Twenty, even.
Judith Guest
Every man prefers belief
to the exercise of judgment.
Seneca