Dexter

NOTE: This reflection is very personal. It is not referenced to one specific scripture passage, but comes out of my philosophical assumptions about Christ-like character. Names and details have been disguised to protect the guilty.

I have to make a decision soon and it is not a decision I would have chosen to make. It doesn’t please me very much. A friend of mine, who I am going to call Dexter (because I don’t have any friends called Dexter and don’t even think I know anybody called Dexter) had made a commitment to me. Admittedly it was a two way thing, I had made a commitment to Dexter as well. I thought things were going to work out well and that it was going to be to our mutual advantage.

But the arrangement we had didn’t seem to give Dexter everything he wanted out of the deal. So he decided to pull the plug on it and there is no going back, unfortunately. His mind is made up. He told me he’s given up on the arrangement. Like most partnerships, it requires the cooperation of both parties to make it work. When one stops making his or her contribution, there’s nothing the other can do to keep the thing afloat.

So what is the decision I have in front of me? Well I can respond to this whole situation one of two ways. I can feel disappointment and hurt or I can get angry. I’m weighing the options here. If I get angry, basically I give Dexter power over me, at least my emotional state. I make him responsible for my happiness.

At the same time, I confess that it gives me a short-term feeling of control. When I’m yelling at him and expressing my frustration, he’s at a disadvantage. But knowing this guy, he’s just as likely to turn it around on me and I am going to end up apologizing to him for getting mad at him. So that would make it all worse for me – not only would I feel angry with him, I’d be made to feel bad for that. Dexter’s likely to act very negatively because he’s the kind of guy who has never made a mistake in his life. It’s not really that he’s never made a mistake; it’s just he's sure he's never made a mistake - except possibly getting into this arrangement we had.

While being made to apologize for my own legitimate frustration over his spoiling our agreement is troublesome, it doesn’t touch the main issue of my giving him control of the situation. When I do that, in effect I’m saying, “You’ve really hurt me and now it’s your job to fix things up and make me feel better.” The fact is that Dexter couldn’t care less about fixing things up. He knows that I’m still committed, so he can take what he wants from what I have to offer, but doesn’t feel obligated to put anything back in. All this is justified by his conviction that our arrangement doesn’t give him everything he thought it would when we struck the deal and shook hands.

If I give him permission to be in total control of the situation I am setting myself up for serious long term frustration. If I get angry with Dexter and just hold that, I’ve permanently handed over control of my life to him. If on the other hand I can just accept the pain, then I keep control of it. I keep control of my response to the situation and, right now, all that’s left to do is to respond to the situation because the arrangement is shot. He’s already given up on it. There’s no point in trying to talk him back in to it.

Now, feeling pain is not my favorite thing to do. I’ve had physical pain and I’ve felt emotional pain and I don’t like either. But absorbing the wrong and feeling the pain is probably the more beneficial thing to me as a Christian. I don’t know that anybody ever became seriously more like Jesus by flying off the handle and being angry because somebody was hurting them.

I think I have become more like Jesus when I’ve accepted the pain that people have dished out to me and accepted it for what it was. All my suffering comes as the consequence of sin - sometimes sin in my own life, sometimes sin on their part. But I think that understanding how I am feeling as a consequence of sin is a better option than getting angry and making others responsible for my happiness. After all, most people couldn’t care less about my emotional state. They may sympathize, but they don’t feel responsible.

So today I am seriously contemplating just taking the pain. It wouldn’t be my first choice. I would love to have kept this arrangement with Dexter, but it isn’t going to happen so it’s time to move on. The only way to move on is to own it, forgive him and take the next step, whatever that step might be for me.

Ron Hughes
© March 2007