Why You Shouldn’t Place Your Identity in Your Ideas

The great entitlement of the 21st century is the assumption that we can and must share our opinion with the general public. Thomas Jefferson, who was famous for reinventing himself to advance his ambitions, would be put to shame today by anyone with a Facebook page or blog. Public relations work is a full-time job for many of us, and we have only one client: ourselves.

Our “work” is facilitated by the proliferation of ways we can share our feelings, our accomplishments, our tastes, and our grievances. We have blogs for our thoughts, Facebook for our screeds, twitter for our “hot takes.”

Self-representation is just part of our lives.

But what does it do to our spirit?

Never in human history has the average person had such easy access to sharing her thoughts with the general public. Such a drastic shift in how we interact with each other and the world has to affect us in ways we have not fully come to terms with yet.

What is apparent to me, because I’ve battled with it myself, is that this easy assumption that we must share our thoughts and “shape our brand” can lead to an overvaluing of our opinions. When we spend so much time representing ourselves, we can’t help but place some of our identity in what we think and how we are perceived.

I do not think this is sustainable.

Economists talk about how the modern American economy has basically been a boom-and-bust economy. We overinvest in a sector, and make our economy dependent on it, so that when that sector crashes not only is that investment lost, but also the entire economy suffers. In the 1990s we had the tech bubble; in the 2000s it was the housing bubble.

In economics, and in life, there really can be too much of a good thing.

I believe that an “identity bubble” is forming in this decade. We pour so much of our aspirations into our own creativity and reputation when we should know better: Like any other bubble, the identity bubble will burst. We are not our best hope.

How do we stop the boom-and-bust cycle?

The fortunate thing is that we are not passive players in this story.

Spiritual disciplines offer us tools. This 21st-century problem can be fought with old practices: prayer, fasting, Sabbath, silence, and solitude. All of these disciplines condition us to rely on God’s power and who He is, rather than our own power and the false identities we put on to impress others or feed our ego.

There is another counter-cultural step we can take today: a 21st century spiritual discipline. I call it the spiritual discipline of representing another.

You see, I used to work in government.

My job was to represent a politician’s view—not my own. I could not write or speak in public about my own views, because my job was in service of another.

Politics is not the only job where this is the case: really anyone who is not self-employed has an obligation that supersedes our own personal opinion on every matter—even if we ignore that obligation.

What would it look like for you to lend your voice to represent someone other than yourself?

Perhaps it means siding with your spouse in a discussion even if you might not see an issue precisely their way. Or it could lead you to take a position on an issue that benefits the oppressed or unheard, even if that position might have a negative consequence for yourself.

Perhaps…

If we can allow ourselves to represent someone else’s opinion, we will begin to realize that our value is not based in how many people agree with us, or how many “likes” our Facebook posts get.

There is more to life than simply being right. There is certainly more to following Jesus than simply holding the right opinion.

So much of our culture tells us exactly the opposite, which is why we need to actively cultivate right thinking through thoughtful, constructive action. Through prayer, fasting, solitude, silence, Sabbath and, perhaps, representing another, we can counter the lie that our ideas are what matter most about us; we can find comfort in a God whose love and compassion are beyond our understanding.

Why You Shouldn’t Place Your Identity in Your Ideas is a post from: Storyline Blog