Unitarian Universalist Church of Palo Alto

Reflection: Paradoxical Commandments

Susan Owicki
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Palo Alto, CA

I like the spirit of these paradoxical commandments (and in case you weren’t counting, there are ten of them).

I think you can interpret them in two ways. One is that you have to be willing to do the right thing, no matter how hard it is. That seems admirable, but also a bit daunting. So I like to take them in a more playful spirit. These commandments talk about a lot of bad outcomes, but notice that most of them imaginary.

Like “Give the world the best you have and youÕll get kicked in the teeth.” That kick in the teeth could happen. But at the time when you are deciding whether to give the world your best, the kick is all in your imagination. So I like to think of these commandments as variations on the theme: Don’t let your imagination scare you out of doing something good.

Now I speak as one whose imagination has done that any number of times. Working on this reflection made me remember a time when I was helped by a commandment very much like the ones I just read.

This was about 15 years ago. I was working in a high-tech firm. The place had a pretty competitive spirit, not mean, but a lot of jockeying for position. Although I had worked in that kind of atmosphere a lot, I was realizing more and more how much I didn’t like it. I also began to notice how much it got in the way of doing my job.

Here’s what would happen. I would need something from someone else — advice, resources, information, whatever. I would think about asking for it, and my imagination would take off. Maybe my request would be ignored, or rejected, or ridiculed. Maybe I would end up looking stupid or feeling inadequate. A barrier of fear would rise in my mind. Sometimes I would get past that barrier without too much trouble. At other times, though, I would delay or find excuses not to do what I needed to do.

As I got clearer on how my fears were getting in my way, an odd conviction took hold. I began to think that it was just plain wrong of me to let myself be blocked like that. I was getting paid to do a job and I needed to do it. There wasn’t any room for debate.

As that conviction grew, things changed. When I knew I should ask for something, my imagination still created fearful images. But now I had my own personal paradoxical commandment. It said: If you ask for what you need, you may end up feeling like a loser. Ask anyway.

That commandment turned out to be remarkably empowering. Somehow, once I accepted it, it trumped the fears in my imagination. I didn’t have to decide what I would do each time fear arose, because the decision was already made. It got me right past the barrier.

So I started being braver and asking for more. Did I find that all the things I imagined were crazy? No. As I said, it was a competitive place. Sometimes I did get unpleasant responses, and I did end up feeling like a loser. But not as often as I feared. And, because I was asking for a lot more, I ended up getting a lot more. So the bad times didn’t matter all that much.

I wish I could say that I learned a lesson there that lasted the rest of my life. But once I left the job, I forgot about the power of that commandment. In fact, on Wednesday, my covenant group was discussing procrastination, and I owned up to how the fears in my imagination were keeping me from working on this reflection.

Thinking back to that job, I realize that it was awfully nice feeling that empowered. Maybe I need to find another paradoxical commandment.

 

Text of the Paradoxical Commandments by Kent M. Keith