Delusions

I watched the movie “A Beautiful Mind” the other day.

The brilliant man in the movie went a little crazy, he saw and heard people that weren’t there. Those delusions became his mechanisms for getting through life. His mind and its dysfunctional patterns got away from him.

Finally at a desperate point he was forced to look hard to find the flaw in his reality—he was about to lose everything. He then made the incredibly difficult choice to every day pass on what he felt and saw, on what seemed to be working for him, the alternate reality that for so long comforted him and made him feel important.

It’s not that different than what we all have to do if we want to get past our bunk and dysfunctional mechanisms--discern what is real, then choose to pass over and over on things that aren’t. Like the man in the movie, we have to say “no” to our own delusions; else we too are carried deeper into our own dysfunctional patterns, our own brand of crazy. It doesn’t matter that we can see and feel them, that they make us feel important or that they seem to be getting us through this difficult life.

That’s faith—believing there’s something worth that painful journey…There is hope for change, it matters what we do, and there is more to life than what we see.

The man in the movie also added healthy patterns to his life: He became part of a community, developed some attachments to people to “elbow out the delusions.” He had to quit treating his delusions as real; quit talking to them, quit giving them his time and attention…quit feeding them. He replaced time spent on them with real, hard work. He also had the love and care of someone who believed in him and affirmed his right steps. Maybe no one does it alone.

He never got completely free of his delusions, we rarely get miraculously healed, although we're taught to pray and wait for it. No one tells us instead we have to face down the delusions and “elbow them out."

Every damn day.