Have you ever felt like you annoyed
people? More to the point, have you ever kept your distance from
people to make sure that you didn't annoy them? Most people can
pretty much tell when they've outstayed their welcome, and know
instinctively when to back off. It's actually quite the gift, in my
opinion, to be able to read people in this way, and it's something
which the majority of people in this world unjustifiably take for
granted.
Having spent the majority of my life
living with Asperger's, I've also spent most of my life not being
able to instinctively know when my presence is not wanted. After my
treatments, it is a gift that I now never take for granted. But
throughout most of my life, I just came to assume that my presence
wasn't welcome unless it was directly stated, and even then I felt
like I could never be certain, and so even when people would
encourage me in this way, because I could not read them, after a
little while I would try to politely keep my distance in some way.
This morning, as I drifted on the edge
between conscious and unconscious thought, I realized I was doing
this same thing with God. I had been so conditioned throughout my
life to keep my distance and to not be an unintentional nuisance to
people that I have been unconsciously doing the same thing with God.
Somewhere on the edge of my conscious thought, the enemy has been
whispering something like, “don't get too close. You don't want to
annoy Him until He tells you to leave.”
The lie to this is that He won't ever
tell me to leave if I continuously call on Him, and bug Him, and talk
to Him, and so on. It would run completely contrary to His “treatment
plan” for not only myself, but everyone. In order for us to achieve
union with Him, we must draw closer to Him and stay close to Him, not
politely keep our distance. He knows this, and He wants this for
everyone, including me. The explicit command of Jesus Christ was
“Remain in Me” and He went on to spell out what happened if a
person didn't, and what was possible if a person did. I know all
these things, but no one gets over decades of conditioning overnight.
Part of my hesitancy to draw closer to
Him is also simple, or not so simple fear of relationship because of
my Asperger's past. It's nowhere near as apparent or as strong as it
was, but I realized today that it is still there. It is a fear of not
knowing what to do or how to act. It is a fear of not understanding
how to just be around and enjoy someone else's presence.
Relationships are awkward and uncomfortable at best, even if they're
what you might want most in the world.
As I look back, it has been almost five
years now since my treatments. I had thought I was past all of these
things, but the truth is that they are still deeply embedded and
ingrained into my psyche even if there are no “physical” reasons
for them. They're there because they are the ways I was conditioned
to think by my disorder and how the people around me reacted to my
disorder, and even if they no longer affect my relationships with
other people as much, they do still affect my relationship with God
more than I realized.
This isn't something which can be fixed
overnight, but must be changed through reconditioning, and this takes
time. God knows this, and I know He isn't impatient with my apparent
lack of progress. As long as I continue to try and make progress He
continues to encourage and push me farther. As long as I continue to
move towards Him and not away from Him, He's good with it. He knows
me. He created me and has intimate knowledge of every particle,
pathway, impulse, and dimension of my existence.
But there is always the voice. Not the
still, small voice, but either the unconscious whisper or the alarm
bell yelling in my mind that continues to tell me lies that I have
been conditioned to drift towards my whole life. I consciously or
unconsciously expect a certain reality and the demon reinforces it
with its lies. As a result, I begin to warp my own reality by my
assent to the belief which the demon is reinforcing with its lie. The
Fathers of the Philokalia described this as well. Demons will tell
you what you want to hear or what you're afraid to hear and you
believe it thus making it the reality you experience regardless of
actual reality.
I am reminded, in some ways, of the
ways in which the “Mist” is described in the recent Rick Riordan
book, “The House of Hades.” The easiest and most effective way,
this book reveals, to manipulate the Mist (the unseen field which
warps the reality of ordinary mortals, demigods, and sometimes
immortals so that they don't see the reality of the supernatural
world around them), is to try and make someone believe that what they
expect to happen, what they want to happen, or what they are afraid
will happen is happening.
Fighting this constant manipulation by
the unseen, unbalanced, and malevolent powers is long, tiresome, and
never ending work. It requires knowing yourself and not being afraid
to really examine what you are actually believing, what your actual
desires are, and not being afraid to delve into the dark, sometimes
very dark parts of who you are because these are the parts of
yourself that contain the things you don't want to think about and
don't want to believe about yourself and so you ignore them. Don't
delude yourself into thinking that the enemy ignores them too. These
are the places demons read like best selling novels, and then repeats
back to you as “facts”. This is why those same Fathers of the
desert were adamant in their admonitions to guard your heart and
mind, and to never let down that guard.
Even knowing this, it's ridiculously
easy to do. Distractions from prayer and spiritual devotions, mental
and emotional exhaustion, and so on all tend to wear you down until
you let down your guard and the enemy takes full advantage with
little lies, or big ones dressed up as your fondest wishes or worst
nightmares. Giving your assent to them warps your reality further
until you can no longer sense His presence because you no longer
believe He wants anything to do with you and belief (which produces
action) is everything in this very high stakes game. Thus the reason
why Jesus gave the command “Remain in Me,” and the reason why
demons focus all of their attacks on keeping you from doing it.
Always remember what the Apostle John
wrote in his first letter. If we make confession, He will forgive. If
we turn our movement away from Him around into movement towards Him
He will rejoice and run towards us. Be watchful. Be mindful. Stay
alert. These are the things the demons don't want you doing.
