{"id":10981,"date":"2017-01-12T19:27:56","date_gmt":"2017-01-13T03:27:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dminlgp.com\/?p=10981"},"modified":"2017-01-12T19:27:56","modified_gmt":"2017-01-13T03:27:56","slug":"bursting-the-bubble","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/bursting-the-bubble\/","title":{"rendered":"Bursting the “Bubble”"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n\"\"<\/a>Introduction<\/strong><\/p>\n

It was good to step out of the \u201cbubble\u201d of my professional, protected, pompous life and read, The Social Animal <\/em>by David Brooks.\u00a0 Brooks said, \u201cPeople gravitate toward people like themselves.\u00a0 When we meet new people, we instantly start matching our behavior to theirs.\u201d[1]<\/a>\u00a0 Jumping into the two fictitious characters of the book, Erica and Harold, I became immersed into the world of people that my profession is trying to reach.<\/p>\n

As a pastor, I can become immersed and gravitate toward people just like us.\u00a0 Being intentional about reaching and touching the unsaved world around us is a mandate from our boss and Savior.\u00a0 Jesus would have connected with Erica and Harold.\u00a0 Brooks awakened a world around me that is quite different from my \u201cbubble\u201d of Christian life.\u00a0 It caused me to ask how I am doing with the \u201cHarold\u2019s and Erica\u2019s\u201d around me?<\/p>\n

Brooks said, \u201cWe spend large parts of our lives trying to get other to accept our patterns \u2013 and trying to resist this sort of mental hegemony from others.\u00a0 On a broader scale, people don\u2019t just connect; they compete to connect. \u00a0We compete against one another to win the prestige and respect and attention that will help us bond with one another.\u201d[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Summary<\/strong><\/p>\n

David Brooks does an exceptional job making two people become real.\u00a0 He follows the ancestry and family dynamics of their parents and then takes us from their birth to their meeting that culminated in a life together.\u00a0 Brooks doesn\u2019t just tell a nonfictional story about the lives of two people.\u00a0 He goes deeper.\u00a0 Brooks said, \u201c\u2026I am going to tell you about these two happy people from the perspective of this enchanted inner life.\u201d[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

This \u201cenchanted inner life\u201d was Brooks\u2019 attempt to show us what he calls the \u201cunconscious system\u201d.\u00a0 \u201cI want to show you what this unconscious system looks like when it is flourishing, when the affections and aversions that guide us every day have been properly nurtured, the emotions properly educated.\u201d[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

Brooks leads us through the reality of Erica and Harold\u2019s lives, but he goes beneath the obvious and reveals the unconscious realities that shape them, and in reality, shape us.\u00a0 \u201cThe unconscious in not merely a dark, primitive zone of fear and pain.\u00a0 It is also a place where spiritual states arise and dance from soul to soul.\u00a0 It collects the wisdom of the ages.\u201d[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Analysis<\/strong>
\n\"\"<\/a>At times The Social Animal <\/em>is raw.\u00a0 It reveals the \u201cbehind the scenes\u201d of the unconscious realities that Harold and Erica face.\u00a0 The angst of youth, the adultery of adulthood, the anger of family heritage, and the adversity of relationships that shift so quickly.\u00a0 Brooks doesn\u2019t just \u201ctell\u201d us about these two, he draws us into their psychic, motivations, and morals that direct their journey.<\/p>\n

As you read The Social Animal, <\/em>you began to immerse yourself in their lives from a deeper concept than conversational.\u00a0 You find yourself engaging with their lives and Brooks giving you the intellectual dialogue as you writhe from success to failure.\u00a0 But is that enough to cause us to step outside our \u201cbubble\u201d and find Harold and Erica and affect them with truth that comes from Jesus Christ?<\/p>\n

Brooks stated, \u201c\u2026if reasoning led to moral behavior, then those who could reach moral conclusions would be able to apply their knowledge across a range of circumstances, based on these universal moral laws.\u00a0 But in reality, it has been hard to find this sort of consistency.\u201d[6]<\/a>\u00a0 At this point of The Social Animal<\/em> I was torn inside.\u00a0 Am I delivering every week a message that is more than just good reasoning?\u00a0 There is a universal \u201ctruth\u201d that is in Jesus Christ that the people that I speak to, the Harold\u2019s and Erica\u2019s in my congregation, need to know about.<\/p>\n

Thank you, David Brooks, for bursting my \u201cbubble\u201d again and giving me a heart for every Harold and Erica that I get a chance to impact.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> David Brooks, The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, <\/em>(New York:\u00a0 Random House, 2011), 211.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Ibid., 213.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Ibid., xii.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Ibid., xii.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Ibid., xvii.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Ibid., 282.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Introduction It was good to step out of the \u201cbubble\u201d of my professional, protected, pompous life and read, The Social Animal by David Brooks.\u00a0 Brooks said, \u201cPeople gravitate toward people like themselves.\u00a0 When we meet new people, we instantly start matching our behavior to theirs.\u201d[1]\u00a0 Jumping into the two fictitious characters of the book, Erica […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":68,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[167,780],"class_list":["post-10981","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-brooks","tag-bubble","cohort-lgp6"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10981","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/68"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10981"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10981\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10981"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10981"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10981"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}