Tag: attitude

Why don’t we change when we know we should?

“Change? We don’t want to change!” I was told. The message couldn’t be clearer. Arguing would have been pointless. But what I thought was ‘If you won’t change, then your group will die’.

For more than a year I’d been hearing complaints from the church women’s group that the younger ladies wouldn’t come to their meetings. In the distant past that women’s group had been relatively large, perhaps 40 or 50 attending each week. Every meeting followed the same pattern. Notices at the beginning, then a speaker, and after that tea and cake. Frankly, what mattered most was the tea and cake time, not for the refreshments but because that’s when they could chat to each other. The main reason many ladies attended was for ‘fellowship’ – being friends, sharing news, giving encouragement, asking for advice, and, so some said, staying up to date with the gossip. But the years had passed, and the oldest members had either died or were no longer able to come out on dark nights. The headcount had declined, down to about 15 on a good week. But the numbers of women in the church had grown, in fact grown a lot. The newcomers were younger, most with ages ranging from early twenties to late forties. Many were studying or working, often with long hours. Some had families. Others belonged to organisations not related to the church, and several went with friends or husbands to neighbourhood home group meetings. The traditional women’s group held little attraction for them.

But their absence didn’t go down well with the leaders of the women’s group. So, as pastor of the church, I decided to meet with them. The leaders didn’t hold back. The younger generation of women were letting them down. They should come to the meetings and swell their numbers. So I was told. Tactfully, I tried to explain that the younger ones lived such busy lives they didn’t feel able to add another meeting into their schedules. “But they should come,” they said. “They are women who belong to this church, so they should support the women’s group.” Summoning up the courage to be more direct, I explained that if, say, 30 of the younger ladies joined the women’s group, they’d outnumber the existing members by two to one, and they’d almost certainly vote for change. Which is when they replied “Change? We don’t want to change!”. And so our meeting ended, and within two years the women’s group had its final speaker, last cups of tea and slices of cake, locked the doors, and never met again.

It was obvious that they needed to change, but they wouldn’t. In their case, they liked what they had and didn’t want anything different from that. It was a fatal attitude.

But not an unusual attitude. Whether we think about personal habits or organisational practices, it’s often the case that clearly things must change and yet they don’t. But why not? That’s what this blog post is about.

First, though, I should clarify that I won’t be trying to explain compulsive behaviour caused by addiction or mental illness. Alcoholics, for example, often know perfectly well that drinking is ruining their health, family life, and job performance. Yet they can’t resist that first drink which then leads to many more drinks. A young man told me a similar story, but in his case about a gambling addiction which had caused him financial ruin. Drug addicts may also be well aware that their ‘habit’ is killing them but they’re unable to refuse the next ‘hit’. The complexities of addiction and mental illness lie beyond the scope of this blog post. Here I’m writing about the more common experience described some 2000 years ago by the Apostle Paul: “I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing” (Romans 7:19).

What follows are seven reasons why we don’t change when we know we should, including when we wish we could. Most of these refer to personal change, but the first is about organisations.

Organisations have remarkably sticky cultures.  Management books describe how the appointment of a new CEO rarely brings about significant change in the way a company goes about its business. The CEO might put forward a new policy, but staff will react with “That’s not the way we do things around here”. They may never say those words publicly, but it’s how the employees feel, and therefore how they react to proposed change. Businesses have a culture – beliefs and customs – which reinforce the status quo. For the staff, the way things get done is the only way to get things done. Hence change is resisted.

In 1990 Peter Senge wrote a masterful book called ‘The Fifth Discipline’, with the subtitle ‘The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization’. His conviction is that businesses are rarely learning organisations, and since they don’t learn they don’t change. Senge writes: “What if even the most successful companies are poor learners – they survive but never live up to their potential?” He continues:

“It is no accident that most organizations learn poorly. The way they are designed and managed, the way people’s jobs are defined, and, most importantly, the way we have all been taught to think and interact (not only in organizations but more broadly) create fundamental learning disabilities. These disabilities operate despite the best efforts of bright, committed people”.[1]

Note Senge’s words about “the way we have all been taught to think and interact”. Our ideas have been conditioned and our brains trained to operate in certain ways, and it’s devilishly hard to change those patterns. Hence organisations keep doing what they’ve always done. Those ‘stuck in a rut’ ways of thinking and acting are huge barriers to change, even when such change would obviously be good.

Unwillingness to admit we’ve been doing things the wrong way.  Adopting a new way of thinking or working seems like an admission that what we had or did before was second-rate. Pills used to come in screw top containers; now those containers have child-proof tops. I typed a thesis of some 100,000 words on a typewriter, throwing away every page which needed more than the simplest correction. Now even the simplest laptop has software that makes writing easy, with nothing printed out until near perfect. My parallel parking in a tight space often used to involve getting out of the car to see exactly how much further back I could go. Now my car has a reversing camera, so judging how much space I’ve got left is easy. With each of these examples, what was mentioned first was clearly inferior to what I described second. Adopting the new was admitting the old wasn’t great.

Rather than accept that, some cling to what is old and familiar. I knew a finance director who so disliked computer spreadsheets that he longed for the large bound ledgers he’d used when an apprentice accountant. I’ve met car mechanics who agree that the technology of modern cars aids reliability, but they still long for the simple engines and fittings of a past era, because they loved taking them to bits and using their skills to make repairs.

Accepting that the old ways or old things were not very good, and occasionally really bad, is not easy for many. Hence they resist change.

Change requires time, effort and sometimes money.  Let’s never ignore a fundamental reason people dislike change – they need to learn the new thing. Not everyone enjoys learning new skills. Our moderately large organisation needed to adopt the most popular word processing software. Most of the staff were delighted, because it meant our word processors would easily and accurately incorporate the electronic documents sent by people outside our organisation. But there was a resistance movement. Some had mastered keyboard shortcuts in the old software, and they knew how to reveal hidden codes which helped with editing. Worse, they loved the DOS software[2] because of its clean screen and none of the myriad options via drop-down lists.  But, fundamentally, most who resisted simply didn’t want the effort of learning a new system. To surrender to laziness would have been short-sighted and foolish. The change was made. It required persuasion, time, effort and money, but all the staff eventually appreciated the new software.

Suggesting change is needed can offend.  Telling a spouse or partner that they drive badly is maritally dangerous! It certainly risks a furious row. There’s much the same risk when criticising a different kind of driving – that of a fellow golfer who keeps slicing the ball off the tee. I had the uncomfortable experience of playing alongside a couple when the husband constantly criticised his wife’s standard of play. He got angrier and angrier at her poor shots; she just went quiet. What she might have said – but wisely didn’t – is that he wasn’t much of a golfer either. I know of an organisation which provided parenting coaches to advise parents on how to bring up their children. The coaches were typically uninvited by the parents after two visits. No-one wanted to be told their child raising skills were lacking. Management gurus have the same problem when hired to help a struggling business. The company CEO may have brought in the consultant to fix his employees, and does not appreciate being told that what needs to improve is his leadership skills.

Without great sensitivity, advising people that they need to change can create a defensive, negative reaction. That just makes a bad situation worse.

Taking someone out of their comfort group.  At almost all golf clubs, groups of friends regularly play together. After the match, they’ll sit around enjoying a beer or a coffee. Their socialising after the game can last as long as their game because they enjoy each other’s company. Each of them feels they belong there. But what if one of them must leave the group? Perhaps he can’t afford all the drinks, or needs to give those hours to another activity. Surely he can just leave? Actually, he may feel he can’t. Over the years the group has transitioned from being casual friends to a place where everyone feels they belong, where they feel safe. They draw strength from each other as they share opinions, hopes, problems, challenging issues and get encouragement. The person who feels he should leave wonders how he can manage without the group.

What makes a close-knit group strong is what makes it hard to leave, or to disagree with the majority. That can be true in a workplace, where one person would struggle to differ on important issues like attitude to the boss, whether pay levels are fair, and how hard everyone should work. Group belonging is also strong in churches, where people share faith, pray together, get encouragement, and come away feeling more able to face hardships. It happens between people who have lived near to each other for a long time. My parents were close friends with all their neighbours. They talked at front doors, visited in each other’s homes, and got together on significant occasions such as midnight on Hogmanay (a Scottish custom at the start of a new year). In any of these cases, leaving or disagreeing with the group is difficult. My parents eventually moved to another part of town, but it robbed them of important friends. It would be the same for someone giving up on a golf fraternity. In the workplace, rejecting a group’s view can lead to being ostracised from the company of colleagues.

Even when people feel they should change, they may opt not to change if it means leaving a group which is important for them.

Fear of an unknown future.  Change creates something unfamiliar. In the late 1990s Alison and I moved hundreds of miles from Aberdeenshire in Scotland to Oxfordshire in England. Many things were different. Busier roads near London meant I learned to ask how long will my journey take, not how far is my journey. Affluent Oxfordshire had alternative values from those I’d grown up with in Scotland. All our friends and family were in the north, far distant from where we had moved to. Now I was heading up a large mission organisation, very different work from being a church pastor. And, instead of a normal routine of local journeys, now I travelled all over Britain and to literally dozens of other countries. People in Oxfordshire thought I spoke strangely, remarking “You have an accent”. I learned to reply, “So you think you don’t?”

The very word ‘change’ means things won’t be the same. Change takes us into a future we’ve never experienced, perhaps one we could never have imagined. And, for many, that prospect is daunting, so daunting they refuse to change and they stay with what they already have and know. Twelve years later, when we told family and friends we were leaving Oxfordshire to live and work across the Atlantic, several said “I couldn’t do that…”. They said they couldn’t. Actually they could, but what they meant was they wouldn’t do that. They’d choose the familiar over the uncertain.

Whatever the pluses or minuses of what we have already, the big positive is that it is known. We can cope with it. The future may not be like that. What if our hopes and dreams turn to dust? What if we quickly regret the change? We may never be able to go back to what we left. That can feel too big a risk to take. Therefore people resist change.

No decision is a decision.  This is my last note about change. Imagine a CEO has to decide whether to market his business in a completely different way. Or, more radically, the CEO has to decide whether the company should abandon its old merchandise for shiny new products. The old stuff is still selling but not as well as it once did. And new lines might bring new customers. He wishes he could sell both the old and new, but he can’t. To have the new he must let go of the old, and he’s not sure he can do that. In a dream which is close to a nightmare, he’s getting into a beautiful boat and sailing away from a safe pier, only to find the boat sinks. When he wakes, he fears that’s what might happen if he moves to a new product line. He’ll take his company from its safe place, only for it soon to sink. The CEO is paralysed with uncertainty, so in the end makes no decision at all.

But, of course, he has made a decision. Not to change is a decision, and, for that CEO, sticking with an old product line would be a bad one because market trends were moving on. Sometimes change is absolutely necessary. That’s how it feels for those threatened by war who abandon their homes and become refugees. Or, in a more ordinary situation, the change might be to another employer, one who treats staff more kindly. For the refugee, failure to change could result in death. For the employee, staying with a bad employer would mean years of overwork and exploitation. Some situations, of course, are not clear cut, but I’d argue that, in most circumstances, change must be an option. Yes, it has to be well thought through – all possibilities considered – then followed by a thoroughly positive decision. Not changing may be the right thing; it simply shouldn’t be for the wrong reasons.

I’ve listed seven reasons why change doesn’t happen even when we know it should. But none of those reasons are invincible barriers to change. We are not prisoners of the status quo. Down the years I’ve experienced change many times, and almost always change has been positive for me. It has not always been easy, and most times uncomfortable at first. But change has gifted me with new challenges and new experiences, the large majority of which have been positive and meaningful. Be brave!

[1] Page 18 in the 1990 edition. Peter Senge is a senior lecturer at the Sloan School of Management at MIT (the world-renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology, located in Cambridge, just outside Boston). The Fifth Discipline is still published, now in a 2006 edition by Random House Business. The book has sold in the millions world-wide.

[2] DOS stands for Disk Operating System. Many web sites explain how DOS works, including this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_operating_system

Celebration of discipline

The word ‘discipline’ has more than one meaning. So you know the sense I intend here, I’ll begin with a definition: Discipline is an attitude of mind and a way of doing things without which hardly anything worthwhile or lasting gets done.

Therefore, I’m not writing about discipline as punishment. During my school years in Scotland I had unwelcome meetings with the tawse[1] (the word is plural of taw which means whip) which inflicted considerable pain on my hand. Thankfully, this so-called discipline was abolished in the 1980s. Punishment is not what I’m meaning here when I use the word ‘discipline’.

Nor does my title ‘celebration of discipline’ imply the meaning of discipline used by Richard Foster in his 1978 book ‘Celebration of Discipline’. Wikipedia describes Foster’s book as an examination of ‘the inward disciplines of prayer, fasting, meditation, and study in the Christian life, the outward disciplines of simplicity, solitude, submission, and service, and the corporate disciplines of confession, worship, guidance, and celebration.’[2] It’s a remarkable book which has sold over a million copies. But I’m not writing about spiritual disciplines.

A few examples will show the sense of ‘discipline’ I mean.

Example 1    At the age of 17 I learned to touch type. (I was taught both shorthand and typing at a further education college, as part of training for journalism. There were only two males in a class with 20 females.) On large, old-fashioned typewriters, we learned to rest our index fingers on the ‘f’ and ‘j’ keys, and type fffff jjjjj, over and over again. Then we did fjfjfjfjfj and jfjfjfjfjf. The following week we did the same drills with middle fingers on the ‘d’ and ‘k’ keys, moving gradually from ddddd kkkkk to dfjkdfjkdfjk or kjfdkjfdkjfd or even dkfjdkfjdkfj. When more fingers and keys were in play, we moved on to simple words and sentences. Initially these exercises were mind-numbingly boring but, with practice, I did learn to touch type which gave me a great sense of achievement. While most of my fellow journalists typed with only two fingers and stared at their keyboards, I used eight fingers and one thumb (the other thumb is never used), and to this day don’t look at the keyboard. The discipline of those drills gave me a skill for life.

Example 2    For many years I prepared at least one but often two sermons every week. Often I’d write them out in full, some 4000 words each. There were two problems:

1) Never enough time to research and prepare;

2) Sometimes a mind blank about the next sermon.

There were two answers to those two problems:

1) The absolute deadline of an approaching Sunday. I had to be ready by then, which forced me to get on with the preparation;

2) The remark of Scottish theologian William Barclay about ‘writer’s block’: that the art of inspiration is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair. In other words, stop faffing about and get on with the work.

The discipline of the deadline and the discipline of just sitting down, starting the work, and letting inspiration come, meant my sermons were always ready.

Example 3    Twice recently we’ve noticed a woman go past our house, but she pauses after every two or three steps. Why stop like that? She’s training her young dog to walk on the lead by her side. She moves forward, so does the dog, but after only a few steps the dog pulls ahead. So, she stops, makes the dog wait, and then begins again. When the dog gets it right, it’s rewarded; when it gets it wrong, she never shouts, just waits and then they restart. Most importantly, she never gives up on the training. My wife Alison knows a lot about dog behaviour and she’s impressed. That woman’s discipline – of herself and the dog – will have huge benefits for years to come.

So, with these examples in mind, I hope you can see why, for this blog, I defined discipline as:

  • an attitude of mind
  • a way of doing things
  • without which hardly anything worthwhile or lasting gets done

Discipline is about how we think and how we act. And discipline is necessary to succeed in things that matter.

I’ll expand on each of these.

Discipline as an attitude of mind

I was probably only the right weight once: on the day I was born. That day came only a few years after World War II ended, while food shortages were still common. My parents’ idea was that a chubby child was a healthy child. In fact I was overweight. I’m still chubby, though keep protesting much of it is muscle. I’ve read various books on losing weight. One book effectively pronounced me a lost cause. The author said that, in middle age, almost no overweight person gets back to their ideal weight and stays there. The very few who maintain their right weight have rigid discipline. They’d achieve their daily step count no matter the weather, and would not eat even a single square of chocolate.

The rigidity of that statement troubled me then and still. But I got the author’s point that a seriously disciplined mindset was essential. I’ve known people try to break drinking and smoking habits who lost the battle early on because they told themselves ‘Breaking the rules won’t matter just once’ or ‘I can have a holiday day occasionally’. But those ‘just once’ and ‘holiday’ days soon become frequent, and the cause is lost. Sometimes being lax with discipline is immediately and seriously dangerous. If, when I’m riding my motorbike, I wasn’t unfailingly disciplined about doing my life-saver shoulder check, I might be dead.

Whether we’re thinking of personal safety or goal achievement, a ‘happy go lucky’ attitude isn’t good enough. A disciplined way of thinking is essential.

Discipline as a way of working

I’ve had six books published and contributed chapters to two more. Is it difficult to write a book? For me, the honest answer is ‘no’ and ‘yes’. At any moment I have 50 ideas of things I could write about, and at least one of them makes some sense and would be of interest. So I don’t lack a subject. Then, once the idea is clear, writing isn’t difficult for me. I’ve written easily since I was a child. I could churn out thousands of words a day if I needed to.

But I have at least two difficulties with a major writing project. The first is the simple but hard one of making myself sit down and type the words. My mind will flip to ten other things I could do, some of which will be more fun and give quick rewards. Writing can be a slog, and a book is a long game. The work is tough. The second challenge is editing. Writing the first draft for a book is creative and perhaps exciting, but after that comes revision after revision: correcting typos, clarifying thought, cutting unnecessary material, watching for contradictions, and so on. That’ll happen at least ten times, and I’ve edited some books more than twenty times. Editing is very tedious.

I deal with the first of these – making myself do the work – by creating a non-negotiable deadline (publishers often impose those anyway!) A favourite phrase of mine is ‘A deadline is the mother of motivation’. It works for me.

And I deal with the second – making myself do the boring work – by defining minimum targets I must meet each day. So, when I typed my 400+ page thesis on a typewriter where almost no errors can be corrected, my goal was three pages a day. I would get home from an evening meeting about 10.00, then type and retype from 11.00 to 1.00 in the morning to achieve three perfect pages. I could not do that every night (I was often travelling), but on every day possible I produced three pages without fail. It got done – and the thesis was accepted.

Each person will have their own method, but it must be a disciplined way of working.

Discipline as essential for anything worthwhile or lasting to get done

Three things fit under this heading.

First, you can be casual with trivial things but must be serious to achieve important things. When a young golfer began on the professional tour, his brilliant play got everyone’s attention. He won a few tournaments, and the experts tipped him for the top, saying that with his potential he’d win all the major championships. Yet as he moved through his 20s there were only a handful of modest successes. When he was 30, he admitted he’d put more into living the good life than into his golf game. Now he would change. But he didn’t change. He didn’t dedicate himself to practise or to follow his coach’s instruction, and never succeeded at the highest level. He lacked discipline, and never fulfilled his potential.

We’re constantly tempted to dabble. We do a little of this, then some of that. We start and then stop. We do what we like and avoid what we dislike.

Life can be lived without discipline. But it’ll be a life devoid of what’s most worthwhile.

Second, the best things in life last only with hard work. You can bring in a team of designers, gardeners, labourers and volunteers and create a beautiful garden in one or two days. Plenty TV programmes show that’s possible. But, all too often, the garden they make is at its most gorgeous only until the TV cameras leave, or for only a few days. Why not longer? Why not always? Because a garden is a living, changing thing, and without disciplines like weeding, watering, fertilising, pruning, cutting, planting its beauty won’t last.

Nor does a marriage stay wonderful without constant care and investment. Or a career mature without development and upskilling. Even a product needs continual adjustment or reinvention to meet evolving tastes and needs.

Disciplined hard work is essential for longevity.

Third, to win a race you must both start and finish. In London and Chicago I’ve watched marathon runners stream past heading for their medals at the 26 mile finishing line. I’ve stood off to the side thinking how marvellous it would be to run a marathon and get a medal. But there are two barriers for me. One, I’d never have the courage to enter. Two, I’d never have the ability to finish. And you don’t get the medal without entering and finishing.

Many read a novel and think they could write just as well as the author. Or listen to a singer and reckon their voice is just as good. Or consider they could give advice just as ingenious as the consultant their firm brought in. But they don’t do any of these things. They don’t start, or, if they do, they don’t finish. They lack determination and they lack perseverance, both of which require discipline. Only with those do the best things actually get done.

Let me finish with this. Some people are super-disciplined. Some people are ill-disciplined. Then there are those who are disciplined in some things but not others. I’m in that middle category. Usually I long to be more disciplined. I’d achieve more of the things that really matter to me. Yet I wouldn’t want the possible downsides, such as the inflexibility that I sometimes see in my super-disciplined friends. So, in respect of discipline, my report card would read: ‘Has some discipline, but might benefit from more!’ Perhaps you’d like to ponder what your report card would say…

———————-

[1] More about the tawse here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tawse

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Foster_(theologian)

Will life always be this way?

A central character in Ken Follett’s novel ‘The Eye of the Needle’ is hurt and weak, but rouses himself with this thought: ‘It was important not to permit oneself the psychological attitudes of the invalid’.

I read that sentence twice. And then a third time. It meant something to me personally.

I suspect all Follett had in mind was that the injured character galvanised himself into readiness to fight. He wasn’t thinking that all ‘invalids’ have the same psychological attitudes.

But what he wrote took me back to a critical moment in my mid-thirties.

I’ll begin my story when I was 18. I was a trainee journalist working in Edinburgh, when one day I felt back pain and by the next day could hardly move. My doctor prescribed pain killers and bed rest. Two days later my parents arrived to persuade me that I couldn’t just lie in my one room bed-sitter, unable to shop or prepare meals, and they’d take me home with them.  I agreed, but I might not if I’d realised their plan was that my bed would have a wooden board over the mattress. Back then, that was the accepted wisdom for people with bad backs. Drugged and desperate I lay on that board, but it made my pain much worse. Eventually they had mercy and removed the board, and slowly I got better.

That was only the beginning. I had similar struggles through my twenties. Some chronic pain was always there, then every few years it would become severe and everything would stop for a few weeks. Mostly I kept going through university studies and church ministry, and even played scrum half in my college’s rugby team.

Then came my mid-thirties. By then I had been a full-time pastor for some years, and Alison and I had four young children. We’d had a wonderful experience planting a new church in Livingston, not far from Edinburgh. Now I’d been called to become pastor in the north east Scotland city of Aberdeen. Getting ready for that change involved long journeys, extra meetings, and final get-togethers. Life was busier than I ever imagined it could be.

A week before our move my back gave in. The pain was immense. Any movement was agony. It didn’t matter if I stood, sat or lay down; every position was bad. My doctor prescribed strong medication which dulled all my senses. Friends gave up their bedroom for me. Not just to let me lie there day and night, but so Alison with her friend Kathy could pack up the home we were leaving. One evening I was eased into our car, the seat reclined, and with kids in the back Alison drove us 130 miles to Aberdeen. There I lay on a thin mattress on the floor. Somehow I managed to attend the service where I was inducted as minister of the church, and even preached. Then I went home, and lay again on the floor. A few days later the top orthopaedic surgeon from the hospital arrived to examine me, and promptly admitted me to hospital. I was put on traction, and for two weeks I just lay there.

Then, with pain slightly eased, I was sent home and my back slowly improved. About two months later than scheduled I began my ministry properly at the Aberdeen church. Good things happened during the following weeks. But my back was not stable. Pain worsened, and again I was taken into hospital. This time they carried out a diagnostic imaging test – a myelogram – which involved a contrast dye injected into my spinal column. That allowed the medics a much clearer view of what was happening around my spinal canal than standard X-rays could give. But my body reacted negatively to the dye, causing more pain and keeping me in hospital for another two weeks. During that time I was measured and fitted for an upper body harness – metal bars sheathed in leather with tight straps to hold my body in the right posture. The idea, I was told, was that I’d be unable to move in unhelpful ways, and thus let my back heal. I felt almost unable to move in any way, except by making penguin-like rigid motions. But at least I could go home.

That was two days before I was to conduct a wedding. The couple had sat by my hospital bed while I prepared them for the service. On the wedding day I unbuckled and removed my harness almost as the wedding march was being played, and put it back on as soon as the service was over.

Over the following months and for a couple of years I was better. Life was good. The ministry was being appreciated.

But the debilitating pain was just hiding. It returned with a vengeance. This time I met with a neurosurgeon who recommended an intriguing operation called, I believe, ‘Chemonucleolysis of Lumbar Disc Herniation’. An enzyme would be injected into my bulging disc which would dissolve disc material and thus release pressure on the spinal nerve. Only a needle would be used, no scalpels. It all sounded good. I went into hospital the day before the operation. The neurosurgeon came to explain that my body would never have encountered the enzyme before, so its reaction couldn’t be exactly known. My body could go into shock which, in rare cases, would be fatal. That wasn’t comforting. Before the operation a small access port was inserted into my arm, ‘in case we have to give you urgent treatment later’. I knew what that meant. The procedure was done while I was conscious but face down on a special operating table. When they were finished no-one moved. I had to lie still, and the medical team stood around me for ten minutes. No-one said they were waiting to see if I would die, but I suspect they were.

Did it work? For about six to nine months I did feel better. But not significantly after that. I found out that they stopped performing the operation two years later, perhaps because of risks associated with it, but mainly because the long-term results weren’t great. Which, unfortunately, was my experience.

Something like normal life kept happening around these hospital stays and operations. Congregation numbers grew so much we had to move to a larger building. Our children were growing up. Alison began studies towards a health science degree.

What I didn’t care for was that I’d become known as the pastor who began his ministry in Aberdeen as a hospital patient. Whenever I met people they asked ‘How’s your back these days?’ I appreciated their concern but wished for anything else as the opening line of conversation.

Then a deeply unwelcome possibility intensified in my mind. ‘Here I am, aged in my late thirties, constantly immobilised by back problems. Doctors and well-wishers can do no more than urge me to protect myself. Maybe this is how life is always going to be.’

That last thought – that this might be how my life is always going to be – was deeply distressing. I’d always believed I’d get better. Perhaps my back pain would simply go away. If not, then surely there was some more or less invasive treatment that would cure it. No other kind of illness in my life had been permanent. I always got well. And I’d assumed that would happen with my back pain. I wasn’t yet 40-years-old. Life couldn’t always be like this.

But it could. Well-meaning friends and medical professionals (surgeons, general practitioners, physiotherapists) were telling me to manage my back carefully. They were urging a defensive strategy – a ‘do no harm to yourself’ way of living. I mustn’t exhaust myself, or work too hard, or sit too long at my desk or in meetings, or lift anything heavy, or drive long distances. I should always insist on comfortable seating, and avoid strenuous sports or hobbies. While never having to dig the garden sounded good, the implications of the rest were dire. But perhaps it had to happen. I’d have to accept my life ahead would be significantly limited.

I can’t explain why, but I woke up one day knowing I wouldn’t accept it. I couldn’t be that person if there was any option not to be that person. There were still many directions in which my life could go. Was I supposed to delete half the options, leaving only what was ‘safe’ and undemanding? Were outdoor sports like hill climbing and golf – good not just for my physical health but also my mental health – just to be abandoned? Would I never throw a frisbee or play tennis with my children? Would I not lift them up and hug them? Would I consign Alison to carry all the shopping, or take luggage out of the car, or move  the furniture around? I wouldn’t. That day I decided that as long as possible and as much as possible, I’d live life to the full.

And, as best I can, I’ve done that. As a family we’ve climbed Ben Nevis and Snowdon, the highest mountains in Britain. I became a single-figure handicap golfer. I’ve travelled and preached from the Shetland Islands (110 miles north of the Scottish mainland) to churches along the south coast of England. I’ve been in dozens of countries including Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Congo, Angola, Uganda, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Thailand, North Korea and Indonesia. I wasn’t supposed to take long plane rides. I wasn’t supposed to journey over arduous terrain. I wasn’t supposed to hike up steep mountains, sleep in rough quarters in remote and dangerous places, and sit on the floor of jungle huts listening to stories of persecution and hardship. But I have done these things, and consider each one an immense privilege. I’ve tried to be a help and a blessing to those I’ve met, but have received back twofold anything I was able to give.

None of that would have happened if – using Follett’s line – I’d permitted myself the psychological attitudes of the invalid. If I’d settled for a highly protected, uneventful life, everything would have been different.

So, has the pain gone away over those years? No, not at all. It’s still the same pattern, manageable most of the time but then critical for periods of several weeks.

But now I do have a better understanding of why it happens.

One of the very painful phases occurred while we lived in America. My doctor prescribed powerful painkillers and directed me towards one of the most eminent orthopaedic surgeons in the Chicago area. He and I met, and before deciding on a course of treatment he sent me for MRI scans. Afterwards I consulted with him again. He put the images on screen and began: ‘Have you spent your whole working life doing manual labour?’ I laughed, and explained I hadn’t spent any of it doing manual labour. He apologised, but said, ‘When we see a back like this, it’s almost always someone whose life has involved heavy physical work over many years.’ He took me through the images and pointed out three herniated discs (commonly called slipped discs). Their pressure on spinal nerves would cause severe pain. And that wasn’t all. He added: ‘You can’t have a back like this and not have arthritis throughout’. I waited for some good news, perhaps a surgical option that would put me right. But there wasn’t one because, he said, no operation would give meaningful benefit. All he could do was recommend physiotherapy and a sensible use of pain medication.

Everything that doctor told me had been true about my back throughout my adult life. No accident had caused it, he said. It was just how my back was. And, in a sense, I’m okay with that. I’d never before really understood why I had ongoing chronic pain with bouts of acute pain. The new knowledge was helpful, and I’d continue to be positive and do everything I should and could.

Is that realistic for everyone? After all, what does a ‘positive approach’ mean for someone severely disabled, such as a soldier who’s lost his legs? That’s a very different situation to mine. I could live life close to what would be normal for someone without a wrecked back. The person who’s lost both legs has much greater challenges to overcome. But that doesn’t mean life must then be lived under a permanent shadow.  Good and positive things can still be done.

As a child I read and re-read the story of Douglas Bader. He’d become an RAF pilot but crashed doing aerobatics, almost died, and had both his legs amputated. He fought hard to regain his strength and with artificial legs regained his flying qualifications. But the RAF forced him to retire on medical grounds. Then World War II began. Experienced fighter pilots were in short supply so even Bader with his tin legs was accepted. He won air battles above the Dunkirk beaches and in the Battle of Britain. In 1941 he was shot down over German-occupied France, and made a POW. Several times he escaped but was recaptured and eventually sent to Colditz Castle. After the war he held senior posts in the oil industry, played golf to a high standard, and was awarded a knighthood by the Queen.

Very few can be like Bader. A biography was written about him, followed by the film Reach for the Sky. Why? Because his story is exceptional. But his positive approach to life doesn’t have to be exceptional.

Every blog piece I write is intended to have at least a little wisdom. What’s the wisdom here?

I hope it’s this. I don’t actually like Follett’s reference to ‘the psychological attitudes of the invalid’. It’s far too sweeping. But I came close to permitting myself to think all ambitions had to go, that I could do nothing of significance, and life would have to be lived defensively and dependent on others. If I’d surrendered to those ‘psychological attitudes’ then, in some sense, I would have become an invalid.

That surrender doesn’t have to happen. There is another way of living. I know people who’ve done great things despite great challenges, and I’m privileged that some of them are my friends.

If, in any way, this account of my health journey helps you lift your eyes to better horizons, to greater possibilities, then there will have been wisdom here after all.

————————————-

If this blog has been helpful for you, it’ll be helpful for someone you know. Please send it on, either by using the ‘Share’ button or forwarding the link www.occasionallywise.com. Thank you!