From the book ‘The Power of Stillness’ under the title ‘Knowing’:
Even if not fully “fixed,” faith struggles can be held in mindful space with awareness and patience. No doubt it takes maturity and strength to hold onto this complexity, and for some issues, to hold them for a really long time. But rather than bearing such questions like some dirty secret we must take pains to hide from those around us (or hint that others do so) we can take confidence knowing that this is part of the process not just for some but for all of us.
In this way, we can experiment with creating space when, not-knowing, can exist quite naturally along side of conviction and passion. Perhaps it’s the overemphasis of either that gets us mired.
Glorifying Uncertainty: More than simply “making space” for not-knowing, some have taken it several steps further, to the point of embracing uncertainty as a kind of ultimate aspiration. In this way it can be tempting to glorify paradoxical confusion and uncertainty as somehow more enlightened—with “doubt” spoken as a kind of higher state of consciousness. From this place, conviction itself can be portrayed as unhealthy or even foolish. “Don’t be too convicted or certain. Some have even started pathologizing conviction as an inherent vice (aka “the sin of certainty”).
As Latter-day Saint mindfulness teacher Thomas McConkie has put it. “Unknowing can be valorized in postmodern culture to the point that any form of knowing is branded as childish, or naive”—pointing out that clinging to uncertainty is very much its own form of certainty.”7 Even those who claim “one cannot know anything,” in other words, often do so with a lot of conviction.
More humility would go a long way for all of us, including among those who feel secure in their knowledge. As part of this, maybe we can all admit that discerning the truth of what’s happening isn’t always so easy.
Watching the Inner Workings:
It’s common to talk as Latter-day Saints about something like “feeling the Spirit” or “losing the companionship of the Spirit” as experiences that can (or should be) obvious. And to many people they may well be, depending on where they are in their lives. But what about for those struggling in the middle of complex circumstances, or feeling overwhelming burdens, or undergoing extreme stress or acute trauma?
Very quickly, an experience that has the potential to be clear might get quite foggy and confusing — with the clarity of God’s voice no longer so easy to discern. Rather than recognizing this however we have a tendency to lurch forward insisting we have heard God’s voice. That leaves us vulnerable to uncritically accepting something that God might sincerely want us to explore a bit more.
How can we be sure that our experiences involve God’s true direction, rather than simply conjuring of confirmation from our own ego? For starters, what if we took the time to observe our own inner workings more carefully?
Our experience is that this kind of space can help break down and pick apart the complexities of a thorny situation we’re facing—including experiences that may feel otherwise scary or challenging. In this slowing down and intentional space, you see, we are allowing for something else to emerge: insight. That’s why the most researched form of meditation is often called “insight meditation” —Grande what we might call “revelatory meditation.”
As part of this inner watching, it’s valuable to remember the powerful rule that deeper emotions and convictions play in influencing what we see. It’s not typically the heart that we think of when it comes to knowing something. And yet the prophet-poet Isiah writes about a people’s failure to “understand with their heart” (Isaiah 6:10).
Or we might simply say, “Noah, you’re not paying enough attention to how your emotions are influencing what you see!” As modern research by Dr. Jonathon Haidt and others has confirmed,8 what we end up seeing, thinking and believing is deeply influenced by our core convictions often leading people to chase after beliefs that match their convictions. As much as modern humans love to believe that “logic” and “scientific facts” are driving their judgments there is so much more going on! The Apostle Paul warned the early Saints about in teaching that “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 2:14).
If our heart is dark, then, it influences our vision to see things more in a dark light. And if our heart is light we see things in a very different, brighter way. The key is to notice this—and recognize the influence, rather than just living it out. When we recognize our blind spots in being able to decipher truth (and we all have them) we are better able to navigate those vulnerabilities and ensure that we move through our journey of learning with eyes wide open to all the many influences of what we see, think and feel.
Then we’ll be in a better place to truly know for ourselves the actuality of things, ~Jacob Z. Hess, Carrie L. Skarda, Kyle D. Anderson, Ty R. Mansfield, The Power of Stillness, Deseret Book p.82-84
