Hockey superstitions, you’ve got to love them! Every year, the same thing happens. The two teams that won their conferences are presented their championship trophies (basically, this makes them semi-final winners). They will now go on and play in the finals for the Stanley Cup. But no one or either team will come close to touching those trophies. It is a hockey fact that if you touch it (the lesser trophy), you will never get to touch the Stanley Cup. You can get a team picture with it, but you can’t touch it. Now, if you look at that team photo, you will also notice another superstition—playoff beards. Shaving during the playoffs is bad luck. Looking scruffy during the playoffs apparently isn’t. But superstitions are not just for the playoffs. Lots of players have superstitions about their sticks. Wayne Gretzky wouldn’t let anyone touch his stick after he had taped it and if someone did, he would retape it immediately. Daniel Briere would set apart three sticks for each game and he would rotate through them throughout the contest. If one of those sticks did well (for instance, if it scored a goal), Briere would reward it and give it the rest of the night off. It was a way of encourage the other two sticks to work harder. Bruce Gardiner felt his sticks were not working as hard as they ought and so to show them who was boss, he would dunk them in a toilet before every game. But hockey players are not the only professional athletes to be superstitious. Baseball pitcher, Mark “The Bird” Fidrych, would talk to the baseball making sure it knew where to go and what to do (“don’t let that bat hit you!”). Outfielder Richie Ashburn loved his bat so much he often slept with it in his arms (it could have been worse; Mo Peña was often seen kissing his bat!). Ashburn batted .308 with that bat. Once a tournament began, tennis great, Serena Williams, would never change or wash her socks. If something is working, you don’t change it! Former NBA guard, Jason Terry would always sleep in the official game shorts of his next opponent the night before he played them. And if he missed two consecutive shots, he would change his shoes. If something isn’t working, you change it. Oh, the things we will do to help us make sure we won’t lose. They are funny here, but they are not so funny in our interpersonal games.

This is part four in our discussion of the insightful book, Leadership and Self-Deception (the Arbinger Institute, 2000). There is a pattern of posturing that we all have in our relationships with others that makes sure we don’t lose face, suffer painful criticism or undergo any damage to our sense of self-righteousness. Last time, we saw that this pattern involves a doom cycle where we see the other person’s character as being worse and worse (and our own as being better and better). All this needs to happen so that we can justify our sinful choice to act selfishly and not help or honor the other person in front of us (“The problem can’t be with us. They must not be worthy.”). In short, I hate anything that exposes my sin and threatens me with shame, and I will do anything to turn the focus off of me and on to someone else. Unfortunately, we are all self-deceived and we don’t even know the gymnastics we go through so that we do not lose our sense of self-righteousness.

Before we get to our next chapters, let’s review.

  1. The problem with being self-deceived is that we don’t know we are self-deceived.
  2. When we are self-deceived (aka, to be “in the box”), we see ourselves and others in a distorted way. We ignore the truth and see things in the way we want them to appear.
  3. In every situation, we have an inner-sense of what we ought to do for the other person. Now, we can choose to honor that sense or we can betray that sense. When we betray what we know we ought to do, we put ourselves in the box.
  4. When we betray what we know we ought to do, we feel the need to justify our choice, and so we blame the other person and see them in the worst light possible (and ourselves in the best light possible).
  5. Whenever I blame someone, I simultaneously justify myself. I do this by exaggerating their faults, inflating my own value and virtue and by overstating my importance. As a result, I see the other person as far worse than they really are and myself and my responsibilities as far more important than they are.
  6. Just because we don’t hear our inner voice urging us to help someone, doesn’t mean we have not betrayed ourself and have escaped this doom cycle. Just the opposite. After betraying ourselves over a long period of time, we develop patterns that are characteristic of us. In short, we carry certain boxes with us wherever we go.
  7. The absence of prompts to help someone is often an indicator that we are deep inside the box.

 

Part 1: Key Points to Think About (Chapters 14-16)

  • People have a sense of how we feel about them. If they sense we are blaming them for something or if they sense we look down upon them, they will respond to us in a defensive posture. This defensive posture will mirror our contempt for them. They will blame us and will drive them to justify themselves for their bad behavior toward us. Everything that we have said about us when we are “in the box” is now true about them.
  • However, there is one difference between us. We got “in the box” when we betrayed what we knew we should do. They got “in the box” as a defensive measure to protect them from our assault. In other words, when we are in the box, we provoke others to be in the their own box against us.
  • But there is a twist here. When we are “in the box” against someone, we provoke them to do more of what we say we don’t like about them. Once we betray ourselves, our chief goal is to justify ourselves so that we can appear righteous. To justify ourselves, however, we need them to continue doing what we despise.
  • As strange as it may sound, what I need most when I am “in the box” is not for the other person to do the right thing, but to continue to do the wrong thing so that I can continue to feel justified in my stance against them. To feel justified in blaming the other person, we need them to be blameworthy. We need them to be a problem. If they suddenly became a “saint,” we would have no grounds to blame them and our attempt to justify our bad behavior would fail. If we continued acting badly, we would become the problem.
  • Remember, when I am “in the box,” I am self-deceived and cannot see the truth about myself and others. I will also be blind to my own motivations.
  • Because when we are “in the box” against someone and they are “in the box” against us and because we both need each other to continue in this bad behavior so that we can justify our own actions, we act almost as if we have colluded together saying: “I will mistreat you so you can blame your bad behavior on me if you’ll mistreat me so I can blame my bad behavior on you.” (LaSD, p. 101).
  • As we said above, once ‘in the box” toward someone, we provoke them to get in their “own box” toward us; and then we give each other all sorts of reasons to stay in the box.
  • Once we are so focused on justifying ourselves (and blaming the other person), we cannot focus on how to resolve the issue at hand. We are only interested in winning and in justifying ourselves and preserving our sense of self-righteousness. We don’t want to resolve the issue. We only want to beat the person and feel superior. Hockey superstitions exist so that the games can resolve properly. This cycle of blame and self-justification wants the strife between us to continue without end.

 

Part 2: Show and Tell

What would this look like? Suppose back when our sons lived at home, I felt that one of them (let’s call him “Datt”) was pushing his limits and was being less than responsible in his school work, in his chores and in his general demeanor. One night, I was sure “Datt” would spend the evening working on his school project, but instead he asked to borrow the car to go out. He was probably already sensing that I was “in the box” towards him and saw him as acting irresponsibly and he was probably already “in the box” toward me when he asked. Not wanting things to blow up in my face, I decided I would let him hang himself. I didn’t want to let him go, but if I gave him an unreasonable curfew (say 10:30) and he failed to be home by that time, then I would have plenty of evidence to use against him. He felt I was being unreasonable with the early curfew, but he needed the car so he begrudgingly took the keys and left in a huff. All evening long, I stewed that he was not home working like a good and responsible student, and I could not wait for him to come home late so that I could lambast him. I probably spent a good portion of the night thinking of exactly what I was going to say when he drove in at 11. But then at 10:29, I heard the car come barreling into the driveway, the door slam shut and Dratt come running into the house with seconds to spare. Now, technically, I should be happy. Dratt was being responsible, but I wasn’t happy. In fact, I was disappointed and felt that he may have only been home on time, not because he was acting responsibly, but to mock me! I have to see the worst in him or I can’t justify my desire to be angry at him. And since I have been “in the box” toward him all night, I now have to justify my bad attitude. Therefore, I can’t welcome him home and praise him for being on time. Instead, I have to say something snarky that clearly shows that he is still to blame. And so, instead of saying, “thanks for being on time,” I find myself saying, “you cut it really close, didn’t you?” And we go our separate ways, both of us still “in the box” toward each other.

Superstitions are just one example of how far we will go to win. They are both funny and sad. Unfortunately, we are now seeing how far we will go to win in our interactions with others, but they, sadly, are not funny at all. We are sinful people who are selfish and self-righteous, and we will do anything not to lose face, lose our sense of self-righteousness or to lose our sense of superiority. We sin against ourselves by not doing what we know is right. We then blame the other person for our sin. We exaggerate the other person’s faults. We see them in the worst light. We inflate our sense of virtue. We provoke the other person to be in conflict with us. We collude with them so that they will continue to mistreat us so that we can mistreat them. And even when they do right, we make sure they know that, in our eyes, it is not right enough. And over time, we adopt these patterns of relating so that they seem natural. They are who I am, and I will do anything to protect my own sense of being right.

 

Part 3: A Theological Thought

Let’s see if we can refine what Leadership and Self-Deception is saying about this doom loop. The book argues that it all begins when we betray ourselves and refuse to do the good that we know we ought to do. I would like to suggest that we are not betraying ourselves, but rather, betraying God. God calls us to love our neighbor. God calls us to serve others. God calls us to act compassionately. God calls us die to self. God calls us to follow Jesus. And the Bible is filled with statements about how we are to treat one another. Three passages stand out.

John 13:14-15:

“Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.”

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 follows the same theme:

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

And Philippians 2:3-4 grounds it in bedrock:

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.”

If all we had were these three passages, we would have more than enough to guide our interpersonal interactions. In short, we are not betraying ourselves. We are betraying God’s call. Whether it is a sin of commission or a sin of omission, when we refuse to love and serve our neighbor, we are betraying God’s work in us.

And when we do betray God’s call like this, we often hide it from ourselves. Jeremiah 17:9 is right:

“The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.
 Who can understand it?”

This is where self-deception comes in. We don’t want to see our own sin, and so, we hide it from ourselves. Instead, we blame others for our sin and promote our own self-righteousness. We inflate our own goodness and exaggerate the faults of others. And we do everything we can to justify our (distorted) image of ourselves. As such, we slander the other person to make ourselves took better. Paul addresses such behavior in Colossians 3:8-11:

“But now you must also rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator. Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.”

 And if that is not enough of roadmap to set your feet in the right direction, Paul goes on, saying (Col. 3:12-14):

“Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.”

In short, when dealing with people, we don’t need superstitions. We don’t need strife. We don’t need slander. We don’t need self-deception, but we do need the Spirit to empower us to live out God’s Word and to love the people God puts in our path.

 

Part 4: A Few Things to Think About

This week, while you are out and about, be aware of a few things.

  1. Be aware of how often people are responding to you based on what they are feeling you are thinking about them (what signals are you emitting?).
  2. Be aware of how often you criticize someone for doing something “right” (but not right enough).
  3. Be aware of how often you struggle to put into practice something you know you should do? And be aware of how long that inner debate takes.
  4. Be aware of how often you want to be proven right as opposed to finding a solution to the problem. How long does it take you put the needs of the other person first?

Next week, we will turn the corner and start to talk about how to get out of the box! In the meantime, change your socks and wash them thoroughly.