Hop Pride

I was talking with a buddy yesterday over coffee (he no longer drinks my high test but decaf) about the wish we both have about wanting to be "rock stars." For him. it is literal as he is a musician and it has morphed into being on stage Me, it is the more generic use of the word describing one who has legions of adoring fans. My stage was first athletics, and now it is writing.

I think everyone wants to feel that their life matters. That we weren't just bubbles of existence carried away by the wind into the abyss of nothingness. So, we wish to make an impact and be appreciated and acknowledged by others. I call it "dust applauding dust" as that is where we shall return. But, the dust shall dance again. Some to everlasting life, some to eternal destruction.

Many times our dreams are laudable. Very few people want to be good at being bad. Like being the best porn star or highest-grossing drug dealer in the area. No, typically our goals are above board and legit. Nothing unseemly. But, just because the cause is good doesn't mean our pride doesn't start to wrap around our intentions. It is rather insidious.

This reminds me of the hops out back on the trestle on my porch. Last Spring, I stretched my construction acumen to its limits and built the trestle after a rather chaotic visit to Lowe's. Then, my brewing buddy mentioned that a local nursery was selling different varieties of hop plants. 

In the past I had grown hops at my previous property with the rhizomes which is a stick of sorts with sprouts and shoots on it. It can be real hit or miss as to whether it will take or not. My first effort out back was with hop seeds and that just abjectly failed. 

The hops plants, however, have prospered. I actually got hop cones this year which is really unusual for the first season. The hops plants weave themselves in and out of the trestle in a rather remarkable manner. The analogy of the hop plants being pride is limited because the hops are doing what they are supposed to be doing. However, in the sense of my usage, our trestle-like goals can become green with the plants of pride if not checked and pruned often.

The dream may be all good but our wishes that we seek to attain by our dreams might, and usually are, quite a bit darker. A good pride test is when we fail, are betrayed, experience nonchalance of others to our endeavors, etc. Our reactions to adverse responses, or no response at all, reveals the heart issues.

For quite some time, I wanted to carve out expertise on the college transition issues and I truly have. I do good and even sometimes great work with my kids at school. My doctoral work and dissertation received unusually high praise from my professors.  Out of my research and professional experiences in working in college preparation for a quarter of a century, I wrote a book. I wanted badly for the book to make an impact (yet) underneath the good it would do, I was also hoping for affirmation of my talent, writing skill, and overall genius.

Yeah, that didn't happen. 

Although I have received positive feedback from my students and others about the book, the typical response has been tepid. All of the sacrifice and suffering turned into bitterness. So, when a friend--who has an enormous amount of contact with influential college personnel-- recently texted me that he had some ideas about how to get the book out into peoples' hands, I was like "whatever."

I have seen the danger and destructiveness in being ambitious. It creates a chasm to fall into when things don't go as planned. Jesus talks about a seed needing to first die before it can give life and by this He means the seed of self. To become truly spiritual means that others' pain, struggles, and suffering become as important as our own issues. As my pal pointed out yesterday, overweening ambition creates anxiety. I think he's right.

We serve as He deserves and not as we determine. So, we may be a great success or not. God can use our failure to move His kingdom forward. For instance. with my book, I foremost needed to write it for myself, to make sense of how I saw things. I decided to not direct my efforts to the Christian market per se. Although my book cites Christians like C.S. Lewis and Soren Kierkegaard and Simone Weil, I also give non-Christians a lot of attention like Steve Jobs and others.

I seasoned the book with spirituality but wanted to bless those who hold many different beliefs. If someone would reconsider the relevance of faith to their life, all the better, but I didn't write the book in an attempt to corner and checkmate other wordlviews. I had to give myself permission to write the book with an open hand and not try to niche my book to suburban evangelical moms who are afraid of their kids fornicating in college. Not that this isn't a serious issue but it is fear-based writing and marketing, something that works but it doesn't make it right and holy.   

The buddy who offered to help with the book is coming over tonight. We are going to drink beer and watch the Trump vs. Clinton debate which could turn into the equivalent of Mixed Martial Arts with kicks to the rhetorical jaw of each other. I half expect Bill Clinton to get out of his seat in the audience to challenge Trump to a fistfight. It is already quite ugly but it could get uglier. I don't think we have hit bottom yet here.

While my buddy is here, we will talk about the book and his ideas.  

Eric Bierker Ph.D is the author of "On The Edge: Transitioning Imaginatively to College." A book for the college-bound.      

        

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