Should you take a leap of faith?

For many people, the answer is anything but clear. It’s not equally easy for everyone to change, even when they feel deeply that a change is needed and wanted.

So… is gravity working in your favor?

* * *

Leaping is not a universal. Cultures vary in how they treat leaps. (They variegate.) There are complex social constructs around such correlate leaping skills as courage, vulnerability, shame, and so forth.

And much of that information is a revelation to some people.

Some of those people (who experience the revelation) will enjoy a biological assignment that makes it easier for them to shift their default in the face of such dawning realizations; in other words, they find it fairly easy to change when they get the news.

Some others, however, will be able to hear the news, understand it, and even agree in principle, but still not be able to easily absorb it as a natural part of who they are. That is not a matter of how hard they are trying. With the best will in the world, it might take them years or decades of waiting on other prerequisite processes of change to occur; in fact, some people suggest that it can take multiple lifetimes simply to become able to change in certain regards (or at all).

* * *

Not everyone will find it easy, then, to default to a vulnerable lifestyle just because they have learned that it is a necessary component of compassion, loving kindness, and similar empathies. No one should be told that they could make that change if they just tried harder to make a leap of faith and let themselves be more open.

For some people, it is not a simple choice.

* * *

To make matters worse, some people are biologically assigned to react to change and difference with fear instead of curiosity and openness.

Posed with the notion (however fanciful) that aliens might be observing our planet, some people hope to meet them, while others fear being abducted and painfully probed. Or, to use an example that is closer to home, people vary widely in their reaction when taught that a person’s gender orientation is not determined by their biological sex assignment. Some people react to this news with openness, and others with fear (and others somewhere else in that space).

People who are relatively open in their approaches to change can be surprisingly closed when it comes to empathy for the struggle that the fear-bound individuals face. Sometimes it will be incumbent upon the open among us to accept the additional effort needed to build bridges where leaps are not forthcoming. Getting frustrated, giving up and abandoning someone to their fear, thinking of someone as if they were merely being stubborn, or too conservative… these are not empathetic, compassionate approaches.

2024-02