In his book Velvet Elvis, Rob Bell compares our beliefs to the springs of a trampoline, helping launch us higher so we can see further and live life more fully.
However, there's an alternative way of living and believing that we can fall into instead: Brickianity.
When we get into a mindset of brickianity, life becomes about building walls of protection around ourselves and instead of springs, our beliefs become like bricks… inflexible, conforming to prescribed standards of appearance and all about having right angles!
If you take one of the beliefs out of the wall of brickianity then the whole thing could crumble and fall, so we tend to defend our beliefs when living with this mindset and cement them in place.
These beliefs could be about politics, money, sport, your musical or artistic preferences, what you believe about family, your kids, your friends and, most importantly, what you believe about yourself.
If you have answers that can’t be questioned? You may have fallen for brickianity.
If you're more concerned with promoting and defending your current beliefs than curious and interested in others. You may have got stuck in brickianity.
If you're scared to change and embrace mystery then you may need to leave behind brickianity.
Here at Q we’d rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned.
And this morning we continue our quest of exploring mystery...
Let's start with a very silly video!
There are plenty of dumb ways to die, but there is also an unintended consequence to avoiding risk at all costs. Clare shares how a risk averse culture is having some damaging results on society and limiting our spirit of adventure and discovery.
Our desire to be safe is important, but we must ask "At what cost?"
We've explored isms a lot over the past months at Q. Is it possible that we've made safety another dogmatic "ism" that we conform to? What are we sacrificing on the altar of safetyism?
Safetyism is a trade off - we give up our freedoms, doubting that we capable of making wise, healthy and beneficial decisions ourselves and the more we're told that we are the problem, the more we'll begin to align ourselves with this belief.
"When safetyism becomes the primary driver in organising societies and communities, we de-skill the individual in exercising personal judgement and responsibility. It enables our weakness instead of encouraging us to be strong in order to face the challenges of life."
In The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Quasimodo wakes up to the reality that the church he was told to stay inside, for his protection, has actually become his prison and he longs for the freedom of life beyond these walls.
In the movie Up, we see two characters who are willing to risk their safety and spring into action because of their value of someone else.
If we want to experience something new, we need to risk leaving the comfort of the familiar behind.
"What new things do you want to see that would be worth taking risks for?"
In this video, the Ecologist, Allan Savory, expresses his frustration at a culture that only accepts perspectives that are peer-reviewed, to the detriment of new scientific discoveries.
"The finest candlemakers in the world didn't even think of electricity."
There was nothing wrong with candles, but if the status quo of candlelight had never been questioned, there would be no electric lights. If people hadn't been allowed to think outside of the commonly-held thoughts, then no new discoveries would have been made.
Unless we're willing to risk trying something that might be a little bit scary, we'll never grow beyond what we're currently experiencing and safetyism might end up stifling our spring!
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