The same impulse that makes us want our books to have a plot makes us want our lives to have a plot. We need to feel that we are getting somewhere, making progress. There is something in us that is not satisfied with a merely psychological explanation of our lives. It doesn’t do justice to our conviction that we are on some kind of journey or quest, that there must be some deeper meaning to our lives than whether we feel good about ourselves. Only people who have lost the sense of adventure, mystery, and romance worry about their self-esteem. And at that point what they need is not a good therapist, but a good story. Or more precisely, the central question for us should not be, “What personality dynamics explain my behavior?” but rather, “What sort of story am I in?”
-William Kilpatrick,
Why Johnny Can’t Tell Right From Wrong
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(HT:
Justin Buzzard)
2 comments:
For more on this idea, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller is excellent
Great quote!
I believe it touches on something deep within each of us as image bearers of our Creator. From the systematic rollout of creation (Genesis 1-3) to the manner in which we must worship (see Cor 14:33), to the "intelligent" design of this universe and our very biological presence, we are hard-wired teleological beings, longing for direction, intentionality, purpose, meaning. God does nothing unintentionally. It is the "empty self" (to quote J.P. Moreland, Kingdom Triangle) that assaults our essential identity as human. But, when our sense of an ending gradually emerges from a story, something magically satisfying happens in each of us.
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