12. What Should a Reader Understand After Finishing Chapter One?
The Lord loves you and wants you to be happy.
That is what I want you to understand.
Everything we have discussed throughout this chapter begins there.
The promise of belonging.
The importance of Joy.
The purpose of accountability.
The possibility of restoration.
The relationship between belief and practice.
And the five virtues of the Lens: Empathy, Truth, Joy, Kindness, and Anti-Greed.
All of it.
Because I believe the Lord loves humanity and wants people to experience good lives.
Not necessarily extraordinary lives.
Not lives without disappointment, pain, conflict, or responsibility.
But lives in which happiness is possible, Love is available, and suffering is not treated as something people must endure simply because someone else believes they deserve it.
I want you to understand that you are loved.
You are wanted.
And you do not have to earn your right to experience goodness.
The Lord will meet you where you are.
But there is something else I want you to understand before we move forward.
Something that explains why I am writing this book in the first place.
Religion Has Failed People
Religion has failed to communicate and demonstrate God’s Love in many ways.
I don’t think that should be a particularly controversial statement.
History provides more than enough examples of religious institutions participating in oppression, defending exploitation, protecting abusive leaders, and demanding obedience from people who were already suffering.
But we don’t have to look at history to understand the problem.
We can look at the ordinary experiences of people who were taught that God’s Love depended upon their ability to satisfy someone else’s expectations.
People who were told that suffering made them virtuous.
People who were encouraged to remain in harmful circumstances because leaving would supposedly demonstrate a lack of faith.
People who were taught that questioning religious authority was the same as questioning God.
And people who were made to feel that their worth depended upon how useful, obedient, or respectable they appeared to others.
These experiences matter.
They matter because religion is supposed to help people understand and practice what is good.
And when religious teachings or institutions cause unnecessary suffering, those consequences deserve examination.
That does not mean every religious institution is harmful.
It does not mean every religious teacher is dishonest.
And it certainly does not mean that people must abandon their faith.
There are religious communities doing extraordinary work.
There are teachers who genuinely care for the people they serve.
There are traditions that have sustained people through terrible circumstances and helped them build lives filled with meaning, community, and Joy.
I know that because I have experienced the goodness that religious communities can provide.
I also know that goodness does not excuse the harm that religious institutions sometimes cause.
Both things can be true.
And Truth requires us to acknowledge both.
Essentialism Is Not Here to Replace Your Faith
I want to be clear about something.
Essentialism is here to supplement and fortify the faith you already have.
It is not an invitation to abandon your religion.
It is not a demand that you adopt mine.
And it is not an argument that everyone must understand God in exactly the same way.
Essentialism is broader than Christian Essentialism.
Its practices are available to people regardless of whether they believe in God, worship another deity, follow a different religious tradition, or practice no religion at all.
Within Christian Essentialism, I understand the Lens as an expression of the Imago Dei, the image of God.
But the Lens does not belong to Christianity.
It does not belong to the Shaman States of America.
It does not belong to any religious institution.
And it does not belong to me.
Empathy, Truth, Joy, Kindness, and Anti-Greed are available to everyone.
They can help us examine what we believe.
They can help us recognize teachings that encourage goodness.
And they can help us identify teachings or practices that cause unnecessary harm.
If your faith already teaches you to love your neighbor, the Lens can help you explore what that Love looks like in practice.
If your tradition emphasizes honesty, the Lens can help you consider how Truth should be communicated with Empathy and Kindness.
If your community values generosity, Anti-Greed can help you examine whether that generosity is freely offered or being used to establish control.
And if you have been taught that happiness is selfish, Joy may help you reconsider whether goodness is something you are allowed to experience.
You do not have to abandon everything you have learned.
You can examine it.
You can preserve what is good.
You can question what causes harm.
And you can develop a deeper understanding of how your beliefs affect the way you live.
Faith should not require you to stop examining the consequences of what you have been taught.
You Are Going to Affect Other People
There is another reason I want people to practice Essentialism.
It isn’t only about improving your own life.
It is also about the people around you.
Every day, you interact with people whose experiences you may know very little about.
Family members.
Friends.
Coworkers.
Neighbors.
Strangers.
People who agree with you.
People who disagree with you.
And people you may never encounter again.
You cannot know everything they are carrying.
You may not know what happened before they met you.
You may not know what they are struggling to understand.
And you may never discover what effect your interaction had upon them.
Sometimes a small act of Kindness makes an enormous difference.
Sometimes an ordinary conversation gives someone the confidence to make a difficult decision.
Sometimes being treated with dignity reminds someone that they deserve better than what they have been experiencing.
And sometimes a careless remark, an unnecessary humiliation, or an abuse of authority causes suffering that lasts far longer than the interaction itself.
You never know what touches another person, good or bad. Why not make it more likely it is good?
That is one of the reasons we practice the Lens.
We cannot guarantee that everything we do will have a positive outcome.
Good intentions do not eliminate mistakes.
And even thoughtful actions can have consequences we did not anticipate.
But we can become more attentive to how our behavior affects other people.
We can practice Empathy.
We can seek the Truth.
We can respond with Kindness.
We can recognize and protect Joy.
And we can refuse to use other people as instruments for acquiring status, power, or control.
Those choices matter.
Not because they make us perfect.
But because they make us more responsible for the effect we have upon the world.
But That Wasn’t My Intention!
Now, here is where things become uncomfortable.
When someone is confronted with the harm their actions have caused, one of the first things they may say is:
“But that wasn’t my intention!”
And perhaps it wasn’t.
Perhaps they genuinely believed they were helping.
Perhaps they did not understand the consequences.
Perhaps they were repeating something they had been taught without examining it.
All of those things are possible.
But none of them changes the fact that someone may have been harmed.
And none of them removes the responsibility to examine what happened.
This is particularly important when we consider systems built upon domination.
White supremacy is an obvious example.
Its foundation is the belief that white people should occupy a superior position within a racial hierarchy.
People defending discriminatory systems may claim that their intentions were benevolent.
They may describe exclusion as protection.
They may describe control as guidance.
They may describe inequality as the natural order of things.
And when confronted with the suffering those systems create, they may insist that suffering was never the intended outcome.
But even if we accept that explanation for the sake of argument, we still have to examine the foundation.
How can you reasonably expect goodness to grow from a foundation of Greed?
Remember how we define Greed in Essentialism:
“The desire to take more than needed for status or to lord over another and the lack of personal responsibility for the pain that causes.”
Greed is not simply wanting something.
It is not enjoying comfort.
It is not pursuing success.
It is the desire to take more than we need for the purpose of elevating ourselves over others, combined with a refusal to accept responsibility for the suffering that creates.
And when a system begins by declaring that one group deserves greater power, status, or control over another, we must examine what that system is actually designed to protect.
Whose well-being matters?
Whose choices are respected?
Who is expected to sacrifice?
Who benefits?
And who is told to endure the consequences?
These questions are not answered by insisting that the people exercising power meant well.
Good intentions do not transform domination into Kindness.
Nor do they transform exploitation into generosity.
And they certainly do not make another person’s suffering disappear.
Greed Breeds Cruelty
This is why Anti-Greed belongs in the Lens.
Without it, the other virtues can be distorted.
Someone may claim to practice Empathy while only extending it to people they consider worthy.
Someone may claim to value Truth while concealing information that threatens their authority.
Someone may celebrate Joy while demanding that other people suffer to preserve their comfort.
And someone may perform acts of Kindness while expecting obedience, gratitude, or loyalty in return.
The appearance of goodness is not the same as goodness.
And a good result does not automatically justify the methods used to obtain it.
Greed breeds cruelty.
That does not mean every selfish decision produces an immediate catastrophe.
Nor does it mean people who have acted greedily are incapable of changing.
It means that when status, domination, and the refusal to accept responsibility become the foundation of our choices, cruelty becomes easier to excuse.
Other people’s suffering becomes less important than protecting what we have taken.
Their objections become inconveniences.
Their boundaries become obstacles.
And their demands for accountability become threats.
Eventually, maintaining control can become more important than doing what is right.
This is why Truth and Anti-Greed must work together.
Truth allows us to recognize what is happening.
Anti-Greed challenges the desire to preserve an advantage at someone else’s expense.
Empathy helps us recognize the suffering involved.
Kindness guides our response.
And Joy reminds us what we are trying to make possible.
The five virtues work together because Love requires more than the appearance of goodness.
Intention Is Not the End of Accountability
I want to return to that statement:
“But that wasn’t my intention!”
Because I do believe intention matters.
There is a difference between deliberately hurting someone and making an honest mistake.
There is a difference between ignorance and malice.
And there is a difference between someone who wants to repair the harm they caused and someone who wants to escape responsibility.
But intention is only part of the story.
What happens after someone discovers that their actions caused harm?
Do they listen?
Do they seek to understand?
Do they acknowledge what happened?
Do they make an effort to repair what they can?
And do they change their behavior so that the same harm is less likely to happen again?
Or do they insist that their good intentions should be enough?
“I didn’t mean to hurt you” is an explanation, not a remedy.
That distinction is central to Essentialism.
Accountability is not supposed to be an endless exercise in humiliation.
It is supposed to help us recognize harm, accept responsibility, and make better choices.
Sometimes that requires restitution.
Sometimes it requires establishing boundaries.
Sometimes it requires removing someone from a position where they can continue hurting others.
And sometimes it requires admitting that we were wrong about something we believed very strongly.
None of those things is necessarily comfortable.
But discomfort is not the same as cruelty.
And acknowledging the pain caused by our choices does not mean we must spend the rest of our lives punishing ourselves.
We have already discussed Jubilee.
We have discussed restoration.
And we have discussed the importance of reducing suffering rather than pretending that pain can always be eliminated.
Those teachings apply here, too.
We can accept responsibility without surrendering the possibility of becoming better.
We can correct harmful behavior without making punishment our permanent identity.
And we can recognize that someone has suffered without demanding that they forgive us before they are ready.
The purpose is not to prove that we are good people. The purpose is to do good and take responsibility when we fail.
Love Is Something We Practice
Throughout this chapter, I have described the Lens as five virtues.
Empathy.
Truth.
Joy.
Kindness.
Anti-Greed.
Each virtue has value.
But practicing one while neglecting the others can leave us vulnerable to misunderstanding what goodness requires.
Empathy without Truth may prevent us from confronting harmful behavior.
Truth without Kindness may become an excuse for unnecessary cruelty.
Kindness without Anti-Greed may become a performance designed to acquire approval or control.
Joy without Empathy may leave us indifferent to the suffering of others.
And Anti-Greed without Joy may become an exercise in denying ourselves goodness rather than protecting it.
The virtues are intended to work together.
When we practice the Lens together, the virtues become Love.
Not merely a feeling.
Not simply a declaration.
And not a reward reserved for people who agree with us.
Love becomes something we demonstrate through the choices we make.
It becomes the way we examine our motives.
The way we treat other people.
The way we respond when someone tells us they are hurting.
And the way we take responsibility for the consequences of our actions.
That does not mean we will always get everything right.
We won’t.
But we can continue learning.
We can continue correcting ourselves.
And we can continue making choices that increase the likelihood of goodness rather than suffering.
What I Hope You Take With You
If you remember nothing else from Chapter One, remember this:
The Lord loves you and wants you to be happy.
You do not have to earn that Love.
You do not have to become someone else before you deserve it.
You do not have to practice my religion.
And you do not have to believe everything I believe.
You are allowed to ask questions.
You are allowed to examine what you have been taught.
You are allowed to recognize that something has harmed you, even when the people responsible insist that they meant well.
You are allowed to experience Joy.
And you are allowed to build a life in which happiness becomes increasingly possible.
Essentialism is here to help you explore those possibilities.
If you already have a faith, I hope the Lens helps strengthen and fortify what is good within it.
If you are questioning what you believe, I hope it gives you useful principles to examine.
And whatever your beliefs, I hope it helps you recognize the effect your choices can have upon the people around you.
Because your life matters.
And so do theirs.
You may never know how much an act of Kindness meant to someone.
You may never know whether a conversation helped someone reconsider a painful belief.
You may never discover that your example encouraged someone to make a better choice.
And that is all right.
You do not have to witness every result.
You do not have to receive credit.
You do not have to control what another person learns from your example.
You can simply practice the Lens and allow other people the freedom to decide what they will do with what they encounter.
But remember that your intentions are not the only things that matter.
Examine your foundation.
Examine your choices.
Examine their consequences.
And when you discover that something you have done caused harm, take responsibility for what you can repair.
You never know what touches another person, good or bad. Why not make it more likely it is good?
That is the invitation I want to leave you with.
Not an invitation to become perfect.
Not an invitation to surrender your faith.
And certainly not an invitation to place your trust in me instead of examining what I teach.
It is an invitation to experience goodness, recognize it, protect it, and share it.
Because the Lord loves you.
Because your happiness matters.
And because the people whose lives you touch deserve the opportunity to experience goodness, too.
You are loved. You can experience Joy. And you can help make Joy possible for someone else.
That is where Essentialism begins.
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