Being Okay . . . in the Wildernesses of Life

BEING OKAY IN THE WILDERNESS

Many of us have had times in our lives where it feels like we are lost in the midst of a wilderness.?The wilderness may feel like a desert, a deep forest or being stuck out at sea. The wilderness is a lonely, miserable and oppressive place of despair and humiliation.?These are lengthy situations of survival and waiting that can involve an identity crisis.?

We get thrust into these wildernesses for many reasons. Some of the reasons are our fault. Job losses, divorces, deaths, or other kinds of failures put us there.?Sometimes the wilderness happens outside of our control because the timing was terrible. Recessions and economic “bubbles” outside our control bring wildernesses when jobs, job opportunities, employers, and even economic sectors seem to evaporate.??

We feel vulnerable if not naked in very raw ways in the wilderness because the road we had committed to with everything we had dead-ended in the middle of nowhere.?We may have invested blood, sweat and tears in career, academic and relationship directions that promised prestige and fulfillment only to find out we are unqualified for the few meaningful jobs available.?We may have pursued trusting relationships with others that fell flat or did not materialize, or even ended in the appearance of betrayal.??The wilderness makes us critical of ourselves where we tell ourselves we were foolishly wasting our time, pushing our luck in risking things, and that our judgment was poor.??Our self-esteem in the wilderness can be all but decimated.

There are spiritual aspects to the wilderness.?How we have ordered our world view can get brutally refuted.?What we expect from God in provision (meeting our needs) and deliverance from our problems does not come when we either want it or feel that we need it.?We pray and we do not get the answers that we want or expect.?We do get what we think we need.?We may suffer and struggle to make sense of why what is happening is happening. We may be around people who do not understand our beliefs or even mock us because we have them. Our faith can be shaken in the wilderness because what we have held in our hearts gets challenged.?

These wildernesses are not just spiritual, but also have economic and vocational dimensions as well.??We feel embarrassed and ashamed because we are not what we should be. ?We do not have the prestige and resources we deserve.?We are not where we should be in terms of our careers and status, and we do not seem to qualify for any of the decent-paying, available positions. ??We may feel abandoned because the people we knew and depended on prior to the wilderness are gone. ??We may live by subsistence because the expected full-time income is not coming. ??

To survive the wilderness it may be necessary to take one or more terrible jobs that pay at least something. Some of these workplaces may be risky and exploitative commission situations.[1]?Other such jobs are temporary, menial positions where the person in charge is ugly and abusive.?These bad work environments have drama and abuse especially when there is unethical and unfair behavior by those in control.??In these situations it is possible to simultaneously feel gratitude and humiliation when people ask: “What do you do?”??In the midst of the abuse and chaos we likely grieve and get mad at ourselves where we analyze and dwell on we got stuck in this situation.??Our analysis of our situation erodes our remaining self esteem as it does not supply us any solutions but only possible causes and blaming. ???

We are helpless because we depend on unseen others.?The unseen people will make the decision that leads to our escape from the wilderness. However, we often get repeated rejection for all the escape attempts we make.?So in the wilderness, we are unsure of who we are; what we are doing; what we are going to do; and how long we will be there.?In the helplessness and lack of opportunity we may feel stupid and engaging in self-loathing.

Along the line of job opportunities, the wilderness tends to make pyramid schemes seem legitimate.[2] ?They do not say “no” when there is nothing else but rejection, and they hard-sell the potential success.?Of course the fine print is that you have to make the sacrifice and try to sell everyone you know in your family and all your friends. ?The people in your network who have money and interest are in likely short supply and so even these schemes are not a viable option.??These wilderness situations are like an old traveling carnival fun house in which there is promise that proves to be a fraudulent illusion.?

In our vulnerability and mostly destroyed self-confidence we tend to think all kinds of catastrophic thoughts.?These include the worst possibilities that we will never be able to fix or solve.?When we feel like this and think like this we feel like we are on the brink of losing all we have because we are not seeing the solution that delivers us from all our problems. ??Furthermore, finding the solution or rescue from the wilderness is impossible because in the midst of our lack of self-trust we are unsure of what the problem really is???We feel humiliated even while we are all alone thinking our thoughts.?

This chapter looks at what we can do to be okay in the wildernesses of life.??It discusses coping strategies that include gaining one’s bearings and daily living methods.?It will examine when the wilderness might be artificial and of our own making. ????

Bearings

???????????We do not normally think about our bearings when we are not in a wilderness as we have them and we are in “autopilot.”??Our goals are clearly marked in a sufficiently ordered fashion.??Whether or not we are satisfied, there is at least a direction with purpose and meaning.??Whether or not we are happy our needs are met.?We have some kind of security with the bearings.?Whether we are mindful or mindless, we have an idea of who we are . . . where we are going and we are okay.

???????????Our identities are typically defined by the direction we are going.??We get a sense of security by our identity. ?We belong with that identity and direction. ?If we are no longer that person going in that direction we can become insecure individuals lacking identities if not suffering identity crises.?There is an intense distress when we can no longer identify with the profession or roles in which we had invested our hearts, money and time.

The distress increases when we have to be around bad people in terrible work and living situations.?This distress is a reaction to both perceived and real dangers. ?The bad types demonstrate that they are aggressive and habitually out to exploit or manipulate others because they can.??However, we may not understand that we were manipulated until it is too late.?We may realize that we have done something dishonest or unethical in the process.??We are tempted to . . . or may actually lose some of the bearings of our moral compass when we are desperate to survive.??

Losing our bearings in the wilderness leads to even more disorganization and distress.?There is more to lose when there is no focus.?There is a need to regain bearings and have order in both life and morality.?Regaining bearings starts with making an admission and clarifying process as to what is necessary and what matters.

Admit there is a wilderness and take stock?

???????????Admitting that there is a wilderness is painful.?We may cry and we may feel on the verge of a panic attack because we are already highly stressed.??We will need to make effort to say:

1) Yes, I am in a wilderness where I cannot see what is far ahead of me.

2) I can only see what is right in front of me.

3) It is possible that I have more to lose if I do not do something.

4) I need to get some bearings.

People do not normally change unless they realize there is a problem, and realization is crucial in gaining one’s bearings in the wilderness.??

In the process of getting bearings we have to take stock or inventory of what we have and what is there. ?While this is not a highly intellectual process, taking inventory means an actual list (whether on our phone, computer, or actual paper) of what we have in terms of:

1)?????Money,

2)?????Physical assets (the stuff we actually own, like a car and clothes),

3)?????The debts and bills we have.

4)?????The place where we are living and how long we can be there?

We must make decisions about what we are going to do with what we have that include.?

1)?????Where can we store our things?

2)?????Who do we have to negotiate with?

3)?????What are the bill due dates?

We must then explore our immediate options in terms where we must go to live?

1) Who do I know with whom I can stay?

???????????2) What are my other affordable housing options?

???????????????????????a) Do I go to a homeless shelter?

???????????????????????b) Who I can I ask to identify someone who is taking borders or renters?

???????????3) What is the worst or least I am willing to accept in deciding a place to live?

For many the process can seem surreal that we are asking these questions and listing the answers, but it is a clarifying process that brings a clearer and more orderly picture.

???????????The typical, recurring answer to the questions above list should be your family members, but family may be unavailable.?First, your family may be financially unable to help you.?Second, your family may be too far away—as on the other side of the world or in another country.?Third, you may have burned your bridges by your behavior in which you have hurt your family members or you made yourself untrustworthy.??One more reason is family dysfunction—your family is unable to emotionally and mentally be a support because of their problems.[3] ?If your family cannot help you, then you may need to connect with a church or other agencies in your area to get answers to these questions.

???????????In taking stock, we must sometimes intensely concentrate or focus on the present.?We may have to repeatedly refocus in the now whether it is one-hundred times in an hour or day.?We may have to admit to ourselves that we hurt and we are in need. We are crying or on the verge of crying. Our hurt is real but we have got to focus on something. We must make sense of what is in front of us.

???????????To make sense we must create some sense of order in the way we focus on what is in front of us by answering four general questions.?What is necessary now? What matters now??What is good judgment or responsible behavior right now? What can I do right now? ??When we are answering these questions and following through on the answers, we are beginning to set bearings because we can handle what is immediately in front of us.

What is necessary now?

Clarifying what is needed or necessary in the immediate present is the best place to start.?We have to ask whether our basic needs are being met.?Out of the confusion or the state of being overwhelmed, some people may sincerely or sarcastically ask: What are my basic needs???

Abraham Maslow (1943) provided a good answer when he identified what he called a “hierarchy of needs.”[4]???In a nutshell he noted that we have physical needs, safety needs and a number of types of emotional needs.?If the physical needs and safety are not met first the emotional needs are not going to matter to us.?

Thus, our physical and safety needs must be met first.?Do we have a roof over our heads??Do we have the food and clothes we need today???Are we in a safe place? ????Where do we have to go to get these things???

???????????Somewhere in our safety needs in the 21st century include being able to get around and having a working wireless or cell phone service with service.??In essence we could live in the moment but being able to communicate but being able get away from danger can be crucial.?For many people in larger cities laid out for cars, having a car can be necessary to get around to job interviews and jobs.???

What matters now?

For some there can be a conflict between what matters and what is needed. ?We determine some of our priorities with our emotions and not the facts.?We make some of our priorities to avoid perceived humiliation and feared judgment.?We often painfully learn as we go that we are physically getting by without something we thought we needed.

At this point there is good news and there is bad news.?The good news is that we quite often learn that we do not need that much to get by.?The bad news is that we still feel terrible because of the unmet emotional needs.??

Taking Maslow’s hierarchy a few steps further we have needs to belong with other people and needs to feel good about ourselves and what we are doing.??As discussed earlier when we are in the wilderness we are not where we want to be in terms of career, job, or vocation.?Many of us truly experience the emptiness that comes from not doing the work that we want to do, and we are not necessarily being accepted by the group of people doing that work; we are not feeling fulfilled.???

We feel negative emotions when our needs are not met. In this case the feelings we tend to feel include frustration, embarrassment, humiliation and shame.??

Because of our state of humiliation, pretentiousness is very possible mask or disguise in the wilderness.?It serves as a coping skill or defense mechanism in the form of denial that our situation is not that bad. We can create an air of grandiosity as to our importance, but it is an illusion (if not a delusion) and not who we truly are.?Some without integrity or maybe even a conscience truly wear the mask of pretentiousness and don’t give it a second thought.

As part of the mask it may be difficult to think about character and the moral compass when we are surviving in the wilderness. Some people feel that they must do anything possible to get what is needed, even if that means stretching the truth or engaging in dishonesty when others appear to be doing it.?(This especially happens in the commission sales situations.)??Desperation increases the level of risk one is willing to take and the compromises one is willing to make.?

???????????Violating one’s own values out of desperation and pretentiousness often leads to unhealthy rationalization.?Some people in the wilderness who go against the values they have practiced may call those principles “antiquated” or out of touch with the real world.??They try to ease their feelings of guilt by saying to themselves and others that what they are doing is necessary to get by.????

However, the strain of guilt will only further stress those with character who value integrity because they are putting forth and perpetuating a lie.?If and when found out for who they truly are, there is further damage that can keep them in the wilderness longer.?Being real, honest and humble about who we are and the condition we are in while in the wilderness may indeed be painful, but it less risky than succumbing to the temptation of acting pretentious.?

Our values that comprise our moral compass and character speak to what matters to us. ??Our very sense of wrong and right helps avoid guilt that will only distress us further.?Our moral compass points to what our principles and priorities are, where we should begin to regroup, re-focus, or at least try. ??

We have a conundrum with no easy answer as sometimes we feel that what is right and honest costs us something, and maybe it indeed does. ?However, practicing integrity and honesty does not put us at risk of legal charges.?

If given the choice between working 2 or 3 service jobs that pay minimum wage versus a questionable, commissioned sales job while in the wilderness, it likely would be better to take the minimum wage jobs.??It is more stable to stay busy making at least something guaranteed than engaging in the risk and stress and no guarantee that risky commission sales jobs bring.??Stability can breed clarity and that can lead to further gaining of bearings.????

Not a Clean and Neat Process

It should serve to say the process of getting one’s bearings is not necessarily going to be clean and neat. It can be messy and confusing to sort out realistic and unrealistic priorities.??But realistic priorities tend to be short-term and not long-term.

The long-term situation maybe in the back of our minds, but staring at it amounts to a distressful waste of time.???The long-term situation in the wilderness is at best a guess or our imagination.?If our imaginations are contemplating the worst outcomes, those are potential catastrophes we believe we will never be able to handle.??If we spend a lot of time fantasizing on where we want to be, we may have some initial pleasant feelings but will likely end up depressed in the end because we are not there.?Either result of looking too far ahead distracts us from what can be done now and drains us of the energy needed to do it. ??

Furthermore, dwelling on the past is also a drain that does not make us better individuals. Despite all the proverbs and maxims against it, it is very human to remember the past and take it a step farther to dwell on it—it is a part of grieving.??However, with the memories come feelings—both good and bad. ??The good ones are what we call nostalgia.?The bad memories with their feelings have the potential effects akin to paralyzing us or locking us away in our own private jail cell.??The usual products of dwelling on the past are a bitter face, negative tone of voice, angry words, repetitive talking about how you are a miserable victim, and avoidance by others who hate being around those things.

Logically and rationally, the long-term situation is created by repeated action in the present, so indeed what we do now to gather our bearings is crucial in the wilderness.??

As we gather and maintain our immediate bearings, we can begin to explore our longer term options.??We can ask questions, knock on doors, fill out job applications, and network to examine possibilities.?We may get some abrupt “no” answers, some polite “maybe” answers and more than enough awkward or embarrassed “I’m not sure yet” answers when it comes to options.??The “maybe” and “I’m not sure yet” answers mean we wait.

Waiting

There are times of waiting in the wilderness when it seems that there is nothing more we can do and we have no power to make anything else happen.??We are dependent upon known or unknown others to act or make a decision.?When we wait we pass the time until we get an answer or the expectation is fulfilled.?In its ideal form we are peacefully still and do nothing when we wait.

When we are in the middle of the wilderness we do not have peace and we feel that we must do something and rumination monopolizes our thoughts as a substitute form of activity. ?Regardless of how unproductive it is (as discussed above), it is human to ruminate or dwell on the past.??We will likely be critical of ourselves because none of us survive matters perfectly. In our self-critique we pull off scabs and emotionally stab ourselves again and again as we think about the “could haves,” “should haves,” and “would haves.”?It is normal to have these moments. They will subside and we will feel “less badly” when we get distracted by something else. ??Waiting means repeatedly tolerating unpleasant emotions and distress as we pass the time in the wilderness.

Waiting is distressful because our mind wants to go somewhere but our body cannot.?When there is a greater investment of time, emotion, or money there is a higher sense of stress because we have put a lot of our heart in the matter.?Waiting for negative things to happen brings upon a variant of stress called “dread.”?With waiting comes worry.

Worry

When we worry, we tend to dwell about three categories of issues.?The first is an issue where we are dependent upon the decision or action of someone else and we have no control but are helpless in the matter and we dread the negative possibilities.?If we are not dependent upon another, then the subject of worry is the outcome of a future matter (like the long-term situation discussed above) or an event and it not turning out the way we want it to and what we will do if the worst happens.?The third category of worry is when we take ownership of a problem that is not ours to own.??

Worry is a form of anxious thinking that masks itself as analysis and problem-solving.?It is a problem-focus that is not productive because no practical and reasonable solutions present.?Sometimes the problem is a manufactured one that is not real or likely.?While worrying is a human tendency it is a pseudo-activity; we feel that we are doing something but we are not.

As a form of anxiety worrying stimulates our bodies to produce physiological reactions that motivate us to run from dangers even if no real, factual or physical threat exists in the moment. If we merely feel or think there is a threat, we can feel anxiety. ?Regardless if it is real or perceived, anxiety stimulates the adrenal gland to produce adrenalin to make us run from the danger, but we do not run it off, it causes muscle tension, headache, and gastro-intestinal problems.?Furthermore, the adrenalin produced by worrying makes us restless and we have difficulty relaxing, going to sleep or even focusing.??

Continued worrying can eventually lead to panic attacks.??When we do more of it we get increasingly agitated and restless. We can press ourselves that we must do something but we are stuck and maybe even feel like a failure because we cannot solve the problem. We are thinking with our feelings and not with our rational minds, so with “nothing to do” the tendency is to keep worrying because it feels like we are doing something.??Thinking with feelings tends to be impulsive and rapid that includes jumping to conclusions that are practically impossible.?Such thinking also includes dwelling on the worst possible scenarios that we will never be able to resolve all by ourselves.?When our mind and body have had too much of this anxiety and self-manufactured hopelessness, a panic attack happens.

???????????Panic attacks caused by worrying are more likely to happen when we are by ourselves and have nothing else to do. In this case there is also no one else with us to help us stay in reality.?At this point we have brainwashed ourselves into thinking that what we think could happen is happening, and we can do nothing about it.?Worrying leading to a panic attack is a valid example of the cliché’:?“Insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting different results.”

???????????It is no surprise that worrying can and does become habit especially in the wilderness.?It is a choice that we do not realize that we make or that we have been making because it is so natural and automatic to do. Not worrying is can be a difficult, intentional action, but if we are going to get and keep our bearings in the wilderness we at least need to do less of it.?It is indeed a challenge to stop worrying or reduce how much we do worry.???????

Reducing our worrying while in the wilderness

???????????Since worry is a form of thinking, the general strategy is changing what we think. Our thoughts should be focused on the present.??Our standards should be realistic and not overly-demanding.?We may have to fill our minds with other content.?We may have to get out, connect with other people and do things to balance our thinking.?Reducing worry may have to be a multi-faceted commitment that includes changing what we think and reducing the amount of time we are in our heads.

The starting point in worry reduction is practicing the view that solvable problems are only those that we can handle in the here and now. ?Future problems do not get solved until their times come. ?We all know past problems but they only exist in our memories and will not literally or actually get solved because they have passed. ??The useful here question is “What can literally be done now?”

Worrying about “past problems” is dwelling on them. ?There is a difference between remembering the past and dwelling on the past.?Remembering comes and goes and sees both good and bad. ?Dwelling is obsessing on the negatives of the past to the point of ignoring the good of the past.?Furthermore, with dwelling we judge ourselves in a perfectionistic manner as if we should have been the all-knowing and all-powerful God. ???We see ourselves as so stupid that dwelling is necessary to avoid it from happening again. ??

While indeed there may have been terrible events and situations, we can choose and commit to stopping dwelling, and practicing stopping dwelling on the past right now.?This commitment can be started by practicing that:

·????????No human (including you and me) is born into this world knowing everything and we make mistakes,

·????????People of all intelligence levels learn from and do not repeat most mistakes,

·????????Dwelling on the past does not make us better but only bitter,

·????????Dwelling wastes time and energy that could be better used elsewhere, and

·????????Things may not have turned out the way you wanted them to just because of what you think are your mistakes that got you where you are. ???

In a nutshell we stop worrying about or dwelling on the past by changing what we think now and sticking with it. [5]?

Worrying about the future is essentially dwelling on the negatives that could happen and that we are not going to get what we want or expect and it is likely going to be bad if not a disaster.??In such cases our imaginations conceive situations where we against all hope will be helpless and destroyed.?We can think up absurd possibilities that infinitesimal chance of happening. As previously discussed, such thinking makes us highly anxious.?If we stay focused on worries, we will

·????????Feel all the more miserable,

·?????????Lower our self-esteem and,

·????????Give ourselves over to potential panic attacks.?

It would great if we could all just stop worrying, period. ?But we humans will still do some worrying, especially in the wilderness.?Stopping worrying about the future can be hard work in which we stay in the present and stay focused. ?

Worry can be an addicting behavior.?There will be times (no matter how well we have done in not worrying) where we will get absorbed again in our worries. ?At times worry seems to have a modicum of wisdom because the subject we ruminate on is important if not crucial.??If we catch ourselves, we can stop worrying and get our minds on something else.

What We Do While We Wait

If we aim not to worry while we wait, we have to be doing something.??Stopping worrying usually means starting something else. ??We may actually have to start and continue a number of activities and practices that to maintain order, create meaning, and begin to look ahead for opportunities. ??Waiting is probably as much an art as it is a method.?We have unfulfilled expectations which we must endure through the time until they are fulfilled. When we have unfulfilled needs, we tend to have various forms of anxiety and anger that physically stress us.

Assuming that that we have gained some bearings, it is crucial to maintain order in our lives. Maintaining order means continuing those practices and methods that keep us stable.?As products of this focus, we will live within our means and limits and avoid chaos and drama. Maintaining such order in the wilderness means daily or weekly review of what is necessary and what matters.

In addition to the regular review of what matters there is often the need to create distractions for ourselves in the forms of some kind of project or activity.?These projects are not necessarily going to be grandiose but some kind of cheap or free achievement or accomplishment that take some time, challenge us to do something or better us as a person. The activities may have to create some kind of meaning that help us show that we have meaning and purpose in the lives of other people.

We are being okay in the wilderness when we are creating meaning and we matter. Yes, our self-esteem and identity are still probably damaged and we are in pain, but we begin to develop a larger view that the world is bigger than us in terms of who people are and what they need. ??While not perfect, having a bigger picture gives us a different perspective on our problems which can improve our emotional state.

Part of the bigger picture can include developing gratitude or at least a sense of thankfulness.?When we are thankful, we are mindful of how it could be worse it could be. We hopefully recognize that despite being in a wilderness, we have our needs met and we are living and breathing.

?When we are in the wilderness, we have no clue as to how long we are going to wait there, and we don’t necessarily know what we need to do to get out, but if we want to get out, we have to start knocking and exploring opportunities. ???There is no magic to knocking and searching, but for most of us in the wilderness we have to do it. There will be starts, stops, and rejections, but the person who is diligent and patiently persists for ways out of the wilderness will find them.

The Artificial Wilderness or One of Our Own Making

Part of the wilderness ending may mean being willing to accept that doors have closed. Maybe a dream is shattered, and a career path is not going to work out, or a career in one field is over, and there is a sense of grief and loss.??The wilderness is essentially one putting the rest of life on hold while waiting for the dream to come to reality, something that proves to be a foolish fantasy. ?

Giving up dreams that are keeping us in the wilderness is equivocal to surrendering.?Surrendering means we have failed in something that we had based our self-esteem and reputation on. Surrendering also means grieving the time, energy, blood, sweat and tears invested in the dream.?We fight surrendering because we do not like to lose and we do not like to be humiliated. (But does anyone like the feeling of humiliated?)

However, here is often a point in time where surrendering can also bring about a sense of relief.?A chased dream that either gets farther and farther away from us or continues to be beyond our fingertips can evolve into a weight on our shoulders that increases with the time, energy, and resources put into the pursuit. When we give up the dream that is not going to happen the weight also is gone and we can move on.?The process of the wilderness ending may be working through the different emotional states of grief and loss and concretely demonstrating acceptance through pursuing a different path.[6]

People who fail to grieve or stay stuck in grief also may stay stuck in the wilderness or enter a wilderness of their own creation.?Some dreams are pursued to the cost of putting the rest of life on hold. The wilderness of one’s own creation often occurs that dream is not happening, and a person refuses to accept the reality that its pursuit is causing great emotional, relational, and financial detriment.?While there are views that one should pursue dreams and never give up, there are times when a dream is obviously not going to happen, and the better option is to move on to something else. ?When giving up the pursuit of a dream in order to get out of the wilderness is the healthier option, it is not always the easier choice and it is not painless.?

Lessons of the Wilderness

Being in and getting through the wilderness has a way of teaching us hard but meaningful lessons about ourselves, our priorities, and our ways. ??While waiting in the wilderness we often have clarity that many of our so-called needs prove to be mere expectations or luxuries. We prove them as such because we demonstrate that we either made due or did without them.?The discovery of our resilience in such situations should be a relief but it is not a happy clarification process as our hearts were set on them and our energies were focused on getting them.?

Learning resilience in the wilderness is scary and frustrating.?Not having what we thought we needed can bring on an intense sense of abandonment and panic.?The small and slow steps we take in the wilderness help us gain more and more knowledge of what we are capable of and not capable of, but we do not learn it as we think we should. It can seem that we have reached the end of our knowledge and we start to take slow and small steps because it is hard to see where we are going. ?Furthermore, the distress of not meeting the standards that give us self-esteem and a sense of competency is humiliating. ?The wilderness presents us with a tension between self-esteem and humility and we learn both an emotional and factual knowledge we leave the wilderness with a sense of enlightenment of what is both real and what is possible. ???

What is real in the wilderness is the learning of our humanity.?Our self-esteem is attached to the energy we spend on our pursuits. When we have been successful at a pursuit that we hold as essential for our needs, we at feel competent. ?However, the wilderness brings a feeling of failure and foolishness that we work through because we had based our reputation and our self-esteem on a dead-end and we may humiliation even if no one is watching us and paying attention.??Such experiences of humiliation hopefully instill in us the value of being humble and not pretentious in how we talk about ourselves and looking at ourselves.??

The End of the Wilderness: A New Beginning

???????????When we come out of the wilderness or the wilderness ends, we find a substantial and factual new direction of our lives that gives us the senses of hope and relief. ??The direction of life begins to excite us and we begin to feel hopeful that something good is coming.?We can gain an identity that we can be proud (or somewhat proud) of when we talk to others about who we are and what we do. ?

???????????The end of the wilderness is existentially different for people given expectations and desires.?Some people find that the ending of the wilderness involves moving away from a location or city where they can develop a new identity or reputation.?Others wildernesses may end with the finding of new jobs or new relationships. ?The ending of the wilderness may not be the end-all be all of one’s life and it may not feel spectacular given the hopes and dreams that are dashed, but it is clear that there is a life direction gives a sense of fulfillment.

A Vignette

???????????Johnny had just gotten his bachelor’s degree with great hopes of working in his chosen creative field. He invested in his degree program by going on internships.?A recession came on just before he graduated and job opportunities dried up because companies were not looking for his credentials, especially the corporation at which he had interned (they were laying people off).?

???????????What made matters more complicated was that Johnny could not go home and stay with his parents.?They had moved out of his childhood home and into a one-bedroom retirement condo in another city and had no room for him. ??Johnny’s solution was to find a bed in a house with some guys he had known in college.?He had a small room in the basement that had some privacy but it was cold.

???????????Johnny and his parents also had a deal that he would have to start paying his own bills after college.?The challenge in paying the bills was that in addition to jobs in his field having dried up jobs were hard to get period.?Many retail stores and corporations that were not hiring.?If he had been able to go back to his hometown, he would have likely been able to get a job with someone his parents knew and lived at home.

???????????What he had to settle for was able to get a number of temporary jobs working in warehouses that paid slightly above minimum wage.?He initially barely had enough money to pay his rent, his share of the utilities and his car expenses. ?He eventually was able to get a school bus driving job that started paying a consistent wage that made him feel a little more comfortable.?

???????????Johnny tried being social at church and it was difficult meeting people because it would come up again and again that he was working as a school bus driver while other people were working in their degree fields.?It felt that all of the people who were successful gathered together and left him out of their cliques.

???????????It was not helpful that the people he was living with were becoming difficult.?One guy who had just lost his mother was either drunk or irritable and yelling at him for petty issues.?It complicated matters that the guy yelling at him was the owner of the house and was constantly talking about his needing to sell the house and that he did not know how much longer Johnny could live there. ??He was getting it from all sides and it was heading into looking like a crisis on all sides.

????????????Johnny was very much beside himself and he had to make some decisions.?The direction he wanted to go in life had dead-ended. He was not finding jobs in his college major and he was not good jobs period. He was barely making it financially and it felt like he was at risk of losing the place he could barely afford. Johnny also felt socially and emotionally isolated.

???????????Johnny had to admit that he was in a wilderness.?The road he had been going on dead-ended and he had no idea where he could go.?It was a miserable place where he was at and he and he had no idea how he could get out of it.??Johnny had to cry privately about it because it was a painful reality to accept.

???????????After Johnny cried, he had to make some decisions and he had to gather his bearings. He had to figure out where he was going to direct his energies to feel stable. He sat down in a library outside of the house where it was quiet and made lists of what mattered to him, what was necessary in the here and now.?He made a plan and strategy in the quiet of the library to cope with the lousy living situation and to begin to map out the future.

???????????Johnny’s plan and strategy included spending as much time outside of the house as he could to detach from the grouchy roommate, and one of those places was the library. In other situations, Johnny probably would have told the guy to buzz off, but it just felt right in this situation to ignore, placate and appease him because pride did not pay the rent.

???????????Besides the money for the rent, Johnny took inventory on how he was going to try and get ahead on the money.?He worked out a budget with a plan to get his credit cards paid off, eat cheap but nutritious and mostly canned food from one of the discount grocery store and to buy any clothes from the charity thrift stores. ??

???????????There were a variety of so-called job opportunities that turned out to be pyramid schemes. ?It was both amazing and annoying that several people he knew and did not previously know, approach him and in their second conversation, they pitched Johnny to participate in the very same pyramid.?Johnny listened to them, but it required an investment that he could not afford, and it required recruiting all his friends, and none of them had the money either.?

???????????Johnny also tried a sales job on the side of being a bus driver, but it was a poor situation.?Many people argued over account theft and the product was proving to be a luxury that not many people were buying in a recession.?Furthermore, Johnny felt dirty working in the setting because people were being unethical in lying to close sales and offering deals that were actually against corporate rules.?This particular job especially made Johnny feel like he was in the wilderness because it was very difficult and confusing and made him face his values and what was right and wrong.

???????????Johnny’s wait in the wilderness was already taking too long after the first week. With each rejection letter and each door that did not open he felt frustrated and worried more and more that he was going to be stuck in the wilderness forever.?The thoughts of worry in addition to his continued embarrassment compounded his anxiety that kept him up at night and hindered his sleep.?

???????????Since he was in the library a few times per week, he skimmed through some self-help books on anxiety and what it took to reduce it.?He concluded that he had to make his life more than dodging the bitter and irritable roommate who also owned the house and looking for jobs that were not coming his way. ?As a result, Johnny made sure he went to church every week to think about spiritual matters and he volunteered at a charity for homeless people.

???????????The sense of vulnerability did not leave him and he struggled with feeling like poser as he went to church and then to the charity, but being in those places opened his eyes to the larger picture of the world and got him thinking about other matters. He was able to take a break at times from thinking about his own problems and he felt valued at times by other people as to what he could do. ??His exercise in faith at church did not perfectly solve his anxiety, but he was not feeling alone. He realized that he usually felt better or at least worse when he was in those places because he was just being “Johnny,” and not Johnny, the embarrassed guy who got a college degree that seemed worthless.

???????????As the months went by and there was little response from potential employers in his career field, he realized that he may have to give up his degree program because it was proving to be a dead-end and he could not put his life on hold.?He entertained the idea that he might have to give up the dream of working in his creative field and get about the business of earning a living that would lead to his self-sufficiency and at least get him his own apartment where he did not have to put up with the irritable guy who owned the house.

???????????Johnny started researching other job fields and potential career opportunities while in the library.?He had read an article that many people did not work in their major field, and he decided with tears and grief that he was going to join that group. It was a matter of trial and error in figuring out which career field he could work in???He filled out all kinds of online job applications and signed up for civil service tests.?He kept a list of what he was trying and where he was going.

???????????Despite the efforts, it was still a hard routine for Johnny as all the while he wanted something better but continued to both look and wait for a way out of the wilderness.?Despite his efforts to stay busy and occupied, his helplessness to do anything further to improve his situation was still painful and frustrating at times. ?The room was cold and he endured getting up at 4:30 every morning to go drive the bus in the dead of winter in a quiet manner so as not to disturb the owner of the house.?He tried to be as creative as possible with the food he could afford especially because he could not afford to eat at restaurants. Johnny silently cried to God frequently on Sunday mornings in church that life sucked and he prayed for deliverance from the situation. ?

???????????Eventually, Johnny got an opportunity in the form of a job offer with state government.?The offer came after the sixth civil service test he took for a clerical job in the same city.?It was not what he went to school for, but it was a livable wage and he was soon able to save his money for his rent deposits and his first apartment of his own. He worked hard through his probationary period and was ready to move on and out of the house.?It was not perfect, but was a better direction in his life that offered stability, self-sufficiency, some hope of career advancement and it felt like he was out of the wilderness, and Johnny began to build himself a base of stability based on all of the lessons he learned while in the wilderness.

Conclusion

???????????This chapter explored the challenge of being okay when you are in the midst of the wilderness of life where your life feels like it has come to a dead end and you lack the direction where to go next.?When we are in wildernesses, we are unsure what we are waiting for, but we feel like we are lost and do not have a direction but we definitely do not like where we are.

???????????Being okay in the wilderness requires getting one’s bearings.?Getting bearings involves admitting the reality of a wilderness and the taking stock of the situation and resources both available and in your possession.?We take stock by asking what is necessary now and what matters now. Getting one’s bearing in a wilderness is not a clean and easy process because reality is messy and what we focused on may not be what is actually needed. ???

???????????After we get our bearing, we find that we are waiting to get out of the wilderness. With waiting we are physically parked while mentally and emotionally we yearn to be elsewhere.?When we are waiting, we are not the ones in power or control; we are dependent on others who do or do not know to make decisions, and they do not necessarily have our interests or our emotional distress in mind. ?Waiting is an anxious and frustrating state of being and we express that anxiety by worry.

???????????Worry is that form of anxiety where we continue to dwell on a problem that we cannot solve. Continued worry can escalate into panic, cause some physical problems and descend a person into lower self-esteem and loss of one’s bearing. ?While worry is a very human action, it can be managed by looking it as a choice and choosing to occupy our mind with different thoughts and getting into different activities.

?????????????Some people may be stuck in the wilderness because they are choosing to continue a pursuit of a dream that is actually a pursuit of a dead-end.?It is extremely difficult to give up dreams when a person has centered their lives and reputation on their pursuit. However, there is a point where the cost of the pursuit of dream is a wilderness. Some people stay in the wilderness over being unable to grieve, being stuck in grief, or refusing to grieve the loss of the dream.

???????????Wildernesses end to a new beginning. The new beginning is not always spectacular or fantastic, but it is a direction that both feels like an escape and a direction that has some promise.

???????????Wildernesses can teach us very deep and meaningful life-long lessons about ourselves and our values. The fine print is that the lessons are deeply painful. ?However, through the pain we discover our resilience and our strength, and we hopefully gain wisdom as to how we pursue our futures. ????

???????????The wildernesses of life are a reality for many people. ?They have the potential to be destructive phenomena, but they can be worked through when one starts by working to be okay.???

[1] Other characteristics of these risky commission sales jobs include 1) the employer does not supply sales leads, 2) there are no designated sales territories, 3) the employer does not keep or have the product on hand to sell, 4) the employer does not provide you business cards, and 5) there is a no compete-contract.

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[2] A pyramid scheme is where people become distributors of good or services.?The distributor both aims to sell the goods and service and recruit or sponsor others to sign up underneath them. The sponsor gets a cut of the sales and purchases from those underneath them.?The inherent goal is to grow a pyramid organization of others underneath you so you get more and more revenue from their sales and purchases.

[3] The dysfunction is especially relevant when there is a history of abuse, exploitation, or drug use.

[4] A.H. Maslow (1943) A Theory of Human Motivation. Psychological Review, 50 (4), 370-96.

[5] When we are making such a change we often “relapse” and go back to periods of dwelling on the past. However, as we continue to commit to and practice the different alternative thoughts, we go longer and longer without dwelling on the past.

[6] Kubler-Ross’s (1969) states of grief include shock, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.?