The other day as I was leaving my eye doctor's office, she asked my advice about her 8 year-old neice who "goes to guns" whenever she has to brush her teeth in the evening before going to bed. My doctor had told her sister, the mother of the girl, that she would ask me and I would tell her exactly what to do about it.
She stood then, smiling and expectantly waiting to be told why this was happening and the precise thing to do about it. My mind was racing, even though I was smiling back at her. Could it be that this child associates brushing her teeth with having to go to bed? Has she hurt her gums? Is her toothbrush too stiff? Does she hate the toothpaste? Does she have an aversion to toothpaste? Does it burn her mouth? Does this child have no choices, no way to assert her preferences regarding her toothpaste, toothbrush, time of evening to brush her teeth? Is it possible that the only time she gets attention is when she digs in her heels and engages her mother in battle? Does she feel that unless she does everything "nicely" that her mother's love won't be there for her and she is testing this? Is it a power struggle between mother and child? Is it an effort to be so bad as to engage daddy, too? There were so many issues, so many questions that all I could do was try to explain the difference between medical and therapy culture--and why I couldn't tell her a definitive cause (even though I made some general suggestions about the questions I'd want to have answers to before I could know how to approach this situation).
In medicine, physicians are rewarded for having clear ideas--typically one idea, the idea--about what is happening and what the treatment is that needs to be provided. We expect physicians to know what's what and how to treat the problems. If they start prevaricating and doing the, "Well, it could be this, but maybe it is that, and there is an atypical manifestation of..."--then we beat it out the door and don't go back.
But with therapy, it's a bit different. I was told once by a major professor in my therapy training program that the sign of a good therapist is not in hearing an issue and having the hypothesis for a given behavior. It's in hearing an issue and being able to generate 100 possible explanations for what has happened.
The longer I have lived, the more I believe this. Not only in my professional life, but in my personal relationships as well. We are not the other person and can only guess about how their past, present, anxieties, ideals, and a host of other variables, play into their behavior and words. Regardless of how well we know someone--we still are on the outside making our hypotheses about why they do what they do.
God alone is the One who judges the motives of the heart. We have such monochromatic notions in comparison to what God can see. We feel that we have accomplished something grand if we can look at someone or something and immediately state the cause and effect along with the motives involved. So for my 100 explanations, He has 1,000,000,000 at least. Hard to fathom.
It seems that the grace we receive from a God who understands the makings of us and our behavior is the least we can extend to others who we are unsure of.
Judge not that ye be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you shall also be judged. And with what measure you mete, that shall you receive.
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