Disturbing Habits from “The Adventures of the Teen Jesus”
Jesus was getting old enough to carry more than one question in his head. That’s good because today three questions were present. He was not sure where to begin.
Was he to be a disturber of habits because everyone lived mostly by habit?
Why did Abba recently speak as though he was one of “us”?
And then there was the biggest question of all. Jesus could concede that most evils were the result of human choices, but there was the rankling question of how to reckon harm from non-human causes, harm that had always been accounted as from on high, as the work of gods.
Jesus put out of his mind the suspicion that he was overloading himself. He was determined to get answers. He felt able to move ahead.
Abba helped him sort the questions. “Let’s start with the easy one,” he said. “Habits. Habits are what we do without thinking. Good habits are wonnderful, harmless, a joy. Handling a wagon well. Getting to sleep a certain way. Eating one’s daily bread. But not all habits are good. Not all habits achieve what is desired. It is out of being disturbed that thinking rises. Thinking is how we get to new habits. Thinking is a window of freedom labled ‘Choose!’. You got disturbed by your three questions. So what did you do?”
“I came here. I asked you.”
“And what was happening?”
“I was thinking i guess.”
“You were agitated. Disturbed.”
“Indeed.”
“If the disturbance had never risen, you would have walked along as usual without a thought in the world, enjoying things. Just existing.”
“I guess.”
“Jesus, freedom is the response when a choice must be made. ”
“Yes.”
“And habits are what we mostly live by.”
“Yes.”
“And it is only by being jolted a bit that a habit can be changed.”
“Maybe.”
“Jesus when you say things to yourself like ‘I’m going to’ or ‘I want to’ or ‘I need to’, you are preparing to make a free decision. Into that window of thought there will come things that are important to you. Like — like what, Jesus?”
“My will. My freedom. My choice. I am deciding. I am conscious.”
“Precisely! When you walked off the other day you thought you needed to be a disturber of habits. Your understanding of your work advanced. But you were not sure what it meant. You got disturbed again. Now you see that it means. Disturb a habit, open a door, choice, freedom, action.”
“Yes.”
“Jesus, you will spend the bulk of your time meeting opposition from folk in the grip of lesser habits. Their freedom has been shut down. They are content with the way things are even if they are unsatisfactory.. Your most loving course is to disturb their habits.”
“So I was right?”
“You are right.”
“And.”
“And now the next questions in order of difficulty.”
Ω
Stephen C. Rose is the propounder of Triadic Philosophy and the author of numerous works supporting his thought. He writes daily on Medium and his books are available on Kindle . Twitter is the center of his activities online.
