Chaplain's Corner

By now, many of us understand the meaning of the word “default” as it is used in our computerized lives. A default is a setting on a computer that automatically makes a choice based on a decision or series of decisions made at some time in the past. For example, when I use my work computer and want to print something. Long ago some clever IT fellow set the computer to print on the central printer in our Administrative Center. I never have to tell my computer where to send my print job it has a “default setting” that automatically tells my computer where to send the print job.

Well the other day I was thinking about the fact that long before we had computers and began using this language in relation to these machines we have created, this same mechanism has been true in human beings, part of God’s creative design. Of course it happens quite differently, for people do not have micro chips and settings that can be set. But the human brain is a marvelous creation and life’s experiences have a way of setting our individual defaults so that we think and respond and feel in very predictable ways when certain messages are received. And this all happens without conscious through – it is how we “react”.

Let me share a personal example. It is not unusual for any one of us to receive a message like, “Hey, I need to talk to you, could we set a few moments aside soon to talk.” Now when I hear this sort of message, I immediately feel tension building in my body, my mind begins to think, “Oh no, what have I done now” and I feel apprehension. Now when you hear those words you probably feel very differently or maybe those words don’t trigger any automatic response at all.

So why does such a simple and benign request get my inner world all worked up. Well, I have spent a lot of time lately thinking about this sort of thing and as best as I can figure, when I was a boy growing up, the only time people wanted to talk to me about something was when I was in trouble. Over and over that was my experience as a boy and sometime along the way, in the inner workings of my mind, this kind of message established a “default” and now, even at 60 years of age, if someone, anyone, says “ Hey Larry, I need to talk to you.” Without even thinking about it, this default is triggered and I think, “What have I done now?”, and I anticipate being in trouble and try to think about what I might have done that would get me in hot water with the person who wants to talk to me.

Now this “default mechanism” that every one of us experiences, although originally “set up” to protect us ends up betraying us as we grow up and mature. We all probably have dozens of these “default mechanisms”, some of us are very aware of them; others of us are totally unaware of them. Most of us are aware to one extent or another of some of our “defaults” but most of us find that these “defaults” do not always serve us very well and at times can be a serious impediment to our own physical, emotional and spiritual health.

I have met men who somewhere back in their development developed a default that goes something like this “doctors are to be avoided at all cost”. Now, maybe this came about because of “bad experiences” with a doctor, or observing that when a parent or grandparent went to the doctor something bad always seem to come of it or possibly the fear of seeing the doctor was created in another way. Somewhere deep within this person’s mind, “going to the doctor” is the last thing in the world they ever want to do. So when these fellows gets sick, you may not be able to drag them to the doctor’s office or the Emergency Room. This “default” the “fear of doctors default” does not serve anyone well, for as so often happens, those with this “default” delay seeing a doctor until it is absolutely unavoidable and by that time the condition that brought them to move against the “default” has advanced and the doctor may have a very difficult time dealing with it – which interestingly only reinforced the “default”.

It is possible to have these “defaults” set in our minds in relation to absolutely any reality in life. I know some who have a “default” in relation to God. One man I know grew up in a home where those who taught him about God proved to be generally untrustworthy people. The teaching he received was duplicitous: on one had he was taken to church and the “religious rule” that he was taught was hard and unmerciful. On the other hand, as a rather astute observer of life, he early on realized that the teachings of the church did not match the way his elders lived. In short, there was some pretty obvious hypocrisy at work.

This fellow attended church regularly but refused to become a member. I would often have coffee with him and we would talk about his past and I could see these “defaults” at work in every conversation. At times I tried to break through and encourage him that not all people of faith were like those he encountered as a boy, but to his dying day, the “default” remained and I often thought of those words of Jesus in regards to those who were responsible for setting this default: “And whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea.”

A man I once knew well had a father who told him regularly, “You will never make anything of yourself. You are just good for nothing.” This message became one of these “defaults” in his life. It was a strange thing to observe, for he had made quite a lot of his life. He was a millwright by trade and had a good paying job with CNR. Re had worked hard to get an education and because of his interest in theology had earned a doctorate in theology. The was a pretty good guitar player and he and his wife often sang in church and on other occasions. He was bi-lingual. Yet, despite all the ways he had proven his father wrong – that “default” never went away. The unconscious and immediate message he heard was always, “You will never make anything of yourself. You are just good for nothing.”

Unfortunately, unlike a computer, we just can’t hire a technician to come in and reset our “defaults”. Some people seek therapy from a counselor, psychiatrist or psychologist in an attempt to reset their “defaults” and find a lot of help. Others seek spiritual help through prayer and pastoral counseling and find help. Others seek to help themselves by going to seminars and reading self-help books and find some help. Some find a lot of success others not so much. I have tried them all and can’t say that I have made much progress other than becoming conscious of these realities at work in me. And I guess that is really not such a small thing after all – is it?