Not So Different After All… Dealing with Difference
(Friday 13th February 2015)
You feel bitter. Resentful. Hurt. Unlistened-to. Dehumanised. Sad. Unjustly treated.
You don’t?! Well then maybe you’re a saint, cos I certainly do. Or maybe you just handle it differently. I feel all the above, and more. I could go on…and on!
But, khalas, I don’t need to bore you with my emotional baggage. The truth is, we’ve all been there. We’ve all been on the periphery, on the outside looking in, feeling that we’re the abused, neglected or simply just ignored. I mean, it’s almost like the others don’t even recognise our plight, right?!
And it’s not pleasant. It’s not fun. So un-fun, in fact, that we would never do anything like that to anyone else…..right?
These were some of the issues explored when Daniel and Sharon hosted a workshop with the staff here at Bethlehem Bible College. The subject – resolving our differences – focused on our experiences on the margins of a group. Everyone could easily identify how we felt when subjected to such a position. All of the above feelings, and more, were readily volunteered by the participants. We discussed and explored these.
But then something occurred. The boot was placed firmly on the other foot!
We can all hastily recognise those times when we’re on the margins, but what of those times when we’re part of the mainstream – the side making the rules, setting the tone and dictating the modus operendi of the group? Are we quick to recognise, in those on the margins, the same feelings that we so easily identified when put in that same position? And how can such recognition change how we view the other and, more importantly, how we act towards them?
We are, in reality, creatures who inhabit many different spheres. In some, we are firmly in the mainstream, setting the agenda and enjoying authority. In others, we find ourselves most definitely on the margins, powerless in many ways and at the whim of others. It can perhaps be crucial in either one of these situations, to cast our minds back to when we were on the other side of the fence.
After all, differences are not all that different when you realise that, to someone different, you’re different too.
