Anonymous

I like not being known. That may seem a lit­tle weird, but there is a power in it that is often over­looked. It is an ego cul­ture in which we live, but it is becom­ing too emo­tion­ally oppres­sive to main­tain. Being known used to be a bit of a rush, but now it is a bit of a risk. Fame is more likely to get you cru­ci­fied than crowned. To have a pub­lic life is to be the tar­get of the envi­ous and even the down­right evil. I really do not want my per­sonal life (flaws and all) to be read by peo­ple stand­ing in line at the gro­cery store.

Jesus was pop­u­lar among the hope­less but a threat to the pow­er­ful. For that rea­son, he did a lot of work out of the lime­light. He healed peo­ple that went away — quickly for­get­ting his name and obliv­i­ous to his divine pur­pose. That was no threat to him, though some­times he was sad­dened that peo­ple would set­tle for being merely phys­i­cally healed. Even­tu­ally, it was the spin given to his pop­u­lar­ity by his ene­mies that got him killed.

These days, the moment you are known, you are vul­ner­a­ble to all sorts of poten­tial law­suits. I have lived in cities where peo­ple were told not to wear expen­sive jew­elry in pub­lic or drive nice cars. Doing so made them the poten­tial object of crime. Wear­ing a fur coat can get you accosted by an ani­mal rights zealot. Strangely enough, we have all become walk­ing sym­bols to each other…and sym­bols can morph into targets.

Some of the best coun­sel­ing I have ever done has been in air­ports and restau­rants where no one knew my name. They only sensed that I had some coun­sel­ing skills and the heart to lis­ten. There is some­thing about anonymity that allows peo­ple just to be peo­ple. The minute titles and ego appear in a con­ver­sa­tion, the wounded soul in need of con­so­la­tion runs for cover.

To the ancient Greeks, fame was a form of immor­tal­ity. Many peo­ple still believe that and seek it. The bet­ter power is being an “angel” to some­one in a God-given oppor­tu­nity for good. Qual­ity spir­i­tual results hap­pen when peo­ple thank God for the expe­ri­ence with­out hav­ing the ego clut­ter of some nar­cis­sist hang­ing around.