The Character Line

At a cer­tain level of stress, you will go out of char­ac­ter. You will do things that are beneath your usual dig­nity. You will become crit­i­cal and your addic­tive­ness will come to life. Before you know it, you lose who you are and become some­thing else — almost some­one else. If the process con­tin­ues for a long period of time, you will lose the abil­ity to be your­self again…and to step back behind the char­ac­ter line.

This process has been described in lit­er­a­ture and in var­i­ous pop psy­cholo­gies for a lot of years, using a vari­ety of terms and mod­els. We humans have the capac­ity for good or evil. There is a Dr. Jekyll and a Mr. Hyde in all of us. Our dual nature was spo­ken of by the Apos­tle Paul, when he would talk about the “car­nal man” and “the spir­i­tual man.” Human­ity is split — divided between two pre­dom­i­nate char­ac­ters: one that lives in the moment and is one with God and another that is neg­a­tively fear­ful and narcissistic.

Over the years, I have come to have great respect for what I call the “Char­ac­ter Line.” There is a stress level that has the capac­ity to push me out of char­ac­ter. It is a line that Jesus NEVER crossed. Even when he was being mur­dered as an inno­cent vic­tim, he stayed his true self. He spoke of con­cern for the weak and for the well being of his mother. He for­gave all that were putting him through such agony, and he man­aged to open the door of Par­adise to a dying criminal.

Stay­ing behind the line means hav­ing some insights into your­self, a prayer and med­i­ta­tion life, and wor­thy men­tors (Jesus and other like minds and spir­its). Repen­tance is com­ing back behind the line of true char­ac­ter, and then pick­ing up where you left off as a whole per­son. It does not defend the inner addict but is sym­pa­thetic with it — since it is part of who we all are — whether we want to admit it or not.

“Lead us not into temp­ta­tion” is a way of say­ing, “Dear Lord help us stay behind the char­ac­ter line.” When push comes to shove, like the Apos­tle Peter, we will look out for our own hide — no mat­ter how much lying and cow­ardice it takes. Then we will real­ize the bit­ter real­ity of tem­po­rary self-preservation over eter­nal life. It is enough to bring a per­son to tears — as it did Simon Peter.

As a spir­i­tual per­son, you have the right to dump all sorts of stress. Char­ac­ter is greater than accomplishment. Being the whole YOU is more impor­tant that cav­ing into the expec­ta­tions of insti­tu­tions or others. Maintain a strong line — one carved in spir­i­tual gran­ite — not in shal­low social sand.