November 22, 2021
One of the biggest things that keeps people in the Church long after they’ve mentally checked out is fear. One particular fear is of what kind of drama they might endure if and when they finally decide to stop showing up on Sundays.
Making this worse, people fear the reactions from people who matter to them very much, such as religious friends and family members. People are terrified about what they’re going to say about them or what rumors might start or what untrue information might be proliferated.
We’ve all heard the common advice of, “Don’t care what other people think about you” but we all know it’s not always that simple. Most of the time, we care very much about what people think about us.
But here’s the thing. The reason why you shouldn’t care what people think about you is because you cannot control what these people think about you. At all.
You can certainly try. You might try to control the narrative. You might try to withhold part of the truth as to why you’re choosing to leave your church. You might show up every other Sunday instead of leaving altogether (like you really want to do) in order to keep people from noticing your slow departure.
The result of all that stuff is expending so much time, energy, and thought into trying to control what other people think about you—and it’s all wasted. Because no matter what you do, no matter what techniques or strategies that seem clever to you in the moment, you cannot ever control what other people think about you.
But here’s the key thing to remember: just because someone thinks something about you does not make it true. Let’s illustrate this.
You have Person A, Person B, and Person C. All three of these people go to your church and know you well. You’re very concerned about what these three people might think about you now that you’ve left the church. Let’s take a peek inside their minds.
Person A believes with his whole heart that you are a huge sinner, corrupt, evil, and a blasphemer. He thinks that since you’ve left the church, your entire life will fall apart as punishment from God.
Person B believes with his whole heart that you are a good person, will always be saved even if you never go to church again, that your intentions are pure, and that you will always do good in the world even if you no longer attend church.
Person C believes with his whole heart that you are cat. He believes that you walk on all fours, have fur, use a litter box, and the only thing you can say is, “Meow.”
Person A believes some pretty nasty things about you, doesn’t he? Are any of those things true? No. Can you make him stop thinking these things? No. Even though he thinks this about you, there is literally nothing you can do to make him think otherwise and, more importantly, him thinking these things does not make them true about you. That’s a relief.
Person B believes some very nice things about you. That’s awesome! I’m sure you’re grateful for that and would prefer to have Person B think these things about you forever. But we need to be fair here. Does Person B thinking these things about you make them true? Unfortunately, no. I’m sure Person B’s thoughts are accurate and describe you completely, but it’s not the mere thoughts of Person B that make these things true about you. These things are only true about you if you embody them in your life and your actions make them true. So even though Person B has many good thoughts about you, unfortunately that also doesn’t make those thoughts true.
Person C was only invited to this party for illustration purposes. Does Person C believing with all his heart that you’re a cat make you literally a cat? Of course not. Even though you can prove to Person C that you are not a cat doesn’t necessarily mean you can ever make him stop believing you’re a cat. This just goes to show that even with all the ridiculous, off-the-wall, or made up stuff people can think about you, you still can’t control it. Since you can’t control it, it really doesn’t help you to worry about it.
When you leave your church, people who remain are going to think whatever they’re going to think. Let them. Your time and attention is better spent elsewhere investing in yourself and healing yourself. It’s highly unlikely that any of the people in your old church are going to have thoughts about you that actually reflect reality. As with anything else that doesn’t reflect reality, why bother with it?
At the end of the day, it’s a good thing that you cannot control the thoughts of others. Why? Because that means no one can control your thoughts. I don’t know about you, but having the freedom to think what I want is well worth the price of letting other people think ridiculous, bizarre, and inaccurate things about me from time to time.
I know it’s easier said than done, but work on letting this go. Reread this article a couple of times over the course of a few days and let it really sink in. Because freedom from oppressive, fundamentalist religion is good, but I’d argue it’s not nearly as good as finally reaching the point of no longer caring what anyone else thinks about you.