I like Star Wars, the movie, as much as the next person—at least the original (while not technically sophisticated, or particularly well-acted, nevertheless it retains its charm). But there’s nothing like being corrected by a 16-year-old Star Wars geek on a quote from a movie I saw during its original release. In a movie theater. Before the uppity kid was even born!*
In a congregation reactivity from a disturbance in the emotional field can result from:
- The arrival or departure of a significant group of people
- The departure and loss of a significant number of people
- The arrival of a significant number of “different†people
- The departure of a minister who was fused with the system
- The arrival of the new minister
- A change in the physical plant or campus of the congregation
- A change in meeting patterns (especially those related to corporate worship)
- A change in policies that affect people’s jobs, ministries, schedules, or relationships
- Changes in the finances of the congregation (increased giving, decreased giving, increased expenses, large gifts for endowments or for designated programs or causes)
- Attempts to change symbols or artifacts related to the congregation’s identity
- Nodal shifts in the surrounding community environment
- The discovery of illegal or unethical conduct among clergy or the members.**
Disturbances in the emotional field of a relationship system are caused by anything that threatens to change the homeostasis. The reason isn’t so much that change is a threat, but that change brings a challenge to the emotional system’s corporate identity—its sense of self—and the threat of change in functioning of the individuals that make up the system. These two primary changes are the cause of anxiety, though the reasons people attribute to the anxiety may be varied.
The important thing to remember is that change is the norm, yet it will be resisted due to systemic homeostasis. Most systems with any level of health have the resiliance to ride the wave of change and come out on the other side of the chaos-of-the-in-between and arrive at a new equilibrium. But when the normal anxiety that is the by-product of change goes unregulated it can result in reactivity. Wise leaders learn to recognize reactivity of this nature and will know that they must allow for people to work through their anxiety and reactivity for themselves. The leader who has a low tolerance for others’ anxieties or discomfort often is too quick to move to ease people’s existential pain. Often this merely results in self-sabatogue and in aborting the change process necessary to come out on the other side of things.
*The line was, “I feel a great disturbance in the force,” uttered by Obi-Wan Kenobi (It’s kind of scary that I actually know that).
**Source: Adapted from a handout of a presentation by Betty Pugh Mills. Original source not cited.
