#thought supression

One time I was sitting with a couple worldly friends, during my first week or two of college, it had already been established that I was a Christian, and one of them asked me if I believed that gay people would go to hell.

I tried to evade the question and I couldn’t, so finally I just said, “I can’t have this conversation.”

And then he said, “why not?”

He wouldn’t let it go. And I had no idea how to explain that my words were not free. I had no idea that he genuinely didn’t have the assumption that I was walking around as a full time professional representative of my parents/the church/God and had no control over that. I was mad that he would push me into a corner, and mad that he seemed to be judging me for things outside my control. I didn’t know I could leave. He didn’t know I couldn’t.

Have you ever tried to change a habit? Maybe tried to start losing weight by not thinking about food? Have you tried to play the cool one and not call—or email or text—a romantic interest by blocking out your thoughts about that person? How about trying to stop smoking by trying not to think about smoking?

Did it work? I’ll bet it didn’t. But it’s really not your fault.

In spite of it being a…