Sameness

Estimated reading time: 6 minute(s)

My wife and I are spending the next two days with several hundred other homeschoolers from the state of NY. We even shed our parental responsibilities for those days (thanks to great friends and Grandma!), so as to focus completely on the acquisition of knowledge and supplies for schooling our children at home.

As we were sifting through the aisles and aisles of curriculum from such a wide variety of authors in such a grand assortment of styles, I noticed something. In almost every instance, the curriculum was promoting sameness. An idea or system was presented as a great way to convey knowledge, and marketed as such. Some curriculum even promotes the idea that promoting sameness is bad, but simply by the existence of such a curriculum, the authors ended up doing that very thing.

Before we came to this weekend, which happens to be one of Jen’s most favorite events of the year, we were having a discussion in which I was trying to figure out the reason behind my aversion to conventions. I really couldn’t figure it out. But today I think I saw the bastion of similitude that conventions inherently possess, and realized that may be a large part of it.

I love that we homeschool. I love the idea of it, and the practice of it, and just about everything about it. So, it would follow, one could assume, that I would enjoy a gathering of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of like-minded people from all over my home state for the express purpose of gaining knowledge and resources to that end. That makes sense to Jen. She loves it.

But, not me.

I told her it’s not so much the content, as evidenced above. I would probably be a little more excited about an Apple computer convention… but I still don’t really want to attend an event even with such amazing content as that.

After one hour in the main vendor hall, it struck me. There is a drive in us for sameness. Sometimes it’s in us, to match the behavior and ideas and other qualities of those around us. Sometimes we enforce our beliefs and worldviews on others, hoping to enact some bit of sameness in the process. It is not usually a violent process, just, the way it ought to be. This is quite prominent in the halls of faith. Most every public figure in the realm of Christianity on any level is attempting in some way to lay out a standard to which you should desire to conform. Often the standard is scriptural, but many times it is merely an interpretation.

The drive for sameness is the beat to which we all march. The books we read promote this. The curriculum at this convention says “Be like me!” The very culture of those in attendance here screams sameness. Many are dressed alike, speak alike, act similarly. It’s not that homeschooling by its very nature merely conforms people to some rigid mold. I believe that in every group of people who are connected by a similar interest or station in life there is a much greater degree of sameness than with the general population, thereby creating an appearance of conformity. You can even see this in the groups whose similarity is that they are trying to not conform, as we observed with a group of skaters the other day who looked and acted just like skaters some 15 years ago when we were in high school. And, actually, the homeschoolers are quite non-conformist as well by the nature of the similarity that defines their group.

Even in difference, we find sameness.

The Bible says we are sheep. Sheep follow the sheep in front of them. They do what they do, careful to not get out of step with the rest. In so many ways, that is just like us. I often see myself as the proverbial black sheep, as so often not by will but simply by who God made me to be I find myself choosing or thinking exactly opposite from everyone else around me. I am still a sheep, though. Just the black one. 🙂

So why am I so turned off by sameness? Why the compulsion to be different? Just ask Jen… almost every choice that comes up in life, we choose differently. (We do both enjoy a good Star Trek episode now and then….) 🙂 But somehow, I love variety in life. I love doing things differently.

We know that God is the same yesterday, today and forever, right? So, it can’t be that bad to be the same? Right?

I think perhaps that God is so amazing that while being the same, he is different. We already know that he is three persons in one. That within himself he is three distinct persons – more than just multiple personalities! God is so vast in his own nature that he is actually three separate persons. We also know that all of us are created in God’s image, yet are totally and completely unique. None of these things is just like the other. 🙂 To me, that reflects the vastness of our Father’s character. One of his Image Bearers can not house the enormous variety within his Being. But altogether, we begin to exhibit a reflection of him to the world. All together in our differences.

God did not make us robots to attain some perfect standard of conduct that he has predetermined for every one of his creatures. He has created us all uniquely. There is some drive in us that loves similarity and longs to be like everyone else, or at least associate with like-minded people. And sometimes, that leads to either not being who we really are, just playing games to be who others think we should be. Sometimes that leads to a sense of obligation and duty that God never intended for us. Sometimes that leads to conventions that celebrate sameness and encourage it all the more.

Sometimes that leads to me freaking out. 🙂

I’ll get over it. But I think that I learned something more about me today. Something in me can not conform. I don’t think out of pride or rebelliousness or anything fo the sort. I think it’s just a core part of who I am. Perhaps a piece of God’s nature reflected in me. Perhaps his spontaneity is evidenced in me, his love for variety and creatively approaching every situation differently. You can not help but see his love for variety in the universe that he has created!

Whatever it is, I am glad to be God’s messenger of difference.

Does that make me his “Variety Show”?