Delusional People

Blue tooths are ridiculous. People are willing to appear out of their mind for the sake of convenience. It always takes me a few seconds to realize that someone is talking on their blue tooth, and that they aren't having a lively conversation with themselves. When I notice these people, I like to point them out to my friends. "Dude, check it out. That guy's insane!" It's always funny to imagine that people talking on their blue tooth are just extremely delusional.

Why are we so fascinated with people who have conversations with people who are not actually there? What is it about delusional people that is so interesting? These people live in an imaginary world. When we look at their actions from the outside, they appear totally ridiculous.

Maybe it's because we like to think of these people as being in a completely different category than we are.

I remember one time when I was at a coffee shop in Portland early one morning, and a customer walked up to the barista and threw a piece of pie at him. The customer said, "How's that for customer service? Never mess with a professional boxer!" And stormed out.

Everyone in the cafe - especially the barista - was left totally confused. I was thinking, "Who does this guy think he is?" But that was obvious. He thought he was a professional boxer. And as we all know, professional boxers have the right to throw pie at baristas who do not offer satisfying customer service.

My boxer friend was seriously delusional.

After this happened, the people in the cafe looked around at each other smiling in unbelief at the event that had occurred. It brought us a sense of unity. We were united in the fact that we weren't like this crazy delusional boxer guy. It's so nice to feel normal. It's so nice when you are the driver and not the squirrel trying not to get hit by the cars on the highway. But the truth is we are all delusional. We find our identity in ridiculous things, and we live our lives based on the ridiculous rights we assume from these ridiculous things.

I like to hangout with people with great personalities. They are fun to be around. After a while I notice that I start imagining myself to be these people when I engage with other people in conversations. It's weird.

And sometimes when I'm driving in my car alone I start to replay conversations in my mind, which turn out exactly how I would have liked them to: with me proving my formidable rationalism and wit. Sometimes when I'm playing my guitar in my room - even when I'm worshiping - I start to imagine playing in front of an admiring crowd of peers. Yeah, it's pretty ridiculous.

Sometimes when I write blogs like this I imagine myself being read by thousands of faithful subscribers.

There are things I choose to believe about myself that are quite frankly too embarrassing to repeat.

These illusions always have consequences. I bring these images of myself into my personal relationships. The problem with this is that these images are delusional. They are not real. And my friends are usually good about breaking these images down. When this happens, I often resort to irrational justification, and a lot of times it hurts my relationships; I end up saying hurtful things in a rash attempt to maintain these illusions.

Essentially, I throw pie at my friends because I think I'm a professional boxer. We all do it. So we should repent and find our identity in the truth that Jesus loves us.