Secure Spirituality: A Cozy Cabin
Secure Spirituality is like having a golden key to a cozy cabin that you carry around in your pocket. You don’t need to stay there all day, but you know that if you need some comfort, you can just walk right in, without worry about whether or not the door is locked. Sometimes just knowing it’s there is a comfort in itself.
With a secure style we know that our parents are tuned into us and accessible when we really need them. It doesn’t mean that they aren’t distracted at times, but we know that if we make it clear we need help, they will come running. If we’re sad or scared or hurt, they will hold us and comfort us. We know that we are loved in a way that looks deeper than our shortcomings or successes. The stability of this relationship creates a shelter as we face the overwhelming parts of life, providing a “refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Growing up with a secure style provides us with a key to a cozy cabin. This gives us a healthy map for getting close to others later in life. We learn to reach out in vulnerable ways, to show empathy for others, and to name and navigate our own emotions.
Likewise, when we learn early on that we can get closeness with God without jumping through hoops or cleaning ourselves up, we create a pattern for secure spirituality. Connection with our Divine Parent is a refuge, a firm foundation upon which we can engage with the world and deal with the challenges that come our way. In Christian terms, it means that we know nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” [1]
This foundational assurance doesn’t mean everything goes smoo, but it does bring comfort in hard times. When we feel distant, we know it’s part of the life of faith – not something wrong with us. Rather than striving for closeness, we can rest, knowing that God delights in us. Because God can handle our sadness, pain, fear, and doubt, we don’t have to hide our difficult emotions. When we know that God is always drawing near to us, we don’t have to hate the unholy parts of ourselves, we can just ask for help with them.
When we can bring our whole selves to God and collapse into the lap of our loving parent, we can enter into the resting state of true communion, like an infant in its mother’s embrace, without fretting about losing that connection. There we can find a true refuge from a scary and chaotic world. When we’ve been taught secure patterns of relating to God, we can actually step into the joy and peace and love we’ve been promised to be part of the life of faith.
But what if we can’t trust that our parents – whether earthly or divine – will reliably respond with love and compassion? What if we learn we can’t simply ask for closeness? Then we need to get more adaptive, and come up with different strategies to keep our parents, or God, close. You can read about those strategies here.
[1] Romans 8:39