David Augsburger's Eight Binding Myths And Alternative Freeing Truths

Augsburger, a well known and widely read author and speaker,
is a professor emeritus at Fuller Theological Seminary.

With the author's permission I am posting the following handout I've found helpful in counseling couples and families. Professor David Augsburger taught pastoral counseling courses at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminary in Elkhart, Indiana, where I attended while on a year's sabbatical leave from Zion Mennonite Church and Eastern Mennonite High School. (AMBS is now Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary).

Having grown up in an exceedingly nice, excessively cautious and conflict-avoiding family, I especially resonated with the first four of the following myths, and have benefited from their corresponding truths.

Binding Myth 1: NICENESS IS NECESSARY. Sweet polite tact is the basis for family harmony, so tensions must be temperate, frustrations forgotten. Each must manipulate to get what is wanted without open disagreement or frank request.

Freeing Truth: GENUINENESS ENABLES GROWTH. A balance of caring for others and candor with others invites growth; loving and leveling with others excites health; genuineness and gentleness given in wholeness stimulate depth in life.

Binding Myth 2: DIFFERENCES ARE DANGEROUS. Variations in thinking, feeling and behaving are seen as a threat rather than as a resource for growth. Disagreement is seen as disrespect or lack of love.

Freeing Truth: DIVERSITY IS DESIRABLE. The natural variety in viewpoints, diversity in preferences and uniqueness of persons are to be prized, enhanced and appreciated.

Binding Myth 3: COMMENTS ARE CRITICISMS. The personal implications of any message cannot be ignored. Even compliments are covert demands, blame is present in all criticisms, distance and defensiveness are needed at all times. One is always on trial, and must be forever on guard.

Freeing Truth; COMMUNICATION IS INVITATION. The power of invitation frees us from reacting to rather than responding to each other. Invitation ends shaming and blaming processes and invites one's full responsibility.

Binding Myth 4: ANGER IS ATTACK. All anger is seen as a personal attack. So denied or hidden anger clouds communication, confuses intentions, distorts responses and deadens person to their own excitement for growth.

Freeing Truth: ANGER IS AROUSAL. Anger is an open expression of aroused aliveness and an attempt at real contact. Constructive anger seeks to break through barriers to restructure a relationship more justly.

Binding Myth 5: SADNESS IS WEAKNESS. Open, vulnerable expressions of sadness, tears, loneliness and grief is seen as breaking down since it opens one to rejection or ridicule by another. So hide warm feelings, keep armor closed.

Freeing Truth: TENDERNESS IS STRENGTH. Warm tenderness brings us together. The better you understand my real feelings, the more you will like me. One need not be strong, adequate and coping efficiently at all times to be loved.

Binding Myth 6: LOVE IS CONTROL.  Love is used as a means to gain loyalty, to obligate another to obey, to shape behavior toward a lover's goals. "If you love me, do, think, feel, act as I prescribe." This produces low self-esteem since love is radically conditioned. 

Freeing Truth: LOVE SETS FREE. The more I love you, the more I set you free. Love is given simply because and only because I am and you are. This builds core self-esteem as love is received without conditions.

Binding Myth 7: LOGIC IS THE LAST WORD. All debate must be perfectly reasonable. Feelings must have a rational justification before they may be expressed. Spontaneity is limited, impulsive responses are compulsively edited, intuitions are discounted, feelings belittled. 

Freeing Truth: WHOLENESS IS THE REAL GOAL. Insight and intuition, thought and feeling, fact and human are all equally valued. I am not right, nor are you wrong. Our views are personal and partial with different degrees of truth. Not perfection, but completeness is the goal of growth.

Binding Myth 8: FAILURE IS FINAL. Perfection is an obvious minimum requirement, anything beyond this is proof of your worth and gratitude to parents/God/ideal self. Bad performance is evidence of being a bad person. To fail is to be a failure, so play it safe at all times.

FreeingTruth: GRACE GIVES US THE FREEDOM TO FAIL. Freedom to choose is freedom to fail. An act of failing does not make one a failure. The risk of living is a risk worth taking, living fully includes using ones quota of possible mistakes.