While a bear from the wild may be
captured to live in a zoo or such place and a wild bear may be trained to ride
a bike in the circus, for the most part, wild bears do what wild bears do. Several years ago, while trying to emphasize
a point about how to deal with some types of difficult people, I began to pick
on bears. I could have easily picked on
some other animal, but the bears were an easy target. I have sometimes heard horrible stories about
how a bear somewhere had attacked an innocent hiker. More frequently we hear stories of how a bear
somewhere entered a campground and ate all the campers’ food. Bears, being bears, do not judge the ethics
of their actions. If you get too close
to a mama bear’s cub, she will attack to protect her baby. If a bear is hungry, it will seek out food
and eat whatever is most convenient. The
bear does not judge a camper’s goodness or badness. The bear does not care how hard it was for
the camper to haul the food to the camp site.
The bear is just doing what the bear does. The first time that a bear eats a camper’s
food, the camper may be angry with the bear, but once it has been established
that bears are present and that bears will eat your food, one can hardly be
angry with the bear if the bear does this again. This is why campers often have to hang their
food in trees or put their food in a boat on a lake away from the camp
site. Bears will do what bears do. There is nothing that will make the bear
change its behavior, so, the camper must change how he manages the camp site
and the food.
Like the camper, many of us have people in
our lives that do things that hurt or annoy us.
There are people that continually try to rob of the good things in our
lives. Our first instinct is to take
these behaviors personally and wonder why we have been singled out. We may feel anger at the person and may even
make attempts to change their terrible ways.
However, if we begin to think of them as bears, we realize that these
problematic people are not doing these things “to us” because they do these
things to everyone; it is just their nature.
We do not have to take it personally because it is not personal. The bear is just doing what bears do. The bear’s behavior is not a judgment on us
because the bear is not taking our value into account at all. Just as campers must find ways to protect
their food from the bear’s attacks, we must find ways to alter our ways when we
encounter the “bears” in our lives.
There is not one universal way for dealing with “bears”. Often the
way we need to respond is dependent on our situation. In some cases, doing whatever the equivalent
of hanging our food in a tree is sufficient to protect us from the bear’s
attack. However, as some of clients have
pointed out, there are times when the bears are so persistent that not camping
in those areas at all may be necessary.
One client once heard me talk about the bears and told me that the “bears”
in her life had completely ruined “camping” for her altogether. In this metaphor, we must assume that not “camping”
is not an option. We cannot allow the actions
of some bears to ruin our experience in the great outdoors. We cannot let others rob us of the joy of
living. I know sometimes it feels like
we should just avoid every situation where there might be bears, but the
reality is that bears are everywhere. (I
saw a news story this week of bears wrestling in a backyard in Florida. Who knew there were bears in Florida?). We cannot change the bears, but we sure can
change how we relate to them. The bears
in our lives can be crafty and sometimes can trick us into letting our guard down,
but when we do, we must look at ourselves and how we were deceived and not at
the bear because the deception may be in the “bear’s” nature. If we are picking on bears, then I would say
that we cannot avoid every single animal simply because there are bears in the
world. Not all animals act like the
bears. However, all the animals have
their own way of relating. Some of those
animals can be quite docile and affectionate.
Most of us have some “bears” in our
lives. Some bears live in our own homes
with us and some are people at work, school, or church. Sometimes figuring out the emotional equivalent
of “hanging your food in a tree” can be tricky, but it can usually be
done. “Leaving the woods” or never “camping”
are rarely the best options. If you are
having difficulty with a “bear” in your life, a good therapist might be
helpful. A good trustworthy friend can
often be helpful as well. Just remember
that bears will be bears and you can learn to co-exist with them. Happy Camping.
