“Just follow your heart.”
If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it a thousand times. You can’t watch a Hallmark movie or Great American Family without hearing it. You can’t read a self-help book (I will leave them unnamed since I don’t want to publicize them) without hearing that phrase. You can’t go to a high school or college graduation without hearing those words somewhere in the speech. Without a doubt it may be one of the most popular phrases used in our culture.
Last night in my group I call Wednesday Night Conversations, we discussed this phrase. I shared some statistics with them that I thought were quite telling:
- 84% of Americans believe that the “highest goal in life is to enjoy it as much as possible.”
- 86% believe that to be fulfilled requires you to “pursue the things you desire most.”
- 91% affirm that “the best way to find yourself is by looking within yourself.”
(Source: “Don’t Follow Your Heart by Thaddeus Williams-p.xiv)
But, in reality, following your heart is a really bad idea. To follow your heart implies that you take it as seriously as the Christian takes the Bible, the Muslim takes the Koran, or some cult follows its rule book/leader. You must redefine your identity and anything less than full obedience and expression of every subjective feeling of sexual attraction is unforgivable. Anyone who questions you is a bigot, a phobic, a hater, or worse, an “R.” Our ancestors got a lot wrong, like us. But the one thing they got right was that feelings were not the final authority of right and wrong. Why? Simple. Feelings cannot be trusted. You wake up one morning and you feel absolutely great. Your day goes well. You wake up the next morning with a headache to beat all headaches and you didn’t sleep very well. You day goes terribly. What was the difference? How. you. felt. The fallacy in all of this, the unalterable truth the “follower your heart-ers” want us to think, is that deep down we are all basically good. Aaaah yeah. I know myself. I know I rationalize, make excuses, point the finger of blame, and tend to dismiss criticism.
Word to the wise: don’t follow your heart. It is deceptive and desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9). Instead, we need to align ourselves with God’s Word, whether it goes against our grain or not. The TRUTH is not up for grabs or auction. We need to pray that God will give us a new heart (Jer. 24:7), one that will follow His lead and not our own.
“Follow your heart” is what has made people so self-serving today. It all sounds good on the surface but in reality it leaves us to face life’s challenges alone.
And THAT is exactly the point of why this philosophy is so wrong and to bad to follow. Thanks for a much needed comment Pam.
There can only be one true source by which reality is measured, that is God’s word, the absolute truth. When people tell me that they have no regrets, they lived life to the fullest, I just cringe. At the end of their life, if they did not accept Christ as their Savior, they will have one huge regret.
Everything they put stock in, will no longer matter.
You already know that I’m right there with you Gail. Sad that so many put stock in things that don’t and won’t matter.
Perhaps it is just symantics, but as a Christian we are a new creation, heart and all. I wonder if perhaps it isn’t our heart, but we just simply choose to listen to our old self. Again maybe just symantics. I do agree that the self serving, narcissistic, look at me attitude needs to go. (Said while looking in the mirror)
I think you are looking at it from the view of a Christ-follower Ryan. And I totally agree with you about a new creation. But the view of a person who sees things only from the world cannot make the distinction between right and wrong according to feelings.