Healing at the Root: Turning from an Instant Gratification Culture

One of the biggest issues plaguing our society today is our instant gratification culture. We live in a world where we can access anything we want immediately. From door dash, to Wikipedia, to our trusty bible app, material items and information are at our fingertips and in our orbit within minutes, sometimes seconds. With series releases, we no longer have to wait the wretched week for the next episode of our favorite show to drop. With “pick up” filters on websites, we no longer have to search store shelves or ask for help to find items we need. With control find and google, we no longer need to search the bible directly for scripture. When I want something, I can have something. The time spent waiting, working, perfecting, learning, and being curious is now gone. 

While some of the immediacy modern technology has brought is beneficial - there are also quite a few drawbacks.

One of the more negative areas where instant gratification culture is popping up is in counseling sessions. The most common question I get from prospective clients is “how long is this counseling thing going to take?” They want to know if the inconvenience of their traumas, anxieties, depression, stressors - whatever is plaguing them - will be healed quickly. Why? Because we want to feel better right now. We want tings to “go back to the way they were”. We don’t want to give up time and resources on yet another thing. 

It’s like taking Advil when you have a headache. We pop a pill to feel better so we can continue on with our day, instead of listening to our bodies tell us that something deeper is going on. If we did that, we would have to give up time and money spent elsewhere. So we take the pill and we move about our life, ignoring what our bodies are telling us, and exacerbating the issue. The concept applies to our mental wellbeing.  

What is difficult in working with this generation when it comes to healing (of any kind), is that healing doesn’t happen instantaneously. True healing is hard. It can take a lot of time - months, years even. It can be frustrating - taking three steps forward and 2 steps back. It can sometimes take a lot of convincing to get someone to be willing to do the hard work. But that is why I am all about Deep Roots. When we give healing the time it deserves, we will see healing for a lifetime, in deep and substantial ways - not shallowly and momentarily. 

“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, nor for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward.” Colossians 3:23

The biggest hindrance (other than the instant society) to a client wanting to take the time to heal is our culture’s turn to antidepressants, anti-anxieties, mood stabilizers, antipsychotics - you name it. And the problem exists due to instant demand and a broken medical system. While medication can have its time and place - preferably for very short stints of time - the chronic script writing to address mental illness and just general life dissatisfaction is on the rise. 

Did you know we live in the most medicated society of any other developed nation? Why? Because we have developed an unregulated system in which we can prescribe a medication that will provide instantaneous “fixes”. Much more instant than the work of therapy, life coaching, spiritual healing, proactive physical wellness etc. 

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end” Ecclesiastes 3:11

It is in my nature as a therapist to turn my nose down to shortcuts in healing. But even more it is against my nature as a Christian. Patience is the antithesis of instant gratification. And patience is one of the many things we are called as Christians to emulate. Taking the societal shortcut doesn’t help us discover what is plaguing us. Societal shortcuts don’t help us find strategies to address problems long term. Societal shortcuts don’t help us face the things that are difficult for us and make us grow. Societal shortcuts don’t grow us closer to God.

As Christians we must turn our face toward the Lord and turn our backs on society’s draw to “right now”.  We must walk toward the beauty of going deeper - rooting ourselves so that our healing is eternal. 

Through coaching at Deep Roots Collective you can be provided a wide range of services from spiritual coaching to family and relationship coaching. Schedule a consultation today by clicking here.