In the nineteenth year of my life, Lawrence Barclay held my future in his hands, and I was pretty sure he was about to destroy it.
Brother Barclay, as we called him, is one of the most brilliant people on planet earth, having more information swirling in his brain than one person ought to have. When I was a student in a small Christian college, Barclay was one of my teachers. I remember one day when my roommate, Ray Dutton, hadn’t prepared for our Greek class, he set the perfect ambush. Barclay always walked into the classroom, looked at whatever was on the blackboard, then erased it so he could use it for our lecture. Ray had written the word antidisestablishmentarianism on the board. He knew that Barclay couldn’t erase such a delicious word without comment. He spent the entire class discussing its meaning, origin, and application.
On a special Friday in the last half of my freshman year I went into meltdown. I don’t remember all the reasons, but vividly recall the culmination. In a rage I stood shouting profanities into the face of a student who was about 6’4″ and 225 pounds. The guy could have killed me with one swipe of his enormous paw. Suddenly it hit me that he wasn’t looking at me but over my shoulder. I spun and found myself face-to-face with Brother Barclay and knew that what he caught me doing was reason for expulsion. (For some reason, the college didn’t want their ministerial students talking like heathens.)
Barclay crooked his finger and headed to his office. Feeling as if I were walking to my own execution, I followed. I could already imagine the folks back home gossiping about my lack of fitness to be a minister.
As we sat, he casually asked, “Having a bad day?”
I unloaded. Not yelling or cussing, just pouring out my pain. I told him what had happened on Monday, then Tuesday, and so on until that very moment on a Friday morning. He listened patiently and then, instead of telling me that he would begin the procedure for my expulsion, he asked, “How much do you know about adrenalin?”
The gist of his explanation to me was that with each new upsetting experience my body had produced more adrenalin. That chemical prepares us to “fight” or “flee.” It exists to give us extra strength to win the battle or the race for safety. If we don’t burn the excess adrenalin off — in our culture of dealing with things emotionally and intellectually rather than physically — then adrenalin gradually subsides. If in the meantime another event occurs, more adrenalin pumps into us that also subsides gradually. After a while, we are a walking time bomb. We are so wired with adrenalin, the “final straw” happens and all that energy, frustration, need to battle, and the like explodes in disproportion to the situation. He said that was what happened to me.
“Go to your dorm. Don’t leave your room all weekend except to run, eat, or go to church. Otherwise, stay away from people and things. But you MUST run to start burning this stuff out of you.” And that was it. No expulsion or punishment.
He likely has no memory of this, but I have used that many times over the years to help a couple understand why they were reacting with such intensity toward each other and how that in a state of increased adrenalin, they should NOT try to deal with the problem but instead deal with thier own physical condition. I cannot tell you how often that has helped a couple deescalate their conflict, regain composure over a couple of days, and then deal with the problem in a reasonable way.
So, next time you fight, ask yourself, “Are we both in the right physical and mental state to deal with this right now, or are we going to become irrational?” Base what you do next on the answer to that question.
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