"In the Midst of winter
I finally found there was within me
An invincible summer"
Albert Camus
Some days we wake up with a newfound sense of understanding. In these moments we are granted a short time to glimpse deeply into the machinery of the universe and nod our heads at the poetry and synchronicity of what it is we are doing here. Today for me was one of those days. These kinds of days can never be planned or deliberately discovered, but instead stumbled upon humbly and almost entirely by accident.
One thing I do know, is that for me this feeling nearly always comes from giving some part of myself to someone else. Today I ran a grief counseling group for people who had recently suffered the death of a someone close to them. Normally these groups are quite intense, and today was no exception. About 30 minutes in today we began a discussion of how our time here on Earth echoes much longer than the duration of our physical bodies. This I believe very deeply. All of our human connections have deep meaning, and we affect each other in a million little ways we rarely take the time to truly consider or comprehend. Today, for one hour, myself and 6 other human beings took the time to tell each other a little bit of how much we have affected each other. I precipitated this display of emotional honesty as a result of all of the things I have been through in recent months since I have been sober. It was a big step.
The power and energy in that room were tremendous. All of this was precipitated on the idea that we weren't going to leave things unsaid. Much of the grieving process is about this very thing. We not only miss the person who is gone but we miss the things we didn't say to them. We find we would give nearly anything for one more day to tell someone all of the things they meant to us.
So.... The lesson is, although we don't get that day with that particular person, we can apply this lesson to the people who are still here. We can tell people each and every day how much we appreciate all of the little ways they have touched our lives. We can't just assume people know. We need to say the words. To look into someone's eyes and make this connection.
So I've been doing this for the last week. In many ways I feel like my life is starting over and it's a wonderfully scary feeling. I feel like I have emerged from an emotionally closed cocoon. It is new. Wonderfully new.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Ireland Trip Cont.
I expect to pass through life but once.
If therefore, there be any kindness I can show,
or any good thing I can do to any fellow being,
let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it,
as I shall not pass this way again.
William Penn
While I was in Ireland I met a beautiful girl from Spain. We met in the lobby of my hotel where we tried to strike up a conversation. I know very little Spanish and she knew very little English. It was funny, pleasant, and frustrating. Like the ugly American I am I began speaking louder, hoping this would somehow bridge the communication gap. It didn't
Eventually we adjourned to a restaurant to have dinner. For a moment I felt like a young Hemingway, dashing my way across Europe picking up strange and exotic women from other countries. I was impressed by my own charm, until.......
The young woman began to cry. Very softly at first but then a little more. She was clearly in pain and I wanted to help. As a writer and a psychologist I love to hear myself talk. Although listening is the Hallmark of my profession, I've always enjoyed the didactic nature of psychology as well. I wanted to talk to her and dazzle her with my wisdom, but alas I could not. I thought of putting my arm around her but didn't know how this would be construed and rejected this as well. Although I know that most communication is non-verbal, I was truly stuck as to what to do to ease this woman's pain.
What I did was reach deep into the recesses of my mind to find some remnants of my forgotten High School Spanish. I gently tapped her hand, and she slowly looked up with sad eyes,
",Yo se que la vida es dificil" I said, (I know life is hard)
With this she looked up and smiled. Not exactly the reaction I was expecting, but one that nonetheless was nice to see. I could she was impressed I had recovered my language skills. Soon her smile faded though and she looked back down into the napkin that was folded in her lap.
"I am alone in the world," she said in broken English as she wiped a tear from her face.
"Me too," I replied, and she looked up with understanding eyes, this time patting my hand as she tried to comfort me.
"I know life is hard" she said.
And with this we both smiled, having discovered, in this odd little corner of the world, the power of making a small human connection.
This was a wonderful reminder to me about how nice it feels to help someone. There is a Zen Koan that posits that it is the giver that should be thankful, and this experience was a powerful reminder of how this idea applies to my life. It is truly a privilege to work in the profession of healing others, and this is something I had lost somewhere along the way. I returned to work today with a new found enthusiasm. Reminded from a small and simple interaction with a beautiful Spanish woman that we as people on this earth are supposed to help each other out along the way. It is a lesson I had forgotten, but, as is often the case, someone popped into my life at just the right time to remind me. I'm starting to see that there are always such people available to us if we have the courage find them. As Dostoyevsky said "Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid." This is not going to be me. Not anymore.
If therefore, there be any kindness I can show,
or any good thing I can do to any fellow being,
let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it,
as I shall not pass this way again.
William Penn
While I was in Ireland I met a beautiful girl from Spain. We met in the lobby of my hotel where we tried to strike up a conversation. I know very little Spanish and she knew very little English. It was funny, pleasant, and frustrating. Like the ugly American I am I began speaking louder, hoping this would somehow bridge the communication gap. It didn't
Eventually we adjourned to a restaurant to have dinner. For a moment I felt like a young Hemingway, dashing my way across Europe picking up strange and exotic women from other countries. I was impressed by my own charm, until.......
The young woman began to cry. Very softly at first but then a little more. She was clearly in pain and I wanted to help. As a writer and a psychologist I love to hear myself talk. Although listening is the Hallmark of my profession, I've always enjoyed the didactic nature of psychology as well. I wanted to talk to her and dazzle her with my wisdom, but alas I could not. I thought of putting my arm around her but didn't know how this would be construed and rejected this as well. Although I know that most communication is non-verbal, I was truly stuck as to what to do to ease this woman's pain.
What I did was reach deep into the recesses of my mind to find some remnants of my forgotten High School Spanish. I gently tapped her hand, and she slowly looked up with sad eyes,
",Yo se que la vida es dificil" I said, (I know life is hard)
With this she looked up and smiled. Not exactly the reaction I was expecting, but one that nonetheless was nice to see. I could she was impressed I had recovered my language skills. Soon her smile faded though and she looked back down into the napkin that was folded in her lap.
"I am alone in the world," she said in broken English as she wiped a tear from her face.
"Me too," I replied, and she looked up with understanding eyes, this time patting my hand as she tried to comfort me.
"I know life is hard" she said.
And with this we both smiled, having discovered, in this odd little corner of the world, the power of making a small human connection.
This was a wonderful reminder to me about how nice it feels to help someone. There is a Zen Koan that posits that it is the giver that should be thankful, and this experience was a powerful reminder of how this idea applies to my life. It is truly a privilege to work in the profession of healing others, and this is something I had lost somewhere along the way. I returned to work today with a new found enthusiasm. Reminded from a small and simple interaction with a beautiful Spanish woman that we as people on this earth are supposed to help each other out along the way. It is a lesson I had forgotten, but, as is often the case, someone popped into my life at just the right time to remind me. I'm starting to see that there are always such people available to us if we have the courage find them. As Dostoyevsky said "Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid." This is not going to be me. Not anymore.
Monday, November 12, 2007
Ireland Trip
We were born before the wind
Also younger than the sun
Ere the bonnie boat was won
as we sailed into the mystic
Hark, now hear the sailors cry
Smell the sea and feel the sky
Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic
Van Morrison "Into the Mystic"
I have had two truly transcendent moments in my life. The first one occurred when I was 22 and had wandered into the very bottom of the Grand Canyon in the absolute black of night. At that moment, although I was utterly alone in the world, I experienced a kind of spiritual communion with the universe. A sense of oneness, of the interconnectedness of things that has both haunted and sustained me for many years. I've always wondered about that feeling and wanted to recapture the power and beauty of that moment.
This Saturday afternoon, deep in the Wicklow Mountains of Ireland, I found this feeling again. Looking out over the endlessly rolling green hills, in a moment of pure quiet and stillness, I absolutely felt in the deepest recesses of my being, that I was a part of something bigger than myself. This feeling was mystical and magical. A merging of all the powerful emotional forces that have lay dormant inside of me for so long absolutely overwhelmed me in this moment. In this moment, all my sadness, joy, courage, fear, loneliness, hopes and dreams utterly imbued me with a sense of understanding. For a brief moment I lost all semblance of myself, while also getting a quick glimpse of all the things I can accomplish in my rapidly fleeting time here.
Eventually a fellow tourist rambled into my mystical moment and asked me to take her picture. Such is life. Here was a fellow traveler in need, and I was in a position to help her. Although I was temporarily annoyed by this interruption, I also appreciated the sense of metaphor. In my profession I help fellow travelers who have come a long way, but also need a little help to make sense of where they had been. Perhaps this was a cosmic reminder.
Also younger than the sun
Ere the bonnie boat was won
as we sailed into the mystic
Hark, now hear the sailors cry
Smell the sea and feel the sky
Let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic
Van Morrison "Into the Mystic"
I have had two truly transcendent moments in my life. The first one occurred when I was 22 and had wandered into the very bottom of the Grand Canyon in the absolute black of night. At that moment, although I was utterly alone in the world, I experienced a kind of spiritual communion with the universe. A sense of oneness, of the interconnectedness of things that has both haunted and sustained me for many years. I've always wondered about that feeling and wanted to recapture the power and beauty of that moment.
This Saturday afternoon, deep in the Wicklow Mountains of Ireland, I found this feeling again. Looking out over the endlessly rolling green hills, in a moment of pure quiet and stillness, I absolutely felt in the deepest recesses of my being, that I was a part of something bigger than myself. This feeling was mystical and magical. A merging of all the powerful emotional forces that have lay dormant inside of me for so long absolutely overwhelmed me in this moment. In this moment, all my sadness, joy, courage, fear, loneliness, hopes and dreams utterly imbued me with a sense of understanding. For a brief moment I lost all semblance of myself, while also getting a quick glimpse of all the things I can accomplish in my rapidly fleeting time here.
Eventually a fellow tourist rambled into my mystical moment and asked me to take her picture. Such is life. Here was a fellow traveler in need, and I was in a position to help her. Although I was temporarily annoyed by this interruption, I also appreciated the sense of metaphor. In my profession I help fellow travelers who have come a long way, but also need a little help to make sense of where they had been. Perhaps this was a cosmic reminder.
Monday, November 5, 2007
Day 16
Nov 4, 2007
"To know oneself, one should assert oneself. Psychology is action, not thinking about oneself. We continue to shape our personality all our life. If we knew ourselves perfectly, we should die.”
Albert Camus
I woke up today and realized that all the changes I have been making are going to drastically effect my abilities as a therapist. I have been operating somewhat efficiently and fallen into predictable patterns of discourse despite the realities of my double life. Now all this is changing.
I have often had great moments of clarity the night after a drinking heavily although this seems counterintuitive. Despite the horrific dehydration and intense feelings of self-loathing, the parts of my brain that handled inhibition often became completely disabled in these moments. This allowed me to make unusual and often highly articulate verbal connections that were often very effective in a therapeutic situation.
But this was predicated on an addiction. There has been a long history of artists claiming alcohol helped fuel their creative talents. Writers such as Hemingway, Faulkner, and Jack London all drank very heavily to stimulate their writing. It was reported that Winston Churchill drank a quart of Brandy before Breakfast, but despite this fact, he still remarked that "I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me." The author William Styron lamented the loss of his "daily companion" when he quit drinking as described in his memoir of his depression Darkness Visible.
I am not in the same league of any of these men. But I do believe, as I have stated before, that there is a cyclical relationship between self-loathing and creativity. Waking up after a truly serious night of drinking is waking up in a kind of Hell of your own making. Creativity is the ferryman that helps guide one back across the river Styx and temporarily out of this despair. I know this, have leaned on this idea, and adapted to this cycle despite its inherent danger.
Even now as I read this it strikes me as a little illogical and as a bit of a rationalization. The myth that there is a relationship between alcohol and creativity has been examined by a number of researchers who found it was a faulty premise based on poor reasoning. Many writers likely succeeded in spite of their drinking rather than because of it. Still, they believe it helped, and therefore it helped. This is the human placebo effect, which is one of the most powerful forces in the known universe.
I write this treatise because I didn't feel effective today. I found myself "reflecting" a great deal today, which is fine as it is, but not a terribly insightful way to spend an hour. At least for me. Patients with higher levels of insight tend to do better with this kind of therapy, as often they are simply working their own problems out internally while using me as a supportive and effective springboard for their new ideas.
But another part of my trepidation is the curse of self-awareness. For 20 years the purchase of alcohol has also been the purchase of a great deal of deceptively blissful ignorance. Like some grotesque two for one deal, the two have fed and complimented each other for most of my adult life. Now, there is no easy escape and music must be faced, even when I don't particularly like the tune that is being played. Perhaps this is what being an adult is, although becoming one has never particularly been one of my goals. My development has been arrested for many years, and I recognize these feelings as those of an adolescent, which is in many way what I am emotionally. But for now, and for the first time in a while, I'm not afraid of what comes next. Not overly hopeful today, but not scared either, just curious. For today, just curious.
"To know oneself, one should assert oneself. Psychology is action, not thinking about oneself. We continue to shape our personality all our life. If we knew ourselves perfectly, we should die.”
Albert Camus
I woke up today and realized that all the changes I have been making are going to drastically effect my abilities as a therapist. I have been operating somewhat efficiently and fallen into predictable patterns of discourse despite the realities of my double life. Now all this is changing.
I have often had great moments of clarity the night after a drinking heavily although this seems counterintuitive. Despite the horrific dehydration and intense feelings of self-loathing, the parts of my brain that handled inhibition often became completely disabled in these moments. This allowed me to make unusual and often highly articulate verbal connections that were often very effective in a therapeutic situation.
But this was predicated on an addiction. There has been a long history of artists claiming alcohol helped fuel their creative talents. Writers such as Hemingway, Faulkner, and Jack London all drank very heavily to stimulate their writing. It was reported that Winston Churchill drank a quart of Brandy before Breakfast, but despite this fact, he still remarked that "I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me." The author William Styron lamented the loss of his "daily companion" when he quit drinking as described in his memoir of his depression Darkness Visible.
I am not in the same league of any of these men. But I do believe, as I have stated before, that there is a cyclical relationship between self-loathing and creativity. Waking up after a truly serious night of drinking is waking up in a kind of Hell of your own making. Creativity is the ferryman that helps guide one back across the river Styx and temporarily out of this despair. I know this, have leaned on this idea, and adapted to this cycle despite its inherent danger.
Even now as I read this it strikes me as a little illogical and as a bit of a rationalization. The myth that there is a relationship between alcohol and creativity has been examined by a number of researchers who found it was a faulty premise based on poor reasoning. Many writers likely succeeded in spite of their drinking rather than because of it. Still, they believe it helped, and therefore it helped. This is the human placebo effect, which is one of the most powerful forces in the known universe.
I write this treatise because I didn't feel effective today. I found myself "reflecting" a great deal today, which is fine as it is, but not a terribly insightful way to spend an hour. At least for me. Patients with higher levels of insight tend to do better with this kind of therapy, as often they are simply working their own problems out internally while using me as a supportive and effective springboard for their new ideas.
But another part of my trepidation is the curse of self-awareness. For 20 years the purchase of alcohol has also been the purchase of a great deal of deceptively blissful ignorance. Like some grotesque two for one deal, the two have fed and complimented each other for most of my adult life. Now, there is no easy escape and music must be faced, even when I don't particularly like the tune that is being played. Perhaps this is what being an adult is, although becoming one has never particularly been one of my goals. My development has been arrested for many years, and I recognize these feelings as those of an adolescent, which is in many way what I am emotionally. But for now, and for the first time in a while, I'm not afraid of what comes next. Not overly hopeful today, but not scared either, just curious. For today, just curious.
Sunday, November 4, 2007
Day 15
November 3, 2007
... we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.
Paul Bowles
How little precious time I've spent in my life living in the present moment. Most of my brainpower has been spent in a tug-of-war between avoiding thinking about the past by looking forward to my next drink. What was leftover I've tried to give to others.
Some days, forces align in life and we are awarded moments of clarity. Today was one of those days. I looked at my bank account and realized I've saved hundreds of dollars in the last couple of weeks simply from staying out of bars. I used this money to purchase a ticket to Ireland in fulfillment of a lifelong dream.
I feel like I've mined the depths of my childhood, and although there is a great deal more to do, I know that I have fought a great deal of this battle simply by acknowledging and talking about it. I will continue to do this. Some days it will be liberating and some days it will be torturous, but.... I have begun.
But what about going even further back? My mother was from Ireland, as was her entire family. My father was also half Irish. They were both alcoholics as were many members of their families before that.
America is unique in the sense that we as a people have very little sense of our cultural heritage. As White people in particular we often have a vague sense of ourselves as "European" and leave it at that. From working with people of many different cultures, I know that one of the strongest ways to promote self-esteem is to encourage people to maintain a strong identification with the culture they came from. Rather that simply "assimilating" into the White drones we have become, it is much more important for people to have a strong sense of from where it is they came.
So on that note I'm going to Ireland. I want to examine where the foundations of my resilience were laid. Beyond that I want to better understand why it is these highly resilient people also often turn to "the weakness" of alcohol in times of crisis. In speaking of the Irish, Freud once remarked "This is one race for whom psychoanalysis is of no use whatsoever." Although I'm certainly no Freudian, I want to further explore why perhaps the most influential psychologist in history was so confused by my people. Why do we resist self-exploration like we do? Why must we "be strong" as opposed to admitting weakness and asking for help? How has alcohol served us throughout history? How has it failed us?
These are all questions I'd like to explore on my psychological field trip, and I've begun to feel like a little kid again preparing for this adventure. Going to Ireland is the fulfillment of a long forgotten dream. The last couple of days I have reclaimed the idea that time can be a gift instead of a curse. On my own Hero's journey this is a very large step. I leave Thursday. I will report back.
... we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.
Paul Bowles
How little precious time I've spent in my life living in the present moment. Most of my brainpower has been spent in a tug-of-war between avoiding thinking about the past by looking forward to my next drink. What was leftover I've tried to give to others.
Some days, forces align in life and we are awarded moments of clarity. Today was one of those days. I looked at my bank account and realized I've saved hundreds of dollars in the last couple of weeks simply from staying out of bars. I used this money to purchase a ticket to Ireland in fulfillment of a lifelong dream.
I feel like I've mined the depths of my childhood, and although there is a great deal more to do, I know that I have fought a great deal of this battle simply by acknowledging and talking about it. I will continue to do this. Some days it will be liberating and some days it will be torturous, but.... I have begun.
But what about going even further back? My mother was from Ireland, as was her entire family. My father was also half Irish. They were both alcoholics as were many members of their families before that.
America is unique in the sense that we as a people have very little sense of our cultural heritage. As White people in particular we often have a vague sense of ourselves as "European" and leave it at that. From working with people of many different cultures, I know that one of the strongest ways to promote self-esteem is to encourage people to maintain a strong identification with the culture they came from. Rather that simply "assimilating" into the White drones we have become, it is much more important for people to have a strong sense of from where it is they came.
So on that note I'm going to Ireland. I want to examine where the foundations of my resilience were laid. Beyond that I want to better understand why it is these highly resilient people also often turn to "the weakness" of alcohol in times of crisis. In speaking of the Irish, Freud once remarked "This is one race for whom psychoanalysis is of no use whatsoever." Although I'm certainly no Freudian, I want to further explore why perhaps the most influential psychologist in history was so confused by my people. Why do we resist self-exploration like we do? Why must we "be strong" as opposed to admitting weakness and asking for help? How has alcohol served us throughout history? How has it failed us?
These are all questions I'd like to explore on my psychological field trip, and I've begun to feel like a little kid again preparing for this adventure. Going to Ireland is the fulfillment of a long forgotten dream. The last couple of days I have reclaimed the idea that time can be a gift instead of a curse. On my own Hero's journey this is a very large step. I leave Thursday. I will report back.
Day 14
Nov 2, 2007
A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others. When he has no respect for anyone, he can no longer love, and in him, he yields to his impulses, indulges in the lowest form of pleasure, and behaves in the end like an animal in satisfying his vices. And it all comes from lying to others and to yourself.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
One of the cardinal rules in psychology is you don't strip away a person's defenses unless you can also offer something to take there place. Otherwise you can leave a person feeling very exposed and helpless.
According to one theory of psychology known as Internal family systems their are three parts of self found in each person called Exiles, Firefighters, & Managers.
The Exiles are the young parts of the self that have been wounded by trauma. Many times these parts of self get buried deep, as these are the parts that are very vulnerable and scared. If left to their own devices and never dealt with, these parts of self can become buried deep in the psyche, but still may have a large effect on many things we do, including our ability to trust and get close to others.
For me this Exiled part of self was identified and uncovered yesterday. For most of my life I have dealt with this injured part of self by developing a subself as a joker and a clown. I learned early to mask pain by making jokes, and this was a defense that has served me well, or so I thought, until I started thinking about how this part of self related to my drinking. The fact is this part of self developed a need to entertain and be entertained at all times. This is part of why drink, as it provides stimulation and excitement. When people got boring, or more importantly I began to bore myself, alcohol provides an immediate, albeit fleeting release from these feelings of stagnation.
Alcohol is therefore a Firefighter. Firefighters are activated when the feelings the Exiles stir up become too powerful to deal with. Addictions make excellent Firefighters because they literally take the mind to a new state of consciousness. They want what's best for you and to take away your pain. They are experienced and they are effective at their jobs.
Two other Firefighters I use are The Liar, and The People Pleaser. The liar in me convinces others that I am Ok and I have successfully worked through my pain. Worse than that however are the lies I tell to myself. In my profession I must appear healthy and well adjusted. I must convince others with my confidence that I can guide them through the difficulties in their lives. I must be a rock. Must be solid.
But none of this is true. I am weak and I am wounded. This does not necessarily mean I can't be effective, but this also activates the People Pleaser Firefighter. This is the part of me that wants to make people happy. Many psychologists have this kind of personality and have also been peacemakers most of their lives. Much of what drives this part of self is compassion and empathy.
But....... Inherent in this personality trait is an absolute avoidance of confrontation. As a psychologist I often agree with people rather than confronting them. This is dangerous. The people that come to see me often have highly irrational, deeply habituated beliefs that are destroying their lives. Often I avoid challenging these beliefs because I hate that uncomfortable tension and disagreement. I rationalize that I can change people by being kind to them and modeling empathy. This often works, and is in fact the component of therapy that is often most effective. But still, sometimes I know this is a lie and I am acting in the interests of my own comfort.
So these, in a nutshell, are all my defenses, and knowing them in many ways diffuses them. No one is without defenses, and part of growth will be trading immature defenses for more mature and advanced ones. This is my challenge, my desire, and my tightrope. If I fall I'm not sure how I'll get up. Today truly feels like a new day. A strange, odd, and confusing new day.
A man who lies to himself, and believes his own lies, becomes unable to recognize truth, either in himself or in anyone else, and he ends up losing respect for himself and for others. When he has no respect for anyone, he can no longer love, and in him, he yields to his impulses, indulges in the lowest form of pleasure, and behaves in the end like an animal in satisfying his vices. And it all comes from lying to others and to yourself.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
One of the cardinal rules in psychology is you don't strip away a person's defenses unless you can also offer something to take there place. Otherwise you can leave a person feeling very exposed and helpless.
According to one theory of psychology known as Internal family systems their are three parts of self found in each person called Exiles, Firefighters, & Managers.
The Exiles are the young parts of the self that have been wounded by trauma. Many times these parts of self get buried deep, as these are the parts that are very vulnerable and scared. If left to their own devices and never dealt with, these parts of self can become buried deep in the psyche, but still may have a large effect on many things we do, including our ability to trust and get close to others.
For me this Exiled part of self was identified and uncovered yesterday. For most of my life I have dealt with this injured part of self by developing a subself as a joker and a clown. I learned early to mask pain by making jokes, and this was a defense that has served me well, or so I thought, until I started thinking about how this part of self related to my drinking. The fact is this part of self developed a need to entertain and be entertained at all times. This is part of why drink, as it provides stimulation and excitement. When people got boring, or more importantly I began to bore myself, alcohol provides an immediate, albeit fleeting release from these feelings of stagnation.
Alcohol is therefore a Firefighter. Firefighters are activated when the feelings the Exiles stir up become too powerful to deal with. Addictions make excellent Firefighters because they literally take the mind to a new state of consciousness. They want what's best for you and to take away your pain. They are experienced and they are effective at their jobs.
Two other Firefighters I use are The Liar, and The People Pleaser. The liar in me convinces others that I am Ok and I have successfully worked through my pain. Worse than that however are the lies I tell to myself. In my profession I must appear healthy and well adjusted. I must convince others with my confidence that I can guide them through the difficulties in their lives. I must be a rock. Must be solid.
But none of this is true. I am weak and I am wounded. This does not necessarily mean I can't be effective, but this also activates the People Pleaser Firefighter. This is the part of me that wants to make people happy. Many psychologists have this kind of personality and have also been peacemakers most of their lives. Much of what drives this part of self is compassion and empathy.
But....... Inherent in this personality trait is an absolute avoidance of confrontation. As a psychologist I often agree with people rather than confronting them. This is dangerous. The people that come to see me often have highly irrational, deeply habituated beliefs that are destroying their lives. Often I avoid challenging these beliefs because I hate that uncomfortable tension and disagreement. I rationalize that I can change people by being kind to them and modeling empathy. This often works, and is in fact the component of therapy that is often most effective. But still, sometimes I know this is a lie and I am acting in the interests of my own comfort.
So these, in a nutshell, are all my defenses, and knowing them in many ways diffuses them. No one is without defenses, and part of growth will be trading immature defenses for more mature and advanced ones. This is my challenge, my desire, and my tightrope. If I fall I'm not sure how I'll get up. Today truly feels like a new day. A strange, odd, and confusing new day.
Saturday, November 3, 2007
Day 13
November 1, 2007
Though i know i'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know i'll often stop and think about them
In my life i love you more
In my life i love you more
John Lennon "In My Life"
When I was 13, I ran away from home. I stayed away for 2 nights, sleeping in a baseball dugout and wearing lots of layers. I was mad at my mom, who I thought was treating me unfairly. In addition she was dating a strange man who rode a Harley and had a ponytail. I was ashamed of her and embarrassed by her behavior.
Finally after two days of sleeping in the cold I swallowed my pride and began the slow walk home. When I got about a block from my house, I noticed a great deal of activity on the street and was curious about what might be going on. As I got closer I noticed there was a police car in front of my house. I was sure they were looking for me and I was scared to death.
This was not the case. As I walked up to my lawn my sister saw me and came running at me screaming in anguish. I was confused. I was only gone two days and we weren't particularly close to begin with. Her sobbing and screams were utterly hysterical, and to this day I've never been able to get this tone out of my mind. Finally, I was able to make out a bit of what she was saying. It was my mother. She had overdosed on a combination of pills and alcohol. My mother was dead.
The pain didn't start then, not yet. Numbness and dissociation are often the first responses to trauma. That day was too unreal and too unbelievable to remember.
Only it wasn't. Although small details escaped me, the emotional pain of that moment left a deep and indelible hole in my heart and in my soul. This pain has been my driving force, my magnetic north, and shaped everything I've ever done since and ever hoped to be. Much of the good I hoped to do in life can be traced to that day and to that moment.
But.....Although I believed for years I had made some peace with this event, I know this is a terrible and haunting lie that ultimately made me nearly drink myself to death.
This is the first time I've told this story in nearly ten years. I told it to my therapist and relived that day today in all of its terrible detail. I am psychologically drained but also feel like an incredible weight has been removed. This secret has been a vicious undertow pulling me down for the last 25 years.
I am afraid to go to sleep tonight, fearing like Hamlet "what dreams may come." I am deeply troubled but I am better. In a strange and absurd way I am better, although I am quite literally haunted by what occurred today. I'm very aware that people must often get worse before they get better. For tonight at least, if I do sleep, I will sleep in the belly of the whale. But I will emerge. Must emerge.
Though i know i'll never lose affection
For people and things that went before
I know i'll often stop and think about them
In my life i love you more
In my life i love you more
John Lennon "In My Life"
When I was 13, I ran away from home. I stayed away for 2 nights, sleeping in a baseball dugout and wearing lots of layers. I was mad at my mom, who I thought was treating me unfairly. In addition she was dating a strange man who rode a Harley and had a ponytail. I was ashamed of her and embarrassed by her behavior.
Finally after two days of sleeping in the cold I swallowed my pride and began the slow walk home. When I got about a block from my house, I noticed a great deal of activity on the street and was curious about what might be going on. As I got closer I noticed there was a police car in front of my house. I was sure they were looking for me and I was scared to death.
This was not the case. As I walked up to my lawn my sister saw me and came running at me screaming in anguish. I was confused. I was only gone two days and we weren't particularly close to begin with. Her sobbing and screams were utterly hysterical, and to this day I've never been able to get this tone out of my mind. Finally, I was able to make out a bit of what she was saying. It was my mother. She had overdosed on a combination of pills and alcohol. My mother was dead.
The pain didn't start then, not yet. Numbness and dissociation are often the first responses to trauma. That day was too unreal and too unbelievable to remember.
Only it wasn't. Although small details escaped me, the emotional pain of that moment left a deep and indelible hole in my heart and in my soul. This pain has been my driving force, my magnetic north, and shaped everything I've ever done since and ever hoped to be. Much of the good I hoped to do in life can be traced to that day and to that moment.
But.....Although I believed for years I had made some peace with this event, I know this is a terrible and haunting lie that ultimately made me nearly drink myself to death.
This is the first time I've told this story in nearly ten years. I told it to my therapist and relived that day today in all of its terrible detail. I am psychologically drained but also feel like an incredible weight has been removed. This secret has been a vicious undertow pulling me down for the last 25 years.
I am afraid to go to sleep tonight, fearing like Hamlet "what dreams may come." I am deeply troubled but I am better. In a strange and absurd way I am better, although I am quite literally haunted by what occurred today. I'm very aware that people must often get worse before they get better. For tonight at least, if I do sleep, I will sleep in the belly of the whale. But I will emerge. Must emerge.
Thursday, November 1, 2007
Day 12
October 31, 2007
When you finally go back to your old hometown, you find it wasn't the old home you missed but your childhood.
Sam Ewing
Halloween. Today I wanted to do something good for someone else. To direct a little of my energy outward instead of inward. To begin to square up some long forgotten accounts in my own bank of Karma. I volunteered at a halfway house for convicts who are in need of psychological services, and this journey took me to one of the worst neighborhoods in my city.
I walked past the little children trick or treating, and observed that many of them could not even afford costumes. It broke my heart in a million pieces. I wanted to take these kids in. To give them what I had. To help shape and steer their lives. I wanted to make life different for them.
But even part of this is a lie. Much of what I was really mourning was the loss of my own childhood. Stephen Foster once wrote, "No matter how far we travel or what sadness the world imposes on us, all our hearts ache for the best memories of childhood, the security of a family and parents, and the familiarity of a home." Although our hearts ache for these things, the reality of childhood is for many people a different experience. What we are often mourning is sometimes not our childhoods themselves but the idea of a childhood that was unlike the one we actually experienced. That's what seeing those kids conjured up. They were a reminder of false memories and unrequited longing. Childhood for them is likely not a wonderful time of innocence. Not here. Not in this neighborhood.
Reconstruction is often about acknowledging loss. That's the key question in most people's lives. What have they lost? Many of us mourn a youth we misremember and possibilities we never explored. We are not mourning the experiences of youth but rather the lack of experiences that we never quite had the courage to explore. But alas this time is gone. We can't go home again, and often we remember a version of home that was really not there to begin with.
Somehow these tears are oddly cathartic, and help me purge some memories of my unhappy childhood. Acknowledging I'm missing a youth that never happened helps me avoid excessive sentimentality which is a favorite past time of many alcoholics. It also gets me thinking of the time I have left, and how these can be authentically good times. If one can believe in the possibility of joy anything is possible.
When you finally go back to your old hometown, you find it wasn't the old home you missed but your childhood.
Sam Ewing
Halloween. Today I wanted to do something good for someone else. To direct a little of my energy outward instead of inward. To begin to square up some long forgotten accounts in my own bank of Karma. I volunteered at a halfway house for convicts who are in need of psychological services, and this journey took me to one of the worst neighborhoods in my city.
I walked past the little children trick or treating, and observed that many of them could not even afford costumes. It broke my heart in a million pieces. I wanted to take these kids in. To give them what I had. To help shape and steer their lives. I wanted to make life different for them.
But even part of this is a lie. Much of what I was really mourning was the loss of my own childhood. Stephen Foster once wrote, "No matter how far we travel or what sadness the world imposes on us, all our hearts ache for the best memories of childhood, the security of a family and parents, and the familiarity of a home." Although our hearts ache for these things, the reality of childhood is for many people a different experience. What we are often mourning is sometimes not our childhoods themselves but the idea of a childhood that was unlike the one we actually experienced. That's what seeing those kids conjured up. They were a reminder of false memories and unrequited longing. Childhood for them is likely not a wonderful time of innocence. Not here. Not in this neighborhood.
Reconstruction is often about acknowledging loss. That's the key question in most people's lives. What have they lost? Many of us mourn a youth we misremember and possibilities we never explored. We are not mourning the experiences of youth but rather the lack of experiences that we never quite had the courage to explore. But alas this time is gone. We can't go home again, and often we remember a version of home that was really not there to begin with.
Somehow these tears are oddly cathartic, and help me purge some memories of my unhappy childhood. Acknowledging I'm missing a youth that never happened helps me avoid excessive sentimentality which is a favorite past time of many alcoholics. It also gets me thinking of the time I have left, and how these can be authentically good times. If one can believe in the possibility of joy anything is possible.
Day11
October 30, 2007
Life is just what happens to you
while you're busy making other plans
John Lennon
Interesting how alcohol affects our perception of time. We can fill up so much space in our lives doing and saying things we can't account for, that eventually we may wonder if we aren't living parallel lives. One is a fearless creature who roams the city by night and acts without fear or thought of consequences, and the other who is in charge of suffering.
Life has slowed down since I've been sober. I'm becoming mindful again of the things I used to dream about that has for many years been quieted by my other more immediate and self-gratifying part of self. Alcohol activates this ghost in the machine, this imp of the perverse. That part of us that wants to say whatever it wants to say, approach scandalous looking women, vanquish the loud-mouth at the bar, and perhaps most importantly move through life without fear or regret.
But this is a lie, because the sufferer in you inherits this regret like a long-suffering battered spouse. This is the part of you that must make apologies, settle tabs, suffer headaches, and make sense of what remains of the tornado.
Is it possible to access the fearless part of self, without these dangerous repercussions? For most people who drink my guess is no. Alcohol represents the purchase of bottled courage that unfortunately never lasts, and leaves you wondering why you've traded away so much for the purchase of these magic beans. What courage you did summon you've forgotten about, but still, that irrational part of you remembers it differently, and feels that this alcoholic imago may surprise us despite his poor track record.
So for today at least I've worked on integrating these parts of self and take risks and chances without a visit to the alcoholic gas pump. I'm finding that engines can run on other things, alternate fuels, although I'd be lying if I said I knew what they all were.
One of my favorite movie moments comes in Fellini's 8 and a Half, where the lead character's thoughts, worries, and anxieties are all overwhelming him, when suddenly he thinks to himself "and yet" and then floats above his problems on the clouds of a wonderfully, creative daydream. The human brain can do this, can take us away, with these parts that are mystical, powerful, and creative. I too would like to float away from my reptilian brain for a while. I know it exists, I've been there, lived there, and had some short tantalizing glimpses of what life can be like.
I often use the metaphor in therapy from the movie The Wizard of OZ, that everything we seek and desire is already inside of us. We must however, be willing to do the work, to scrub the floors, and find these resilient and enduring pieces of our construction. This is when life can cease being survival and begin becoming adventure. Today, for a moment, I have been dusted of some of these long-neglected parts of self. I don't want to waste any more time.
Life is just what happens to you
while you're busy making other plans
John Lennon
Interesting how alcohol affects our perception of time. We can fill up so much space in our lives doing and saying things we can't account for, that eventually we may wonder if we aren't living parallel lives. One is a fearless creature who roams the city by night and acts without fear or thought of consequences, and the other who is in charge of suffering.
Life has slowed down since I've been sober. I'm becoming mindful again of the things I used to dream about that has for many years been quieted by my other more immediate and self-gratifying part of self. Alcohol activates this ghost in the machine, this imp of the perverse. That part of us that wants to say whatever it wants to say, approach scandalous looking women, vanquish the loud-mouth at the bar, and perhaps most importantly move through life without fear or regret.
But this is a lie, because the sufferer in you inherits this regret like a long-suffering battered spouse. This is the part of you that must make apologies, settle tabs, suffer headaches, and make sense of what remains of the tornado.
Is it possible to access the fearless part of self, without these dangerous repercussions? For most people who drink my guess is no. Alcohol represents the purchase of bottled courage that unfortunately never lasts, and leaves you wondering why you've traded away so much for the purchase of these magic beans. What courage you did summon you've forgotten about, but still, that irrational part of you remembers it differently, and feels that this alcoholic imago may surprise us despite his poor track record.
So for today at least I've worked on integrating these parts of self and take risks and chances without a visit to the alcoholic gas pump. I'm finding that engines can run on other things, alternate fuels, although I'd be lying if I said I knew what they all were.
One of my favorite movie moments comes in Fellini's 8 and a Half, where the lead character's thoughts, worries, and anxieties are all overwhelming him, when suddenly he thinks to himself "and yet" and then floats above his problems on the clouds of a wonderfully, creative daydream. The human brain can do this, can take us away, with these parts that are mystical, powerful, and creative. I too would like to float away from my reptilian brain for a while. I know it exists, I've been there, lived there, and had some short tantalizing glimpses of what life can be like.
I often use the metaphor in therapy from the movie The Wizard of OZ, that everything we seek and desire is already inside of us. We must however, be willing to do the work, to scrub the floors, and find these resilient and enduring pieces of our construction. This is when life can cease being survival and begin becoming adventure. Today, for a moment, I have been dusted of some of these long-neglected parts of self. I don't want to waste any more time.
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