it's just a movie

"Life is a comedy for those who think, and a tragedy for those who feel."  - Horace Walpole

In college I went with my roommate to see the movie, "Awakenings" with Robert De Niro and Robin Williams.  It was about Dr. Oliver Sacks, who worked with institutionalized adults who awoke, briefly, from persistent, nearly vegetative existence.  I bawled my eyes out. As the lights rose and people began to exit the theater, my dear roommate, Krissie, looked at me very matter of factly and with near disdain  and said,  "It's just a movie."

You know, life changes you.  Experience shaped me from being a feeler to a thinker (that thinker was probably in there all along, but that's another part of the story).

Mary Pipher is a psychotherapist and author, who I admire a great deal.  She wrote Reviving Ophelia and Letters to Young Therapist, among other books.  In Letters to a Young Therapist, she conveyed that people have three functions:  THINK, FEEL, and DO (ACTION).  Most of us are out of balance toward one of these things.

Now, as I said, I am a thinker.  Sometimes I imagine that my brain is my main sensory organ, with fingers of thought that reach out and experience the world.  Whether it's a first impression or a gradual understanding, I am very aware of my thoughts.  For me, it's probably easiest for me to "do", next.  I think that's something I enjoyed about working in hospice, where an emergency or unpredictable situation could come up at any moment - it's not hard for me to think, then act.  I guess, something akin to people who work in an ER.

So at this moment in my life, my biggest challenge, the place I most have to pay attention, is my feelings.   I am so busy thinking and doing, that I don't always take the time to feel.  I notice this particularly under stress - at my worst, I can turn into kind of automaton, a la Mr. Spock from Star Trek.  I don't think this comes across to people on the outside, but I've realized that this is what can happen inside. 

But, as always, it seems like what we all need is:  First,  AWARENESS/INSIGHT and Then, BALANCE.  Poetry has become an important way for me to pay attention to, and feel my feelings.  Journaling is something else that helps me.  Listening to music, going to movies, taking time for silence and meditation, these are ways for me to not turn off my feelings (or trick myself into thinking they're turned off).

Maybe your wife is a feeler and you're a thinker.  Maybe you're a feeler and your boss is a do-er.  You can see where these differences can sometimes be wonderful and complementary and other times lead to conflict!  I've found that it's worth  considering whether we tend to be thinkers, do-ers, or feelers.  Not only can it help us begin  to get a better sense of balance, a steadier place to come from, it can help us understand where we might be having differences with people we love.

everybody's under pressure - but how do you release it?

My clients are really, really good people.  In fact, I think I probably have nicer, kinder, more compassionate, and plain old good clients than any other therapist in St. Louis and maybe in the United States.  I say that only partially tongue in cheek.  I think there's a little bit of truth to it, and also a little bit of my own bias.  Of course I'm biased - I've gotten to  know them and when you get to know people, without judgment, you get to see how awesome and beautiful they are on the inside.  I think of my clients as both trying to enjoy or get more fulfillment out of their lives and/or find ways of coping with life's difficulties and grief.  But this isn't just my clients, this is the human condition - both longing for fulfillment and trying to triumph over challenges and times of sadness or pain

When we try very hard to do and be our best, whether as employees, as parents, as friends, as spouses, sometimes the pressure builds up and often we find release valves for all that pressure without stopping to think about it.  Maybe we yell at our spouse or kids, maybe we get drunk/high, maybe we are promiscuous, maybe we overexcercise, maybe we overeat.  Sometimes we find healthy ways to release pressure to - we go hiking, write a poem, watch a sad or really funny movie, spend an hour with our friend or sister on the phone. 

I think most of us, whether we're in therapy or not, would benefit from answering the questions - what are my release valves?  How do I try to let go of some of the pressures of life?  Are these the release valves I want to have?  Are they helping or hurting me?

When we can answer these questions fully and truthfully, we can be more aware and make sure the choices we are making are the ones we really want to make.  We can understand some of our actions, even our actions we don't like, in a more compassionate way.  And, we can appreciate our time hiking or painting or going to listen to our favorie band, in a deeper way. 

On a somewhat other note, I'd like to share a quote I received on email today from Pema Chodron, a Buddhist monk.  She's written many books and I subscribe to a weekly 'thought' exerpted from one of her publications (here's the link http://www.shambhala.com/heartadvice/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=HA%201/19/12  ): 

BEGIN WITH KINDNESS TO YOURSELF

We are all in this together. So when you realize that you’re talking to yourself, label it “thinking” and notice your tone of voice. Let it be compassionate and gentle and humorous. Then you’ll be changing old stuck patterns that are shared by the whole human race. Compassion for others begins with kindness to ourselves.

Have a good week, everybody!

Changing your strategy

I'm going to share a little bit about my eight year old boy.  First, I'll tell a couple things I enjoy immensely about him, then I'll tell a story that is specific to him, but also universal to all of us at one time or another.

The boy is funny, but he doesn't share that with everyone.  He's not like a comedian.  He's also rather shy.  So you have to know him pretty well to be privy to his sense of humor.  The other day at dinner he looks over at me and says,  "Mom.  Have you ever thought about your job?
"What do you mean?"  I say.

"You're a psycho.  Therapist.  Psycho.  Therapist.  You are a cuckoo therapist!"  Well, I am glad we all know were we stand in my family and yes, I had actually thought about what a funny word "psychotherapist" is.

Another funny thing recently...I'm in the basement doing laundry and I hear him shouting "Mom, come up here - you're going to think this is hilarious!"  

I come up and he's lying on the bed with his Calivin and Hobbes Book (It's  a Magical World, I think).  "Look at this one," he says.

It's one-frame and shows Calvin and Hobbes looking at a snowman that has a hot water bottle on its head.  Hobbes says, "Why does that snowman have a hot water bottle on its head?"  Calvin answers, "He's committing suicide."

Okay, so it's a little dark.  Actually, I like that we can share Calvin and Hobbes, which I've always loved, as well as a general sense of humor.

So, now I'll tell you that my son picked up chess in the past eight months.  He taught himself to play by reading The Dangerous Book for Boys, and dug up a chess board that was packed away in the basement.  My husband and I were kind of delighted - chess is fun for adults (unlike, some other board games) and an adult and child can be equally skilled. 

The boy entered his first amateur chess tournament the other weekend.  As we drove over to the St. Louis Chess Club, he says, "Mom.  I know my strategy.  I'm going to play Hyper-Aggressive.  Not a lot of people know how to handle Hyper-Aggressive."

I think to myself,  "Here we go." But, I say something profound like "Oh."

God love my son, but he did not deviate from that Hyper-Aggressive strategy (and though I've never been an 8 year old boy, I can really feel that Hyper-Aggressive would feel like THE right strategy to an 8 year old boy).  So, in four rounds he lost three and had a stalemate in one. 

I love that my kid remains optimistic throughout the process.  After each game, he'd look at me and say, "I still have another chance to win!"

We even left the chess club with a participation medal and got into the car, where he indeed, got upset about the losses. 

I am not just saying this to be politically correct:  I really don't really care if he wins or loses as long as he has fun.  I am pretty emotionally detached from the win/lose process in any sport or game as far as my kids go.  Yet I won't say this wasn't a stressful moment for both of us.  I tried simply acknowledging how I could understand he was disappointed, but this didn't seem to be that helpful and maybe even escalated him. 

Finally, what I said (okay, yelled), was "Honey, you had one strategy and you never changed it, even though you had evidence that it wasn't working.  There are so many strategies in chess - why don't you pick another one and just try that and see what happens.  If that doesn't work, find another strategy and see what happens.  One of them will be a winning strategy."

I'm not sure if it took, but it occurred to me as the words were coming out of my mouth that the "stick with the strategy" mindset is a hinderance to many of us in many areas of our life.  How many times do we keep trying the same strategy with a boss, a spouse, a parent, a career, a course of study, a life's ambition, a house project?  Even when all the evidence says it's not working, we don't want to stop.

When I was telling the story of my son and the chess tournament to my friend, Jen, she said something like, "yeah, I think sometimes we blame our execution of the strategy and think if we just do more of the strategy that will change to outcome."

Sometimes, we don't give up our strategy as a matter of pride.  Sometimes we don't give up our strategy because we don't know other strategies.

If we're stuck in life or not getting the results we want in a certain area, I recommend letting up a little, making room a little, trying something different.  Why not?  If we're not getting the result we want anyway, what do we have to lose?

anxious? what to do/not do

In the past month or so, my son taught himself to play chess, which I thought was really cool since I've said for about 20 years, 'I should really learn how to play chess,' but I've never done it.  So, he dug up a chess board from the basement, read some directions from the Dangerous Book for Boys and now we have a new pasttime in the family (I've since learned how to play, too).  We found out about a great place in St. Louis, The St. Louis Chess Club, http://www.stlouischessclub.org/ and told him we'd take him.  On the afternoon we were supposed to visit for the first time, he threw his dessert from lunch in the trash - unheard of!  'What's the matter?' I asked.  'I'm too anxious to eat it.' he said.  'Anxious?' I asked - his seven year old self using the word anxious  made me anxious.  'Mom, there are three types of anxious - nervous, excited and worried.  I'm excited.'  Yeah, of course. 

It's true what he said.  I looked it up in the Oxford English Dictionary.  As I observe it, the older we get, the less anxiety we have that feels 'excited.'  We tend to lump it in with worried and nervous and it can grow to low level panic. 

So, here are some thoughts about anxiety and coping:  In my life and in my work I observe there are a couple ways people tend to cope with anxiety - 1) overfunction, 2) underfunction.  I am a classic overfunctioner.  Just at the moment I am feeling overwhelmed by things like raising small children, running my own business, taking care of a sick relative, and serving in some kind of church leadership role (you can tell this is just a made up scenario, right?!), that's when I decide is the best moment to finally put a poetry manuscript together.  That's so sensible.   I have admiration for people who are underfunctioners, though this gets them in trouble too (I hear) - when life places too many demands, they get caught up in a CSI marathon or realize that they really NEED 10 hours of sleep a night.  Obviously, many people are some combination - overfunction in their home life, for example ('the entire house must be clean RIGHT NOW!!!) and underfunction in their work life, etc.

I've become a big advocate of trying something different or even the opposite of what you'd normally do.  No matter how 'anxious' it makes you.  If you are feeling anxious and have the urge to sign up for a new spinning class, maybe make a deal with yourself to hold off on that urge for a week.  Try sitting down and reading a book.  If you are overwhelmed and feel like you just need to come home and take a nap after work, call a friend to go on a walk instead.  It will feel very weird at first to do or not do something different than usual, but I think it's worth it.

On a note not totally unrelated to anxiety, but also I more founded in reality and compassion, I want to acknowledge that many of us are thinking of the people of Japan and, whether we are consider ourselves religious/spiritual or not, we are holding them in our thoughts, hoping for the courage and wisdom of our leaders to help guide the efforts to alleviate suffering there.

what we do to survive

Kelefa Smith's article in this week's New Yorker, "Word", www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/atlarge/2010/12/06/101206crat_atlarge_sanneh about the poetics of hip-hop, has me focusing on poetry as a mechanism of survival. Among other rappers, this piece uses Jay-Z, who just published a book of his lyrics, Decoded, as representative of hip hop culture and lyrics. Of particular interest, according to Smith, are his anecdotes and footnotes - a collection of the ideas, thoughts, situations that inspired him. He began his 'career' selling crack, before he seriously started writing rhymes. I imagine there was an instinct to survival both in what brought Jay-Z to selling drugs and what led him to start and pursue writing and rapping.

So, my life and Jay-Z's are not and have not been real similar if you look from the outside, but that doesn't stop me from feeling kinship with him when it comes to writing, and possibly, when it comes to an instinct toward survival that has a creative impulse.

Of many "life-changing" experiences for me, working as a home hospice social worker for six and a half years is one of the primary ones. I began this work when my oldest child was six months old. I remember that my first day out, shadowing a nurse, we visited an impoverished young mother dying of cancer and being cared for a by her young adult son, a elderly man who lived alone, but had visits and some help from family, and a mentally ill woman , cared for by her parents, who was dying of a disfiguring and cancer of her face and throat. Every day at work was an intense experience. I had to improvise my way through helping people in ways that I never imagined - answering questions like "what is going to happen to me when I die," holding trash cans for near strangers while they threw up in them, rocking a teenage girl in my arms while the funeral home workers took her father's body away. All this while I was raising babies (our second child came along after a couple years). My husband travelled a good deal. I was exhausted physically and mentally so much of the time. I felt a simultaneous sense of deep appreciation for my life and a sense that I was close to laying down to die myself. This is when I started really writing poetry. When I say really writing it, I mean I was compelled. I got up at 5 or 5:30 in the morning for years, because that was the only quiet time of my day and I wrote. I took workshops. I read other people's poetry. I had to do it, in a way. Looking back, I think I had to do it to survive.

Where does mental health figure in to this? As humans, we have a lot of choices of what we can try to do to survive. I am not saying I have never had a self-destructive impulse. I've bought and "snuck" cigarettes lots of times over the years because I somehow felt I 'deserved' a cigarette. And that's one example, only. There's a line from the Bruce Springsteen song, Devils and Dust, something like, "when what we do to survive kills the things we love/ fear's a dangerous thing/ it'll turn your heart black you can trust." I agree that fear is a dangerous thing. So, I wonder about the impulse and choice toward positive, life-affirming, creative survival instincts. How can we all develop these, search for these, love something in ourselves (our spirit, if you will) and then create rather the quash or destruct? If you are reading this and find yourself in a place that feels desperate and you find yourself coping by means that you know are self-destructive, I challenge you to look for something creative, something that brings you some pleasure and even if it is in the secret of the dawn, because you are worried you're not "good" at it - just do it.

In that spirit, I am attaching my very first hip-hop lyric I ever wrote. Yesterday! It was for one of the teens in my teen poetry group. I don't think it's 'good' in a critical sense, but this is about taking chances and creative means of survival. You can laugh if you want, I can't hear you. Take care, everybody.

For G

I am the cool cat,
the top cat,
the cat in the cradle,
the everlasting cat,
the cat in the hat.
I am the cat of all trades,
the cat's pajamas,
the mad cat,
the sad cat,
the feral cat,
the domesti-cated cat.
I step with careful paws.
Beware - claws.
This is my caterwaul.
My rage, love, fear, longing - raw.
Humpty Dumpty - he broke in his fall.
Not like me;
this is how I arrive.
Feet first, head up.
Nine lives.