Category Archives: group psychology

“To Gloat, Or Not To Gloat; That Is The Question.”

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In the glory days of my beloved Arkansas Razorback Basketball team in the early ’90’s, the rabid fans in the home crowd would break out into this little ditty when “we” had vanquished another foe–“Oh, its hard to be humble, when you perfect in every way” In a memorable moment, the Texas A & M coach Shelby Metcalf was so angry, he walked to center court after the gloating tune and ground his shoes into an image of the Razorback mascot on the floor as he looked up into the crowd defiantly That was delightful gloating and I will never forget it. And, yes, I have a gloating dimension with Joe Biden having been inaugurated and Trump and his insurrection having been thwarted…so far! But my gloater is modulated this time, even more than it was back in 1989 in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Gloating is a human impulse, and I’m not groveling in contrition for feeling this impulse, but it is immediately modulated with the realization that, “This is no time for gloating.” This is no time for the childish ego-delight of having vanquished a foe in an athletic competition; this is a moment about our country’s welfare and even that of the world.

My study of history is brought to the table with this moment, In 1899, in the Spanish-American War the U.S.S. Texas had just sunk the Spanish cruiser, Viscaya. When the victorious “Texas” was cruising past the burning and sinking ship, its crew was loudly cheering when its Captain, John Woodward “Jack” Phillip, chided them, “Don’t cheer boys. Those poor devils are dying.” Though it is human nature to gloat here, there are so many “poor devils” who are dying and I’m not even speaking of the Republican Party upper echelon but of the rioters who so foolishly stormed the Capitol on “01/06/21.” Many of them are sorely regretting having given into their childish, old-brain impulses, having been stirred up by a sociopath president. And even Qanon members are regretting their actions, one of them, the Buffalo-horned “shaman,” crying out, “We were duped by Trump.” Others have reported feeling foolish. Gloating is not in order and even blaming should not be first priority. This is a “mess” we have been in for more than four years and gloating and blaming is short-sighted. It is so very Trump. We have an historic challenge before us and maturity, grace, and prayer is called for. I’m trying to “whup up” those qualities inside myself.

A Poem Relevant to Our Nation, “Bow Down to Stutterers.”

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Joe Biden put something on our table last week that Trump will never do, given a constitutional flaw that makes it impossible to admit any fault—he admitted a human flaw, stuttering.  Furthermore, he offered the stage to a 13 year old lad who he has coached recently about stuttering, Braydon Harrington. Braydon humbly accepted  this opportunity to demonstrate tremendous courage and offer a brief speech in which he did indeed stutter

Though stuttering is a neurological disorder…as is every malady, including “being human”…I immediately thought of a poem in which this malady was approached in poetic imagery.  Edgar Simmons,  a Mississippi poet who grasped the nuances of the heart and was able to present stuttering from an interesting perspective.  In the poem which I will offer, he saw stuttering as representing a heart with so much energy that conveying  its burden into words was a challenge. This poem is so rich but one particular image really speaks to me, “The stutter’s hesitation/Is a procrastination crackle/Redress to hot force,/Flight from ancient flame.”  Simmons presents the stutterer as being gripped by a passionate intensity that words cannot contain.  It brings to mind Goneril’s response to her father’s (King Lear) question, “How much do you love me?”  She responded with a simple, “More than words can wield the matter.”

BOW DOWN TO STUTTERERS
By Edgar Simmons

The stutter’s hesitation
Is a procrastination crackle,
Redress to hot force,
Flight from ancient flame.

The bow, the handclasp, the sign of the cross
Say, “Sh-sh-sheathe the savage sword.”

If there is greatness in sacrifice
Lay on me the blue stigmata of saints;
Let me not fly to kill in unthought.

Prufrock has been maligned
And Hamlet should have waived revenge,
Walked with Ophelia domestic corridors
Absorbing the tick, the bothersome twitch.

Let me stutter with the non-objective painters
Let my stars cool to bare lighted civilities.

Meditation Can Intervene With One’s “Monkey Mind.”

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The “spin” that I have kicked around the last few posts pertains also to religion, even mine! I was given by birth the Christian tradition, which I still greatly respect, but which I realized I was given in a socio-cultural context from my birth in the American South in the early 1950’s, coming with a particular “spin” which taught me that my hyper conservative Baptist church was very “special”; it was  so “special” that even the Southern Baptist Convention of which we were a spin-off was “too liberal.”  There was a sense in which my little denomination, the Landmark Missionary Baptist Church, took for itself the exalted position of the “bride of Christ,” an honor that awaited us when we got to heaven. These were good people, very, very,  good people, who afforded me this “spin.”  If I had not been given that “spin”, I would have been given another; we all get a “spin.”  Many of the generation I grew up in did not take it as seriously as I did and were able to slough off the spin-dimension  more readily than I was; they were secure enough to not take themselves so seriously.  I was very thin-skinned, very wounded and needed the specialness “spin” to protect me from the vulnerability that would have otherwise overwhelmed me.

My spirituality has, therefore, always been “all about me” more than I could have imagined.  This is still the case and will always be.  In a sense, “I can’t help it” for I am a mere human and can only “hold this treasure in an earthen vessel.”  My ego, still with its infantile baggage, wants to believe otherwise and have the assurance that the viewpoint I have on spiritual matters is beyond question, is “objective” in some sense.  But we are never as “objective” as we think we are and this leads to delusional thinking, especially in religion…and politics. But once you “see” a dark dimension of your heart, it is not eradicated but its power begins to diminish; that “diminishment” process follows one the rest of his life.

Beginning about a decade ago when I stumbled across the work of Richard Rohr and a meditation class at a lovely church in Fayetteville, Arkansas, this narcissism began to crumble.  St. Paul’s Episcopalian Church offered many treasures, one of which was a Sunday School class which emphasized Eastern and Western meditation wisdom and practice.  There this “monkey mind” of mine became more visible, its shrieking and chattering more apparent for what it was.  Next time, I will explore a bit more the importance of meditation in my life.

Here I Elaborate Further on Recent Post About Hannah Arendt…

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My last post was dense, convoluted, and “self-reflection” running amok.  That is ok as it was “me” and I shared from this “me” that has helped me stumble through “mite near” seven decades of life. But two days later, I’d like to simplify things…once again, “a mite”…and kick around for a moment “internal dialogue.”

Hannah Arendt described Adolph Eichman as totally bereft of this human quality, not able to stand apart from the mausoleum of thought that he was.  This character flaw of his was symptomatic of the Third Reich which Arendt, in assessing Eichman, described as “the banality of evil.”  This banality is what happens when we are so immersed in our cognitive grasp of the world that we disallow the possibility of other humans having a “cognitive grasp” of their own which deserves respect.

This internal dialogue is the capacity to have a vein of “self-talk” in our heart which allows us to occasionally pause, look at some of the things we are most certain of and ask ourselves, “Hmm.  Maybe this “rock of Gibraltar” in my consciousness merits another look-see.”

There are so many examples in life today of this malady, but I want to put on the table a trivial anecdote from decades ago.  A news clip in the mid-seventies described a man in Dallas, Texas who became so frustrated and angry when his Cowboys football team lost a game that he grabbed his shot gun and blew out the TV screen. This must have stunned his neighbors as a gun shot next door led them to calling the police. I love sports myself and the Dallas Cowboys were, and still are, my favorite team.  I have suffered many disappointments with them over the decades as too often I’ve suffered the ignominy of watching them get beaten.  BUT, I’ve never been THAT upset! That poor bloke, demonstrated what it is to be “a brain stem with arms and legs,” allowing his seat of emotions to overwhelm him and suspend judgement.  He acted without the presence of the “pauser reason”  that Shakespeare has given us. The Grace of God has equipped most of us with this discretion and we are able to check ourselves throughout the day and avoid “acting out” like that.  Without this taken-for- granted contrivance in our heart, we too would that “brain stems without arms and legs” and catastrophe would unfold.

The complicated machinations of the human heart that I wrote about two days ago can be simplified with Arendt’s notion of, “internal dialogue.”  It is this human quality that permits us to reduce that cognitive/emotional tumult with an automatic filter, of “common sense.”  Without this “common sense” that most of us comply with routinely we will wreak havoc on our world.  Only if  we happen to live in a world, or even a little corner of a world that has also suspended common sense and shut down this “internal dialogue,” we can get by with it.

“Lord, in your infinite Grace, help us.”

Over-emphasis of Law Reveals the Absence There Of

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The Trump/Covid 19 virus continues to beset us!  I am afraid, as you probably are, but I do have a “Center” that does indeed hold…apparently!

I hate to brag, but from even before this twin-faced pandemic hit us, I recognized that Trump and the GOP’s need to hide was very significant, and very revealing.  “Build that wall” was about more than the boundary between our country and Mexico; it was a disclosure that Trump has always been desperate to “build walls” between himself and the world, between his conscious mind and the monstrous, demonic madness that rages in his heart.  (NOTE—I confess that I must really want to brag…but am still too “humble” to embrace this and all other human qualities!!)

This “virus” is the expression of a denial system that has lain not-so-dormant in the American soul for decades ago, and egregiously so in the Republican Party.  But, as Carl Jung told us, “What resists” persists and the Bible told us in its heavy-handed ancient manner, “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it.”My adulthood spent largely in the mental health profession reveals this tumult in my own soul.  Since early childhood, I too have “built walls” and comforted myself in the self-referential and linear prison that denies “reality.”  But as Jung noted, “it” is now coming out, paralleling this historical moment we are living through.  But spiritually/emotionally I appear to harbor less “darkness” compared with that which cowers in the bowels of Trumpism.  (Hmm!  “darkness” and “bowels.”  Do toy with that  Metaphor in your heart;  toy with that choice of words!!!)

“Walls,” i.e. boundaries, are an essential dimension of human experience…and technically of the whole Cosmos that embraces us.  But over-emphasis of “walls” reveals a corresponding absence of them in the depths of one’s heart.  Trump is the poster boy for this ancient human malady.  His crawl out from under the socio-cultural/political rock of our nation reveals an opportunity for us, individually and collectively, to consort for a moment with this primordial darkness.

(CONCLUDING AFTERTHOUGHT–If you are subscribed to this blog, please indulge me for a while as I post more frequently.  My “belly is full of words” and they want to spew, just as they did in the belly of that ancient bloke in the book of Job who merited but a cameo in that narrative. This is the thing about blogging that I appreciate; it permits the self-indulgence that my timidity prevents.  Those who know me personally should be so grateful!!!)

 

Clinical “Executive Functioning” Now Direly Needed!!!

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Executive function is a clinical term to describe one’s ability to manage his life, to deal with its stresses and strains and to manage them with wisdom. This function of the cerebral cortex offers us “working memory, flexible thinking, and self-control” which facilitates an ability to exercise this gift in fulfilling our basic needs and doing so in cooperation with others… most of which are usually busy trying to do the same. Impairment of this neurological gift will make it “hard to focus, follow directions, and handle emotions.”  Its diminishment will leave us with unconscious fears and anxieties, creating problems for our life and for those around us.

As this pandemic continues to beset us, like a hawk circling above looking for additional prey, our nation’s, “executive functioning” is woefully inadequate, specifically with our Federal government and its “executive.”  We are immersed in a spiritual crisis; and humankind is equipped with an ability to “manage” crises, but only if we can do so with direction and a spirit of harmony. If our collective “executive functioning” functions maturely it will demonstrate a capacity to learn from experience, recognize error, and adjust our strategy.  It will accept responsibility for the crisis, not fretting over “who’s at fault” but on “how can we address this crisis?” most effectively.

We live in a world of contingency; circumstances are always present. But we have been given human “agency”, the capacity to act meaningfully toward what lies before us, hoping that as we do so we are acting toward the betterment of all. With the empowerment of this efficacy, we can facilitate a “purge” of the “common weal.”  And this brings to my mind the illimitable wisdom of Shakespeare, alluding here to his play, Macbeth, when his allies were recognizing the peril of staying with their “executive.”

Well, march we on
To give obedience where ’tis truly owed.
Meet we the medicine of the sickly weal,
And with him pour we in our country’s purge
Each drop of us.

So, will we manage to pour “each drop of us” into the “purge” that we need?  And in present day, the “medicine of our sickly weal” needs to be a spirit of unity, not any “Macduff” and his boys.  Nevertheless, we could readily utilize a leader in whom we can put our faith, providing this caveat is considered—faith in a leader always carries the risk of finding a leader who is nothing but another version of Trump.

 

 

 

Baseball!!!

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I’m currently watching the 7th game of the 1952 World Series between the New York Yankees and Brooklyn Dodgers.  I was seven years old when this game was played and would not “discover” baseball until a decade later when Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris were caught up in a home run chase…without the aid of any pharmacology!  Mantle was a 20 year old rookie in 1952 and I was delighted to watch him hit a home run.  But now there is no “live” baseball.

 But that was then, this is now!  Sure the wonderful game has changed drastically as has the whole of life.  The were no over-paid players in 1952, no  tyrannical and arrogant team-owners, and no collective bargaining strife that occurs from time to time.  But there is still that magical “crack of the bat,’ the pop ot cow-hide smacking the gloves, the smell of pop-corn and the cry from the venders in the stands crying out, “Get your pop corn, get your peanuts,” and the thrill of “my team” winning the “ole ballgame.”

But I reiterate, “That was then, this is now.”  Life has changed dramatically and fundamentally.  Today Covid 19 has shaken us to our core, our welfare is deeply related to the whims and fancies of the stock market, microwave ovens are a common place, rotary dial phones have been buried in the dustbin of history, and we have an American President who publicly needed to reassure about the size of his penis.  It is so tempting to despair, particularly with the virus but also the moral and spiritual bankruptcy of our political leaders.  I’m’ not for sure  why I still take delight in life, still having nagging memories of “the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to.”  My childhood insecurity, hyper self-consciousness, and vulnerability still whisper in my ears daily and persistently.  I guess wisdom does comes with age, allowing me to recognize my continued “denial system” about reality, no longer allowing this “denial system” to offer the solace of certainty with its accompanying arrogance.

Today, I am just here…as in “here.”  It is only this “here-ness,” this present moment which you and I share even as you read this, is the only moment.  “Past” and “future” do exists as a necessary contrivance, but it is only the present moment that we have, described as Eckhart Tolle as, “The Power of Now.”

Thoughts About our Endemic Obtuseness

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The “deep state” is often brought to the table in this pandemic by the Conservative voice. Technically, “it” is present also with our Progressive voice; for there is always unacknowledged intentionality in each of us, in all groups and individuals, as none of us know objectively what we are doing, saying, or thinking. But this “dilemma” proffers us an immediate ruse, individually and collectively–simply choosing to disregard the presence of subterranean depths in our heart. W. H. Auden had this problem in mind with the poetic quip, “We are lived by powers we pretend to understand.” Satchel Paige, the brilliant, talented, and eccentric pitcher from baseball’s “Negro Leagues” in the mid-20th century often advised, “Don’t look back; whatever is there is gaining on you.”

In this current “deux ex machina” that is before us, blame is an immediate, self-serving escape from the sense of responsibility that it demands. Blaming China, or perhaps the “deep state,” or Obama, or some version of “them” only hampers our nation’s ability to address this crisis. Prophetic voices in a crisis like this become from beyond the pale, not from within it; the Reverent William Barber is a notable example. But Indian novelist and political activist, Arundhati Roy, last week also had a prophetic word for the world, describing this pandemic as, “a portal” through which we might find a turn-around in the very nature of how we grasp the world:

Whatever it is, coronavirus has made the mighty kneel and brought the world to a halt like nothing else could. Our minds are still racing back and forth, longing for a return to “normality”, trying to stitch our future to our past and refusing to acknowledge the rupture. But the rupture exists. And, in the midst of this terrible despair, it offers us a chance to rethink the doomsday machine we have built for ourselves. Nothing could be worse than a return to normality. Historically, pandemics have forced humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next. We can choose to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it. (from interview on Democracy Now)

This Indian wisdom brought to my mind a “war-horse” of many conservative pastors, 2 Chronicles 7:14, “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.

 

 

A “Coronavirus” Has Struck Our Political Heart

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The coronavirus has struck our nation’s political heart.  I here am alluding to news from China that the physician who first attempted to alert his country to the presence of that virus, Wi Linliang, a 34 year old opthamologist, has now died of that virus.  When he first attempted to sound the alarm, he was told to stop and was detained for “rumor mongering” which, according to the Washington Post, is what happens in China with any news that threatens the social order.  In an autocratic political regime, fear abounds and any information that might create unrest is quashed…even if that “unrest” might be a temporary necessity.  An autocratic regime, or mindset, is just a two year old ego on steroids.

Mitt Romney mustered up the courage to warn the Republican Party, and the nation, of the “virus” of certainty which has found a voice in the person of donald j. trump. The problem with certainty of this ilk is that it is so rigid, based upon internal frailty and vulnerability, that it cannot allow any contrary thought.  In the history of this blog, I have likened it unto a group who might think that the moon is made out of cheese; once its members have invested heart and soul into that belief, they cannot be dissuaded. Any outside perspective that might deign to “intrude” will be disallowed, castigated and even attacked in favor of unexamined premises and preconceptions, regardless of how foolish or insane they might appear to others. This is because these “unexamined” premises and preconceptions are merely a house of cards, lacking any firm foundation in the “bowels” of the heart.  The more this cauldron of reptilian brain energy is confronted, the greater will be the venom and opprobrium that will be offered in response.  It does not have to be “reasonable”; it just has to be teeming with the vim and vinegar of certainty which will always be validating to those who lack existential, i.e. “spiritual” grounding.  And now the speciousness, the vacuity of the American soul has found a mouthpiece in the person of “the donald” who is the veritable “toy of some great pain.” (Ranier Rilke)  This “pain” is the anguish which spiritual teachers, such as Jesus, offered “the balm of Gilead” but not in the form of a “rational” palliative, but one in the form of faith.  This faith, however, is more than a rational construct and obsessive devotion to dogma, but something that springs from the depths of the heart.  And you cannot “think” your way into that mysterious dimension of life that drives us all; “faith” begins to blossom when you tap into that “Mystery.”

I will never forget that Mitt Romney moment.  He is deeply conservative and deeply religious; but in that moment his religiosity reached deeper into his heart than his political affiliation.  Conservatism is a vital dimension of any body politic; my country’s conservative voice is deeply frightened and has resorted to an autocrat to find its footing.  There must be other “Mitt Romneys” who will dig into their heart and find that courage to speak up if our country is to get out of this “two-year old ego mania” that we are now witnessing.

In My Youth Romney’s “Kind” Were Not Even Christian!

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In my youth, as a Baptist in the South, Mormons were not even Christian…in our estimation.  Today he is demonstrating “Christian” courage that I’m only now beginning to tippy-toe into.  He is about to speak truth to power by being the only member of the Republican Party to vote to remove Trump from office.  He has already faced intimidation from his party and now it will increase tremendously.  When group-think dominates a party, or any group, any one who dares to defy that toxic kool-aid will face exclusion.  That is why as a youth in the Baptist fold I kept to myself questions that were bubbling in my heart as the need to “fit in” was too important to me.

I am addressing here the toxic dimension of “belonging”, when “fitting in” becomes a tyrant and group-think is allowed to take over.  And, yes, even with noble veins of thought like the teachings of Jesus, toxicity can creep in when the ego, described by the Apostle Paul as “the flesh,”  is not recognized. I hope that Romney will gain courage under the tremendous pressure he will now face.  He has not been as outspoken as he should have; but now he has nothing to lose.  He will certainly be “primaried” by his party but he should use this opposition to “out-Christian” the “christians” who have sold their soul for “thirty pieces of silver.”