Category Archives: mental health

St Francis and his Gift of “Boundary Problems”

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I first became familiar with St. Francis in college studying medieval history. When I heard the anecdote of him stopping on a path to pick up a worm…“Brother worm” to him…and removing it to the side of the path so that it would not be stepped on, I privately guffawed, thinking, “Oh my Lord. That guy was nuts.” And though I have matured and understand him much better and am even very sympathetic to his teachings, I still think he had, clinically speaking, “boundary problems.” His “boundary problem” was that he did not see clearly and distinctly between himself and others and even clearly and distinctly between himself and the earth. But now at this point in my life I’ve even gone further “down hill” and don’t see my diagnosis of “boundary problems” as being as valid as I once thought. St. Francis was just a very sensitive soul who saw the inter-relatedness of all things, of the whole world, and recognized that we are not separate and distinct from the world in the way we think we are. We are, after all “dust of the earth.”

Now, I might add that some people do have “boundary problems” and failing to draw clear boundaries can pose major problems in one’s life. However, someone with this “problem” can be a gifted person who has something to teach us and I think St. Francis was one of those. Furthermore, one of his contemporary devotees, Richard Rohr who is a Franciscan Monk, is one of those gifted individuals and his teachings have had a profound influence on my in the past few years. Here is his blog from today:

When I first joined the Franciscan order in 1961, my novice master told me we could not cut down a tree without permission of the Provincial (the major religious superior). It seemed a bit extreme, but then I realized that a little bit of Francis of Assisi had lasted 800 years! We still had his awareness that wilderness is not just “wilderness.” Nature is not just here for our consumption and profit. The natural is of itself also the supernatural. Both natural elements and animals are not just objects for our plunder. Francis granted true dignity and subjectivity to nature by calling it Brother Sun, Sister Fire, Brother Wind, and Sister Water. No wonder he is the patron saint of ecology and care for creation.

Once you grant subjectivity to the natural world, everything changes. It’s no longer an object with you as the separated and superior subject, but you share subjectivity with it. You address it with a title of respect, and allow it to speak back to you! For so long creation has been a mere commodity at best, a useless or profitable wilderness depending on who owned it. With the contemplative mind, questions of creation are different than those of consumption and capitalism, and they move us to appreciate creation for its own sake, not because of what it does for me or how much money it can make me. For those with spiritual eyes, the world itself has to be somehow the very “Body of God.” What else could it be for one who believes in “creationism”? As Paul puts it, “From the beginning until now, the entire creation has been groaning in one great act of giving birth” (Romans 8:22), so it is not only an evolutionary body but an eternally pregnant body besides. God’s creation is so perfect that it continues to create itself from within. The Franciscans were not wrong in not cutting down ordinary trees without a very good reason.

One of the common problems of our world today is that we don’t “grant subjectivity” to our world and even to other people. We assume other people see the world just as we do and often tyrannize our young children into doing so. And when we have tyrannized a young child into forgoing their own subjective view of the world, we have taken their soul from them.

Boston Bombers and the Danger of “Big Thoughts”

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“Big Thoughts Have Got Us.” These words of the poet Gene Derwood come to my mind every time I hear of someone else getting carried away with his/her ideology and carrying it to the extreme of taking lives, their own and certainly those of others. I always remember the wisdom of Mike Dooley, “Thoughts are things. Choose the good ones.”

And they, thoughts, are “things” in that they carry weight and can lead us to actions that are not in our own best interest or in the best interest of others. And I am speaking from experience. Now it is easy to look at the ideology of the Boston Marathon bombers and say, “Oh, why did they ever think that and get carried away by it?” Well, that is a good question and there is lunacy in their thought system that is not present in the thought system of most of us. But all of us have “thoughts” and none of our “thoughts” are devoid of intent, noble though we may think them to be. For example, let me take the thought system of Christianity, a “thought system” which I subscribe to and do so ever more passionately. But the danger I face, and the danger that all Christians face, is that they take their “thoughts” as having ultimate value and fail to realize the emotional valence they have been given by our life experiences. Yes, most of us have “thought systems” which are relatively benign compared with the Boston bombers, but they are not totally benign. I, for one, am appalled to recall some of the things I have done and said under the guise of “the Spirit leading.” For, even with benign and even noble thoughts we can be brutal. Even with “Jesus Christ” we can seek to dominate, control, and brutalize other people.

Let me be more honest. I have had interchanges under this persona of “LiteraryLew” which I have had to confess to a few friends are mean-spirited, to put it mildly. And there will be more of that as I am a mere human, driven by passions which at times consume me. But, may I always be subject to Shakespeare’s “pauser reason” which will make me “meta” every now and then and seek to balance some of my verbal and emotional excess. For, with things we feel so strongly about we can be so brutal.

 

Language “Calming the Savage Beast”

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As I work with very young children as a substitute teacher, I marvel at the early childhood memories that come flooding back. The haunt of anxieties, fears, insecurities, and neediness surface though they no longer terrorize me. I have matured and have developed an ego, an ego which itself is mature enough to allow these feelings to resurface without feeling its integrity is jeopardized. So, I learn from this classroom experience even as I am patiently helping these lovely children to learn.

Neurology has taught us that our experiences from birth onward…and even before birth…stay with us and shape our lives. For the roots of the ego are organic and so we get a head start even before we are born; and, I would deign to say, even before we were a “gleam in our daddy’s eye.”

But especially after we are born, we soak up what is going on around us and begin to formulate an impression of the world, one basic impression being whether or not the world is an hospitable place to be. “Do I like this place or do I want to check out?” Fortunately, most of us are wired to want to hang around even if our world happens to be very ugly and the same wiring helps us develop coping skills (i.e. a “denial system”) that can thwart what would be otherwise an unbearable subjective anguish. But sometime the “denial systems” are too maladaptive and lead one beyond the pale when he/she grows up and begins to take part in the human carnival. That is when therapy becomes relevant and sometimes even incarceration and even…perhaps…capital punishment.

One of the basic tools of denial is language itself. It is our ability to formulate words and enter into the verbal world that calms the savage beast that reigns prior to that Oedipal moment. Nikos Kazantzakis pithily referred to those “twenty-six toy soldiers that guard us from the rim of the abyss,” George Eliot said that we should “speak words which give shape to our anguish.” and Conrad Aiken noted that,”to name the abyss is to avoid it.” And now I have suddenly wandered knee-deep into the field of semiotics. If you find exploration of the nitty-gritty of subjective development, of that moment in our early life when language is being “wrapped around” the primitive beasts of our early subjective anguish, let me suggest Julia Kristeva who has written brilliantly and eloquently on this subject. Her books draw from her practice as a psychoanalyst with patients whose denial system, i.e. “linguistic filter,” has been compromised either neurologically or by trauma. The Kristeva title which delves most deeply into this is Power of Horrors.

Gender, Politics, and Sexuality

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One of my dear cyber friends that I’ve met through blogging is a woman whose blog is NeuroResearchProject.com. I will refer to her here as “V.” She works in the field of neuroscience and is obviously a prolific reader and blessed with a “curious mind” and I would add, “heart.” One of the many interests we share is the subject of gender and politics, certainly including the realm of “sexuality.” She and I are in accordance with the notion that power is a basic dimension of this intrinsically human realm. And, I might add, I think that power is a basic human issue and is relevant to every dimension of the human experience. If we draw the breath of life, we exercise power in some fashion, even if perhaps it is merely with our “powerlessness.” But that is a dangerous note to make as it easily “blames” the powerless for their lot and does not immediately address the tyranny of those who exercise “real” power in the “real” world. Here I share with you the observations of “V” re this subject and invite you to check out her excellent blog. Her observations refer to a couple of things I had noted to her in earlier correspondence. I also close with a very fascinating poem by a Palestinian woman about the exercise of power in the sexual act.

You said: “we sure did not like what had preceded our reign.”
That’s an interesting statement. In his Psychology Today article, “Why Men Oppress Women”, Steve Taylor said the oppression of women stems largely from men’s desire for power and control, which we talked about in earlier conversations—the power issue. Power and dominance increases dopamine and can hijack the brains reward center. I think men tend to have a disadvantage because of testosterone and one of its by-products called 3-androstanediol which increases dopamine. In his book “How Power Changes the Brain”, Dr. Ian Robertson states that too much power, thus too much dopamine can lead to gross errors of judgment, egocentricity, and lack of empathy for others.

Back to Taylor’s article, he states that the same need which, throughout history, has driven men to try to conquer and subjugate other groups or nations, and to oppress other classes or groups in their own society, drives them to dominate and oppress women. Since men (not all men) feel the need to gain as much power and control as they can, they steal away power and control from women. Taylor’s comment compliments what Dr. Robert Sapolsky observed during the years he spent with the Savanna baboons in their natural habitat. When lower ranking males were bullied by higher ranking males, they usurped authority by dominating the females in the troop, sometimes abusing them. He found that this social/cultural dynamic was not fixed; that it was learned behavior and could change dramatically (far less aggression and oppression). http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/peace_among_primates

You said: “Misogyny was underway but we were compelled by biology to desire them.”
Taylor goes on to say that even the former isn’t enough to explain the full terrible saga of man’s inhumanity to woman. That many cultures have had a strong antagonism towards women, viewing them as impure and innately sinful creatures who have been sent by the devil to lead men astray and has featured strongly in all three Abrahamic religions. As the Jewish Testament of Reuben states:

“Women are evil, my children…they use wiles and try to ensnare [man] by their charms…They lay plots in their hearts against men: by the way they adorn themselves they first lead their minds astray, and by a look they instil the poison, and then in the act itself they take them captive…So shun fornication, my children and command your wives and daughters not to adorn their heads and faces.”

Taylor says this is linked to the view—encouraged by religions—that instincts and sensual desires are base and sinful. Men associated themselves with the “purity” of the mind, and women with the “corruption” of the body. Since biological processes like sex, menstruation, breast-feeding and even pregnancy were disgusting to men, women themselves disgusted them too.

He further states that in connection with this, men have resented the sexual power that women have over them too. Feeling that sex was sinful, they were bound to feel animosity to the women who produced their sexual desires. In addition, women’s sexual power must have affronted their need for control. This meant that they couldn’t have the complete domination over women—and over their own bodies—that they craved. They might be able to force women to cover their bodies and faces and make them live like slaves, but any woman was capable of arousing powerful and uncontrollable sexual impulses inside them at any moment. He concludes by saying the last 6000 years of man’s inhumanity to woman can partly be seen as a revenge for this.

Source: http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/out-the-darkness/201208/why-men-oppress-women

And now the poem that I promised:

This evening
a man will go out
to look for
prey
to satisfy the secrets of his desires.

This evening
a woman will go out
to look for
a man who will make her
mistress of his bed.
This evening
predator and prey will meet
and mix
and perhaps
perhaps
they will exchange roles.

By Maram al-Massri

 

In Praise of Jimmy Carter

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Jimmy Carter is still going strong as he approaches his 90th birthday!  He is incredible!  And, he appears more lucid and coherent and “together” than does “literarylew” on occasion!  Though I would not deign to “pile on” and diminish his presidency, the real work of his life has taken place in the 33 years since he lost the 1980 election to Reagan.  And, I know this loss must have been a devastating experience for him.  He must have suffered immensely.  And, to make it worse, his presidency is often described as “ineffective” or as a “failure.”  But, he is holding his head high and is doing very important work with the Carter Foundation and with Habitat for Humanity.  In a video clip I will post here, he discusses with Jon Stewart his work in Africa in almost completely eradicating the Guinea worm.

I have suffered disappointment and even failure in my life.  And, I never just completely caved in and wallowed in despair…too long.  I too have pulled myself up from the floor and persevered.  But, if I had been in a position like Carter’s and had suffered an ignominious defeat at the hands of the American people, I don’t know if I could have gotten up off the floor.

But his life is a demonstration of faith, an embodiment of the New Testament observation that “Faith without works is dead.”  And though he has dissolved his ties with the Southern Baptist Convention, I’m sure his faith is very “Baptisty” even today.  (And, I might add, so is mine!)  I conjecture that he has found that his traditional Southern evangelical faith can withstand the scrutiny of a critical, intelligent mind and has even flourished as a result.

God appeared to me after this interview and told me that in a short time Jimmy will cross the river Styx and will find a very handsome golden mansion awaiting him.  And those streets will be embellished with an additional layer of gold.  And the angels will fete him as will the other humans who have preceded him into that celestial domain.  And he is going to give Jimmy a real hearty “Atta-boy.”

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-april-9-2013/jimmy-carter-pt–1

Children Belong to All of Us!

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Melissa Harris-Perry (weekend MSNBC news talk show host) provided fodder for the right-wing extremists last week when she emphasized our collective responsibility for our children. This immediately got their “panties in a wad” but this wad became even tighter when Sarah Palin came out from under her Alaskan rock, displaying her intellectual acumen (or lack thereof), and alleged that here again was a “liberal” effort to encroach on parental responsibility. To summarize conservative concerns, “Our children are ours! Keep your government hands off of our children.” This mind-set sees children as property, as extensions of the parents selves.

But my real concern here is the simplicity of thought that was demonstrated. Ms. Palin and her ilk demonstrated again their inability…and spiritual unwillingness…to hold contradictory notions in their mind at the same time. They failed to see that Ms. Perry was not proposing that children are not the primary responsibility of parents. She was merely emphasizing that children are a gift to us all, that we have a collective responsibility to provide an hospitable world to them, and that failure to do so is a grave error in judgment. It is possible to hold both notions in one’s mind at the same time but it will not happen with the hard-core extremists who are not capable of Pauline “spiritual discernment.”

And this problem is very much related to their anti-science stance.  Quantum physics portrays the world as full of contradictions and conflicts, a teeming morass out of which our God-given mind has given us the ability to impose order upon. But beneath this “order” there is still Mother Nature in all her conflicted glory and we ignore this conflicted glory with our neat little conceptual packaging at our own peril. One anecdote from quantum physics which is very relevant is the notion that molecules are “waves” and “particles” at the same time. That makes no “sense” at all but Mother Nature is not required to fit into our world of “sense.” Quantum physics also teaches us that we are basically empty space and that the world we see is ephemeral, including the world of our own body and psyche. Grasping this notion is very humbling but very invigorating and empowering. It has allowed me, for one, to see God at work in a marvelous though mysterious way that is tremendously exciting. But I am deprived of the specious “power” of having it all figured out any more or having any hope of doing so. Alas and alack, I’m left with nothing but faith!

Now, I am wont to emphasize that I see both sides of the picture and give some faint nod of respect to the other viewpoint. But, there are instances in which I am less apt to do so and this is one of them. Keep in mind I am not talking about conservatism as a whole, only those who are what Karl Rove called the “nutty fringe.” Their ignorance is not merely a lack of intelligence or education but is darkness personified. And, unfortunately, there are many conservatives who know better, who do not subscribe to the lunacy of the extremists, but who have allowed themselves to be controlled by them merely to get their vote. “The best lack all conviction and the worst are filled with passionate intensity.” (W. B. Yeats)

The Pain of “Seeing Things Too Well”

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And one trembles to be so understood and, at last, To understand, as if to know became The fatality of seeing things too well. –Wallace Stevens

Matthew Warren, the son of widely-renown evangelical pastor Rick Warren, has taken his life. Only in his mid-twenties, the report from his father was that his son had struggled with depression and “mental illness” for most of his life, often pining for death to ease his pain. I was deeply troubled by this story, so sorry for the young man who was so overcome with the difficulty of life and for his family whose life has now been shaken to the core.

“You who watched Matthew grow up knew he was an incredibly kind, gentle, and compassionate man,” Warren wrote. “He had a brilliant intellect and a gift for sensing who was most in pain or most uncomfortable in a room. He’d then make a bee-line to that person to engage and encourage them.”

This anecdote from Pastor Warren reveals that Matthew was a very sensitive soul, who could be described as “having boundary problems” and taking on the troubles and pain of other people. In my trade, I once heard a psychiatrist describe a similar soul as suffering from “porosity of boundaries.”

I don’t know anything about the Matthew and never will. But I certainly identify with him as I know what it is like to overly-identify with other people and, on occasion to cross a line and take on more of their pain than I should. That is why I was a “mental health professional” and often could have uttered the famous words of Bill Clinton, “I feel your pain.” But, mercifully my “porosity” never reached the extreme of this young man and I’ve never had to battle with suicidality.

Life is really painful. Most people are “blessed” with blinders but some are not so fortunate. If they are lucky, they will be able to channel this anguish into a productive outlet…art, music, “care-giving” professions, ministry, etc….; otherwise, they suffer terribly and sometimes opt for the “bare bodkin” that Hamlet pined for. Most cultures do not make room for young men and women of this cut, those who “see things too well.” This greatly exacerbates their pain, forcing them to suffer in isolation. I’m reminded again of the wisdom of Leonardo da Vinci:

O cities of the sea, I behold in you your citizens, women as well as men tightly bound with stout bonds around their arms and legs by folk who will not understand your language; and you will only be able to give vent to your griefs and sense of loss of liberty by making tearful complaints, and sighs, and lamentations one to another; for those who bind you will not understand your language nor will you understand them. Leonardo da Vinci, from “Of Children in Swaddling Clothes”. Just as Jaspers would note, da Vinci knew that we “have to take it where we find it.”

“Unpacking My Heart with Words” Review

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When I started this “literarylew” adventure about two years ago, I prefaced my efforts with a line from the book of Job, noting that “my heart is full of words, like a taut wine skin, about to burst.” I then borrowed a line from the other important body of Holy Writ in my life, Shakespeare, and proposing that I would “unpack my heart with words.”

As I have been “unpacking” in word, and in the “deed” of my day-to-day life, I’ve realized that when you “unpack” anything at some point you empty it out. You realize the obvious, the suitcase or box is empty and you can quit unpacking. But when you “unpack” the heart, you do discover and experience “emptiness” but you find that it is a never ending “emptiness” and that, paradoxically, in some very uncanny way you are full when you are empty.

Now part of me is still very vain and wants the above to conclude with some report of an epiphany of sorts, some glorious spiritual experience which puts me up with the luminaries of the past and present. And, I might add, this “unpacking” spiel kind of invites it! But, it ain’t there! And I’m so glad I don’t want it to be and in part this is because of cowardice. I have a hunch it would be too painful. “It is what it is” or “I am what I am” or the Popeye the Sailor Man version, “I yam what I yam.” I know emptiness more than before but mine is mercifully a very prosaic emptiness. Thus I’m not a poet, huh?

We so miss the point. And we do it persistently, brazenly, and deliberately. This is because we do not like to confront our emptiness for doing so exposes our frailty and foolishness, showing us to be veritably “strutting and fretting our hour upon the stage.” Now, don’t get me wrong. My life is now also daily “strutting and fretting” but I view it with a different perspective now. I don’t take it (i.e., myself) so seriously and, paradoxically, realize just how infinitely important “it” is. The Infinite becomes manifest through each of us as we go about our day-to-day lives humbling chopping wood and carrying water.

I want to share again Lao Tzu’s thoughts about this emptiness:

Thirty spokes are made one by holes in a hub,
By vacancies joining them for a wheel’s use;
The use of clay in moulding pitchers
Comes from the hollow of its absence;
Doors, windows, in a house,
Are used for their emptiness:
�Thus we are helped by what is not
To use what is.
(trans. By Witter Bynner)

 

The Power of Gratitude

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I awoke this morning with a powerful sense of gratitude in my heart.  First, I had slept pretty well, my lovely wife was next to me as were my two dachshunds. I When I awoke this morning, I was intensely grateful for some reason for so many things. stirred and felt my hand on one of the lovely puppies. I got out of bed and paid attention this time to the simple pleasure of my mobility, knowing that as I age that will probably be more of an issue. I ambled into the kitchen, took pleasure in the fact that it was clean and organized, and made my coffee. Moments later I was grateful for the aroma and taste of this morning brew. I looked outside and could see the day breaking, noting the bird feeder where “bird theater” would be convening shortly. I turned on the television and found CNN where I could again watch the rest of the world, already spinning and weaving through the course of its day.

This gratitude is a new dimension of my life and has even been a discipline of sorts for the past couple of years. I read a book back then which noted the value of gratitude even for the simple things of life and I started to practice gratitude myself. I feel it has been a powerful influence in the spiritual direction of my life since then. By making this effort, I awakened a “gratitude muscle” in my heart which had long lain dormant and I have cultivated that muscle since then.

The New Testament teaches us to “Give thanks in all things.” Now, I do not think Paul had in mind compulsively “thanking God” each and every minute of our life, trying to earn “suck points” with a God who has nothing better to do that sit “up there” and offer “atta-boys” to those of us who follow His commands. I think he was suggesting that exercise this “gratitude muscle” from time to time in our life and discover that it can help us orient our life to the good that is present in this world, even in the midst of things that are often not so good. This discipline also has value as a cognitive behavioral therapy strategy as a deliberate focus on something positive when things are not going so well can be a powerful antidote to stress or even despair. And, it can be a powerful step in the direction of “getting over ourselves” from time to time, taking the focus away from our tendency to view the world through the narrow prism of our own self-interest and needs. I am currently reading a book by an evangelical Christian, Ann Voskamp, (One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are) in which she describes keeping a “gratitude journal” as a way of coping with difficulties in her day to day life.

Change Means “Mangled Guts Pretending”

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Ann Voskamp, writing from a conservative Christian viewpoint, reflects great depth stemming from having endured great loss in her life. And she notes in her book, “One Thousand Gifts” that, “awakening to joy awakens to pain”, and describes joy and pain as “two arteries of the one heart that pumps through all those who do not numb themselves to really living…Life is loss.” She also interprets Jacob’s wrestling with God as an inner spiritual battle that we all risk if we desire to change into the expression of our inner essence that so many of us fear. She describes the quest for wells which hold living water, noting that these wells don’t come without first seeking them with desperation and that “wells don’t come without first splitting open hard earth, cracking back the lids. There’s no seeing God face-to-face without first the ripping…It takes practice, wrenching practice, to break open the lids. But the secret to joy is to keep seeking God where we doubt he is.”

But, now I want to share the same truth in the words of someone from a vastly different perspective, Tony Kushner, the noted playwright and author of “Angels in America” and more recently author of the screenplay for the movie, “Lincoln.” A character in “Angels in America” poses the question, “How do people change” prompting the following answer:

Well, it has something to do with God so it’s not very nice. God splits the skin with a jagged thumbnail from throat to belly and then plunges a huge filthy hand in, he grabs hold of your bloody tubes and they slip to evade his grasp but he squeezes hard, he insists, he pulls and pulls till all your innards are yanked out…and the pain! We can’t even talk about that. And then he stuffs them back, dirty, tangled and torn. It’s up to you to do the stitching. And then you up you get. And walk around. Just mangled guts pretending.

Wow, that is intense! “Mangled guts pretending!” Notions like this is enough to deter anyone from changing, to opt for the status quo, personally or collectively. Or, as Shakespeare put it in Hamlet, to, “cling these ills we have than fly to others that we know not of.” (Shakespeare, in Hamlet)

And I can’t help but apply this to our country in its current turmoil. As Bob Dylan sang decades ago, “The times they are a changin’” and it is producing great political and social turmoil. And one point made in the brilliant movie Lincoln was the tremendous social unrest that Lincoln knew the country faced when he broached the subject of the 13th amendment.