Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Impact


There is a part of being human that I’ve always found difficult. I hope that it doesn’t have to always be this way, this hard, but it always has been, and I want to try and do something about it. I’m afraid though. This is one of those things that requires me to ask for help. If that isn’t difficult enough, I know to get at this, in a real way, I have to ask for help from you, the very people my blindness impacts the most.

I can’t help it. I’m only human. That is not only my overused excuse, but it happens to be true.  Addressing this issue is probably going to take all the compassion I can muster, and all you can muster too. Being human means I generate impacts (often hurtful) that I’m not aware of. I am clumsy and blind, and I don’t know know it as much as I need to. Because all of this is so, I need you, and I know you need me. I would like to believe we could deal with the impacts we necessarily have upon, and with, each other.

I am one of, what my friend Jim calls, the “not-sees.” I don’t see some things very well.  What happens is that I do a lot of damage — I’m like the proverbial bull in the china shop — because I’m looking somewhere else, or I’m just unable to see all of the consequences of my actions.

I’ve done a lot of therapy, hell, I’ve been a therapist for a long time. Amongst the many things I did in both those roles, has been operate by the belief that I (one) could stop bumping into, and hurting (and sometimes being hurt by), people. I have been wrong about that. This is another example, though pretty ordinary, of how blind I can be.

Lately, I’ve come to see that my blindness is part of being human. I can see, only partly at best. That awareness has made it easier for me to apologize, but does nothing to help me cause less harm. Now my hope rests upon the company I keep. I know I’m going to bump into them from time to time —I’m fond of saying community is a contact sport — but it seldom goes easily when I do. I’m not pretending I’m not blind —I’m not a climate change denier (claiming we humans have no effect on the world) — in fact, I’m too aware that I do, and it leaves me feeling a regret I have a hard time getting past.

So my basic self-image right now contains an awareness that I am perpetually hurtful to the one’s I say I love. Since I say I love community that poses a real challenge to me. I want to do more than just feel bad about it. So, I’ve come to asking for your help. I know if I could just forgive everyone I wouldn’t have to feel this way, but I don’t want to issue a blanket pardon, that doesn’t adequately address the harm in the world that I (and others) seem to be a part of.

I realize I can’t make all of the hurt go away. I know that pain is sometimes the way Mystery gets in, but it seems that there is more hurt in the world than necessary. I’d like to be part of that changing some.  And, I’m just foolish enough, or immature enough, to think that it can be different, for me, and for all of us. But, I’m currently at the place where I can’t imagine that hurting, the hurting I’m responsible for, being addressed without your help.

I keep thinking about a more active form of forgiveness, one that is more immediate, personal, and natural. My imagination though runs to climate change. Before us, within our experience, there is plenty of evidence of our (we humans) impact upon Earth. Alongside that impact, I want to place the impact we have upon one another. Just as the climate is changing in response to our actions, so is the world of social relations being shaped by our impact upon one another.

I know I can’t help impacting you. I know you can’t help impacting me. But, I don’t live in a world where that is just a random coincidence anymore. I live in a world where I am awash in connection. I know there is little that is actually random about it. Yet, I still live like my social impacts are merely farts in the wind. That no longer seems right.

I need your help to live otherwise. Let’s talk about it. Let’s interact like our contact, our incidental impacts upon each other, are really gifts, gifts that indicate how truly connected we are. I want to celebrate the new awareness that is coming to me later here in life, and I can’t do it without playmates, without others who will share with me the difficult process of dealing anew with my (our) blind ignorance.

I don’t like to know that I am (despite my best efforts) overbearing, controlling, and think too much of myself. I don’t react well to finding out either. But, I can do better. I imagine that if I wasn’t feeling so alone, and so prone, in my isolation, to all kinds of bad feelings, that maybe I could handle knowing more about myself. I also imagine that if I knew I was deeply connected and wanted here, then I could celebrate the little things, the places where we intersect (despite, and even sometimes because of my intransigence).

Connecting asks this of me. I don’t think, despite all my self-reliant alarms, that I can pull this off alone. This is one of those places where I can’t help saying (thank God my disability has forced me into this ability), I need your help.

Please help me! I (words that are taboo in our social reality) need your hand. And, I have reason to suspect, you need mine. Let’s make the most out of our impacts upon each other!

You’re Perfect The Way You Are


There is a brief snippet of a story that introduced me to the subject I want to reflect on here. I was sitting in my men’s group many years ago when one of the men recounted this portion of the story. It seems a Zen Master was addressing his students, and he said, “You are perfect as you are” and “you could use a little improvement.” Hearing that story kicked me into a level of self-reflection that continues to this day. I have evolved since that time and so has my take on this paradox. Today, in this writing I hope to find out more about this on-going evolution. Bear with me, because I want this exploration to be more than merely an exercise in narcissism, I am hoping to touch what is universal about the task of loving oneself.

When I first heard this story I realized I had spent most of my life being on the “you could use a little improvement” side of things. I was a growth junkie. I had devoted myself to rooting out all of the ways I have holding myself, or anyone, hostage to my lack of development. Always, I was a work in progress. I still am. This wouldn’t be so bad if it didn’t affect everything around me. At first, I was just aware of how it was a way I maintained a kind of perpetually inadequate self-image. Now, I’ve come to see it is more pervasive than that.

The remedy then was to shift my focus from “needing improvement” to “perfection as you are.” This provided an essential antidote. I was a lot easier on my self and slowly even developed more self-compassion. I remembered the story and maintained a kind of perspective on my self. My attitude towards me changed some. I say some because I have come back around to this little piece of wisdom and found myself fed anew by it. It turns out my happiness, and how I regard and treat others, is effected by how I hold the paradox alluded to by this little story. Here’s what I mean.

Until now, I have been a one-sided man. I haven’t had much capacity to hold paradox. As a result, even though I could relate to how this little story reminded me of the necessity of balance, I didn’t really have the capacity for paradoxical awareness, the ability to hold both sides. I got better, but I also got more sophisticated, and developed another thing to work on. I now, could strive for a new level of realization, and think myself honorable, while perpetuating my feeling of inadequacy. I was still a work-in-progress, I told myself, who wasn’t a work-in-progress, and that is true, but that belief only deepened my self-delusion. I knew I contained imperfections, which made it hard for me to settle down, and believe I was perfect as I was.

Lately, I’ve had a greater opportunity to be happy. The benefits of aging are setting in. Things like, more self-possession, less emotional reactivity, more interest in others, and a greater sense of connection with all of Creation, have altered my life. I’m ripening into somebody I’ve always wanted to be, but I still keep myself, and others, on edge, because I don’t hold the whole paradox fully yet. Recently, I became aware again, of how easily I let go of being “perfect as [I] am.”

I realized that my happiness hinges upon my developing, but still insufficient, ability to be “perfect” and to need “a little improvement.” Not only that, but I realize that holding myself hostage to my way of being one-sided, not only meant I couldn’t be happy with myself, but I couldn’t be happy with anyone else either. I have been a therapist, family counselor, community-builder and spiritual being, and always I relied on my ability to sense what was wrong with a situation. I have been good, and have learned how to promote growth. But, because of my one-sidedness, I have also promoted inadequacy and reliance on growth.

Now, I am becoming more capable of something I could only dream of before. Instead of seeing everything in terms of either/or, I am much more capable of both/and awareness. Thanks to the reminder of my friend Xan, I know I haven’t developed this capacity through my own efforts, instead it has been grown through me, by Life. I am ripening into a more complex awareness, that lets me see that I (like everyone else) am like Creation. Creation is perfect like it is, and it has the remarkable capacity to extend its perfection into improving/evolving.

As a self-identified change agent, I’ve come to a deeper level of this realization, that there is a wholeness at play, and that my best efforts only assist what is already underway. The best move I can make is to stay out of the way, and to dance happily in celebration of what is happening. Under these conditions, my happiness turns into happiness with others. Wow! What a good feeling follows!

Balance


Since I had the stroke, and suffered brain damage, I’ve had no balance. I lack the part of the brain that handles proprioceptive signals. So, I don’t know where I am in space. I’ve already written, in a past Slow Lane, how I’ve compensated by leaning on community, and letting others balance me. By and large this has worked — with a little learning on my part. As a result, I have a great appreciation for what we can do for each other. Today, I’m thinking of balance again, not so much about it, as about the tensions I always feel unseating me. These tensions assail me as I reach for a new temporary balance point. That’s what I want to focus upon, the dynamic tensions, the one’s that keep me poised on edge, balanced precariously, while reaching further.

Those in the academic world might call these stresses, dialectical tensions. To me, however, they are part of the complications that make relating so interesting. I am finding, as I get older (I’ll bet you are too), that keeping my relationships vital and meaningful occupies me fully.

I like relationship challenges, though I often find myself bemused, confused, humbled and stretched by forces I’m only now beginning to grasp. Balance in this realm is something more than physical. I am coming to rely on the sometimes contradicting, sometimes complementary, always paradoxical, forces at play.  Balance here is dynamic. These forces, the tensions that guide me now, keep pushing me into a zone of paradox. Here I seem to be growing, and I’m discovering that these same forces are re-balancing me.

I’m talking about relationship forces (or, tensions) that knock me off-balance for the sake of some greater, more functional, balance. Things like growth and harmony, closeness and intimacy, and completeness and wholeness. If you think about it, each can be complementary, and each can be in conflict with the other. It seems that they are great examples of how opposites attract, constellate, conflict with, and rely on each other.

Frankly, when I was younger, and less amenable to what is, I often got tired and dismayed by being buffeted around so much by these forces. I still do sometimes, but now, I know, they are growing me. I’ve learned that losing control, sometimes wisely surrendering, and being thrown ass over teakettle, frequently means that I discover balance where I wouldn’t believe it existed.

I’m still learning. There seems to be a way of immersing myself in the flows that these tensions generate, which introduces me to a zone of paradox. Suddenly, there is harmonious growth, intimate closeness, and temporarily complete wholeness. I don’t live there and cannot willfully go there, but sometimes I get taken there anyway — into this strange world where things morph into each other. I’ve come to believe that I have a greater chance of acquiring access, to the insights and capabilities of this state, if I could just make better friends with the tensions I notice around me. That has been easier said than done. Nature doesn’t seem to care, or it cares differently, because these tensions accost me, whether I’m ready to learn and willing, or not.

The tension that seems to exist between harmony and growth regulates my relationship life. These energies carry many things. Familiarity, comfort and aliveness, depend upon the right mix. Too much growth can make a place hot and irritating. Too much harmony can be stultifying — too cool. Without the right mix of intimacy and closeness, someone can feel unloved and uncomfortable. Similarly, being contented with self, or primarily chasing after self-growth, can throw one into self-distrust, rebounding against everyone. So, a lot is at stake, and the balance point is not easy to reach, or obvious.

These tensions bedevil me. They render my life perpetually off-balance, yet miraculously they also, if I can tolerate their discomfort, re-balance me. I have lived with them long enough now to trust that they will deliver me, not only to a new balance-point, but to a new paradoxical awareness. These tensions are connected, meaningful, and designed to bring me closer to my true nature. What I seem to be discovering is more than a new balance-point. Instead I find a more balanced awareness. Somehow, these delicate and subversive tensions transport and sensitize me. The struggle for balance they provoke becomes something else — a strange apprehension that Life is more than it seems.

The Tension


I want to spend some time facing one of the most vexing realities I’m confronted with. I haven’t really tried facing this dilemma head on before. It drew my attention recently, and appearing on my radar screen, I began to think this is a phenomenon I run into all the time, and I haven’t really looked at it. Now, I’m stopping to do so. And I’m encountering the reality that what I face now has been ruling me for a long time. I am filled with dread. I don’t want to encounter what I cannot handle, but neither do I want to be ruled by what I fear.

I’ve been feeling a kind of troublesome tension that wracks my awareness and limits me. I’m talking about my awareness of the terminal condition of this world. I know how bad it is. And, I have difficulty knowing. I feel like I should do something right now, and I feel guilty because whatever I would do is not enough. I cannot put this heartache to rest. I’m damned if I do (respond) and damned if I don’t (become passive and guilty).

I feel like I am caught in an avalanche. I should try to survive. I am overwhelmed by the power of what I’m involved in. Survival is not really my call. But neither is just giving in. I vacillate between these two poles, feeling trapped and distorted by my awareness, that this is the reality I’m in. I cannot conceive of a way to make a difference, nor can I do nothing for very long. I ‘m never get off the hook. For a while I can convince myself of a change, then little by little, I realize that change doesn’t really change anything. I live with a certain anxiety that this house of cards is already coming down.

Sometimes I think it should, that I should help it, that my contribution is to add weight to this crumbling structure, to help it fall. But then I just as quickly fear the possibility. I don’t want the human experiment to end on my watch. I feel intensely disloyal.

I don’t really have a place to stand. I’m just uneasy. Anything I do is contaminated by my awareness. Not doing anything, or enough, is equally unsatisfying. I am literally torn apart, if I let myself know what I already know.

I carry this burden. Who doesn’t? I don’t think this just troubles those who are awake, it seems probable to me, that I suffer an awareness, that even when it is not consciously felt, all humanity bears.

I live with an impossible recognition. The nightmare goes on, and if one pays attention, it gets more and more horrifying. Still, I live within it. I can’t help but think about what I might be like if I didn’t have to bear this form of gravity, if, somehow, I wasn’t caught up in these times. Still, I am.

I can feel this weight every time I move. I can feel it when I am still, too. To be honest, it distorts everything I do. I don’t want it to, but it does. This is my environment now. I live with the day-to-day possibility of collapse. All of my interactions are defined, to some extent, by the reality of demise. I don’t really know what kind of human this makes me? I just know that living seems to bear this form of torment.

So it seems to me that modern life contains a kind of anxious tension that our ancestors may have never known. Do you think they could have imagined a time when humans had reason to not trust each other, because we know now how culpable we all are?

I’m discovering something though. In the midst of all this difficult mess, I am finding that I trust more those who are not pretending that crisis isn’t looming. I tend to listen harder to those who let themselves feel the mess we are in. I don’t mean the one’s who are just horrified (and want to do something), but those who are intent upon living within the truth of this world. I tend to listen to, and respect, those who’s hearts are broken by this shattered world, and have the temerity to live, relate, love, and exist torn apart. Their guts hang out, like mine, and I am encouraged.

Strangely, there seems to be nothing so humbling and enlivening as acceptance. The world is crumbling. For some reason this is coaxing the best and worst out of our species. I chose to look at the best. I hope that serves evolution, because it gives me hope. It may be that it takes such extreme conditions to evoke an awareness that can bear a fatal truth. If it does, then I am glad I get to be on the scene, for this moment in our species life.