I Love Saunas

It's striking to me to experience a repeated set of behaviors on a regular basis, virtually every time I go to use the sauna at our local Community Center in Santa Fe. I love saunas, and have been using them with some regularity for, oh, a good 35 years. I like to sweat, and I especially like the dry heat of a good sauna. I used to, if the opportunity was there, follow the sauna with a cold plunge of some kind. I don't do this now so much. Now I mostly jump into a warm-hot shower and rinse off.

The sauna at the Genoveva Chavez Community Center is pretty large as saunas go, maybe 12 feet by 5 feet, and maybe 7 feet high, with a long bench along one of the 12 foot walls, and a couple of additional benches, at two heights, along the rear 5 foot wall. When possible, I use the highest bench along the rear wall. That's where it's the hottest. But when necessary, I'll use the long bench along the 12 foot wall, and hopefully be able to sit right next to the electric heater.

Here's what happens routinely in the sauna: someone will comment on how "it's not very hot in here today", and then someone else will offer as how it's a good idea to throw some water onto the top of the electric heater so as to create some hot steam. If they happen to have a water bottle with them, they will indeed proceed to do just this, perhaps with a cursory inquiry about whether anyone would mind (with no real intention of letting that stop them, I always feel, unless there were to be a particularly strenuous objection, I suppose).

So this routine has been going on for literally years there at the Center, and what happens periodically is that the heater breaks down - it's not the kind of heater that is designed for water to be thrown into it, or onto it, as some types of electric heaters are, and so the electric elements short out - and then the sauna is closed for a period of some weeks usually, while whatever steps need to be taken are taken to repair/replace the heater elements, and everyone is thereby deprived of the use of the sauna during this period. The management puts up signs prohibiting the use of water on the heater, which go routinely ignored, and has even, finally, covered the thermostat inside the sauna with a wooden plate, since one practice among users is to throw cold water onto the thermostat, thereby cooling it down, which presumably then tells the heater to gear up into a hotter zone. It's all very bizarre, and the cycle repeats itself on into the eternal, or so it seems.

All of this is very much like what people do much of the time within themselves, which leads to one form or another of distress and unhappiness. That is, people behave based on mistaken, inaccurate, and even completely contradictory sets of assumptions, expectations and understandings, expecting a certain set of outcomes which are unrealistic, yet continuing to do the same mistaken things to attempt to bend reality to their mistaken ideas, rather than troubling to learn the ways of reality as it applies in the circumstances, and adapting expectations and behaviors accordingly.

If you don't understand the functioning of a dry sauna, and expect it to behave as if it were a steam room, and if you don't allow enough time for the dry sauna to function as it is meant to do, and if you are expecting it to do its magic on you in the 5 minutes you can spare, for example, then you will inevitably and forever be a disappointed sauna user, and you will wander off into the wilderness of your erroneous ideas never knowing what the actual problem is. All the while the sauna will be working just as it should, and you will continue to believe that it is faulty. You will continue to blame the apple for not being an orange, rather than enjoying the sweet (or sour) taste of the luscious apple in front of you. Sounds simple doesn't it? Yet how difficult it apparently is to adjust one's dearly held beliefs and expectations to accommodate reality.










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The Real Work

Cultivating an ability to tolerate distress (Marsha Linehan's notion of "distress tolerance") in the form of uncomfortable, difficult, painful, frightening feelings;
developing a capacity for "sitting with" these kinds of experiences without necessarily doing anything about them (like trying to "get rid of" them; or even change them, for example);
learning to see the problem as this compulsive need/desire to "do" something about distress/discomfort, and NOT as the mere fact or reality of the presence of these experiences. These kinds of feelings and thoughts are by now part of the conditioned package of who you are. They aren't ever going to simply go away. Oh, too bad you say? Not really, I say.

Again, the real problem is in expecting and believing that you can somehow, magically as it turns out, make them disappear. THEN you'll be ok. This is simply a misdirected effort and a mistaken set of beliefs in action. The real work is about how to relate with these experiences, how to work with them creatively and constructively, so that more deliberate and conscious choices may be implemented, rather than remaining victim to what are automatic responses.

Oh yes, patience is required. And a much more accepting and compassionate relationship with yourself. But I can't do that, you say? Well, that's where the work lies. You'll have to learn, and practice, and make mistakes and get better at it over time. Most assuredly, it can be done.









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The Real Client In Couples Work

Today I saw a google ad when I did a search for "couples counseling", that told readers to BEWARE of couples therapy, and not to get involved with it before reading the "guide" to be found on the linked website. I decided to click on the ad and have a look. A "former marriage counselor" talks about the shocking truth regarding marriage therapy, which is that there is, according to him, a 75% failure rate when working with these "experts", and that, no better than the un-helped national averages, a full 50% of couples seeking therapy will end up divorced.

Why is this so? Because, we are told - and this is the "real" core issue in couples therapy, not, as is usually believed, problems with communication - most therapists have had no (not even a single course) training in marriage counseling, and they are in fact trained to treat individuals, and so when working with couples they fail to have as their client, the marriage/or the relationship, and instead have two individuals as clients, thus leading to inaccurate understanding, and to ineffective (at best; damaging at worst) treatment.

While I'm not too fond of the semi-hysterical presentation of this person's ad, I have to acknowledge that he has an extremely valid point to make: in working with couples, it is, in my experience, and in my opinion, of critical importance to be sure to emphasize that the success of the relationship will depend on the ability of each of the people involved to conceptualize the relationship as the focus of their attentions and of their efforts, and not exclusively, or even so much, their individual agendas. Another way to put this is that, if the relationship is to succeed and to flourish, both parties will need to be able to transcend their exclusively personal agendas, preferences, needs, wants, and priorities, and to deliberately decide to make the relationship the top priority.

Of course this can get tricky. There has to be some degree of balance in terms of personal needs also. Asking someone just to give up their personal needs in favor of the needs of the relationship is to over simplify the complex dynamics of good relationships, and to devalue to an extreme the needs of the individual. We're not looking to make martyrs here, but to find ways to grow into a deeper understanding of the realities of successful long term relationships.









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Who's Who Anyway?

By which I mean, who is it that we are really relating with and reacting to in our intimate or "significant other" relationships? Who is it that is triggering our reactions? Is it the person in front of us, the one with whom we are interacting, or is it really our parent or other early childhood caregiver. You know, the one who has had such a profound and lasting effect on us; the one who has shaped our thoughts and needs and feelings and expectations and unconscious goings on regarding close interactions with a very close "other"?

And the answer is...........................
Number Two!

It would be a very serious mistake to believe that you escape your conditioning, or that you haven't been conditioned by your early experiences, for better or for worse, or that you somehow, miraculously, and alone in all the world, function according to simple, known, or chosen beliefs and values and decisions. In order to be able to approach doing this would require years of self reflection, insight, wrestling with habits and established patterns of behavior, and not a little bit of good luck and grace. In other words, it don't come naturally (or automatically).

Given this then, learning to recognize our reactive patterns, and to make desirable changes in these areas, and to separate our "automatic" responses to old relationships from what's going on in the here and now, and from who is happening in the here and now, becomes essential to relationship and to personal health. Just insight alone won't do it. Oh yes, I'm a modern, liberated, self sufficient so and so. I know all of this. I wouldn't dream of holding my husband/wife/girlfriend/boyfriend/partner/lover to those old, outdated gender roles, etc. Why is it then, that when I don't get things the way I expect them, I get so frustrated, or angry, or condescending, or judgemental, or afraid, or shut down, or hurt, or feel so out of control?

Because I am reacting based on probably unconscious and well established patterns of thought, feeling and behavior, and not on what I have begun to integrate in the way of self understanding, emotional and spiritual healing, and real choice.










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Shame

   
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Shame is a paralyzing force. In fact, it's so difficult, so painful for most people that it gets buried very deeply within the psyche so as not to be experienced in any conscious way. Then of course, it works its diminishing magic more subtly, more insidiously, out of view, but no less active and damaging for that. This seems to happen automatically, as a necessary strategy for survival and for some level of "acceptable" functioning in the world and in relationships.

Too bad. Yet at the same time there is the possibility of growing into a conscious approach to this horrible sense of oneself, and when this can happen, and when this self identity can be approached and worked with therapeutically and compassionately, the shifts in one's experience of oneself, the grace with which one can begin to relate with oneself can be astounding and wonderful.

If you are feeling stuck in therapy - or in your life for that matter - or if you are finding yourself repeating patterns that you thought you'd "worked with", or that you can't seem to get a grip on, or that are destructive or damaging or...........
it's possible that a more focused exploration of shame in your being could open things up for you in ways that will be very beneficial.

The Intersection Of Spiritual And Psychological Health

Carrying on from last post about forgiveness, we begin to see how the principles of spiritual development and psychological health intersect. It is understood that we are not talking about religion in any organized sense, or about any rigid set of beliefs about this or that. Isn't it telling that on any given street of significant size there might be several different churches, synagogues or temples, each offering the real "truth" as only its teachings can provide, each believing that it has the "right" way, probably the only right way to that truth, and each sure of its special place at God's side. Of course this assessment can be carried around the world, with each country and each religion claiming that oh so special place in the scheme of right things for itself.

This is not what we're interested in here. We are instead interested in the core spiritual principles and teachings of many of the world's wisdom traditions. These, not surprisingly, tend to be very similar, if not exactly the same. I'm willing to conclude that these principles and teachings are rooted in an understanding of the human condition and the human psyche, so that when we are instructed to practice, for example, forgiveness, it is not simply in order to meet an arbitrary and perhaps nice, if naive "be good" agenda - or to be controlled by the power of the State for its own nefarious purposes, as in religion as the opiate of the people - but because it is understood that this experience is central to the deepest levels of health, or wholeness, or healing that the human psyche can achieve.

"I'll give you everything I got for a little peace of mind" sang Mr. Lennon. I recently read through most of a biography of Marlon Brando - I couldn't finish the whole thing. It was, frankly, too painful and a history of too much self-indulgence to be altogether tolerable. One of the themes running through the book was Mr. Brando's endless search for some peace of mind, a quest which he did not succeed in (despite, incidentally, decades of psychoanalysis). At one point he is quoted as saying to a fellow actor that he - this other actor - could never portray a certain kind of experience because he, the other actor, had never hated the way he, Mr. Brando, hated. The sense of this hatred is palpable throughout the book, and I don't think it's any accident that Mr. Brando failed to achieve peace of mind in its presence. The two are indeed mutually exclusive, as we have been instructed over and over again.

If psychotherapy is to be able to help clients achieve some experience of relaxation, of peace of mind, of happiness, then it seems all too obvious that certain principles and practices which have been discovered to lend themselves to the attainment of these experiences will need to be, at some point in the process, employed.





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A Little On Forgiveness

So let's talk about forgiveness, or more precisely, self forgiveness. If the thesis that you are punishing yourself is accurate, then in place of a punitive relationship with yourself, a relationship of forgiveness, tolerance, compassion and acceptance of your humanity becomes the antidote, and the key to your liberation from the heavy psychological hand of this internal prison guard/enforcer.

You understand of course that we are entering the realm of spirituality, but not only spirituality. This is also the realm of psychological health, happiness, freedom and well being. It may not be just as simple as "love is all you need", or it might be just that simple, as long as we distinguish between the principle and its implementation. The simplistic notion that one needs to just "let go" has to be abandoned, and in its place the realistic practice of actively cultivating an integrated, felt experience of self love will be undertaken.

How to do this? You can use whatever methods work for you: visualization, self soothing, self hugging, self talk, self parenting, singing to yourself, etc. Welcoming the inner part of you who has transgressed. Practicing an understanding and supportive relationship with that part of you.
Treating yourself gently rather than harshly. Engaging a new belief that says that you will be a better person for offering yourself forgiveness than for imposing punishment.

Oh yes. There is the element of time. While "just let go" is supposed to happen instantly, the reality is that forgiveness develops over time and with effort and intention.






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Being "Bad"

What about those very deeply established feelings and beliefs that many people live with, sometimes knowingly and sometimes, maybe mostly, unknowingly, that they are "bad". This often takes the form of struggling with "inner voices" of self judgment, self criticism, and shame.
Shame being about who you are, as distinct from guilt, which is more about what you've done.
Sometimes there are no identifiable "voices", just the gnawing feelings of badness, of imperfection, of failure to live up to some internalized - and generally impossible - set of moral standards. There is usually no wiggle room; after all, these are matters of MORALITY, and so no room for self forgiveness, understanding, tolerance of one's flaws or mistakes, or acceptance. One must, typically, be punished in some form for one's transgressions, and people are incomprehensively creative in inventing ways to see that sentence is carried out, usually from within, without the need of external authority.

This can range from relatively mild self denigration to complete self denial in the form of severe dissociation or amnesia. Mostly we live in the mid zone, with addiction, neuroses of one kind or another, co-dependency, non-nurturing relationships, power struggles, varying degrees of physical, emotional and spiritual violence, both self imposed and imposed by others, self hatred,
malaise, anger, anxiety, depression and despair.

Oh, and let's not forget the inability to apply to oneself all of the consideration, understanding, tolerance and forgiveness that one can more readily and naturally extend to virtually anyone else. At this point the situation becomes slightly bizarre, if common.

To be continued......................







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A Work/Life Dilemma

What if you are youngish, have a well paying job, with good health benefits, and flexibility insofar as seasonal down time is built in, which you like, and now you have a primary relationship which, of course, needs attention and nurture, and you work 60 to 80 hours a week which makes this nurture impossible, and indeed you get lost to yourself in this job, by which I mean that you do not now know what your actual needs and wants are and you are not doing the things that you can identify as central to your deeper passions and creative fulfillments, because you simply operate on automatic pilot, though you do the job well? (Breath).

What you get is some feeling of financial security, and this is important to you because you grew up poor and didn't like it, the possibility of creating a small nest egg, a feeling of control, and of course the health benefits, which you may actually need to use because you also haven't felt really well for several months now.

What do you lose? Yourself, your relationship, the possibility of having a family, maybe your health, your passions, your joy, in some meaningful way your happiness.

What would you do in this situation?






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Enhanced Functioning In The World

How to be more functional and effective in the world? In relationships, in marriage, at work, as parents, as partners, as individuals. How to discover and identify who one truly is, in terms of one's needs and wants, in terms of one's souls' desires, in terms of what is of fundamental importance, and what isn't. How to trust others to truly be present for you, especially when this has not been a common experience in all of your life? How to find the kind of balance in life, among all of the various areas of demand and desire, that is a prerequisite for real satisfaction, fulfillment and happiness? How to live as though your depths actually mattered?

Hmm. As I like to say, on at least one level, none of this is rocket science. That is, it's not so difficult to understand the basics. Be true to yourself, as in, listen to your heart and soul, and follow their lead. Show up, that is, be present to yourself and to those you care about. Be willing to take meaningful risks in order to be true and real. Ask for and accept the genuine support of others who care about you. Learn to set your priorities in order, and to apply your energies in proportion to those priorities. Choose you battles: not everything is worth a big effort. Pace yourself.

Don't imagine that you will wake up one morning and somehow, miraculously, be "finished", that is, free from all of your old patterns; re-born into a new person who has no neurotic tendencies;
a person for whom everything now is easy and fluid and fresh and without conflict and without difficult feelings and without aspects of self that you don't like. Instead, understand that whatever changes you want to make will require consistent application of skill and awareness. Understand that your old patterns will indeed continue to present themselves, on a regular basis, and that that doesn't mean that you are failing. It simply means that you are now aware of them, and this awareness opens the door to possibility.

Step One: Awareness; Step Two: Acceptance; Step Three: Choice; Step Four: Application
Something like that. Quite orderly, really.





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A Bit More On Cost

So here I am with a client who has been unemployed for about 4 months now, is three months behind on the mortgage payments, and is awaiting the "call" from the previous employer who has promised a job "next week" for a couple of months now (there is a huge bureaucracy involved, so this sort of delay is not surprising). Therapy is truly helping this person. It's not a "brief" therapy. This could go on for quite a while. By now I'm carrying a back bill of 6 sessions. Not tremendous, and not nothing either. This affects my income, which, in case you wonder, is not large. I enjoy working with this client, not least because I see the steady progress that is being made in some pretty significant areas, and because of the commitment that this client has made to healing.

I'm willing to "carry" this client. I expect to be paid some day, but who knows? In spite of today's headlines that declare that the recession is officially over, this client is caught up in the same financial circumstances that literally millions of other Americans face: the highest unemployment rates in decades; unprecedented home foreclosure rates; a general economy that, before today it seems, has been shrinking. Yesterday, when a check was offered at session's end, after we had talked about the relationship between client's shame and the lack of money, I gave it back and told this client to go buy food instead.

I'm not telling this story to garner praise for my generosity. To me this situation seems obvious and inevitable: one does not take money for therapy when one knows that the client has had to borrow money for food, and when there is an established therapeutic relationship in place that is benefiting the client.

When people I feel a connection with ask me about my work, my stock answer is that it's a good thing that my wife has a real job. We certainly wouldn't be able to live on what I make. And partly, this is because of personal decisions I've made regarding my fees, my non-relationship with insurance companies, and situations like the one described above. Also, I'm not a very good "business" person, not unlike many creative people, so "marketing" isn't something I do. Oh well. C'est la vie.

I know there are "high powered" therapists who make huge incomes because they are good business people, because they approach their private practices as businesses first, and, not insignificantly, because they see largely wealthy clients. This has never been my approach, or my motivation for practicing as a therapist. It's not where I come from, either personally or professionally. So what about every one else? The "average" person, or the poor person needing therapy? A client at a private, expensive residential treatment facility that I used to work at once said, in expressing his gratitude for his situation, that while he was fortunate to be able to pay for his treatment, "poor addicts just die". And so it goes.

Or does it have to?







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The Cost Of Therapy

Typically, psychotherapy is pretty expensive. This is because it has its roots in an aristocratic white social environment, and because it developed out of a western medical milieu where professional medical people held high status and commanded high fees. Nowadays, "psychotherapists" include medical doctors (psychiatrists), psychologists (PhD's, PsyD's, or EdD's), and Masters level practitioners including clinical social workers (MSW, LISW, LCSW, etc.), and clinical counselors (LPCC's, LCPC's, etc.).

The debate about the cost of therapy is never ending, and there does not seem to be any clear cut way of resolving the dilemma. I say" dilemma" because many people who would benefit from good therapy will never have the opportunity to do so because the cost of the service is out of their reach. This is no different in many cases from the costs of medical and health care in general in our current economic system and insurance/(obscenely) profit driven health care system.

So what to do? There are community "mental health" agencies that are supposed to pick up this slack, and make therapy (or more commonly, "counseling") available to the masses. The reality however is that these agencies are typically government funded, and we all know what happens to funding for all "non-essential" services as a general rule: it is, of course, drastically cut. This means that many of these community mental health agencies go out of business. The ones that remain spend most of their time and energy struggling to survive, to raise funds, to meet ever increasing paperwork demands, and to provide direct services to ever growing numbers of people. It is not uncommon, for example, for a therapist at such an agency to be expected to see 25-30 clients a week. Plus do all the paperwork involved. Plus attend meetings. This is not possible if it is also expected that the therapist will be able to remain healthy and to provide quality service.

Then there are the private practice therapists. If insurance is funding the service, it may also not be uncommon for a therapist to see 30 clients (or patients) a week. If insurance is not funding the service, this number is likely to be considerably lower. Still, we all know that there are millions of Americans who do not have health insurance, and so are left to fund therapy services out of pocket. This is where the high cost becomes problematic for many.

The dilemma is extended when you factor in the legitimate need of the therapist to be able to make a living. So what does "make a living" mean? Of course this is different for every person.
Is the British surgeon who makes a million dollars a year under the socialized health care system, and living very well, being deprived because she or he is not making the 2 million she would make in unregulated America? You see how this goes.

So it becomes a very personal moral, ethical, practical and spiritual consideration for each practitioner. How much do I charge for my services? What are my legitimate needs? What are the "customary and usual" fees in my community? Are these within my personally acceptable parameters? Are they too high? Too low?

To be continued......................





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It's Not Rocket Science

Not infrequently I hear myself saying this to clients: "It's not rocket science."

What I'm referring to are the concepts involved in understanding how the psyche generally works.

I'm not even talking about the subconscious, or the unconscious, collective or otherwise. I'm simply talking about the basic rules of the road that seem to apply to everyone. For example, when we're afraid of being judged, we often employ a defense strategy - a "mechanism" - that will keep us protected from feeling the painful feeling of being judged by another. We might decide, internally, and probably out of consciousness (ok, I AM talking about the unconscious) that we don't care what anyone thinks or says about us, and present to the world, to other people, an outward demeanor that looks carefree and confident.


If it's too difficult - embarrassing, shame inducing, contrary to our image of our self - to admit that we were not able to be truly present for an intimate when they really needed us to be, we might offer any number of "rationalizations" or justifications, or just plain excuses, rather than feel the depth of the anger or the betrayal or the pain that our intimate is experiencing.


These sorts of things are very common. We have all learned and invented personal versions of them, and other strategies, to protect ourselves from unwanted feelings or thoughts. It's this sort of thing that I refer to when I say "It's not rocket science". Coming to understand these common psychological behaviors isn't all that difficult. What becomes difficult is to learn to see how they operate within ourselves, to learn how to "bust" ourselves when we're doing them, and to learn new ways of seeing and behaving that will contribute to freeing us from our own self defeating ways of doing things in relationship with others and with ourselves.


It does indeed take time, and effort, to learn and to establish new habits, and more self supporting ways of being in the world.






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Simple In Principle, Maybe Not In Practice

Here's the principle: you can experience whatever you want to, if only you'll focus your "consciousness" on that, or "put it" there.

Example: if you want to experience the ever present energy of love, you only need to choose to focus your consciousness on that energy within yourself, instead of on whatever else you may be experiencing, like fear, or anger, or sadness, or any train of thought. As long as you're focusing on the thoughts, or the feelings other than love, you won't be able to experience the love. So it becomes a matter of desire, and of re-focusing whenever you move off track.

Sounds simple enough, in principle. And I agree that it is simple. So what is it that prevents people from being able to do it easily? Is it, simply, a matter of different desires? If I'm depressed, and struggling with hopelessness, and an overwhelming sense of powerlessness to change anything, is it simply that I don't want to change this strongly enough? Are there other operative factors?

I'm quite certain that there are other factors in operation as well, and yet there may be a way in which it is possible to consider the simplicity of this principle as real. One factor that I come across with some frequency in my work is just that people don't understand that the changes they're after will come about in steps, over time, and not all-at-once in a flash of transformation. This implies that it will be necessary to "practice" certain new ways of understanding and of doing things, until a new experience is stabilized, or learned, or established. An obstacle that can then present itself is that people don't "want" to have to make that kind of effort, and so don't, and so don't experience the changes they say they "want".

Disappointment may then follow, and a belief that therapy doesn't work, and resentment may develop on top of that, or a client may come to believe that they themselves are just not good enough, not deserving enough, not strong enough, not capable enough, etc. It can become quite complex, whereas the principle we started with remains in itself, pretty simple.

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The Risks Of Therapy

It would be nice to think that therapy will make you feel better all of the time. After all, that's why people enter therapy, isn't it? I mean, who enters therapy if they think it's going to make them feel worse than they already do? Well, maybe a masochist would do that; would even count on it. But short of that, I think it's realistic to suppose that people enter therapy because they believe it will help them to feel good. There have even been therapy self help books written with titles like "The Feel Good Book".

It may come as a surprise then to discover that the therapeutic process can elicit difficult, painful, frightening feelings also, and that every session will not end with you, the client, feeling better than when you arrived. Along these lines we have other therapy related books with titles like "I Never Promised You A Rose Garden", and "Love Is Never Enough".

If we conceive of therapy as a journey of healing, as a process through time, we will be better able to imagine that this journey might have down's as well as up's; bumps and turns in the road;
bad weather as well as good; and a guarantee of changes along the way. From this point of view we can say that the process of therapy requires a certain amount of courage; a certain adventurousness of spirit; a certain willingness to be surprised, disappointed, challenged, and ultimately strengthened by our experiences.

Not much different from a life well lived, you might say. And you might be right.





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Give An Hour.ORG

Give An Hour.org is a non-profit, non-partisan service organization established to help provide free counseling/therapy services to returning veterans from the Iraq/Afghanistan wars. Services are also being provided to veteran families. Many of these men and women, as well as their children, are affected adversely by the experiences of combat, family disruption, and the often very difficult re-integration process following deployment.

Here are just a few astounding facts to consider:

According to the DoD Taskforce on Mental Health, among troops returning from Afghanistan and Iraq, 40% of soldiers, 1/3 of marines, and fully half of National Guard members are suffering from psychological problems following deployment;

children from military families are twice as likely to die from severe abuse as other children are, and rates of abuse and neglect rise dramatically (40%) during the time of deployment;

a recent Rand Corporation study reports that some 300,000 US troops returning from Iraq/Afghanistan are suffering from Major Depression or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, while another 320,000 are suffering with brain injuries. Only about half of all of these women and men have sought treatment;

there are an average of 18 suicides a day, among America's 25 million vets.

I've taken the step of signing up, along with some 4,000 other therapists (so far) across the country, with Give An Hour, in order to be able to contribute something in the way of compassionate care to some of these men, women and children. This is not an issue of politics or party lines, but a matter of offering some measure of help to people in dire need.

If you'd like more information on Give An Hour, please click on the title of this post to visit their website.



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Reality Tends To Intrude

For a while, things are going much better. Insights have been gained, new and considerably more compassionate relationship dynamics are being employed with oneself, self care is becoming a real and active part of everyday life, and as a result, you're feeling "exited about life" for the first time in many years. You're experiencing genuine hope for the future, a more open expanse of possibilities, instead of the dark tunnel of despair and depression that has been your abode for so long.

Then, it's as though the wrathful hand of God has slapped you across your beseeching, uplifted face. Not you! it seems to say. Did you really think I'd let you feel good about yourself! Who do you think you are?!

To make matters worse, you are, without really knowing it, the one playing God. It is actually your own self judgment and self criticism, along with your own unrealistic expectations about your recovery, that is exacerbating your slide back down the slope of old behavioral and emotional habits. You were doing things right, you figured, and the results were real. I've arrived! It's been a long journey, but I've finally arrived! Whew!

What you haven't accounted for is what I like to call your "defaults". Those patterns that are simply programmed deeply into your personality, and are the places you will tend to "default to" under stress. The familiar. The well established. The original. Everyone has them, and learning to live with them in more creative and loving ways is a key to continued recovery and development. The reality of "two steps forward, one step back", has to be understood and integrated as a natural part of the healing and growth process. Especially in the early stages of recovery.



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What's Normal?

"I'm stuck", she tells me, a little tearfully. This is an utterly unknown condition for her. She doesn't recognize herself lately, and neither do her friends, who are encouraging her to "snap out of it" and get back to the familiar, capable, get-things-done person they know. She doesn't understand why she can't seem to do this, and she believes they're right: she should be able to simply snap out of it, whatever "it" is.

In the course of our first conversation I learn what the last three years or so of her life have been like: major stressors, family emergency, a medically predicted child death (which didn't happen), uprooting and moving across country, a challenging new marriage. She's always been the "strong" one, doing whatever needed to be done, taking care of others, having no time to stop, or to fail, or to be needy herself. A survivor.

"I don't have time to break down" she tells me, so instead she has become depleted emotionally, physically and I suspect spiritually. She is experiencing multiple symptoms of depression, and can't "move forward" with her life as she's known it. She cries easily and "all the time", and feels that something inside of her has died. She derives no pleasure or satisfaction from anything, and her creative activities have dried up. Coming to see me is the first time in her life that she's ever talked with anyone about her distress, and it's because she feels scared, powerless ("For the first time in my life I'm dealing with something I can't handle on my own") and defeated that she has finally sought help.

One of the first things I have started to do with this client is to begin to frame her experiences in ways that will tend to "normalize" them, that is, help her to see that, given the challenges she's been up against, and the circumstances of her current and past life, her responses are pretty predictable, if not guaranteed; connecting the dots between circumstances and "normal" human needs and reactions; validating the sense of overwhelm that exists; reassuring her that she's not going crazy, but rather is needing to learn what it means to have a complex emotional life, and what it might look like to begin, very probably for the first time in her life, to have good support, and to take good care of herself emotionally.

\There is hope.



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Surprises Happen

I continue to be surprised by clients who, at times, seem to be able to find solutions to very distressing problems that simply wouldn't, or didn't occur to me. Not that I should be finding these solutions. After all, it is in the client's best interests, and it is the most liberating and the most empowering when they find their own solutions. Following the principle that each of us somehow knows, ultimately, what we need in a given situation, it shouldn't be too surprising when this sort of insight occurs, yet it is.

I can allow myself to experience my own biases as they arise in any situation, and I can allow myself to observe my inclination, my desire, to inform a client of what I think they ought to be doing, and it is part of the art and skill of good counseling not to do so at the wrong time. This is not to say that there are never situations in which it is appropriate to "direct" a client. There clearly are, either because the client is simply unable to "protect" her or himself, or because this is the most likely strategy to yield good results with a particular client. These "directions" are often delivered in the form of "suggestions", but sometimes they are more blatantly "instructions".

But when a client arrives at what seems and feels and looks like the right solution for themselves, this is a lovely and important moment in therapy and in life. And when it is outside of my own thinking on the subject, it is a sort of secret delight, and a pleasant surprise as well.

For me, it is one of those things that serves to bolster my faith in humanity, and in the potential of good therapy. Let the surprises begin!



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Choice Points

There are times in therapy, and they are very challenging times, when we arrive at what is sometimes called a "choice point". This occurs when, as a result of therapy progress, or life events, or a combination of factors, a client arrives at a juncture in their life; a crossroads. The question becomes then: "which direction do I take?" The options can be starkly differentiated. Often, one road represents the "old ways", a continuation of the direction from which one has come. The other road represents the "new me", a progression of the healing work that has been taking place in therapy. While it might seem an easy, or perhaps a simple choice to make, it is actually, typically, frought with inner conflict and turmoil, clashing loyalties, fear of the unknown vs. the comfort of the familiar, and direct challenges to one's courage and commitment to self.

Taking the road that continues the past can mean a dangerous journey away from healing, away from one's truth, away from one's Self. It can amount to a denial and a rejection of what one has come to experience as one's healthy core. Contemplating the "new" road comes with numerous difficulties of its own. It might mean turning away from what others in one's life want, or think is best. It might mean taking a leap of faith into unchartered psychological, emotional and spiritual territory, without even the comfort of what one has known all of one's life. It will certainly mean testing one's willingness and ability to trust: to trust oneself, as well as to trust the "bigger picture", or "higher power", or God, or The Universe, or simply what one has begun to tap into in one's own journey of health.

In a universe where there are few, if any, absolutes, we can perhaps take some consolation in the thought that nothing is absolutely right or wrong, and that whatever choices we make, while they will certainly have their effects and their consequences, might not be absolutely un-repairable. We can afford, perhaps, to make even serious mistakes, if we are willing to learn from them. While some people seem to need to be "hit over the head" by reality in order to learn from their mistakes, it is also possible to follow, or to learn to follow, more subtle cues. This, of course, requires practice and experience, and choice points are examples of opportunities which can provide this experience, and which can be built upon as we journey through life.



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Being Present

There are virtually inummerable ways to "check out". We all do it. In its more extreme forms, this checking out takes the form of dissociative states or disorders, such as multiple personalities, or losing track of place and time. In its more common forms we can think in terms of ordinary activities like spacing out on TV, over eating, risk taking behaviors, any of the possible addictions or compulsions from drugs and alcohol to running or exercise. In other words, anything can be used as an escape.

And what is it that we need, or want to escape from? Could be anything from the routine and tedium of everyday life to extreme trauma. There is good reason to conclude that the need or desire to leave ordinary reality in some form is hard wired in our brains. It would be impossible, I suspect, to find a culture, current or historical, that did not incorporate an understanding of this need, and provide methods for its satisfaction. So, given the fundamental human experience of "escape", or altering consciousness, what can be said about the importance of "being present"?

While "taking a break" from the stresses of life can be both healthy and productive, making a (bad) habit of it ultimately creates more stresses and multi-layered problems. Cultivating the capacity to be present with one's experience, to "show up", to "be real", to be "in the body", is necessary in order to be able to work effectively with our lives and relationships, and to experience true health and happiness. The term "real time" takes on a significant meaning when it comes to mental health. Of course, cultivating this capacity involves cultivating the ability to be present with, to experience, and to manage or modulate difficult, intense, or distressing feelings.



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The Importance Of Listening

One of the striking hallmarks of the new Obama administration, at least to me, is the repeated references one hears to "listening". Mr. Obama instructs his State Department emmissaries to listen to what the leaders abroad have to say. Yesterday, in his meeting with bank CEO's, he is reported by one of them to have done a lot more listening than talking. In his response to the students to whom I referred in my last post, and their video "Is Anyone Listening?", he assures them that he is.

Although skillful listening is a basic of good counseling, and learning how to listen actively is a basic of good communication for everyone, every now and then I am reminded in a session of just how powerful and inescapable this ability is, and how essential it is in helping people to connect, to heal, and to make desirable changes. What careful listening says is that: I care about you; I want to understand you; I respect you, and what you have to tell me; I want to engage with you so that you can feel acknowledged, appreciated, and, of course, heard.

This speaks to a fundamental need that, I think, all people share: the need to be received; to feel that they are in some way welcomed and valued. There are those, of course, who will say, and who may even believe, that "I don't need anyone." "I don't care whether you approve of me or not." "What you think of me doesn't matter." In fact, these sentimeents are considered sexy, especially for men, but also more and more for women. Just spend 15 minutes looking at the images in any movie theater, in any magazine, on TV. I went to a movie just the other day, and was struck, again, by the movie posters in the lobby, advertising current and coming films. Almost every one of them, maybe 4 or 5, featured images of men with scowling, hard, penetrating, threatening faces. Real men. Men who don't give a damn what you think. Men who clearly don't need any one. The "sexiest" images of women, especially in "fashionable" media, are all of pouty, aggressive, sometimes cadaverous looking models. They don't need you. You need, and want, them, and they know it and thereby have all the power.

But really, we all want, and need, to be genuinely welcomed. Listening carefully is one of the most potent ways to give this welcome. Amazing things are possible from this basis.



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Follow Up On Grief

I happened to catch a piece on 20/20 last night about the realities of my last post. The piece was called "Living On The Edge", and it was about the crisis of ordinary people who have, or who are at serious risk of, losing their jobs and homes. These are people perhaps very much like you and me, that is, they are educated, solidly middle class families with children, who a short time ago were nicely employed as accountants, managers, even surgeons, and who are now either living in homeless shelters, or very close to losing their homes and to exhausting whatever savings they may have had.

Some of the children of these families made a video with the help, and at the request of their high school teacher. They called it "Is Anyone Listening?", and posted it on Youtube. It was a video of them sharing their feelings about what was happening to them and to their families, and it caught the attention of President Obama, who referred to it in one of his speeches, and who subsequently visited these teenagers at their school, to let them know that, indeed, someone was listening, and was trying to do something about fixing the disaster that was affecting so many people today.

The feelings expressed by these kids in their video certainly included the grief that I referred to in the previous post. They spoke openly, cried on camera, and or many, the experience of being able to share what was going on for them - which they had never done before - allowed the arousal of a new hope, and a sense that they were not alone, and that they no longer had to hide what was happening to them and to their families.

Please take this as an object lesson. Getting support for your feelings, even when you are not in as desperate a situation as these families are, is of the utmost importance in these extraordinary times, as it always is.



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Heightened Grief In Extremely Stressful Times

These are difficult times. There have been other times of difficulty, of course. Right now, given the enormous collapse - it's hard to over state the situation - of the world's economies, there is new suffering of a magnitude which is unprecedented certainly in my lifetime. Not tens, or scores, or hundreds, or even thousands, but many hundreds of thousands, or even millions of ordinary Americans have lost, or will lose their jobs and/or their homes. I don't know where they are exactly. Are they living with more fortunate relatives? Are they in homeless shelters? Are they on the streets? Remember, we're talking about entire families, including the sick and the very young.

These are the kinds of situations that we, in this country, are more accustomed to hearing about existing in other places in the world, places usually far distant from us, either geographically or at least psychologically. People old enough to have lived through the Great Depression of the thirties will of course feel not-so-distant from current events. For the rest of us though, how are we effected now by what's going on all around us, even if we ourselves have not yet been directly affected in the most challenging ways?

One of the effects, for those who are sensitive enough, or self-aware enough to recognize it, is an experience of heightened grief. For others, even if they are not aware of it, there is, without doubt, a "subterranean" (ie., unconscious) exposure to more fear, more loss, and more grief.

Not being aware of this however usually means that these emotional experiences play themselves out in ways that might be unrecognizable as what they really are. For example, people will somaticize their fear or grief, so that they develop physical symptoms in place of clear emotional experiences. Or, some people will express a lot more anger, when what's actually happening on a deeper level is fear or grief, which goes unidentified and unacknowledged, as well as unresolved.

I'd like to encourage everyone to recognize the unusually intensified emotional and psychological stresses that we are all subject to in these times, and to be certain to find or create the best possible networks of support that they can.



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Money And Partnership

Money represents all kinds of things for different people: power, security, freedom, happiness, love, equality or the lack of it, self worth, control, success. It should be no surprise then that money issues are one of the most contentious subjects for couples trying to find their way together.

"I want our expenses to be shared equally, and I don't feel that this is the case now".

"I want the freedom to spend some money on personal things without having to report every penny to my wife/husband/partner".

"I make more money than he/she does, so I should be able to do what I want with it."

"I think we should have separate checking accounts and manage our personal money separately."

"I think we should have joint accounts and pool our money."

"I'm the breadwinner, so I get to control how the money is spent."


These are just some of the kinds of issues that are common when starting to explore how money fits into a relationship. Ideally, couples can come to see and understand what money means to them, and so begin to see how their own relationship with money is played out with their partner. Then, while working to get support for the emotional meanings and vulnerabilities that money has for each of them, they can also begin to define real needs and areas where each can support the other in a truly collaborative, healthy, and rewarding partnership, whatever form that may end up taking.



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On-The-Job, On-The-Spot Meditation

You're used to being in charge. You've led an enormous organization and done a heck of a job at it too. You've seen what needed to get done, how it could be accomplished, and made sure your team was equipped with the knowledge and the tools to do it. People praised you; appreciated your abilities; showered you with great respect and admiration.

Now you find yourself in a position of "advisor" to a group leader. You have no real power to take charge, but can only make suggestions, or share your observations. On top of that, your boss now is someone you do not admire, and who's abilities you find serioulsy lacking. You know you could do the job much better, and you find yourself experiencing extreme frustration and even a kind of psychic/emotional pain because the organization is in deep trouble and you care about it deeply.

Oh, and by the way, you're a Buddhist whose "real" agenda, whose most profound motivation is the cultivation of an enlightened mind and heart. You haven't been able to practcice formal sitting meditation for over a year now, because of a certain intense anxiety that grips you whenever you even think about sitting. All of this is confusing and, of course, distressing.

Can the real life arena you're in provide you with meaningful opportunites to practice on-the-job meditation? Of course it can. In the midst of your every day activities, off the cushion, you are being given the contexts in which to cultivate the mindfulness and enlightened heart you so appreciate and desire. The only challenge? Why, your ego, of course.

How do you let go of the ego that has served you so well-at least professionally-in the past? How do you cultivate the ability to surrender to a higher truth, when you clearly see the truth of what you could be doing if you were only in the right position? How do you practice "turning it over" when you begin to recognize the compulsive/addictive/self destructive quality of your drive?

This situation, and others like it, have a kind of fire-like potential for transformational practice.

Not for the faint of heart though, there are many paths to enlightened mind.



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Being "Different" In A Cookie Cutter World

Without making too much of it, I think it's fair to say that, for the most part, people find it difficult to be different from the "the norm". There's always a great deal of pressure, from without and also from within, to fit in, to be one of the guys (or gals), to conform. If it turns out that you are unlike the "norm" in any significant way, this can create a considerable degree of tension, distress, uncertainty, self loathing and self doubt. When this happens, it is of crucial importance that you find people who can support and celebrate your differences, or simply somehow give you permission to be who you are.

Learning to accept oneself is a difficult enough challenge under the best of conditions. Throw in being a bit "odd", or unusual, or just a little "out of the box", and this developmental task can take on seemingly impossible proportions. I'd like to encourage all of you "differents" out there to take hope. Instead of waiting for the world to catch up to you, and berating yourself in the meanwhile, try on the idea that the rest of the world will not be likely to catch up, and that you can move forward blazing new paths without that happening.

I'm not recommending being isolated in your difference - although some of this may be inevitable because of rejection and misunderstanding. I urge you instead to cultivate the appreciation and support of those who can see you for who you are. Having the right kind of reflection of yourself from these people will help you to soar, or simply to feel at home in your own skin.



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Not An Option: Make Time To Go Inside

I suppose it might be more important for those who think of themselves as introverts, but then again it might not be. It might be just as important for just about everyone. What's "it"? Some version of time alone. Down time. Personal space. Reflection. Meditation time. Retreat. A break from the demands of every day. Time to go inward and connect in depth with one's spiritual core. Re-creation, independent of "what you do" and "who you think you are" in the world. The necessity of renewal from within.

It's a cliche, but I'll say it anyway: oh, how easy it is to lose track of oneself amidst the demands of daily life. By "oneself" I mean of course one's essence, one's beingness as distinct from one's doingness. The Source. God. Self. The One. And, how essential it becomes then to allow the times and the places to tune back in. This ought to be something one does every day, but I'm realistic enough to admit that most people don't; and even when people do some form of meditation or other "centering" practice, it is still of importance to allow special times for more intensive, focused, extended bathing in the Pool.

How are busy people, or poor people, or distracted people, or neurotic people supposed to be able to do this? I won 't pretend to know. I'll only say that, to employ another cliche, where there's a will there is indeed a way. So it really is, in my opinion, a matter of will, and not so much a matter of particular circumstances. Virtually any circumstances, short, I suppose, of the most extreme, can be worked with effectively.

Do yourself a favor: make the time to retreat back into Yourself. Make your spiritual practices more of a priority. You'll be glad you did.



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Gradual Steps, Practice, And "Small" Successes

Working with the pressures we put on ourselves to "perform", to be what we "should" be, to do things the way they're "supposed" to be done, even when trying to do these things creates enormous personal and interpersonal distress, presents some challenges. One of the most considerable of these challenges has to do with recognizing the larger cultural context within which pressures like these arise. In other words, this sort of distress isn't just "something wrong with me". It is also, and in a sense primarily, "something wrong with our culture", which then becomes one's personal story as well.

"If I could just muster enough self discipline to _________________", fill in your own blanks:
work a job, go to school, manage a household, shop, clean, study, socialize, pay bills, excel, take care of the kids, exercise, eat right, be sensitive to everyone else's needs................................

And when I fall short of these ridiculously and unrealistically high expectations, I manage quite well to feel terrible about myself. I'm not strong enough. I'm weak. I'm not smart enough. I'm not creative enough. I'm just basically no good. I'm certain many of you can relate easily with these feelings, and the mental messages that go along with them.

Here's an alternative strategy, which on the face of it might seem simplistic, or obvious: practice relating with yourself more kindly; more gently; more forgivingly; more realistically. I know, easier said than done. Of course. That's why I said "practice". Like the development of any skill, relationship skills - including the relationship with ourselves - require practice and cultivation. Some consistency, rather than a great, forceful push of intensity. Think in the long term: gradual, slow development over time.

I know this goes against virtually everything the larger culture presents to us. I know this is opposite to the "quick fix" mentality and set of expectations we're "supposed to" live by (even while great lip service is paid to the other, more "virtuous", more "wise", and indeed more realistic values of gradual progress). I recognize the contradictions, and I hope you will too, because recognizing them will play an important role in your being able to learn how to care for yourself in opposition to them, and to their representative voices in your head.

If you can't have your optimal set of circumstances, for whatever reasons, allow yourself to utilize smaller aspects of the things, people, and conditions that do in fact work for your benefit. Example: you'd really love to be living in a more natural, nature based environment, but currently this isn't possible because your needs - things that you've freely chosen, let's say - require you to be in the city, or in town. Not only that, but your current financial circumstances require you to live in a low-income part of town, which among other things, means that it isn't necessarily very safe, so you're afraid to go out and walk in your neighborhood.

OK. What can you do that might actually be helpful, healing, nurturing for yourself, within these constraints? Instead of concluding that there's nothing that you can do, how about implementing the above "smaller aspects" strategy? Can you create, inside your space, an environment that is composed of natural elements? Can you drive to a part of town, or even a ways out of town, to an area where you can feel safe walking in Nature? Can you have people whom you feel some closeness with into your space? In other words, try not to get caught in an "all or nothing" condition, where you become paralized by the sense of seeing only what you don't have, and nothing of what you might be able to have that would help.



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No Couples Counseling Yet

There are times, and situations, which warrant a "no couples counseling" approach to working with couples. Perhaps the most serious of these is when there is active, ongoing, and serious domestic violence between the individuals. The potential for danger is thought to increase if the couple is to be seen together, because things will be said in sessions that are likely to later be used as "ammunition" by one or both parties, thus fueling the violence.

Under these circumstances, it is advisable to engage both parties in individual therapy, not with the same therapist. Both parties need help, guidance, support, and facilitation in education and self examination. Without this, there is little hope of things in the relationship getting better. It may even be advisable for the couple to separate for a time. Of course, this idea may be vehemently resisted by one or both parties, for a variety of reasons.

When there has been violence in a relationship over an extended period of time, the psychological and emotional dynamics between the parties are deeply dysfunctional, self destructive, controlling, confused, and, of course, dangerous. The unfortunate reality is that these relationships not infrequently end in death for one or another, or sometimes for both people. Over time, the violence tends to clearly escalate without meaningful intervention. It simply is not the case that things will "get better" on their own.

If you know people for whom this situation exists, or if this is true in your relationship, please find a way to look for and ask for the help you, or they, need.



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Careful! There's A Baby In That Bath Water!

Having had some negative experience with health care, it becomes increasingly important to be able to experience care that is genuinely supportive and beneficial. Otherwise there is the very real danger that you as a client in therapy might be inclined to "throw out the baby with the bath water". In this situation that might mean closing yourself to information or strategies that could be helpful to you, because you associate them - perhaps mistakenly - with your previous unfortunate, or even damaging experience.

An example: a client has had unsupportive medical experiences regarding his very real disabling health condition. He may have been told, or it may have been implied that this condition was "all in his head", and that there was nothing "really" wrong with him. As a result of this treatment, and perhaps other previous experiences, he concludes that anything associated with the conventional medical establishment is worthless, and cannot possibly be of benefit to him. Instead, he spends years exploring and working with "alternative" practitioners, to try to get some relief from his debilitating health distress. This in fact IS beneficial, both medically and spiritually, the client feels supported and validated, and does indeed gain some measure of relief.

This same client now finds himself in need of psychotherapy, and through a set of circumstances not altogether of his choosing, finds a therapist who uses an eclectic approach, incorporating some fairly orthodox, mainstream treatment models with other, more cutting edge ones. While the more "alternative" models are appealing to this client, he has, even before meeting with the therapist, decided that certain methods, because they are "mainstream", cannot be useful to him. This is unfortunate, because some of these more conventional methods are actually very powerfully therapeutic, and can in fact be presented and implemented in ways that are comfortable, supportive and effective.

After a few sessions of therapy, when a good therapeutic relationship has been established, the therapist is able to skillfully explore all of this with the client, and the c lient is able to begin to recognize his bias, and that it may in fact be more hurtful to him than helpful in his therapy.

In general, it is the case that a black and white approach to just about anything, while in some ways understandable, will prove to be more harmful than helpful.



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A Little On Power In Therapy

It's not all that unusual for clients, especially clients who've had previous experience with therapy, or with health care in general, to come into therapy with well developed biases against what they believe to be "ineffective" or simply "wrong" approaches to therapy. At least "wrong" insofar as their benefit is concerned. This is usually the result of bad health care experiences, even traumatic ones, in which the client may have been ignored, disbelieved, bullied, or in some other way not given the full respect they need and expect.

Imagine how you might feel if you were to be treated with condescension, with skepticism, with arrogance, or with any other form of disrespect, when you are in a particularly vulnerable condition, and when you are actively seeking help. Not only will such an experience be harmful to you, but it will also tend to sour you to methods and practices which can, when done well, be of significant benefit to you.

This is where the nature of the therapeutic relationship between client and therapist is of paramount importance. Regardless of how well your therapist may understand theories and techniques, the healing potential of any of these are likely to be lost if the relationship between the two of you is insensitive, or aggressive, or in any way expresses its inherent power differential unskillfully. In short, no one wants to be treated badly.

Just a couple of days ago I happen to see Mr. Bush on TV at one of his farewell press conferences, in which he was asking, rhetorically, if it isn't "pathetic" to hear or witness someone expressing "self pity". It's safe to say that, whatever else Mr. Bush may be good or bad at, he would most certainly not make a good therapist with an attitude like this. If a client in therapy were to be related to with this kind of insensitivity, aggression and arrogance, we can rest assured that the experience would be a damaging one.



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Informal Mindfulness Practice

One of the very popular "techniques" in psychotherapy today is "mindfulness". There's the very well known and evidence based successes of MBSR, or Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, founded and elaborated by John Kabat-Zinn; there's the "teflon mind" mindfulness of DBT, or Dialectical Behavior Therapy, developed and researched by Marsha Linehan; and there are numerous other strategies and offshoots utilizing the fundamentally Buddhist practice of mindfulness, or "bare attention".

Typically when we think of these practices, we think of sitting meditation, or formally structured periods of practice, the benefits or insights related to which can then be carried into everyday life situations. There is another approach however, which doesn't get as much press, so to speak, and that is the practice of mindfulness IN everyday situations, without, necessarily, the added participation in formal meditation periods.

Consider: a successful senior executive, now in a subordinate role as a member of a task force to which she is very well suited, and for which she is supremely qualified. Since she is not the "leader" of this task force, she finds herself observing situations which, in her former roles, she would readily have addressed and guided, but in which she now "holds back", thinking her thoughts, making her judgements, feeling the sensations of frustration and impatience, but "doing" nothing. She is "forced" to observe all of this, while not, at least at times, directly acting on any of it. This is the practice of bare attention, or mindfulness.

It is a struggle for her, because she is accustomed to being in charge, and to taking the proverbial bull by its horns in order to wrestle the "problem" into a "solution". Now, she has to "sit with" situations which every fibre of her body/mind wants to "tackle". An interesting dilemma, and a wonderful opportunity in support of her Buddhist practice.

Finding a balance between form and formlessness is an essential Buddhist dilemma, as well as, in one way or another, a meaningful therapeutic challenge.



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Whatever The Problem, You're Basically Good

This is a fundamental Buddhist tenet, as contrasted with, for example, a fundamental tenet of many (most?) forms of Christianity, which declares that we are, due to "original sin", basically bad, or sinful, or in some way damaged and in need of Divine redemption. The first view allows us to belive that we can make mistakes but that we are essentially worthy. The second view allows us to believe that we can try to do good things but that we are essentially unworthy.

I'm not a theologian, so I won't spend time trying to debate or detail the subtleties of either view. As a psychotherapist though, I see the psychological, emotional and spiritual injury and damage that the latter belief system creates for oh so many people. Whatever your religion may be, or if you have no formal religion, which system of beliefs would you prefer? What if it's actually true that we are, us humans, fundamentally good, even when we behave despicably? What if our despicable behaviors are the result of a deep seated ignorance, and not of an essential evilness? I'm also not interested in debating the question of whether or not "evil" exists. Suffice to say that "evil" behavior certainly seems to exist.

The point I'd like to make, from a therapeutic point of view, is that healing options and possibilities are considerably more accessible from the first position than from the second. If I can somehow come to believe, not simply because I want to, but from direct experience, that I am, and you are, and we all are basically whole and healthy and good, then I can take better care of myself, I can allow myself to be gentler and more compassionate with myself (and with you), and I can learn to forgive myself for the mistakes I've made and for the injuries I've caused. All of these traits contribute essentially to mental, emotional, spiritual and psychological health.

I can see myself, and you, as a fallible but good human being, and I can cultivate a level of acceptance that breeds wellbeing and happiness. Seems like a no-brainer when you think about it, yet it is remarkably difficult, often, for people to do. Old beliefs, and ways of relating, do indeed die hard. This is just one reason that it is very useful to have help making healthy changes.



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An Opportunity For 2009

First, let me wish everyone a healthy, happy, blessed and meaningful new year.

We face enormous challenges in these times, personally, relationally, culturally, as citizens of the world. There is no need to list what these are. Almost everyone now is aware. There are of course, as there always are, a few people who somehow manage to keep their heads comfortably buried in the sand. Insane Nero's, fiddling obliviously as Rome burns?

Our president elect tells us candidly, and his views are backed up by the "experts", that things will get worse - economically - before they get better, and that there are no quick or easy fixes on the horizon. "Sacrifice" is now a national theme. "Vision" is another one. We have to think in terms of sustainability regarding energy, the environment and the ecology; we must re-establish America's severely compromised moral stature in the world, by removing support for torture and other heinous behaviors, for example; we must work toward basic health care, employment, affordable college education and decent housing for all; we must be willing, whenever and wherever possible, to communicate respectfully and intelligently with our adversaries.

These agendas will be coupled with, and served by, corporate accountability and political transparency. We have seen how a lack of these qualities has created disaster, at home and abroad; disaster which has touched everyone, or which will, soon enough.

In my work as a therapist, I find the parallels between personal/relational concerns and the issues that play out on the grand scale of international and domestic politics, to be striking. I'd go so far as to say that unresolved personal issues are, to a large extent, responsible for the travesties we witness repeatedly on the world stage. How can we expect skillful, collaborative, respectful relations between countries, for example, when we can't even communicate well with our partner? We can see our personal struggles as a microcosm of the very same struggles that we see occurring politically around the globe.

I invite you to use 2009 as an opportunity to do your personal work. If you are among those who hope for a better world, you will be able to make a much more significant contribution to that world by addressing your own areas of wounding and conflict. As they say, peace begins with me.



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