How can someone do something like that?

August 10th, 2010

So many times people ask me, “How could someone do that?” They wonder how someone can act inconsistent with common values and/or social mores. They cannot reconcile in their heads how this can be, especially when they are talking about someone who hurt them. They could be talking about the soldiers in the Serbian concentration camp, their partner who cheated on them repeatedly or a man who raped them. Several people I have met with feel like it is important to make sense of the senselessness. It is as if the ‘Senselessness’ of it keeps them in a distracted place of confusion and frustration. They perpetually ask themselves ‘why’s and ‘how’s on a gerbil wheel of thoughts getting them nowhere. As if they could figure out Why? their view of the world would be organized and peaceful once again. In other words, if make sense of it, they can heal.

Actually, this interests me a great deal. The knowledges and assumptions of these aforementioned people—that there are benefits to “making sense” of things that happen to them– have been well validated by trauma research. The way we make meaning around events affects a great deal of how we feel about them and how we respond to them. For example, if we see it as senseless, we are confused, disoriented and may feel incomplete. Sometimes we conclude that we somehow caused it, because there is no other explanation. Conversely, if we interpret meaning even around a horrible of togetherness and helping each other- the negative effects of that event will lessen.

I also have a different perspective. Probably from doing this for so long or maybe from life lessons, but I understand that there are so many reasons why people do things. After hearing and witnessing so many things that humans are capable of doing, there is not much that surprises me. People ask me, “Can you believe they said/did that?” I think, “Yes, I can believe it. I’ve seen it all.” This is not because I am jaded or skeptical or see the worst in humanity. Quite the contrary; I see the good and connectedness of all. And it is in seeing the good in all that can help me see why someone who is good can do something hurtful to others. (People aren’t totally good or totally bad.) I can always see what could have prompted someone to do something. I don’t know if it is intuition or just an understanding how the simplest things can lead people astray temporarily. These ‘simplest things’ can really complicate a person’s life: things like poor self image, anxiety, self judgment, fear, and self doubt. These are not an excuse because people are responsible for their actions. However, if it is seen from this compassionate perspective, (rather than, “How could someone do that?” you’d think, “ That person must have been really scared to have done something like that…”) those of us who have been hurt stop blaming ourselves and stop being confused, so that we can use our brain space for healing instead.

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Posted in Anxiety, Meaning Making, Self Doubt, Trauma | 3 Comments »

Aboriginal Wisdom

July 22nd, 2010

In this blog entry I wanted to share with you and except from the latest book that I read. The book is called Message from Forever, a novel of aboriginal wisdom by Marlo Morgan. I highly recommend it. It was educational and inspiring.
The portion I want to share is part of a dialogue an elder Aboriginal woman from the Real People Tribe imparting wisdom to a young woman from the Stolen Generation who wanted to learn about her Aboriginal history

“All new encounters are tests- with food, with people, with ideas. Smell everything first. If someone tells you something, smell it! If it smells all right, then try a little for the taste, but always chew it. Chew for a long time before you swallow. Even words should be chewed for a long time before swallowing because it is easier to spit something out than it is to get rid of it once you have already taken it in.”

This was a response to the young woman’s questioning how in the bush, the Real People know what is edible. But the lesson goes beyond food. It is a much more important message. I sit with people everyday who are confronted with many different messages in their lives. Some of these messages can be harmful if “taken in”. Many times people take undesirable messages to heart and experience pain and suffering. Once this is “taken in”, there is a part of us that is choosing to validate this message. The elder in this excerpt, tells us to take a while to “chew” the words to see if they fit for us. The time allowed is very important. Chewing gives us time to mull it over, see past the initial anger to figure out how we want to feel and respond. Do we want to be available for these words to touch us, affect us, and harm us? Should we spit them out and be unavailable to them?

Through therapeutic conversations, we try to deconstruct messages people have about themselves that they have already taken in, sometimes many, many years ago. These messages have become beliefs with well defended truth statuses and they take a bit longer to deconstruct. When I say “well defended truth status” I mean that this significantly affects how we make meaning around other events and generally how we see and understand the world. So if something happens that is evidence that our belief is “true”, we “take it in”.  And we hold it as proof, saying, “See, I really don’t matter!” or something like that.  Whereas– if we didn’t have that belief, we’d see the event in a different way. For example, if I was to meet a friend for coffee and they were late. If I had taken in messages that I don’t matter in my life, this is what I would conclude by my friend’s tardiness.  I may be mad by the time she comes.

Like the elder teaches, by refusing to gulp down words in favor of chewing them thoroughly before we make the decision to swallow, we may experience the world in a different way.  The elder invites us to be an observer, instead of recipient or even judge.  So, if a friend I was meeting was late, I can chew this and observe it.  I may be able to see many reasons for this that have nothing to do with me. The distance from the situation being an observer allows us, assists us in responding from a preferred place.  I am going to put it to practice in my own life and see what happens.

Posted in Limiting Beliefs, Positive Thinking, Spirituality | 1 Comment »

Noticing What is Precious: Exploration of ‘Absent but Implicit’

June 17th, 2010

How many of you in the context of both therapeutic and friendly conversations heard someone complain, be pained, frustrated, worried or angry? I find it easy to be flooded with examples. At these times, the expression has potential to keep that person down and bring us right down with it. The expression creates a truth status for itself. This is ‘the’ way it is: “I am miserable.” This position often limits any movement from this truth thus exacerbating the predicament.

Therapeutic inquiry into what’s ‘absent but implicit’ * turns this expression on its head, so movement can be made. How would we hear those complaints differently if we knew that in the shadows** of them, there was something that person held precious? “I am miserable” often tells multiple stories. Exploring ‘absent but implicit’ invites us to ‘double listening’, hearing both the expression and also what is absent in the expression, but implicit in its meaning. Thus, if someone is complaining about being miserable, this usually signifies something about how they want to be that is different. It is that other way of being that they hold precious. To illustrate this concept, I am going to share a conversation with a woman named Amy.***

I met with a 57 year old woman, Amy, who was abuse by her brother when she was seven years old. She began a session with the following questions and requests: “Why does sexual abuse have to screw up so much of my life? Why does it have such a long devastating effect on people’s life? I want to know, I want you to tell me!”

I was first curious about further specificities of her context and the effects she was referring to. She told me of an intense pain that followed her everywhere in every part of her life. There were times she felt this pain so pervasively that it kept her, either, up all night or, in bed for days. Not only had it brought her to tears for hours, but it complicated and exaggerated physical ailments, including back, shoulder and leg pain. And above all, it left her with a fear that “I will suffer forever”.
Even though her descriptions were detailed, I knew that there was something absent in her expressions of pain, but implicit in its meaning. I understand that her pain is in relation to something– that her pain is a longing for some treasure and/or a hope for something important to her. Therefore, there is always something implicit in expressions of pain that can lead us to what a person holds precious. In addition, the intensity of Amy’s pain is a testimony to how precious she held said treasure. The pain of abuse is related to what it was the person treasured that was violated by the abuse. I asked a question to see what Amy treasured:

J: Can I ask you, when your brother did this, what was it that the abuse stole from you?

A: He took my innocence, he took my joy, he took my joy of life and then it was gone…I had no joy! None!

Amy quite quickly names what is absent but implicit in the pain that she was experiencing. But I decide to clarify it again to highlight this.

J: Would you say that joy is precious to you?
A: Yes!

To highlight it even more, I ask her to quantify this preciousness.

J: How precious?
A: Very, very important to me.

To ensure a multistoried conversation, I aim to keep acknowledging the pain and beginning the process of giving this pain new meaning.

J: Is the longevity of the devastation related to how ‘very, very’ precious joy of life is to you?
A: Yes! Yes!

Now, I am looking for traces into other stories of this joy. I wonder if she made it through 50 years without joy at all. I was curious if there was perhaps some joy at some point and I was eager to learn how and when she allowed joy to return to her life.

J: Has there been a time, when joy started to come back in your life, even a little?

Amy and I had the loveliest conversation about small stories of joy in her life. Interestingly, the stories began in the context of herself as a teenager, pregnant and in a terrible relationship. Out of her apartment window, there was a bird’s nest with a mother bird warming her eggs. Over a period of weeks, she watched the bird often and felt as though the bird was watching her too. It was almost as if they were cheering each other on as they prepared for motherhood. Amy said that watching and connecting to this bird gave her incredible joy. “Perhaps,” she said, “The first joy she felt since she was abused.” She told many more stories about her connection to nature and animals from trees to woodland creatures. For example, to beat off her depression several winters and give herself some joy, she would walk in the woods and follow animal tracks. As she was relaying these stories, more and more joyful times came into her memory, mostly involving children, animals and the earth. Many intentional state understandings were named such as, a steward of the earth, an advocate, compassion, a commitment to kindness and a commitment to children. Amy was realizing that she hadn’t let her brother take all of her joy. That, in fact, she held onto joy through all these years. Through many more hard times, when joy felt scarce to her she knew exactly how to find it in nature and in children. Without giving in to the fear that ‘she will suffer forever’ and just give up, she continues to seek out, practice and work on ways to help herself feel better everyday. This conversation will hopefully make Amy skills more visible to her so that she has more access to them. Given more access, they will be more readily available to her when she wants to counter the pain as it arises.

While I was hearing about all these accounts, I paid particular attention to the people (and animals) that may have touched or be touched by these joyful stories. Speaking through Amy, I had these folks witness Amy’s reclamation of joy and their part in it that reclamation. I asked what contribution each made and how this affected their sense of self, following a re-membering conversations map.¹ I was interested in these conversations ‘peopling her journey’ (or in this case ‘animalling her journey’) in hopes it would acknowledge and therefore further sustain these acts and skills. For our next meeting, I invited a colleague of mine to witness these beautiful stories and provide another acknowledgement for Amy.

This is only an excerpt of my work with Amy, where we continued to have conversations to make meaning around her abuse and subsequent long term pain. However, this conversation was a significant part of our work which we referred back to often. Amy has since left therapy and recently came back as a witness to another young person who was abused by her brother. At the end of this conversation, Amy sat proud of her accomplishments and said, “I really have a good life, now.”

* The therapeutic term ‘absent but implicit’ was coined by Michael White. (See: White, M. (2000). “Re-engaging with History: The absent but implicit”. In M. White (Ed.) Reflections on Narrative Practice (pp. 35–58). Adelaide, South Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications.

**My use of the word ‘shadow’ in no way reflects the connotation of the Jungian ‘shadow’ metaphor or the metaphor of ‘shadow’ as a dark energy.

*** Amy is a pseudonym

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Posted in Absent but Implicit, Anxiety, Michael White, Narrative Therapy, Sexual Abuse, Trauma | No Comments »

Learning How to be Men

June 8th, 2010

 

This document came from a training group I taught that consisted of three male therapists learning skills in narrative therapy.  To practice skills in creating community documents, we decided to create one of our own.  Building on themes from the year long training process, the group decided to interview each other on how they learned to be men.  This is the document that was created…

Learning how to be men…

Don’t cry- Many of us were taught that “Men don’t cry.”   This is sometimes helpful and other times not helpful.  It is good for certain environments.  For certain work settings, like finance, these skills have been very helpful to us.

Be authentic – All of us can relate to the value of being authentic.  It connects with integrity and we were taught this by our fathers, coaches, grandfathers, teacher as well as women in our lives.  One of us was in his 30’s when he saw men that he admired speaking honestly about how they felt for the first time.  This was transformative.    When we are authentic, we think this increases other’s ability to be authentic.  Now, some of us choose to be authentic even if it means being vulnerable rather than just “looking good.”  It makes us possible to be known and for others to be known.  For another one of us, it was his wife that helped him bring out what he was trying to medicate by drinking.  He was forced to talk about his feelings and this is what helped him feel better.

Be honesty - We have been taught that, “integrity is paramount.”  One of us referenced the Kung Fu TV series, and how David Carradine looked inside himself, and spoke the truth despite the consequences.  One of us was taught the value of integrity by his 12 step sponsor.  He realized if he lied or stole in even if he wasn’t caught, he would know himself as a liar.  He would say, “You caught you.”   That one day changed his life forever.  He realized that his self esteem couldn’t change unless he saw himself with integrity.   

Intelligence is important – We all engage in learning and education any chance we get.  Our dads taught us this.  We like to read.  We are all participating in this training group.  And some of us have gone back to school later in life.  Some of us have changed our career later in life because we wanted to learn more. 

The value of hard work- We have learned to try our hardest and stay determined to meet our goals in life.  All of us have been taught this and working hard has served us well.  Most of our fathers and grandfathers were hard workers.   

Protecting people less powerful – We were taught to protect those with less power.  Instead of using our power over others, we want to protect those with less power like we have been taught.  Be kind and compassionate is important.  One of us was taught to be kind and compassionate by the Christian Brother’s who ran his high school.  One of us had an experience when he was little where his dad saved him from an aggressive dog.  And then he grew up to be the “bully preventer” at school.  And he usually avoided violence with his negotiation methods.  This value has helped all of us stick up for those marginalized. 

None of us are that dissimilar –   During this discussion, we noticed that there were so many similarities between us and so much common in our stories.  We mused how to invite conversations for others to see their similarities and celebrate differences.  One of us realizes from his work with men in prison that there is not much dissimilarities.  Talking about these skills we all learned has us feeling like we are kindred spirits.  We are enthused by how we can bring similar conversations to the folks with whom we work.

Posted in Community Work, Documents, Men, Narrative Therapy, Therapy | No Comments »

What’s guilt to do with it?

June 4th, 2010

What’s guilt got to do with it?  Everything and nothing.  I remember reading long ago that there is but two emotions, love and fear.  But I am left wondering where does guilt fall in the mix?  (Though, I can guess where it falls, since it is not near “love”.  But I’ll get back to that later.) 

I want to know more about the phenomena of guilt because the people who come to talk to me everyday are constantly up against its devastating ways.  And, it is not only them!  It is also most of my friends and family members.  Even yours truly is not immune to guilt’s “dis”-ease.  And from what I have noticed so far, guilt has us taking actions that are often frustrating, usually hurtful, and sometimes self-destructive.  Are we ALL walking around with guilt?  But, why?    I mean, do we want to be frustrated, hurtful and self destructive? If not, I ask again:  Why? 

So, what is guilt? That is a hard question to answer since guilt has as many definitions as people who feel it.  People make meaning around guilt a myriad of different ways.  And they respond to it in just as many ways.   For me, guilt is a fear.  It is a fear that I am someone who I don’t want to be.  I am less than perfect.  Either because what I think I did or how I think someone else thinks of me.  For me, it is not necessarily about ethics or right and wrong or about sinning: It is how I view myself as a self.  Am I less than perfect?  I am literally judging myself*** to be less than perfect.  Another way to look at it is that I don’t trust myself or that I am separated from my spirit.  (But this can also be a definition of fear.) 

Anyway, I have been studying lately how people have been reacting to guilt.  These are some of the ways I have uncovered:  Hating oneself, hating one’s body, having an eating disorder, blaming self for things one didn’t do (i.e., getting abused), accusing others of something, judging others, having obsessions and or compulsions, feeling depressed and or anxious, feeling spiritually disconnected or unworthy, feeling generally unworthy, feeling like a victim, acting like a victim, being irritable, being angry, acting violently, feeling like no one wants them or loves them, overeating, self punishment, self harm and wanting to kill oneself. 

I want to go into each of these and give examples so that they can be recognized quickly when it is present.  Guilt likes to hide behind other problems, so it is sometimes hard to recognize.  My hope is that when it is recognized two things can be done. The first is to find out what is held precious that is in the shadows of guilt and two, hold on to that preciousness and realize that guilt by my definition is never helpful nor is it ever the “truth”.  Once we know this is false, we don’t have to carry it anymore.    

***Here I go again, talking about self judgment.  It is such a problem!  (To read more, please see Globs of Self Judgment and Worry Glob, too.)

Posted in Positive Thinking, Self Doubt, Self Judgement, Worry, Worth | No Comments »

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