The function of shame

In recent years there has been somewhat of a movement in the direction of treating "shame" as a bad, neurotic, harmful sort of thing.  It is treated as an illness, something to be eliminated or to be recovered from.  It seems to me that this view of shame as a pathology ignores the positive and useful aspects of it.

What does "shame" do for us?  It seems to me that shame is a group function whose purpose is to emotionally motivate an errant or deviant member of the group to change their behavior so as to conform with the group norm.  Shame is an unpleasant experience, of course, that being its point.  It is perhaps the primary force intended to produce conformity.  (Conformity to a group's norms, of course, is one of the characteristic elements defining the boundaries of group membership).

It is frequently important to a group to establish its identity by publicly displayed behaviors or dress.  The threat that shame poses to an errant member is that of being expelled from the group.  The threat is not just to the errant behavior, but to the identity or self, and therefore is experienced as a depressive event.  As a result, the experience of shame has elements of depression as well as of anxiety.

When we try to imagine a "shameless" society, we picture a group of people whose behavior is totally without regard to the norms or standards of ours.  Certainly we are most likely to imagine a group whose norms are very different from ours.  We find ourselves "shocked" or repulsed by their behaviors.  Historically, when this has occurred, we have attempted to "shame" the others into conforming to our behavioral norms.

Instances of "shameful" (or aberrant) behavior by an individual may be defined by their group  as "sick" or "insane" or even "evil".  The norms that an individual violates usually have little to do with realistic limits, and are frequently irrational or unreasonable.  The shaming carried out by a group can be personal, aggressive or even violent, and may not be proportional to the offense.

Interestingly, people with untreated schizophrenia have great difficulty in understanding or conforming to the norms of the groups to which they belong.  An individual might dress or behave in a bizarre fashion and experience no discomfort from the disapproving or shaming behavior of others.   In fact, as such individuals get older, their behavior may depart more and more from the local norms, since they experience  no shaming force to cause them to comply by modifying their behavior.

Sometimes the norms of the group have (or had, at least at one time) a rational basis.  But the real motive force behind a group norm is to identify the group, keep it separate from other groups, and to make it readily identifiable.  There is nothing rational about clothing norms, for instance,  but they are highly important to specific groups of people.

Currently there has been a sort of rebellion against "body shaming".  People who are obese experience instances in which a group rejects or shames them for their body shape.  Ostensibly this shaming is based on health issues and sexual attractiveness, and is expected to provide pressures for the obese person to conform by losing weight.  It is rarely effective, however, and almost always painful to the object.

But without shame, why would we conform to the norms of our social groups?  We would have no manners, no etiquette, no rules for acceptable public behavior.  Many people would say we are moving in that direction fairly rapidly already.  Without shaming, there would be little to stop the drift into ungoverned public behavior.

However, while shame may have its uses in producing conformity and rules, it does so through producing discomfort and unhappiness in the person shamed.  When the shamed behavior is out of the control of the individual, the shaming is only damaging and hurtful.  For instance, "making fun" of an individual with a physical or intellectual defect is obviously a hurtful thing to do.  It can't produce conformity, which is not in the realm of possibility for the shamed person.

A more serious instance is in the case of the individual who shames themselves on the basis of what they consider unacceptable behavior.   As a result, they emotionally expel themselves from their group. What makes this more serious is that the group from which they think of themselves as deviant, from which they deserve expulsion, is the human race itself. They withdraw and isolate themselves and ultimately may become suicidal as their ultimate non-membership.

Individuals whose behavior or characteristics are the subject of shame may prefer to view their non-conformance as "not their fault", i.e. something out of their control and thus not be subject to shaming.  Sometimes that is true, but sometimes it is an attempt to justify behavior that the subject knows is aberrant and probably not acceptable to their group, so they believe they can be granted an "exception".

The more "exceptions", the less potent shaming can be as a force producing conformity in manners and behavior.  Too much shame has produced in the past societies with rigid and narrow standards of behavior.  And too little shaming produces a society whose standards are rude and "uncivilized".  Which direction do you think preferable?

Marriage and Deal-Breakers

      Marriage is a very complex concept.  We tend to think about it emotionally, which makes it difficult to conceptualize.  At least, however, it is a contract between two people which binds them as partners with mutual obligations and responsibilities.  We publicly state that this contract is "forever" and indissoluble, but we have certain unacknowledged conditions that allow the breaking of the contract.  These "deal-breakers" are almost never discussed because to discuss them would destroy the romantic fantasy of eternal love.
     We do sometimes consider what would happen if the contract is broken.  Pre-nuptial agreements are an example.  They spell out the division of goods and services between the former partners if the contract is terminated.  Although they are clearly useful, they are extremely unpopular with couples who are "in love", because they are inconsistent with the romantic fantasy that characterizes the beginnings of most marriages.
     We don't, as a rule, consider the conditions under which we consider the contract to be broken and terminated.  "Deal-breakers" are specific behaviors and conditions under which one partner is unwilling to continue the marital contract.  We like to pretend that nothing could make us unwilling to stay married, but this is clearly purely fantasy.  In fact, the majority of marriages end in divorce, so it is quite unrealistic to pretend this cannot happen.
     Therefore it is extremely important to consider exactly what "deal-breakers" are for each member of the contract.  When they are not considered they don't go away.  They are simply not discussed.  In the majority of divorces, the reasons for dissolving the marital contract are accumulated over a period of time.  They are, in fact, based on accumulating increasing negative feelings, which people typically describe as "being fed up".
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  Being "fed up" requires a partner to accumulate instances of intolerable behavior, which is tolerated on the grounds that at some time in the future the other partner will change.  The amount of negative feelings carried by the first partner must accumulate until the breaking point, at which time there is typically an explosion of feelings used to stimulate the partners into breaking up, usually a very anxiety-provoking situation in itself.
     Often the partners are not clear about what they are beginning to consider "intolerable".  Frequently the transgressing partner is not aware of exactly what their partner is finding unacceptable. Often the first partner is not clearly aware of what it is they will not be able to live with.  The ambiguity and uncertainty continue until some event "the last straw" and has crossed the line.
     It is easier to cross the line when you don't know exactly where the the line is.  Neither partner may be clear as to how close they are to marital disaster until the line is crossed.  To spell out where the boundary is, is to commit yourself to an action you cannot easily imagine in advance.  Yet without knowing the boundary it is far easier to cross, and once crossed it may be irrevocable.
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  Whether boundaries are easily imaginable or emotionally uncomfortable is not a good reason to ignore them.  When you are contracting for a life-long partnership, it is extremely important that you know the conditions under which your partner will no longer be willing to remain in the partnership.  To do that, each partner has to carefully consider exactly what their personal boundaries are and to what degree, if any, they are willing to act on their crossing.
     "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.  For example, a deal-breaker for Partner A might be sexual infidelity by B.  If A is willing to be clear that such behavior is unacceptable, then A is committed to divorce if B is unfaithful.  If A is not willing to be committed to divorce under such conditions, sexual fidelity is not a boundary for A.  When a boundary is set, the person setting the boundary must be willing to take action or else it is not in fact a "deal-breaker".
     Deal-breakers do not have to be mutual or "equal".  What is a deal-breaker for A may not be so for B.  What is important is that when A sets a boundary, B knows exactly what the consequences will be.  There is no boundary-testing behavior that will be acceptable.  Of course, no one in the throes of romantic love wants to commit themselves to ending their romantic relationship under specific conditions.  However, without such specification, boundary testing will more often lead to divorce.  "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.
     It's unlikely that at any given moment a person can specify in advance all the possible deal-breakers.  Conditions can arise in the future that could not be anticipated; life-changing events can occur that lead to unimaginable conditions.  People can change in unexpected ways.  A partner can become a drug-abuser or a physical or emotional bully.  However, such possibilities can be considered even if they seem absurd in the present.  They need to be considered whenever they arise.  "Deal-breaker" discussions are an ongoing requirement, before AND during the marriage.
     It would be a very difficult conversation to have, considering the deal-breakers and their consequences.  Each partner has to know something about their own boundaries and limits of their tolerance, no matter how deep their feelings for the other.  That takes more self-knowledge than most young people have, which is why it is so difficult for early marriages to endure.  Difficult or not, the attempt is an important one.  Deal-breakers should not only be discussed before marriage, they should be discussed as soon as one partner becomes aware they are an issue, and should be discussed before they are irrevocably crossed.

A note on specific deal-breakers and issues related to them will follow.

Then or Never: Critical periods in humans

In many, if not all, animals and birds there is a critical period shortly after birth in which certain events must occur for normal growth and maturation.  An early writer in this area, Konrad Lorenz, observed ducklings immediately after hatching.  He discovered they would follow any object of approximately the "right" size as if it were their mother, IF the duckling was exposed to the object immediately after hatching.  By the next day the critical period was closed, and such attachment (which he called "imprinting") could no longer occur.  Some photos exist that show Dr. Lorenz waddling along, crouched down, with a line of ducklings toddling along after him.

Dogs and wolves have been shown to have the same pattern.  If wolves are not exposed to and handled by humans within the first few days after birth, they become untameable and feral.  In dogs the critical period for socialization is considerably longer, and may be as long as 12 weeks, with 8 weeks common in certain breeds of dog. (My doctoral dissertation is in this area).

In humans there is known at least one critical period for language development. If children are not talked to or cannot hear language in the first 3 or 4 years of life, they will never be able to learn to speak.  (I have not looked up this period and am not sure whether the length of time I have cited is accurate.)

It has occurred to me that there may be a critical period in humans and other primates for belonging to a group or pack.  We are group animals, of course.  We seek out groups to which to belong.  This process can be seen in children somewhere before puberty usually noticeable at age 10 and later.  It becomes more and more important through the teen years.  In this period groups form, whether gangs or social groups or interest groups.  What group you belong to is increasingly important.

Group boundaries can be marked by clothing or location or by title.  Probably other methods of marking boundaries can be found.  Transgressing a boundary can be a life-threatening event.  What people wear becomes extremely important, sometimes puzzling parents, but when this happens the clothing items are boundary markers, and not having the right item can mean exclusion and humiliation.

In non-human primates being excluded is a life or death issue, and we probably have some genes that dictate this level of importance to membership.  It is obvious that membership is highly valued;  young people have accepted "beat-downs" or group rapes as the price of belonging to a particular group.
Adolescents have committed suicide because of group exclusion or rejection.  College students may accept "hazing", sometimes quite severe, as the price of belonging to a fraternity or sorority.

So the importance of belonging is clear.  We all experience it to a degree.  Even adults frequently find group membership highly important.  What is less clear is what happens to people who don't achieve group membership during what may be a critical period for group membership.

These people are seen by other adolescents as "weirdos", "geeks", "loners" and other pejorative names.  It appears to me that school shootings have been carried out entirely by loners, non-members of groups, who are filled with otherwise inexplicable rage at those who "belong".  Adults who were not accepted in groups during their adolescence are not comfortable with adult groups. They rarely join clubs.  In many ways they (we) don't seem to quite know how to belong.  They don't get the cues, wear the right clothes, have the right behavioral signals (i.e. "manners").  The tend to be loners their entire lives.  Even when they marry, their families tend to remain socially isolate.

This is particularly observable in military families, in which the teen=age children are moved several times during the critical period for belonging, i.e. the high school years.  As adults they tend to stay on the outside of groups and are isolated to a degree even in their neighborhoods.  They tend to think of themselves as "different", "un-social", and equivalent titles.  In my opinion they will never be able to overcome their sense of isolation.  In a funny sense, they (we) are feral as far as groups are concerned.

Human infants learn at a very early age (prior to 1) to mimic expressions on a parental face.  This "mirroring reflex" is automatic and apparently not accompanied by a specific matching feeling.  For instance, when the parent face is smiling, the infant "smiles";  when the parent frowns, so does the infant, but does not apparently feel badly.  Just the expression itself is mimicked.  Very specific neurons in the human brain (and in some primates) are involved.  I wonder if the beginnings of social isolation are found in a failure of the parent to provide such up-close and personal contact at a critical period as yet unidentified.

Certainly some of us on the autistic spectrum have difficulty recognizing and responding appropriately to facial expressions, tones of voice, body language and the like.  This makes us easily identifiable as potential social isolates.  Asperger's syndrome is an example.  However, intellectual understanding of social cues can help supplement or replace missing instinctual responses.  We can learn what a specific expression means and practice appropriate responses, which can conceal the genuine social awkwardness that underlies it.

It puzzles me that there has been so little research in this general area, which is obviously of considerable importance to understanding normal and aberrant human development.

Lies in relationships, an expansion

Honesty destabilizes, for good or for ill.  It creates the possibility of change.  But change can be in many flavors and directions.  For instance, confessing to an extramarital affair will very likely result in substantial change. However, change in itself is by its nature unpredictable.  When we tell the truth, something new can and will happen.  There is no guarantee that the change will be for the better, depending on how you define "better".

Psychotherapists and counselors are change agents.  We are hired by people who are troubled and unhappy to promote change in them and in their situation.  Since they are already unhappy, change is somewhat more likely to be in a positive direction.  So we tell the truth and encourage our patients to tell the truth.  This honesty can destabilize their inner world and ultimately their relationships, including with the therapist.  Therapists are trained in keeping the changes from damaging the relationship with the therapist, although this is not always possible. The relationship frequently becomes uncomfortable and produces anxiety, sometimes in both the patient and the therapist.  Sometimes the discomfort is great enough to cause the relationship to end.

The therapist is also trained to detect dishonesty and to confront it, so that change can take place.  People are frequently dishonest, even with themselves, and being confronted with the truth allows for growth to occur.  A good working assumption is that recognizing the truth in oneself results in positive change.  It is also necessary for the therapist to be honest.  That does not mean the therapist says everything in his or her mind.  The therapist has the additional obligation to consider the kind of changes and discomfort that arise and to avoid those that might be harmful to the therapy.

The therapist is obligated to be kind as well as honest.  While this is a good idea for all human relationships, it is especially true in the therapeutic relationship.  Therapy is not a friendship with equal and mutual obligations.  Therapists are not there to get better, themselves.  The relationship is not balance or equal, which is one of the reasons money changes hands.

Honesty in relationships also promotes anxiety, in that the changes that occur are not predictable, and it is easy for most of us to predict bad outcomes.  Constant growth and the anxiety that accompanies it would be increasingly uncomfortable.  Sometimes we need stability rather than constant change.  Yet if a relationship becomes too stable and "comfortable", it can stagnate and become monotonous, even boring.   We seek a balance between comfort and the excitement and intimacy of growth.

So how do we arrange stability in an intimate relationship?  We tell lies of omission.  In other words, we choose our honesty with care.  We have to respect the right and need of the others in our relationships for some stability and comfort.  Choosing which things to talk about and when requires considerable skill and sensitivity.  All the parties in a relationship are not equally available for change all the time.  And some topics require absolute (and kind) honesty if the relationship is to survive.

There is no simple formula for this balancing act.  In psychotherapy it's relatively easy, because the client is there for change, not comfort.  But in intimate relationships like marriage the comfort of both parties must be considered.

Social media and relationships

As we have allowed more and more of our previously "private" lives become public, we are  more and more vulnerable.  Not only are our "secrets" becoming known, we are more open to attacks by others which can be highly personal.

It's much easier to be cruel when we don't have to face directly the object of our cruelty.  "Trolling" has become much more common, and people  say things  on websites that they would never say face to face.  It's easier to believe whatever we want to believe about someone when we don't have all the information.

Typed information is more abstract than face to face contact.  We don't have facial expressions  and voice tones;  we don't have the immediate feedback that comes from a direct reaction to something we have said or done.  It's easier to harm others when we don't actually see them being harmed.  A number of psychological experiments have confirmed this idea.

The cruelty of war becomes easier when we don't actually see those we hurt.  Over the years our weapons have allowed us to be at a greater and greater distance, physically and psychologically, from our victims.  They become "targets" or "casualties".  We dehumanize our victims.  Could we have dropped the bomb on Hiroshima if we had seen all the faces of those we killed, knew their histories, how much their mothers loved them, how their partner's hearts were broken?

Now we see the same behaviors on small scale on  the internet.  We attack, we try to hurt, we urge people  to kill themselves, we encourage damaging behaviors... it's all "out there", it's not real, they are just targets in a video game.

Positive relationships conducted via computer are equally biased and distorted.  Fantasies about others, positive and negative, flourish best in the absence of specific information.  Anybody can be flawless and wonderful if they choose to be so, and if the person to whom they are providing information chooses to believe them.  Fantasies don't like reality.  Nobody belches or passes gas in a fantasy.

People  even decide to  get married based on a series of internet conversations.  People  choosing to believe what they are told via computer are easy marks, both financially and emotionally.  Not only is a sucker born every minute, as  Barnum  allegedly said, someone is out there to take advantage of the sucker.

I myself am going to be a multimillionaire soon.  I have to make my bank account open to this Prince from Nigeria and he's going to give me millions of dollars.  I can hardly wait. 

Love or like

The best predictor for longevity in marriage is not romantic love.  The best predictors are liking and respect.  Marriages based on liking and mutual respect tend to wear well. Over time, with respect and like "romantic" affection increases.  Many years ago, marriages were frequently based on convenience and reliability.  Many were arranged by families or "matchmakers". Many couples met for the first time on their wedding day.  Western cultures, as a whole, did not see "love" as a necessary requirement.  It is only with the dawn of fiction in literature and other media that "love" was even a desirable emotion; more often it was seen as leading to disaster.

Attachment is a naturally-occurring phenomenon.  When couples are in close proximity over a period of time, and when feelings are discussed and treated with respect, attachment and mutual affection grow naturally.  This is sometimes referred to as the "Stockholm syndrome", but it simply refers to this basic fact of human nature.  We naturally become attached to others when we share feelings, goals and respect.

So if a marriage is based on respect and liking, affection grows naturally.

However, movies, tv and fiction have emphasized the importance of "romantic" love.  Such love is dramatic, fierce and passionate.  It makes a better story and better movie.  Unfortunately, being based on fiction, it does not last. In a movie or book it only has to last a few hours. But real life is different.  Fantasies don't survive real life.  The bubble pops, usually sooner rather than later.

 The current divorce rate is evidence of that.  Romantically-based marriages only last if over time another basis is found, one based on respect and liking, and the honest sharing of feelings, good and bad.  Romance may get us into a marriage and keep us there for   few months or a few years, but it alone will not and cannot keep us in a  marriage. We need the Stockholm syndrome.

We expect too much from marriage.  Earlier in history the marriage partnership was based on expediency, usefulness, even help in surviving.  How the partners felt about each other was no more important than in any other business partnership.  Business partners did not need to hold hands or cling together in the moonlight to the sound of violins.  They needed to trust each other, to respect each other and value the other person as a person, which meant that how the other felt was important and deserved respect.  Usually affection between the partners  grew over time, although it is true that sometimes it did not.

People are now encouraged to believe that their marriage should be permanently exciting and emotionally fulfilling, with all (or essentially all) of their needs being met by their partner and their relationship.  This is a huge burden of expectation and demand.  None of us can meet every need or fulfill every dream for our partner, and our marriages should not stand or fail based on fulfilling this impossible expectation.  Hopefully what we do gain from a healthy relationship  is far more  satisfying than our ability to mutually act out one another's romantic fantasies.

Love, like every other emotion, comes and goes.  It never remains constant, except in fiction.  In real life we love one another more at one time than another, and it is rarely a symmetrical emotion.  The Stockholm syndrome insures it will return if we continue to respect and communicate with one another.  Commitment should not be a decision based on the sand of emotion.  It should be based on the rock of respect. 

Belonging to groups

Psychologists rarely talk about the importance of "belonging" to a group, or that there is apparently a critical period in us primates that strongly motivates us to start finding a group to belong to.  We all know  this period because we have been through it and so has every adolescent in the world.  As  parents we recognize its occurrence when suddenly our children find what others think of them as hugely more important that our opinion or acceptance. We remember the dangers  of  humiliation even while recognizing the triviality of the issues that lead to acceptance or rejection. We are aware that adolescents will make totally irrational and even dangerous choices in the process of learning to belong.

This age appears to begin in early adolescence and continues through the early adult years, although the most important for later healthy development occurs between 11 and 18.  Adolescents form groups and struggle to  learn and comply with the rules that govern membership.  They watch intently for the signal behaviors, attire, mannerisms, attitudes and values that  characterize their group.  They know that wearing the "wrong" color or type of clothing can result in humiliation. They find that even talking or spending time with someone in another group can result in  ostracism.

Initially the group seems to  be fairly large, perhaps all the children they know, but as time passes the size of the key groups, i.e. the group or groups they most want to join, becomes smaller and the boundaries become more specific and clear.  Later still the importance of belonging to a small  and specific group decreases.  The "critical period for belonging" in which skills for belonging must be  learned is largely over by the time we are  in the middle 20s.

Adolescents will accept  a physical beating to join a group.  Some will commit suicide if they are not accepted. They will frequently try to join a variety of groups, some  of which are potentially or actively harmful, in order to be a member somewhere.  It's  as if they feel they do not have an identity without belonging to something, and they identify to each other with  their various memberships.  In early adolescence they have fairly simple groups, such as the geeks, the "soshes", the athletes, the dopers, the brains, etc.  Later they develop more complex groups, such as  fraternities, military groups, groups oriented around educational goals, church or religious groups. Even later are various "adult" groups, such as Rotary or political groups.

Those who are not successful in being accepted during this phase of their life seem frequently to be permanently marked by their failure.  They tend to think of themselves as "loners" and live more isolated lives. They are rarely (if ever) comfortable with belonging and are always prepared to be rejected. Some accept their alienation and become comfortable with it.  Others seem to carry a burden of resentment and bitterness which can result at striking out at other groups.

There seems to be an ancient part of our brain that demands we learn how to belong to our tribe.  It tells us that exclusion or rejection from the group can result in death.  The fear of humiliation (i.e. rejection by your identified  group) is one of the most powerful motivations for humans.

Recently on television I watched an episode of"Blue Bloods".  In this particular show the adolescent daughter is driving her friends (her  social  group) when the police stop them and find a package of cocaine in the car, in an amount that would result in a felony conviction with permanent life changes for all of them.  No one admits to the ownership of the drugs, so they are all charged.  None of them will expose the one of their group who actually owned the cocaine, because that would be "snitching", which is cause for ejection from the  group and humiliation.

They are actually prepared to accept a felony conviction rather than "snitching", even though they know whose drugs they were.  The person who owned the drugs will allow all of them  to go to  jail rather than take the blame, but they don't really consider that.  He is in their group.  That is where their loyalty lies. The adolescent daughter will have to give up her plans to have professional career or be accepted in a prestigious college; her life goals will be destroyed.

In the episode she never came to terms with the importance of putting her own life ahead of the momentary membership in a temporary (but important to her) group.  Instead this issue is bypassed cleverly.  The daughter then goes to her mother and says "I don't ever want to disappoint you", and thus re-establishes her primary loyalty to the family group.

It's hard to find any literature, movie or play of  any kind that does not have a central concern about group membership and the conflicts between how people belong or move in and out of groups. It's surprising to me how little awareness we bring to this central issue.  It has also occurred to me that the reason I notice it so keenly is due to my own failure to become an accepted group member during my adolescence.  I can look from the outside at how all these groups function more readily because I do not  experience myself as actually in them.

Christmas and Birthdays Are Not For Everyone

Let's be clear first.  I am not referring to the quasi-religious aspects of Christmas.  I am referring to the custom of compulsory gift-giving on both the above-named occasions (Christmas and birthdays).  This custom has clearly far exceeded in importance any religious observances  long ago.  The real celebrators are the merchants.  We already knew that.

But apart from the apparent need to create Christmas bonuses for store employees, what importance does gift-giving really have for adults?  (We leave kids out of this discussion because they are supposed to be greedy and self-centered.)  Perhaps when we are young and starting out gifts can be helpful.  It's hard to understand why we need an excuse to give such gifts.  People we know and love will appreciate the gifts but waiting and giving one day a year seems a little constricted.

There comes a time when gifts become more of an obligation than a pleasure.  We eventually have everything we really need, or else the wherewithal to get them, and waiting until December 25 is absurd when we need to buy a new toaster now.  Giving gifts is equally tedious, not because we don't love the recipients (or at least should), but because choosing the gifts becomes an exercise in shopping for things  we are told  to get.  We become an extension of the gift catalogues and shopping advertisements.  We don't buy out of love so much as because they have ordered through us what they want or need.  This is about as personal as online shopping.

Birthdays are much the same.  Past a certain age the actual count of years is pretty meaningless.  Here we are, vertical and above-ground. We shouldn't need to be informed of our age. It's not for the birthday boy or girl.  It's to tell us we matter to them.  But why wait to tell us we are important?  The odds continually increase against us completing the year.  We would like to be told on occasion that we're important to those we love, and preferably on a more regular basis, and not with presents or a ceremony but with a hug and an extra smile, and a laugh at the old jokes that you have heard before.

Now for the old people in particular (and you know damn well who you are). What can you get us old ones that we don't have?  If we wanted it we would already have it.  We get to the age where getting rid of objects that require attention and maintenance is preferable.  We have accumulated "stuff" for years, and now it is increasingly burdensome and needs to go away, not accumulate more.  Maybe a night out together for dinner, or an invite over to see the grandkids, and a lot more often than one damn time a year.  Even items are ok as long as they are perishable.

Don't try to buy us off with a "funny" card pointing out how old we have become, or with a present that we have no use for.  Why make a point of how many years we have been on this earth?  We already know how long that has been.  Reminding us is more a downer than an upper.  Who thought we would make it this long?  But the time for appreciation of the love and support we can give you is now.  Tomorrow comes faster every day.

Chronic Anger as a disorder

Fear and anger are produced in the same small and primitive part of the brain. Anger and fear are the emotional and subjective accompaniments to the emergency "fight-flight" pattern that is hardwired into our operating system. Fear and anger are what we experience when our physical machinery is ramped up to near its maximum operating speed; our bodies are ready to fight with our full power or to run at full speed. When the situation that provokes them is no longer a threat, we can "power down" and let our bodies recover. We are not designed to run at such an overload for more than brief periods of time. In wartime, for instance, prolonged periods of fear-anger result in considerable physical and mental cost which may require years of recovery.

We have defined chronic or enduring fear as an illness. We call it "anxiety" and we treat it as an illness, with medications and with various kinds of therapy. People become physically ill with the biological consequences of constant fear; they develop high-blood pressure, stress disorders of all kinds, heart problems, and so on. We have no difficulty in recognizing chronic fear as a disorder, but somehow we don't see its complement, chronic anger, as an equally damaging illness, yet we see and feel its effects constantly.

Anger and its expression are increasingly problematic in our world. In the paper we read daily of random murders, group killings, road rage, murderous and abusive relationships, and random violence. We have "Anger Management Groups" to remind people of what they learned (or should have learned) on the grade-school playground. When our anger is turned inward on ourselves in the form of self-blame, we call it depression, and we can treat it successfully. as well.

In the United States of today, we psychologists and psychiatrists diagnose many "emotional disorders", including anxiety disorders and depression. We don't define chronic anger as an illness, though it meets exactly the same criteria as the other emotional disorders do. The only related official diagnosis is "intermittent explosive disorder", which means one or more isolated instances of a temper tantrum. I want to be very clear about this: anger/frustration and fear are normal responses to situations and as such are healthy psychologically. Chronic fear and chronic anger are maladaptive responses and respond well to competent treatment, but we only recognize chronic fear as requiring treatment.

I think we don't see chronic anger as a disorder because our entire culture is permeated with anger. It's part of the air we breathe. Our television shows are about people getting angry, doing bad things, and getting punished by angry authorities. This is as true for the news on CNN as it is on the multitude of detective and police shows. Our heroes are people who have been mistreated and who then fight back, from Charles Bronson and Clint Eastwood onward. Our history began with us getting mad at the English, who mistreated us, and whom we got mad at and fought back against. We love our anger. It provides us with the energy to fight without fear, to stand up to mistreatment and refuse to cooperate with abusive people. It also results in abrasive and dangerous relationships, even to those we love, and to a large assortment of physical disorders.

Does our history and culture mean that we have to tolerate constant anger among ourselves, or to find others outside our culture to bear the brunt of our resentment? Perhaps we should consider how we would be able to function, both as individuals and as a culture, without constant anger in search of a "bad guy" to punish? Can we defend ourselves without anger? Can we stop using anger as a factor in our decision-making? In reality, we may be much more effective if our responses to frustration were rational, logical and not governed by fury.

I think we should consider chronic anger as a serious disorder and plan effective treatments.

Lies of omission in relationships:Part 2

To understand the effects of lies, both overt and covert on relationships, it will  be helpful to review the communication rules that govern the experience of closeness and intimacy.  In Transactional Analysis it is proposed that closeness and intimacy are determined by some specific behavioral rules:  1)  When person A expresses an emotion accurately in  kind and degree, and 2) when person B acknowledges person A's statement in both kind and degree,  then 3) Person A will experience greater emotional closeness to  Person B.  It should  be noted that feelings of closeness are not necessarily (or even usually) symmetrical.  Person A may experience greater closeness or distance to Person B than B does to A.  The degree of closeness A experiences appears to be related to how important A's feelings are to A.  For instance, if A says he "really likes cheese sandwiches a lot", and B responds that she "understands exactly how much that liking is", the amount of increase in closeness A experiences is likely to be a tiny one.

This set of observationally-based rules are easily tested out.  Consider your reaction if you tell someone that you are very angry, and they look blankly at you or tell you they don't  believe you.  Another example: after an angry argument many couples report unusually satisfying sexual relationships.  The Stockholm syndrome is a good example of the development of intimacy between captor and prisoner when feelings are expressed clearly and acknowledged correctly, even when the feelings are  (at least initially) negative ones.

With this in mind consider the effects of directly lying (about emotions, specifically) on relationships.  If A tells B incorrectly about a feeling, no matter how B replies, no intimacy is gained.  In fact, an increase in psychological distance is likely to be noted.  If A tells B correctly about a feeling, and B replies inappropriately, no increase in intimacy is experienced. Again, an increase in experienced distance will occur.

When A lies by omission about feelings, A will feel more distant.  A's behavior may change and be noted by B, who will not likely understand what is happening.  To the extent that the emotions are "important" ones to A, A's distance will increase in proportion to their importance.  As an example, consider the following:  A is angry with B but doesn't want to admit it.  B may or may not notice, but in any case A experiences more distance.

It's clear, I hope, that dishonest, unexpressed, denied or concealed feelings can have a profound effect on a relationship, especially if over time the same behaviors are repeated.  Frequently the lies of omission are an attempt to maintain stability in the relationship although at the cost of loss of intimacy.  Intimacy.distance is never static nor symmetrical, and people negotiate for an optimal level of closeness and distance in a never-ending dance.

Whatever happened to the social contract?

Reading about the reluctance of otherwise intelligent (or at least educated) people to have their children vaccinated for measles and the like brought into highlight a major and increasing shift in our civilization.  Less and less do people recognize that the goodies we get are paid for by our willingness to carry out our part of the social contract.  These people act as if they were entitled to the benefits of civilization and owed nothing in return.

This is the exact equivalent of expecting running water and electricity without paying taxes.   But such benefits as roads and running water are only part of the social contract.  We owe each other certain considerations, even though they are not as specific and clear as city services.  Living in a group requires that we consider the rights of others and can expect them to consider ours. We make some laws to exact consequences when  basic rights are not respected.  We try not to step on someone's toes or touch strangers unnecessarily.  We try to keep our voices down in public space, such as theaters and busses. We understand that an article in a bag in someone's lap "belongs" to them and we expect not to touch it or take it.

Living together demands that we give up some freedoms in order to live with some comfort and consistent expectations.  In a word, we all owe each other.  Without that social contract life in close contact with others would be unbearable. that is, "nasty, brutish and short".

It seems clear that the social contract is weakening.  People live more and more as if there were no other people on the planet.  They talk loudly on their smart-phones about intensely personal things and they do so in public places.  They spit on the sidewalk, they pick their noses while driving their cars and talking on their phones, as if they were exempt from the requirements of the social contract.  They apparently do not realize how dependent they themselves are on that contract for any kind of  survival.  They apparently do not care about our mutual obligations, though they are quick enough (and loud enough) when people do not respect theirs.

The examples are, unfortunately, endless and apparently increasing in quantity and volume.  The refusal to allow their children to be vaccinated is an excellent example.  Younger people who have grown up without worries about infectious diseases don't seem to recognize that the reason they have not seen them is vaccination.  So they think of these illnesses as unimportant.  When somebody raises the question that it might be possible for vaccinations to cause an illness, they see that risk, no matter how small the data indicate that risk is, as easy to avoid.  No vaccination to their children.

They don't recognize that our protection from infectious illnesses is a group protection, depending on the vast majority of the members of the group being immune and thereby not carriers of an illness.  The non-vaccinators benefit from this protection without recognizing any corresponding obligation to the others in their groups.  Once the number of non-vaccinated  individuals reaches a certain percentage, the disease can and will spread.  Not recognizing the social contract and relying on the universe to continue to treat them as special will have its cost.

The same idea applies to the social contract.  As the number of "entitled people" who consider themselves excused from  obligations to others reaches a certain percentage, society will collapse rapidly as the percentage of entitled grows.  No obligations  to others?  Just look out for what I want and the hell with the rest of you? Civilization is  not unlike a herd immunity which protects against savagery and other uncivilized behavior.  When enough members are no longer immune to savagery, the herd loses its protection and civilization (like health) will fail.

How to stop being angry

I have written before about chronic anger and its consequences. Our readiness to fight, both as individuals and as a country, has cost us dearly, both financially and in terms of personal unhappiness and loss.

In this brief note I would like to consider how and under what circumstances we might be willing to stop being chronically angry. We should also give some thought to the real-life consequences in our personal lives of simply stopping being angry as a response to every situation.

Anger is always a response to frustration. On the most primitive level it is a way of giving notice to our caretakers that something is wrong that we ourselves cannot correct. The hungry or wet baby demanding attention is the simplest example. We learn at the very earliest stages of our lives that rage can bring resolution, comfort and relief at the hands of something or someone outside ourselves.

That same mechanism endures through life. Exactly how we express our rage and frustration varies in its sophistication, but never departs from its basic nature: a demand that the external world arrange our relief or satisfaction. It is also an acknowledgement of our own experienced helplessness. We demand that others/the universe relieve our pain and grant our needs, and in the act we acknowledge that we ourselves are unable to provide that relief.

Sometimes the very expression of our frustration, intended to bring us relief, itself stands in the way of our getting what we want. Screaming at your mother when you are hungry works fairly well when you are one, but much less so at age 16. It is the expression, however, that requires modification; the underlying need remains the same as it always did.

I recall stubbing my toe on a rock as a child, and the anger I felt, which led me to first kick the rock, which hurt worse, and then to throw the rock as far as I could. My anger was at an uncaring universe which I could not control. My powerlessness increased my anger, and I reasserted my power by first kicking and then throwing the rock. I doubt if all of that prevented my toe from hurting, however.

We get angry when people and things don't do what we want. In the primitive parts of our brains we expect that anger itself to result in changes to meet our needs. Rarely does that work. But how do we drop the anger reaction and find more effective ways to get what we want? Sometimes the anger is at situations or people who no longer exist. In my work,  being angry at an abusive parent or ex-partner who no longer is alive is a distressingly frequent example. We cannot turn a dead abusive parent into a loving one.

One of the key elements in dealing with chronic anger is that it contains hidden at its core an element of hope. Anger is our earliest form of magic, and we never quite believe that it will simply not work. Hidden inside us we believe that the anger will cause the other person (or thing) to change, especially when we don't have a clue as to how to make it happen ourselves.

A friend once confessed to me that he was often (or chronically) angry at his girlfriend because she was unaffectionate and unromantic. However, when he expressed his frustration and anger things did not get better, but rather worse: she kept her distance and avoided his company for a while. On the one hand he understood that his anger and sulking did not make him more attractive or desirable. It certainly didn't spark any romantic feelings on her part. At the same time, he felt that not letting her know how he felt meant that she wouldn't know he wanted her to change. He felt helpless to get what he wanted. He recognized that her feelings about him were not in his control, and to some degree not even in hers. But the element of  hope he felt encouraged him to keep trying, in spite of its futility.

We know when someone important to us is showing anger or resentment toward us it is because they want something from us. It's easy to feel defensively angry in response. We can get caught in our helplessness. What's the alternative?

Sometimes we have to give up hope that we can get what we need. That's not an easy decision to make, but without it we cannot grieve for what we are missing or have lost and begin to move on. Our anger can be an avoidance of grief. Indeed anger is considered one of the early stages of grief, even though it is clear that it is a separate emotional response. We don't want to accept our loss.

But perhaps some losses should not be accepted. Accepting loss and grieving for what we don't have is not always a good answer. Grief involves a acceptance of an unchangeable circumstance, but passivity is not always useful. Sometimes we need to be assertive and even angry to fight for what we want, nor just accept the situation. America would still belong to the British Empire if we had not done so.

It's hard sometimes to accept that there are important things in our lives that we cannot change. It's hard to know which things should be fought for and which should be let go. This latter is a discrimination that can only be made cognitively, not emotionally. "Moving on" always requires grieving.

Manipulating our own emotions

The two disorders most commonly treated in the field of mental health are anxiety and depression.  Depression is always a disorder;  there is no degree of depression that is healthy or beneficial in any way.  Anxiety is different in that respect.  High levels of anxiety, especially in the absence of any real threat, is clearly dysfunctional.  Very low levels of anxiety, however, are not healthy either.

For instance, walking down a dark alley at 2 am jingling your keys and whistling blithely is probably not in the service of survival.  We need some anxiety to make us wary and watchful. In the absence of any anxiety at all, it would be easy to forget to make sure your doors are locked at night, or that you have changed the batteries in your smoke-detector.  A small amount of anxiety can "motivate" you, or at the least trigger your attention to potentially difficult situations.

We use anxiety to push ourselves (in the absence of cognitive motivation) to take precautions against over-spending on unnecessary items or not paying our income taxes.  We make ourselves mildly uncomfortable to get ourselves out of our comfort zone and take action when it is useful.  We do this by imagining potential problems in the near future, which triggers an anxious reaction.  For instance, we tell ourselves that if we spend too much, we won't be able to make the car payment and that the dealer will repossess it.  That thought arouses our anxiety, and we then make a plan to do something about it, and as a result our anxiety decreases. Or we might tell ourselves that having too much to drink at the office party might result in behaving badly enough to affect our employment, so we decide to limit ourselves to one drink.

Recently a patient told me that when she hasn't had any fun or excitement for a while, she begins to get restless, and thinks about "going  shopping", which is always fun for her.  Her income is extremely limited, and she is aware that if she spends much money she could have a serious problem in meeting her bills and rent.  So she tells herself something like the following:  "It doesn't matter if I spend too much, I can always work it out somehow.  It will be fine! Stop worrying!  Nothing bad will happen!".   As a result her anxiety drops.  Since she has always used her anxiety to control herself (instead of cognitive decision-making) there is now nothing to stop her, and she spends recklessly.  

Most of us use our anxiety to limit and control our behavior, so when we drive our anxiety down through denial and rationalization, we lose our limits and our willingness to control our behavior.  The more we rely on emotion and "motivation" to control ourselves, the more unsafe and unwise our behavior can become when our anxiety is too low.  Of course there are other ways to lower anxiety below the useful point:  we can drink too much or use drugs.  Even under these latter conditions (drugs and/or drink) we have used self-talk to deny the negative possibilities resulting from drinking or using drugs, so our anxiety-provoked defenses become non-operative.

An alternative is to make cognitively-based decisions.  These are decisions reached through rational and non-emotional thought.  They require data-based information and accurate appraisals of possible outcomes.  When we need to make a decision, we can set our emotions aside and consider the real issues and potential outcomes, not just what we want to imagine. We can take  a longer view of possible outcomes and consider them as well.

I remember telling my children when they were in the early years of adolescence that the time to make a decision about sexual behavior was at home in the afternoon and sitting in the living room, not in the back seat of a car after kissing and fondling for an hour or when under the influence of alcohol.  Emotion-based decisions are always remarkably short-sighted. That's fine when you're choosing a movie to watch or a flavor of icecream.

Trust and infidelity

Many times couples come to see a therapist after one of them has had an extra-marital affair.  The question asked (usually by the wronged partner) is "how can we rebuild our relationship" which usually resolves into a different question:  "How can I rebuild my trust in my partner again?"  Of course, the answer is that you can't. The wronged partner will always have the knowledge that their  partner broke their word and obviously is capable of breaking it again.

The reason they struggle so hard with this question is that it is the wrong question.  As asked, it  is unanswerable.  There is no way to undo what someone has done.  No amount of apology or explanation or resolves to "do better" can change the past.  An important contract between the two people has been broken.  It cannot be repaired, but a new contract can be forged.  "Forgiveness" is not the issue, because you can't stop knowing what you now know.  However, grieving is painful, and resentment and anger are "easier", so sometimes the question is:  Is the wronged partner willing to let their anger go, grieve the lost "trusting relationship" and build a new one?  That's not a simple or easy question.  What's important is to recognize that there is nothing the unfaithful partner can do about it.  Trusting is ALWAYS up to the truster.

It is important in ANY contract to know what are the conditions in which the contract is broken, and what are the consequences?  When this issue is addressed AFTER  the contract is broken, the genuine issues as to consequences are heavily overladen with emotion:  anger, grief, fright and sadness.  It is much more healthy to make such decisions about the contract at the start of the serious part of the relationship.  One should ask (and be asked) what are the "deal-breakers?"  Finding out what the consequences of a broken contract after the contract is broken is very difficult.  Boundaries are best defined before they are broken.

But be that as it may, answering the "right question" is difficult in a different way.  The right question (or questions) for the wronged partner are something like:  Do I want to continue this relationship, even though it has been damaged?  If so, under what conditions do I want to do this?  And what will be the boundaries?  For the unfaithful partner the question is more on the order of:  What kind of contract can I keep?

It must be recognized that trust is a gift given to the other person, not something that must be earned by them.  The trust you give to someone is your gift to them.  Once broken, there is nothing they can do to repair it or get it  back.  Trust is up to the truster, not the trustee.  The truster must make their own decision, knowing their partner, whether the relationship is worth trying to salvage.  The old relationship is forever changed.

Trust, once broken, is no longer salvageable by promises or even good behavior.  One can, however, be clear about the conditions under which the relationship will be continued, if it is to be continued.  The power in the relationship is now in the hands of the person who was wronged.  The old relationship is dead and must be grieved.  A new contract must be written, and a new relationship built with eyes wide open.

Of course this is possible, though difficult.  The key to the success of such a project is at least partially dependent on whether the parties know clearly what the conditions of termination are.  The partners both have to recognize that they are helpless to protect themselves against the possibility of dishonesty, and there is no assurance that it will not happen again.  They are starting again, but this time knowing a little more about each other, and hopefully knowing what and where the boundaries are.

A Mother Answers a Five-Year-Old's Questions About God (Part One)

I have a number of grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and the conversations I hear and imagine between mother and child are fascinating and frequently take an unanticipated turn.  The following conversations took place on a road trip, which is often a place where extended conversations can take place.  It's clear that parents who have not anticipated and prepared for these questionings can find themselves getting in deeper and deeper.  (I made a note of a couple of spots that proved problematic). So here is the first of several installments.7

Does God have a peepee?
Yes, honey.  We know that because God is a man, and men have peepees.

Does God have to pee?
I don't know.  I guess so. (This is  where she went wrong, I think)

Does he have a toilet?
No.  He pees into the clouds so that makes rain!.

Does it get on us when it rains?
No!  He pees over the oceans so it doesn't get on anybody.

Does he drink water?
He can drink anything He wants.

Where does he get stuff to drink?
He probably sends his angels to get some for him. I think there is milk in the Milky Way.

Do they go to the store like we do?
No.  I think they get it from the sky.

Can we see them get it from the sky?
Sometimes you can.  They look like a streak of light, because they go so fast.  Some stupid people call them 'shooting stars'. But they're angels getting milk for God.

God is real big, isn't He?
Yes, of course.

So his peepee would be real real real big too.
I suppose so.

Would it be bigger than Daddy's?
Oh yes. Definitely. A lot.

At this point snickering and outright giggles from other passengers brought this particular interchange to a halt. A brief halt for beverages and gasoling intervened.  After the break the same two people  are involved in the subsequemt conversation.  I think it should be clear by now that making things up as you go along can be a lot trickier than you might have thought, and the conversations take you to very peculiar places when they are not planned.

Does God wear clothes?
I think so.

Where does He get them.
From the God Sky Store, I think.

Does He have to give them money?
No. It's His store.  It's the God Sky Store.

Can we go to that store, the God Sky Store?
Maybe when we get old and die.

Dead people go to the God Sky Store?
Um, yes, I guess they do.   (This turned out to be a mistake, I think)

What do they do there, the dead people?
I think they put things on the shelves so God can find them.

Where do they get stuff big enough to make clothes for God?
Way, way out in the sky past the stars is the Big Stuff Place.  That's where they get it.

Does it grow there?
Yes.  They grow Big Stuff and they sew it together on Big Machines for God.

So when we die do we have to go to the God Sky Store and work?
I suppose so.  Either there or the Big Stuff Place.

I don't think I want to go there..
Well, you have to.  We all have to.  It's just the way things are.

How do you know?
They told me at church.

How do they know at church?
I think God or one of the angels told them.

Have you ever seen one?
No. But they told me they did.

Do God and angels talk to some people and tell them things?
Yes.  That's how we know these things.

Did God ever talk to you?
No.  Not really.

Did an angel talk to you?
No.

Just to other people?
Yes.

Why not to you?
I don't know.  I suppose you have to be very special for God or an angel to talk to you.

I wish I was special.
You are to me.

But not to God?
No, I guess not. But everybody is special to God.  Just some people are more special than others.

Does God only speak to the Special People?
Yes.  It's always been that way.  And the Special People write it down and they tell us.

How does God know which people are Special People?
I don't know.  I think the Special People must be very very good people.

I've been very very good.
Yes, you're a very good child.

But I peed in my bed once.
Yes, but all children do that.  That doesn't make them bad.

Even Baby Jesus? 
Yes, even Baby Jesus.

I wish God thought I was special so He would talk to me.

This discussion definitely took an unforeseen turn.  I plan to listen carefully in the future and make better notes.

Addiction as privilege

Technically, addiction is the result of your body becoming dependent on pleasure-producing substances to the degree that discontinuing the substance causes profound physiological disturbance.  We could stretch the definition beyond usability by attempting to shoe-horn substances like water or food.  What is meant is quite clear, however.

People attempt to widen the definition of addiction to include behaviors, such as gambling or sexual activity.  As a psychotherapist it is useful to ask the purpose of such a re-definition.  The answers seem clear. There is an implication of reduced power to control one's behavior due to some sort of physical dependency.  "Sex addicts", for example, don't simply enjoy sex, they "must" have it or some sort of withdrawal and physiological disturbance must result. Consequently they are not somehow as responsible for controlling their behavior as the rest of us non-addicts.  The same reasoning applies to "gambling addiction" or "food addiction".
Thus defining oneself as an addict of some kind implies a lesser responsibility and blame for the behaviors involved.  If one simply "can't" (not "won't) control their behavior, they can't be blamed.  They want to consider themselves "ill", not morally culpable.  They should get a free pass  for their behavior, no matter how damaging it may be to themselves or others.

Our innate responses to stimuli fall along a normal curve, with the majority in the mid-range, and with extremes at the tail end of the curve.  We respond to sudden noises with a wide range of reaction, from nearly placid disinterest to sudden leaps and shouts.  One has only to watch the reaction of new-born infants behind the viewing glass to flash photographs to observe this range, and it is clearly innate.  But just because our response lies toward one of the extremes does not imply an "illness" or disorder of some kind.  People who have relatively extreme reactions learn to moderate them.  We do not allow people to have a free pass to hurt someone just because they are more easily angry or frightened than others.  The law makes no exceptions, nor should it.

The Price of Personal Freedom

Personal freedom and its costsThe central idea found in Buddhist philosophy (especially in Zen Buddhism) is “enlightenment”, which means (among other things) the recognition of one’s absolute personal freedom.  Freedom, as described by Zen philosophers, arises from full awareness (satori), which in turn arises from the recognition that all human rules and boundaries are essentially self-created and self-imposed.  Freedom thus presents the individual with the possibility of existing in a boundless, open universe which imposes no personal nor moral obligations.

Humans seem to prefer to operate as if they had far fewer choices than in fact they have.  Perhaps we find having essentially limitless choices overwhelming.  Certainly many (or most) of us are more comfortable with a relatively limited outlook, restricted choices, some self-chosen obligations and the like.  Where there is an empty boundless plain, we like to construct fences and to constrict our world to what we have confined inside them.  By doing so we easily may become less aware of the choices that we make every minute.  In a sense we usually prefer to operate on automatic pilot, as if all our choices have already been made and don’t require any further thought.

It’s not very practical or useful, for instance, to try to choose among the hundreds of actual choices available to us each second.  For instance, at every intersection we can choose another direction, or decide to get out of the car and walk, or hitch a ride with a stranger to wherever they may be going, and so endlessly on.  It’s far easier to ignore all the choices that we could make, or to assume that they are already irrevocably made, and just keep on keeping on.  By limiting our awareness of our choices we gain convenience and ease but we lose some of our sense of personal freedom.

Every day I see people who feel “trapped” and powerless, unable to find ways to change their situation or even to see that there might be such ways.   I sometimes remind them that there is literally nothing to stop them from “changing your name and moving to Seattle”.  They tend to treat such a comment as a joke.  Another “joke” I tell people:  A drunk presses up against a light pole on all sides.  After he goes completely around, he falls to his knees and shouts "I'm walled in!". 

Freedom is a very real thing.  Zen literature is full of examples of Buddhist monks demonstrating the abitrariness of their rules:  The student asks the master “What is the nature of the Buddha?” and receives an arbitrary answer:  a dried up stick, or perhaps a slap in the face.   The point is made that although the student is obeying "the rules" as he sees them, the master is demonstrating the triviality of the rules themselves by stepping "outside the box", and it is hoped that the student will awaken to reality.

 It should be clear that freedom is not something we achieve through meditation (or medication) but something that we already have. We already have the capability of acting with freedom, that is, without reference to what we consider to be "the rules".  We can do as we like.  We can go off “automatic pilot” and control our lives directly.  We can move to Seattle and change our name.  Nothing stops us but our unwillingess to act freely. However, what is not clear is that the price for such freedom may not only be the loss of personal possessions but the end of our belonging to others that we love.

No human relationship can survive in the total absence of rules.  We like to be able to predict what will happen at dinnertime tonight, at least to some degree.  We want some stability in our relationships and our lives.  In fact, we are willing to sacrifice some of our freedom in order to obtain stability and predictability.  In that process, however, we may forget that the sacrifice of some personal freedom is a choice, and that we may unmake that choice just as we made it.  

Freedom means no obligations of any kind, given or taken.  We are free to walk away from our job or our marriage, for instance, but we can't take them with us.  It is true that our "obligations" are arbitrary and self-imposed;  at the same time there is a price for discarding them.  Our relationships become unstable or disintegrate entirely.  Who will stay with us and love us if we cannot be expected to repay the gift?  Who will pay us money for work that we may or may not do?  It's not an accident that the wise Masters in Zen stories live alone in the forest, or teach for handouts.  And there seems to be nothing in the stories about them that implies happiness or satisfaction.  Freedom?  Yes indeed, but without the human relationships that give our lives much of their meaning.

It's also the case that we tend to become afraid of freedom.  When choices are actually endless, how do we make one?  Perhaps it doesn't matter what path we choose, but most people don't find the prospect of a trackless, pathless universe very comforting.  We tend to choose the devils we know rather than those we don't know.  We also forget that this act is a choice.  We are not limited unless we choose to be.  There is also a great deal to be said for being limited as long as we do not forget that being limited is a choice.

The People Hive vs. Us Others

Visiting a step-daughter in the hospital with her first baby, I'm watching the relatives and friends come and go in the room. Most of them are using their phones to text and twitter and send photos to each other. And, gradually, I begin to get a sense of a huge web of people connected electronically to each other, not communicating ideas but rather the personal trivia of our lives, back and forth, constantly affirming that they are here connected with us, all the time. All the time.

There is a group awareness developing more and more. It's almost as if the members of this huge web don't really exist as separate, independent people any more. Their very identities are tied up with what other people know about them, what experiences they share, their immediate perceptions of the world. I think of this group awareness as like that of a hive of bees, all independently operating but at the same time linked to one another and part of a group awareness that is not self-conscious. This "hive" awareness has somewhat tenuous boundaries of varying intensity, and is also linked to other hives of interlinked people.

The hives haven't been around long enough for us to know about their life-cycles, beginnings and ends (if they ever end). The hive members can't even consider not being linked up every moment, communicating with one another. Their communications are not really about what they're having for dinner or who is going out with who. They seem for the most part to be really simple affirmations of presence and existence. As such the content of their messages can be almost anything. People tweet to each other while in the bathroom, having sex, walking.. privacy doesn't matter when you are a hive member. Hive members tell each other and show each other EVERYTHING, and this unwillingness to have boundaries and privacy helps create the hive awareness and the blending of selves. I get the impression sometimes that hive members are all simply afraid to be alone and disconnected.

And some of us are individual bees, flying along and minding our own business, increasingly on the outside of the growing hives who know all about each other but who are hardly aware of the presence of us singletons. We don't belong. We don't share. We cherish our privacy and our boundaries, while the hives around us blend more and more with one another. Perhaps the hives will themselves develop an identity and boundaries of sorts, even a sort of limited self awareness. If one thinks of the members of the hive as nerve cells and the cell phones as axons and dendrites, it's clear that right now there is little difference between the structure of a solitary brain and the hive brain. The hive can even look out through the eyes of the cell phone and perceive things as well as hear them.

I hope the hive doesn't decide there is no room in the world for solitaries.