Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Breakthrough: Come For the Change...Stay for the Transformation

Wednesday, April 30, 2014



It’s another gray day here in the Twin Cities.  April is ending and I keep wondering when it will finally warm up to something approximating normal weather.  After one of the most brutal winters in decades I suspect many people here in Minnesota are hankering for a deep purge of the cold and gray weather.

I had quite a significant breakthrough yesterday while meeting with my therapist.  I’m more aware than ever before of my tendency to engage in black and white thinking.  It’s a very unhealthy habit.  The topic came up in my therapy session when I spoke about how I would prefer to already be done with the grief that I am feeling. 

Recently I conceived of a goal in which I give myself until the end of 2014 to complete my grieving process.  But as with any goal I must ask myself the following question: Is it a realistic goal?

When a person awakens from an anxiety disorder like I did (within the last twelve months) how long does it take to feel truly ‘normal’ when my past version of normal was actually living in a heightened, though subtle, state of anxiety?  I suspect the process of adjustment is very much related to how long a person has carried around a particular health condition.  In my case my experience of unfortunate trauma began very early in my life.  I had carried my anxiety disorder around for over three decades.  It seems to me giving myself a minimum of a year to grieve and adjust to a life without the deep burden of trauma is quite reasonable.  Perhaps it is still a bit too ambitious.  Only time will tell what is ultimately realistic and what is a bit difficult to reach.

I became aware of my unhealthy habit of black and white thinking when I imagined how I might feel if I don’t succeed at this goal of completing my grieving process by January 1, 2015.  If I don’t achieve this self-determined goal would it mean that all my effort towards realizing it was for naught?  If somehow I could easily measure my progress towards this goal would I conclude I had ‘succeeded’ if I was 80% done with my grieving?  What about 70%?  What if I were half-way there?  Would I not count what forward progress I had made as a success if I hadn't completely succeeded in achieving my goal?  Isn't doing that just a horrible example of black and white thinking?


The deeper issue under my consideration here is the issue of trusting in the unfolding journey of life.  Can I trust that I am moving in the direction that is for my highest good?  Can I trust that my grief will wane away when the proper time has come?  Can I trust that I will take such good care of myself that I will be able to complete my grieving process as fast as is possible?   And just how fast is that?  I do not know.  That is one of the challenges of engaging in deep healing work…when there is little data out there on what a ‘typical’ recovery process looks like it can be difficult to know what to expect.  And the uncertainty can be disquieting.

I am still adjusting to living in a world in which the material world around me vividly presents itself in all three dimensions.  I struggle to put into words what it was like for me to live before and after EMDR and the shamanic journey work I did.  Before last summer I experienced the world in what I would call about two and a half dimensions.  I experienced height and width fairly crisply.  But depth was something else.  I had depth perception before my most recent journey of treatment…but that perception seemed to be impaired or at least under-developed.  I am convinced that the sudden blossoming of the world into three vividly discernible dimensions is something that occurred as a direct result of the treatment I underwent which featured some notable differences from past treatment.  Those differences are, as I have noted, the use of EMDR therapy and shamanic journeying.  Besides the difference in my age these are the only significant differences that exist between this current course of psychotherapy and past ones.

Grief is a human experience so very distinct from anger, fear, rage, joy and all the other experiences a person will often have in life.  Grief and time do not seem to really converse with one another.  Grief and grieving consume time.  Grief has a leaden quality to it…it will not be denied and it will not be hurried out of where it takes up residence.  At least that is my impression based on my own journey as well as the lives of many, many people I have met along the journey of my own life.  And thus it seems a bit laughable that I should set such a firm deadline for the conclusion of my grieving process.  It is healthy to have goals related to our health, vocational achievement and the like.  But undue attachment to such goals, such that failure to achieve them becomes some catastrophic experience that feels like the very world is ending, is not very healthy.  It’s good to have a target to aim at.  It’s also nice to relax as I practice my aim.

I do feel as if my own journey of healing is still unfolding.  I feel that I am still growing.  How long that will be I cannot easily predict.  It would be a very healthy idea to learn to let go more easily and just accept the fact that this process of grieving is going to take some time.

...

I'm about to go to bed now.  It seems it would be wise to literally give myself more space in the flow of time of each day to allow myself to grieve.  Grief needs a space in my life so I can honor it and finally move on without it weighing me down.  And so as I go to sleep tonight I ask my dreams to give me wisdom on how I can be with my grief.






Tuesday, April 29, 2014

Special Gifts

Tuesday, April 29, 2014



I had an enjoyable Skype conversation with a student of the Foxfire Institute of Shamanic Studies in Berlin, Germany this morning.  It’s always a pleasure to chat with someone who has what I would call soulful eyes.

I first developed an interest in shamanic practices many years ago while studying under the direction of Dr. Colorado.   And yet I believe my sensitivity to phenomena we typically do not perceive in ordinary day to day reality has been with me since I was a child.  One experience in the earliest years of my childhood stands out in particular. 

At the tender age of twenty-three I lived among the Lakota Sioux Native American people on the Rosebud Reservation in southern South Dakota.  I can still vividly recall driving back to the reservation after making a trip out west to the vicinity of Rapid City.  As I drove back amidst a landscape completely empty of human habitation I found myself suddenly overcome by an immense amount of grief.  The grief I felt did not feel as if it belonged to me.  It seemed to me that it was a collective grief experienced by an entire group of people who were no longer living.  I did not see ghosts with my eyes.  I did not hear voices with my ears.  But my heart was telling me a different story.  My heart was telling me I was traversing a landscape that had been the site of much suffering.  I already knew this intellectually.  To feel grief in my heart was another matter entirely.

Looking back in hindsight a number of years later I believe I was experiencing the grief of the Lakota people who lost so much when the Americas were colonized by people not indigenous to the two continents.  How exactly I was able to feel this grief is not something I can easily describe even now.  What is the term for something that extends beyond your individual self?  I believe the term is transpersonal.

My conversation this morning leads me to reflect on the gifts I carry within me.  And I wonder if there are perhaps more gifts inside me than I have consciously been aware of.    Exploring your culture of origin can activate what I would call ancestral memory.  It’s my belief that such memory may literally reside encoded within our DNA.


Monday, April 28, 2014

Sadness and Cold Rain


Monday, April 28, 2014


I was hoping today would be an easy day.  It wasn’t.  It was probably, yet again, a confluence of factors that caused me to feel so sad.

First of all there is the weather.  If springs here in Minnesota continue to be as lame as the only two I have experienced thus far I think I would want to move away for this reason alone.  It’s almost May and we have experienced a very cold rain coming down in occasional torrents since yesterday.  Yes, the days are much longer now but this feels like small comfort considering how brisk the persistent east wind is.  I am ready for true spring weather.

The second factor was my seemingly innocuous work tasks for the day.  I spent part of the day wrapping packages for the upcoming hospice gala fundraiser.  There was one basket full of cute plush monkeys with smiles on their faces.  Another basket featured a baby blanket with children’s books.  I actually had to step away because I felt as if I was going to cry at one point.  Seeing all these cute, smiling monkeys just caused me to think of how I went to the dentist this morning to wisely invest my attention in taking care of my teeth.  These are the teeth I don’t show very much because I do not smile as much as I would like to.  I would like to smile more. I would like to have more fun.  But before I smile more I suppose I will have to work through my dense grief.

I felt so sad throughout the day.   At one point I felt the texture of the baby blanket and imagined the blessing it would have been to have always had a mother available to me throughout my earliest years who was healthy, balanced and nurturing.  I was fortunate to have other women in my life who did provide me care and kindness.  But as far as my most immediate home environment I did not enjoy the blessing of a consistently present mother.  I wish I had.  I may be a forty year old man but the sadness from the trauma in my childhood hasn’t completely healed.  I wonder how long it will take me to traverse the terrain of my inner world and purge the grief I have carried for so long.

I am happy to be working again.  More days than not I enjoy the work I do.  That is a big blessing in itself.  I am looking forward to seeing the results of all our work come Friday, May 9th.

I wish I could feel as if it were possible to have a healthy relationship with my father.  But I have given up on that dream.  It isn’t a realistic dream.  My father seems to be too afraid of his deepest feelings and wounds to ever give himself permission to explore them.  That is his immense loss.  And it is an immense loss to all who are connected to him. 

It’s strange how it has not even been a year since my whole old life disintegrated and I discovered I had still not fully healed from the trauma of my earliest years.  And thus I went through the anger, terror, anxiety and pain yet again.  I will not make this journey again.  I want to deal with that which still haunts (and has haunted) me now.  The time to heal is now.  My personal journey of healing will remain my first priority until I am done with the journey.  I still do not know how long it will ultimately take for me to heal.  I feel well underway now.  And yet it seems there is still such a long way to go.  There are days when I wonder why I get up in the morning and keep trying to improve my life.  In some respects it seems my life has changed very little since last June.  Indeed, I am still dealing with the consequences of some of my decisions I made last June.  I want to be free of the painful undertow of my earliest years of life.  When will I attain my complete freedom?

I occasionally have the feeling of being an isolated person whose voice is like one crying out in the wilderness.  Some days I have overly morbid thoughts about how I will be remembered once I have passed away.  These are dark thoughts for a forty year old man in basically good physical health to be having.  But there they are.  I cannot deny I have them.

I hope one day this long therapeutic journey will prove its worth.

If you are reading my blog and have found it of benefit I would really appreciate a supportive comment now.  I’d like to believe that what I am doing is making a difference in the world.



Five Things I Am Grateful For

Flirting with a cute neurologist
Healthy teeth
Ben and Jerry's ice cream
Green grass
My enjoyment of writing


Saturday, April 26, 2014

Honoring Our Ancestors

Saturday, April 26, 2014


As I have continued my journey through therapy once again I have noticed some fundamental changes taking place.  Some of these changes did not happen when I went through therapy on previous occasions.  Whether the changes happening now are due to the different quality and techniques used in the therapy or due to the fact that I am older than when I first went through therapy as an adult is difficult to ascertain.  I think some changes in the perspectives we carry are only natural as we make our way through our lives and (hopefully) mature.  Experience is an amazing teacher.

One change I notice is that my attitude regarding my families of origin is beginning to change.  About ten years ago I was actively involved in a graduate degree program in which I focused particular attention on a field known as indigenous science.  My primary mentor in that program was Dr. Pamela Colorado.  Dr. Colorado has made it her life's work to bring about a healing synergistic synthesis between Western science and what she calls indigenous science.

I was drawn to the teachings of indigenous science because I perceived the Western scientific paradigm, which I was first deeply exposed to as an undergraduate student of atmospheric science at Texas A&M University, lacked something significant.  My intuition is what led me to feel Western science lacked something.  When I was younger and casting about to find a way to make myself feel 'whole' I didn't really have the words to describe my own feelings of emptiness and alienation.  Discovering Dr. Colorado and her life's work helped me to address this darkness of knowledge and spirit.

Here is some content regarding indigenous science taken directly from the Worldwide Indigenous Science Network website (found here):


Indigenous science is a way of knowing and a way of life. The power of indigenous science lies in its ability to make connections and perceive patterns across vast cycles of space and time. This "Great Memory" belongs to the entire human species, but it is most full active in cultural healers who develop heightened levels of consciousness. The Great Memory may also be realized more universally when the interspecies bond is honored.

Like Western science, indigenous science relies upon direct observation for forecasting and generating predictions. There are cultural tests to ensure validity. Individuals are trained in various specializations—for example herbalism, weather observations, mental health and time keeping. Unlike Western science, the data from indigenous science are not used to control the forces of nature; instead, tell us the ways and the means of accommodating nature. Other critical distinctions include the following:




  1. The indigenous scientist is an integral part of the research process and there is a defined process for ensuring this integrity.
  2. All of nature is considered to be intelligent and alive, thus an active research partner.
  3. The purpose of indigenous science is to maintain balance.
  4. Compared to western time/space notions, indigenous science collapses time and space with the result that our fields of inquiry and participation extend into and overlap with past and present.
  5. Indigenous science is concerned with relationships, we try to understand and complete our relationships with all living things.
  6. Indigenous science is holistic, drawing on all the Sense, including the spiritual and psychic.
  7. The end point of an indigenous scientific process is a known and recognized place. This point of balance, referred to by my own tribe as the Great Peace, is both peaceful and electrifyingly alive. In the joy of exact balance, creativity occurs, which is why we can think of our way of knowing as a life science.
  8. When we reach the moment/place of balance we do not believe that we have transcended—we say that we are normal! Always we remain embodied in the natural world.
  9. Humor is a critical ingredient of all truth seeking, even in the most powerful rituals. This is true because humor balances gravity.


Of all the relationships I have entered into in my life my discovery of Dr. Colorado and her work was one of the most profound.  I became a very different person as a result of my path crossing with her own.

The fifth distinction noted above is particularly relevant to my writing today.  I repeat it here: "Indigenous science is concerned with relationships, we try to understand and complete our relationships with all living things."  When I first embarked on the academic program that led me to meet Dr. Colorado I could not easily put into words that part of my struggle and search was indeed focused on the issue of relationships.  It is my opinion that the industrialized 'First World' in which capitalism is defined as a primary organizing economic principle has some fundamental assumptions built into its foundational framework that are both inherently alienating to the individual and also at odds with a sustainable relationship with the Earth on which we depend for our very sustenance.  The purpose of my blog post today is not to explore these issues in any great depth.  I want to instead focus on the issue of relationships.

One manifestation of my issues as it relates to the realm of relationships was that I simply didn't feel I really belonged most anywhere I lived or traveled to.  I have visited more American states than I have not.  My father was born in the States and my mother is a native citizen of Germany.  And even though I grew up in the States and am not legally a dual citizen of both countries I still feel quite at home when I visit Germany.  The law does not recognize what is inscribed in my own heart.  In discovering indigenous science I found a way to understand and better interact within the relationships I had with myself, my families of origin and the world at large.


Two and three years ago I experienced my first significant hints that I would ultimately make a trip to Germany in the near future (as from the perspective of that time).  While visiting the island of Maui in May, 2011 I encountered a newspaper article in the Maui Times about the historical legacy of the Nazi period in Germany.  Then, about nine months later, in February, 2012 I experienced a more subtle hint. While at home one day I saw sunlight cascading into my bedroom and illuminating the photo of my four grandparents which I customarily have sitting on my altar.  Only my paternal grandfather (the one of my four grandparents who is of Dutch ancestry first and foremost) was in shadow.  The sunlight was illuminating my three grandparents who were primarily of Germanic heritage.

Last year, while making my trip to Germany as part of a fellowship awarded to me by the American Council on Germany, I took some time to visit my relatives and honor my long departed grandparents.  In doing so I was attempting to practice what I had first learned through meeting Dr. Colorado...namely practicing the use of indigenous science to cultivate healthy relationships with all that I am a part of.
Now, having finally provided some background for the purpose of context, I can speak about how I feel now.

Lately I have been experiencing what I would call are the limitations of 'ancestor worship.'  Ancestor worship as a phrase is perhaps not the best way of describing what I do in relation to my families of origin.  I try to honor all of my ancestors (or 'all my relations' to borrow a phrase commonly found in Native American parlance) with the life I live.  One challenge that can arise, however, is when you fundamentally do not agree with some of the choices your ancestors made or attitudes your ancestors held.  It is this issue of differences of perspective that has been on my mind lately.

In regards to my father I have wondered how much of his own dysfunctional behavior is rooted in his own relationship with his father.  As my paternal grandfather has long since passed away and I do not known if I can trust what my own father now says (as I have elucidated in other entries in this blog) it is difficult for me to reconstruct my father's relationship with his father.  However, I think I can safely say that my grandfather and father are, like so many people, 'products' of the broader backdrop of the unique historical period they have lived in.

And I believe this holds true for my maternal family of origin as well.  For example, in trying to learn more about my mother's father I once heard my father speak briefly about my maternal grandfather's attitude regarding the Ukrainian people.  My maternal grandfather served on the side of the Nazis and was sent to Russia.  As of this moment in my life I still know very little about that period of his life.  However, I have tried to imagine what it must have been like when Germany was defeated in 1945 and the country lay in ruins.  My grandfather was in his early 30s at that time.  To witness your entire nation occupied, its infrastructure obliterated and its future immensely uncertain was an immense trauma for the German people.  And of course there were the horrors visited on so many other European peoples during the time of Hitler's regime.  I have no doubt the war significantly affected my grandfather.  (I can still recall him talking about Germany immediately after World War II and how 'alles war kaputt' (everything was ruined/broken).)  To be a young man at the time of your nation's apparent long-term demise must have been heart wrenching.  Anyway, I have digressed a bit.

If my own father is correct it appears my maternal grandfather didn't have the highest opinion of the Ukrainian people.  It's difficult for me to not have this anecdotal information be in my mind as of late considering current events in Ukraine and Russia.  In hearing my father relay his knowledge about my maternal grandfather I again can't help but think about the significance of historical influences.  How much of my grandfather's attitude was a result of Nazi conditioning?  I cannot easily answer this question even though it is an interesting question to pose.

The point I am essentially trying to make in this posting is that honoring our ancestors only takes us so far in our own personal development.  Our ancestors made mistakes just as we have.  Our ancestors are influenced by the circumstances of the unique time in history they lived in...just as we are.  We might not fully understand our ancestors' decisions but is it all that realistic to expect that we always could do so considering the continual change of the world at large?  Would I have ultimately lived a life very different from my maternal grandfather had I been born into his particular circumstances in the Germany of the early 1910s?  I cannot answer this question.


As I continue to work through the impact the trauma of my early life history (which is itself intimately intertwined with the lives of my ancestors and their own successes and failures) had on me I see that I am gradually disentangling myself from the circumstances of my own origin and seeing my life more clearly and a bit more dispassionately.  As I do this I find myself feeling more and more like my true self.  The journey of self discovery can be a long and arduous road.  It certainly has felt like that for me more than one time in my own life.

I still honor my ancestors in my own way.  I still believe in displaying this one particular photo of my four grandparents on my altar.  But it seems I am finally mature enough now to be able to be my own man and not feel this is somehow disrespecting my ancestors.  Loving relationships can only be built on a mutual foundation of respect.  And that respect can and must itself be founded on recognizing the inherent dignity of all human beings.  And yet it can be challenging when we live in particular circumstances in which our societies' media blare propaganda designed to denigrate other people.  The Nazi Germany of my grandfather's early adulthood demonized the Jews.  Today in America one sees 'news' media like Fox News vilify poor people and minorities.  It seems every generation has its designated scapegoats.  Will this ever change?  I wonder.

I love my ancestors and honor them as best as I can.  Even though I feel completely estranged from my paternal family of origin (and wonder if that will ever change) I still love my family.  I attempt to cherish the good memories I have of them and not dwell in the painful ones.  Can a person do more than that?

...

NOTE:

During the month of May, 2014 I will be taking a break from writing new content for my blog.  I will instead share the journal entries I wrote while making my research trip which was made possible by the American Council on Germany.  My trip took place during the period of May 13-May 31, 2013.  I will begin writing new content once again on June 1, 2014.















Friday, April 25, 2014

Finding My Way

Friday, April 25, 2014


The monochromatic realm of whites, browns and grays is finally being replaced by that wondrous color green.  I don't think I have ever so eagerly looked at the trees for signs of their opening buds as I have this year.  And yet even now Lake Superior is still more than half-covered with ice...and May is only a week away.  We're definitely easing into Spring this year.

I am finally healthy enough that I do not even see a chiropractor on a regularly scheduled basis anymore.  I only go as needed now.  My calendar is starting to lighten up now; the only regular appointments I currently have scheduled are with my therapist and acupuncturist.

Now that I am working again, my health is continuing to improve, the seasons have changed and I have set other health related goals it's time to focus on another important piece of my recovery puzzle.  It's time to resurrect my financial health as well.  Looking from the outside in it would appear I made no progress whatsoever in the last year in regards to my financial health.  But such an impression would be incorrect.  Why?  Your health is the most precious wealth you can have.  An extremely wealthy man and an extremely poor man (monetary wealth) may both easily die from the same terminal illness.  Naturally wealth can help a person to purchase a much needed treatment or experimental drug that might be outside the financial grasp of a poor person.  Yet regardless of our socioeconomic status we all  have corruptible bodies subject to injury, permanent damage and death.

My bank statement doesn't look much more impressive than it did this time last year.  But my health is so much better than it was a year ago.  I am thus in a better position now to earn a good income now that my health is not a serious factor that could hinder my ability to work.  This is huge progress!

The quality of your life really can change for the better if you commit to taking the actions necessary to make a good life for yourself.  It really is possible.  And it is possible to recover from really severe trauma.  I am living proof of that!


Thursday, April 24, 2014

What Could Have Been

Thursday, April 24, 2014



The grief I am currently working through has many facets.  Thus like a children’s Christmas gift that is marked with the dreaded phrase ‘Some Assembly Required’ it takes a special finesse and mindfulness to deal with the varied factors that contributed to my grief.  Grief can be a complex puzzle.  Pulling apart the strands that contributed to my grief in the distant past, the recent past and the present is not a task for the uninitiated, lazy or apathetic.  It takes very real effort to attend to grief.  But the alternative to attending to it, namely avoiding it, can have serious and lifelong consequences.  I would rather deal with my issues now rather than avoid them.

As I continue to marvel at my ‘new and improved’ eyesight as well as my capacity to be radically present in the moment I can’t help but feel a sadness borne of wondering just how different (and better) my life could have been had the impacts of my experience of trauma early in life been dealt with at the time or shortly thereafter.  All the talk therapy in the world didn’t seem to do much as compared with some sessions featuring EMDR therapy as well as the shamanic journey work I did with a local practitioner.

I have enough intelligence and life experience to know it will not prove beneficial to me in the long term to dwell too much on what could have been.  Eventually the past must be put in its place…namely the past.  Living in the past or in some future filled with anxiety and fear is not really living at all.  I would call that existing…something people on life support who are unconscious of their surroundings would do.  Life is meant to be lived, not tolerated, managed, hidden from or feared.

And yet even though I know it wise not to dwell on past hurts too much it is difficult not to wonder just what type of person I could have been if my past trauma had been dealt with when I was still a child.  Perhaps I would have earned a 4.0 in my undergraduate studies and immediately entered into graduate school.  Perhaps I would be financially secure by this point in my life.  Perhaps I would have a stable, longstanding circle of friends I could count on to be there for me in my life.  Perhaps I would have more trust that investing my heart and mind in the things I really care about would bring returns on my investment that make it all worthwhile.  Maybe I would be a successful singer, writer or artist.  Who knows who I could have been!

In some strange way I have to find a way to put the past to bed…permanently.  People start over at all sorts of ages.  I am always inspired when I hear stories of people who conquered incredible odds and realized amazing personal visions for their future lives.  I still recall reading about a man who obtained his high school diploma at the age of ninety-eight.  Most anything is possible if you commit yourself to the process of growth without deep attachment to the outcome.

I have spoken of the reality of how gender correlates with grief.  In American culture I perceive a too pervasive and dysfunctional concept of manhood that insists that men not openly express emotion.  After September 11, 2001 the ‘Macho Man Syndrome’ seemed to rise in prominence as the country responded to the trauma of that day much as a kid with existing aggressive tendencies would respond to an assault on the school playground.  I have few good and immediate examples in my own life about how one can grieve.  Francis Weller, whom I met last year at the Minnesota Men’s Conference, has a special skill and focus on the issue of grief.  He is  a good resource to check out. 

….

It’s a rainy, cold day here in the Twin Cities.  At least it isn’t snowing.  Our local weatherman Paul Douglas indicates our month of May may have a cool, wet bias.  I wonder what our summer will be like this year.  I hope it is ultimately better than the one from last year.  I don’t much savor unrelenting heat for weeks and weeks at a time but it would be nice to have a summer worthy of the winter we endured.

I am giving myself until the end of 2014 at the very least to work through the grief I am carrying regarding my issues with my paternal family of origin.  Considering how long I lived with the burden of heightened anxiety (which was in more recent years so subtle) giving myself at least a full year to grieve is, in my estimation, quite reasonable.  I didn’t really begin to focus more specifically on my grief until I first was able to dig through and address all the anger I was feeling.  That process alone took several months.  Last year I was consumed with a lot of anger throughout the summer.  This summer will apparently be the summer I actively work through my grief.

This healing journey is something of an odyssey.


Five Things I Am Grateful For

The thawing of the Earth
Rain that washes away the old snow
My therapist
My job
The mere possibility of a much better future



Wednesday, April 23, 2014

A New Season…A New Angle on Grief


Wednesday, April 23, 2014



One can no longer doubt that the seasons are changing…even here in Winter hardened Minnesota.  The sun feels genuinely warm today.  I think I could last make that claim six months ago.  In my own personal development timeline six months ago might as well be a lifetime ago.  So much has changed in the intervening months.  I am so much healthier than I was.  And yet there remains that ponderous, leaden grief.

My grief feels a bit like the huge mounds of snow that have only grudgingly shrunk as the warmth of Spring begins to take a firmer hold.  Is my grief better?  Yes.  Am I done with the grieving process?  No.  I don’t feel anywhere close to the end of grieving.  But I also don’t feel anywhere near the beginning of my journey either.  I am well on my way.

As winter fades and the color green grows I feel both delight and relief, excitement and occasionally an inner calm that seems unlikely given the fairly recent events of my life.  I even feel that subtle shade of happiness known as contentment every so often.  The hardship of the past winter is over.  I survived it.  And I survived it relatively unscathed.  Now that Spring has come thoughts of spring inspired cleansing are filling my mind.  That ‘plate of my life’ that was brimming full last July is much less so now.  I am clearing out all sorts of issues and loose ends.  I am lightening my load…and as I lighten my load I myself feel lighter.  I feel inclined to take a nap in a window collecting full sunshine with a cat on my stomach.  Days like today are the kind that hypnosis is made for.  I could almost fall into an altered state of consciousness just being outside bathing in the sun.

Even though it’s been nearly ten months since the unnecessarily dramatic events of last June I still feel as if I am waking up from a very unfortunate dream.  I’ve been coming into full wakefulness one step at a time.  Like taking one step after another up and out of a dank cellar I find myself emerging into the light of a bigger and brighter possibility.  I can see no horizons in this new reality.  Anything does indeed seem possible.  The limitations of my past do not have to constrain me a moment longer.  I can think outside the box of my past life.  My future will not equal my past.  I only wish I had been at this developmental stage in my life before turning forty.  But considering the amount of illness in my own families of origin I am indeed doing quite well.

The day features not just lovely sunshine but a wind that finally has no touch of the power of Winter in it.  The wind is now blowing from a different part of the world.  A different mindset is necessary now that a different season is beginning.  It’s time to emerge from hibernation.  It’s time to cultivate the new and joyful beginnings we have dreamed about during the solitude of winter.

I am happy for the arrival of Spring.  And I am still sad.  Joy and wistfulness intermingle within me.

Tuesday, April 22, 2014

If Only


Tuesday, April 22, 2014


If only.  If only…Rome *could* be built in a day

I am not a morning person…at least not in the typical sense.  I do not relish getting up early in the morning for the purpose of dashing off to work and being productive for the sake of helping someone else.  I do enjoy getting up and enjoying my morning for my own purposes.  I am still burned out…but I am less burned out than I was yesterday….and the day before…and the day before that one.  The trend of my life is pointed in the direction of improvement though the gains I make each day sometimes feel achingly small and won only after great effort.

It’s a beautiful Spring morning here in Minnesota.  It actually isn’t even below freezing…finally.  We call this progress here in Minnesota.  The color green is making a comeback now.  The area ponds and lakes have liquefied.  Birds can finally actually plunge into them rather than walk on top of them.

I actually like my job.  That is saying quite a bit.  I cannot recall the last time I could say that.  And I like writing each and every day as well.  Life is getting better all the time.  So why do I still feel so much grief?  Well, I would say I feel grief partly due to my impatience and partly due to the magnitude of the changes I am making in my life.  I have basically excised my paternal family of origin from my life.  I am recovering from an anxiety disorder that had not been successfully treated.  When you carry something around like that for over three decades you don’t exactly recover in the course of a day.  Rome was not built in one day…and my re-creation of my life in a form that fulfills my needs will not take place in a day either.  It is a process.  And sometimes those processes take a lot of time.  Babies need nine months in the mother’s womb before they are full-term and ready to enter the world.

There are days when I feel like hiding away and doing absolutely nothing.  At least I am getting better at paying attention to the deepest feelings within me.  I am exploring the terrains of my wounds and finding a way to create a life that effectively applies balm to them such that they heal.  Healing is both an art and a science.  Just as there is no exact formula for success there is also no exact formula for healing.  Everyone is different.  People have unique needs according to their backgrounds, the circumstances of their lives and their goals.  How I ultimately may find my way to the “promised land” of a Healthy Self is not likely to be the perfect match for another person’s journey.  We are all unique and special.  Pigeonholing people for the sake of efficiency or in response to apathy rarely does anyone much good.  At least that has been my observation.

……

Well my afternoon ended on a bit of a low note.  I had a brief conversation with someone within Allina about possibilities that might exist to find a long-term position within development work.  I was discouraged to hear that now is not a good time to be seeking such opportunities.  Allina is currently on a hiring freeze and is looking to focus on cutting costs.  The bottom line is one I have unfortunately heard all too many times in the last three years: Opportunities are scarce.  I am trying not to get enmeshed in self-pity but I am so fed up with the poor economy.  I invested so heavily in my professional development in the hope that it would pay off.  The Return on Investment for my decision to attend graduate school has been minimal…and I have looked for opportunities commensurate with my skill set for three years.  I perhaps wouldn’t feel so dismayed by this ongoing challenge if other aspects of my life were more satisfying.  But most every aspect of my life is a work in progress.  I try to find the beauty in each day…and yet I wonder if I will ever escape poverty, loneliness and a lack of consistent fulfillment. 

My childhood had an obscene amount of instability in it.  I survived it.  But now it seems forces beyond my control are working against my recovery.  What was the point of investing in my future if our economy continues to be lackluster and our supposed leaders devoid of vision or integrity?  I as one man cannot do much to change powerful economic forces that have gutted the American economy.  I as one person cannot reverse American habits such as shopping for bargain basement prices at places like Walmart (even if such habits help undermind the very economic fabric of small communities all over the country).  I alone cannot keep shortsighted, hateful people from gaining power through acquisition of power via the political process.  I do not want to continue to live in America if America continues to become America the stupid more and more.

Anyhow, in the spirit of being grateful I will offer a positive ending to my post today.


Five Things I Am Grateful For

My job
My immune system
My amazingly good vision
The color of green and its many subtle shades
A community of people I trust

Monday, April 21, 2014

What Is Grace?


Monday, April 21, 2014



When I was a student of Naropa University I took a course entitled “Creativity and Tragedy”.  In recognition of the themes of some of my more recent writings I thought I would share a paper I wrote for this class.  The paper was inspired by Sobonfu Some.  The content appears below.


Subonfu Some writes that the state of grace “is that holy and contented way of being that each of us strives for.”  She claims that signs of grace include an ability to “function peacefully in connection with other people in the flow of life” and making “progress in accomplishing the purpose for which we were born into the world in a way that is pleasing to those around you.”  She later states that “to fall out of grace is a gift, one of the greatest gifts that one receives in life.”

To elaborate my own definition of grace will in some ways contradict some of what Some claims.  I do believe that grace is marked by making progress in the accomplishment of our life purpose.  I do not agree that fidelity to such purpose will necessarily please all of those around us.  Far from it, actually I would say.  Also, it does not strike me as necessarily true that being in grace leads us to function peacefully with others.  Sometimes conflict is a sure sign of growth, and conflict is not necessarily pleasing!  I shall elaborate what I mean shortly.

My definition of being in a state of grace is complex.  It is: An awareness that all creation is a bountiful blessing and exists in such a way that it can and does support you when you yourself are committed to the continual adherence to your own life purpose.  Living a life marked by grace is further demonstrated by an embrace of this awareness such that you make fulfillment of your life purpose your focus around which your whole life orients.  An intellectual comprehension that there is a blessing in all which life brings us is not the same as living an acceptance of this in an embodied, daily way.

Leadership involves offering a competency in some skill to others seeking to develop their own capacity in that same area.  An ideal leader seeks to enhance the ability of others even if that should mean she will eventually no longer be needed.

I have fallen from grace previously when I refused to acknowledge a proficiency I have for leadership in some realms outside of the main work focus I have.  The challenge for me has been to accept this capacity, find a way to offer it so that others may benefit and yet remain balanced so that I don’t over-commit my energies and then my ability to help.

I define family as that matrix of people with and through whom the greater world is mediated to us in all its beauty, tragedy, responsibility, privilege, possibility and limitation.  There are two basic families, those of blood origin and those of our own choosing.

Falling out of grace within the context of family can assume many forms, including the rejection of an individual based on a core aspect of self, forgetting of familiar origin and gifts and adoption of ideologies prevalent in a dominant and dominating cultural paradigm that lead to suffering, loss and ultimately total destruction.

It is my feeling that I fall and have fallen from grace according to some in my family by insisting my family itself conduct an examination of how it has fallen out of grace.  When a family is immersed in its unacknowledged shadows, any person who throws a probing light on the consequent dysfunction can easily become a target for mistreatment and eventual alienation.  The Catholic Church has acted more to suppress than empower my family to express its beauty and gifts.  Some wisely observes that “where a certain, narrow kind of Christianity has been instilled, people accept that they have been born evil.  This view infiltrates the way people look at each other.  “We are all basically evil.”  Somehow, some distance back in my family lineage, my father’s family became converted to Catholicism.  I don’t as yet know when, how or why this occurred.  But gradually the family seems to have inculcated as true the now popular misconception of the emphasis on sin, personal and collective, in the predominant Biblical creation myth.  This overemphasis of the fall-redemption ideology seems to have led to my family becoming dependent on an idea of salvation that requires a mediation through priests.

I myself later fell from grace in the estimation of some of my family when I revealed myself to be of a homosexual sexual orientation.  My lack of true shame about my sexual identity clashed very much with the idea of being “objectively disordered” promulgated by the Church that much of my family has been indoctrinated into.

I believe there is much wisdom and truth in Some’s assertion that “we be willing to get down and scratch and dig our own imperfect family back to grace.”  How this occurs and whether a family can accept a return to grace is unclear to me.  In my own exploration I have come to conclude that all a person can do is faithfully stand in alignment with his essence.  Nothing more can be done.  The idea that one of us can or even has changed another is pure delusional folly.  We are separate individuals and what we do “here” can only be a source of inspiration for how someone is being over “there”.  The example a person makes of her life can inspire others to change their own.

As with several of the stories Some briefly relates, my experience of falling from grace has resolved around the reality of unfulfilled expectations.  My father had hoped I would give him grandchildren.  Though this most certainly still remains a possibility, the context of how this would occur would not be as he had first imagined.  I would be married to a man and have to adopt children or use some other creative method.  This is not what he had initially held in his imagination as how it could be.

I also have the common experience of having suffered a long ongoing homesickness.  Throughout much of my earliest years of adulthood I always had an intuitive feeling that seeking out the land of my ancestral origin in Europe was the only way for me to heal.  Spending time in my ancestral land, as one man did according to Some, seems to be the only cure, but a true one at that.

I finally wish to articulate my belief that I may very well be the janitor, “a humble person who will sweep clean” my family history that Some describes.  I certainly have carried a family burden and have often felt myself as a voice crying out in the wilderness.  My intuition is that my family has a special gift it has forgotten to practice.  I hope to discover it during my time in the Netherlands.

I define work as that activity one develops a deep proficiency for, has a gift for performing, enjoys doing and which affords one a living.

It seems clear I have, through my own action and inaction, done nothing to fall from grace in the work sphere of my life.  Rather, as Some herself observes about the West, the broader culture no longer offers a meaningful container in which one can discover the true gifts he has that the world eagerly awaits.  We choose a career and mold ourselves into it rather than allowing our talents to mold our lives.  I am still seeking deeper clarity about my life purpose after having performed numerous jobs through the years.  Somehow the lack of conscious, competent guidance to develop and offer my true gifts has been an invitation into grace, the grace of being willing and able to set out on an exploration for eventual clarity of my purpose.

The village environment Some touches on seems to have the potential to be oppressive in a different manner.  With the purpose of a person known from birth, it seems possible a child might be dissuaded from energetic exploration of activities known to not be in alignment with that purpose  Yet cutting out such exploration would be like cutting out all play.  Removing this outlet has been observed to be detrimental to people’s well being in various health studies.

Possibly the greatest way I have fallen from grace, and continue to do so, has been my continual tentative dance with my knowledge of the inevitability of death.  We are all mortal beings housed in a body which has a finite time here on the planet.  I seem to find myself frequently enmeshed in an outlook that insists there will be enough time to do all I wish to, that I will live to a ripe age and enjoy many things many others do not.  The West’s simultaneous fascination with and denial of death has certainly impacted my own development.

I most identify with Some’s comment that “People say ‘I have this powerful mind.  If I knew how to use it right I would never have gotten sick,’ or ‘I would be able to heal.  Many times I have imagined that it is indeed within the power of my mind to heal my body.  Yet if this is true, I must simply not yet know how to cleverly harness the power of my mind, or so I have imagined.  During my journey to my ancestral homeland, I wish to discover if it is true in my indigenous tradition, as it is with the Dagara, that ‘people who are chronically ill are regarded as specially initiated.’  I have been challenged by a variety of health difficulties for over three years now.  I know not if they shall permanently improve.  That seems to be the evolutionary course.  Amazingly, despite my own challenges, my birthmother’s descent into schizophrenia and my father’s near death at the age of forty, I still find myself deeply ensconced in this illusion that there will be plenty of time.  Of the lessons I feel I need to learn, day after day, and of the many ways a person’s fall from grace can manifest, the truth of our shared mortality challenges me most.  Imagine if we could all treat one another in such a way that is honoring and respectful based in the knowledge, cultivated by an active awareness, that every time we see someone could be our last time being with that person, either because we may die or this other person may die.  Perhaps the cultivation of such awareness would help us to transform the planet.  Perhaps we would take each other less for granted and really be with other human beings.


Sunday, April 20, 2014

That Fabulous Trickster

Sunday, April 20, 2014


I was not planning to write today given that it is Easter Sunday in the Christian calendar.  But holidays have a way of inspiring my heart and mind.  And that happened again today.

Growing up in Texas it usually did not happen that Easter Sunday fell at that special and small window of time when the world outside is bursting forth in green after the dormancy of winter.  The warmest parts of Texas do not even have consistently freezing weather at night in the 'coldest' part of the winter season so the whole idea of a 'growing season' is not really applicable as it is in the northern part of the United States.  I honestly cannot remember an Easter when the trees and plants outside had not already bloomed in the Dallas-Ft. Worth metroplex where I grew up.

As I have noted more than enough times already we are emerging from one of the most brutal winters in decades here in Minnesota.  The lakes around the Twin Cities and points south of here have essentially completely thawed.  But thawing out the northern half of the state will take some time yet.

You could barely guess that winter had been so severe when outside today in the Twin Cities.  Brilliant sunshine and temperatures over 70F are making it easy to forget about the brutal winter while we simultaneously remember that yes indeed there is such a season as Spring.  The season of dormancy does end and the deciduous trees do come back to life here...in good time.  There are still a few piles of snow here and there that are the meager remnants of the mountains of snow created by the plows of our past winter.  But you actually have to look for those piles to even really notice them now.  Meanwhile the buds on trees and bushes are greening up and out.  A few days of weather like what we have today will coax them into full emergence.  Yes, Winter is finally leaving us for another year.

I have been looking forward to this time of year for months now.  After my unexpected deep healing journey began last summer I found my health and interior life improving as the world outside moved in the opposite direction towards the release of autumn and the quiet of winter.  This incongruence between the direction of my own life and the trend in the natural world felt quite jarring for a time.  As Winter began last year I found it a perplexing experience to feel so energized while the world outside was growing dark, cold and silent.  At least the incongruence is over now.


In my blog entry from Saturday, February 8th I spoke of my experience of Jesus after writing about a recent sermon given by the Reverend DeWayne Davis at All God's Children Metropolitan Community Church.  When I went on a thirty day silent retreat as part of my training in the Jesuit order (when I was in my 20s...it feels like a lifetime ago now) I experienced Jesus personifying the trickster archetype.  I want to finish writing on that topic now...or at least write more.

I think rising from the dead after being crucified to a tree is quite the trick.  If that doesn't qualify you as a trickster I don't know what would.  To defeat death itself is the ultimate achievement.  But how else could a person honestly claim that Jesus embodies this particular archetype?  I would answer with the following:
  • Jesus is noted as performing many miracles of healing that simply were unthinkable in the time he lived in.  Lepers, the seriously ill and even those who had died are noted as being healed after an encounter with Jesus.  In my opinion these are still more examples of Jesus being a trickster.  Helping people to miraculously recover from what appeared to be terminal conditions is amazing.
  • Consider also the story in which Jesus turned water into wine.  Do you have any friends who can do that?
  • Chasing the money changers out of the temple was certainly a sudden event befitting the behavior of a trickster. 
  • Walking on water is another amazing trick.  Unless you happen to live in Minnesota or some other place where the lakes regularly freeze in the winter walking on water is beyond the range of your talents.
There are certainly more examples than these but I cannot recall more at the present moment without pondering the events of Jesus' life more thoroughly.

I believe we need tricksters in our world.  They serve a vital role.  Many embody the trickster in the form of clowns, actors, politicians and scam-artists.  The shadow side of the trickster archetype can obviously cause harm in the world...but even the shadow has its value.  Sometimes immense pain becomes the source material from which grow our greatest gifts and insights.  Thus there is nothing fundamentally wrong with pain...it is our relationship with pain that we must transform.  In doing so we can find freedom!


Friday, April 18, 2014

Lightning, Thunder and Rain Oh My!

Friday, April 18, 2014


I am finally seeing something in our extended weather forecast that I cannot recall ever being so happy to see.  It looks fairly likely that we here in the Twin Cities will have lightning and thunder as part of a storm next week.  Even though lightning and thunder sometimes accompany severe snowstorms in the winter these phenomenon are nonetheless something I believe most of us associate with Spring.  Yes, Spring is coming...it really is!  I think it would be funny to make up a t-shirt that reads "I survived the worst winter in 50 years while simultaneously healing from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder".

It's so funny that my deep healing process would coincide with one of the worst winters Minnesota has experienced in decades.  I feel this made my desire for the turning of the seasons to Spring all the more palpable and intense.  My eyes are hungry to see more green in the world.  It's been a long, long time since we had green on all of the trees around here.  The world outside my own skin appears so vivid to my eyesight now.  I am still not fully accustomed to the experience of such vividness.  But over time I am gradually adjusting more and more.

I had an acupuncture session this morning.  I reached a state of deep relaxation I have not experienced in a very long time.  Indeed, I cannot easily recall the last time I felt so relaxed.  The momentum of my healing journey is increasing.  I am so happy to experience this.  Today was the first time I actually felt convinced in the very fiber of my being that I will one day reach a discernible endpoint in my healing process.  I have heard some people say that healing is a lifelong process.  I can believe that would be true.  And yet I would rather focus on the present moment and enjoy all that I am experiencing in this moment.


Five Things I Am Grateful For

Acupuncture
My ability to walk
Nourishing food
My loyal friends
The momentum of my healing process

......


I’m having another one of those ‘special’ moments.  Perhaps it is only natural considering that the winter season is decisively ending now and spring is coming into being.  The area lakes and ponds have finally thawed; there is liquid water again!  And today much of the snow that fell recently melted away.  Green grass is now visible everywhere.  And now even the nights should remain above freezing…at least for the next five or six days.  This is my first Spring season featuring my renewed vision and ‘upgraded’ self made possible by a combination of therapy, exercise, EMDR therapy and shamanic journey work.  It still is strange to be this ‘new’ me.  It really isn’t truly a new me.  I am expressing the person I have always been.  When a veneer of fear and trauma are pulled away you can more easily see your own beauty emanating from within.

I was walking through downtown Minneapolis this evening after leaving the Eagle Bar.  I again felt a bit overwhelmed by the immense subtleties of light and shadow.  Even as I sit and write while waiting for the bus my eyes are catching the shadows of my hands as they appear on the screen.  Cars driving by on Hennepin Avenue repeatedly cast varying amounts of light on my computer screen.  And now an ambulance is driving by.  Looking up I can see the many colors of lighting along Hennepin Avenue.  There are flashing orange and red lights above the entrance to Pantages across the street.  The Graves Hotel building stands further away and is illuminated by pillars of light.  I see a collection of red brake lights on the rear ends of cars as they sit at an intersection a few blocks away.  I can see the texture of dried grass and a cigarette butt in a hole in the pavement near the curb.

Perhaps my inventory of what I see around me seems a bit anal but it seems a good way to convey how unfamiliar this better way of being is.  I see more clearly now than ever before.  It’s not that I wasn’t seeing before.  I was seeing the world before last summer.  But I was not perceiving the world with the clarity of vision I have now.  The change in my eyesight was strangely subtle and simultaneously profound.  I still struggle to describe what has happened to me.  It’s as if I was asleep for about thirty years or so.

A particular memory from my childhood has been in my thoughts the last few days.  The IDS building in downtown Minneapolis has some interior white lighting reminiscent of what you expect to see at Christmastime in Christmas trees as well as outdoor lighting.  I have been remembering the time when I first got eyeglasses as a kid.  I went to a place in a local mall with my Dad.  And I still vividly remember how amazed I was when I realized how people with 20/20 vision actually perceive the world.  All the blurry balls of white light suddenly became crisp pinpoints of light when I put my glasses on.  Now, many years later, I have had a similar awakening also connected to my vision.  The world is as breathtakingly vivid as it was on that day when I first began wearing eyeglasses.

I still find it a bit difficult to adjust to my new way of perceiving reality in part because I am so aware of subtlety.  I see the immense variety of intensities of light.  I see the lights of restaurant signs.  I see the lights of streetlamps.  I see the lights reflecting off a variety of surfaces.  There are so many varieties, reflections, colors and intensities of light that I find myself not infrequently feeling a bit awestruck.  I have never lived without some amount of eyesight.  But what I experience now feels to me like what I imagine a formerly blind person might feel upon enjoying eyesight for the first time.  It feels a bit surreal.  And though I am adjusting to it I sense the process of adjustment is going to continue for a very long time as of yet.  How long I cannot say.  I am living the mysterious unfolding of unexpected healing.  It is extraordinary.

I hope one day the writing I have committed to doing will be found of value not just to the field of medicine but to anyone who would be interested to read it.  I hope my voice is one day remembered and cherished.  I have no children and I don’t know that I can realistically expect I ever will.  I had an interest in having children earlier in my life.  If the right mix of circumstances came along I could imagine still being open to such a possibility.  Maybe such unexpected gifts will appear in my life.  I certainly wasn’t expecting what began last June.