Reflections

A little water clears us of this deed ~ Lady Macbeth I'm going to be more careful about spreading my germs. I have probably got others sick by going out when I was unwell. I have probably also got them sick when I was contagious without knowing it. So I'm going to be more careful from now on; staying as clean as I can and keeping my distance. I will undoubtedly fall into careless patterns again. It's the human condition. So, aside from making amends, I'm going to ask forgiveness for not being able to stay clean and for spreading my germs, as well as forgive others for spreading theirs. That doesn't mean slackening a boundary, at least not intentionally. It actually means firming it up while also knowing it's bound to loosen.  I will give and receive compassionate cleansing.

Metanoia is a transformative change of heart.  The term suggests repudiation, change of mind, repentance, conversion and atonement. ~ Wikipedia There's an AA riddle that asks: If there are three frogs on a log and two decide to jump, how many are left on the log?  The answer of course is three, because they only  decided . (They never jumped). A lot of people I know, including myself, get trapped in self-destructive habits. They know what to do but don't do it.  They don't even  feel like doing it, let alone take that leap of faith. In order to break the cycle of passivity, action is clearly required. But where do you get the courage?  How do you go from head to heart?  They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, but I think it's  through his feet . In Seligman's experiments on learned helplessness , a group of dogs was yoked to another group learning how to avoid electrical shocks.  The yoked group received sho...

Pray you now; forgive and forget ~ William Shakespeare (King Lear) When a person has been betrayed, it is common to seek transparency and disclosure of the truth.  This appeals to our anxious brain hoping to stabilize disturbing emotions in knowledge and facts. What often happens, however, is that every detail teases out the desire to know more, and the quest for truth becomes a twisted and torturous rabbit hole of unanswered questions.  Rather than putting the pain of transgression behind, it gets fleshed out and remembered even more. The truth can sometimes be liberating. So can telling the story of our pain.  But, in some cases, like when you have been betrayed by a loved one, repeating the story of betrayal over and over is not going to set you free. Only forgiveness can do that.  And true forgiveness entails forgetting.  Not forgetting what is right and just, or abandoning the expectation of amends in your relationship going forward, but ceasing...

What kind of lunatic would come back here once he'd escaped?  There were now so many pink and yellow specks in my vision, it was as if I were inside a snow globe. ~ Tara Westover; Educated We are empathic to survivors of trauma we can see; to war vets who have witnessed the slaying of comrades, policemen who have found strewn corpses in a murder scene, survivors of acts of terrorism on the ground or in the sky. We feel for them and understand how the pain of regurgitated memories can prick and ruin the surface of ordinary life. But it is harder to feel for those whose trauma is inscribed in the folds of the unconscious or in the collective body of previous generations.  We fail to understand how sexual abuse (no matter how "small") can permanently move the boundary between self and other, or how African Americans, Native Americans, women and Jews can still be impacted by the horror visited upon their ancestors.  Violations of the soul lead to blind spots where a...

Proof lies on him who asserts, not on him who denies ~ Julius Paulus Prudentissimus I am selfish and social. Invisible to how my actions may look to you, I see clearly your every false move And seek justice and revenge Feeling intensely the results of your misconduct Yet knowing nothing of how my own misdeeds affect you. I am the victim, Born to justify and excuse myself, exercising perfect judgment When it comes to my own freedom More than I will ever be able to pardon you yours. I am not pointing the finger at you. I am looking at myself.

When he opened his eyes he was blind ~ Acts 9:8 Shoes on the Danube Bank Why are we blind to those we oppress? How can we be deaf to their cries? These days we seem to care so much about our environmental footprint yet so little about stepping on the toes of people right beside us.  Why? I don't have an answer, but I do wonder if the power of rank and privilege is something to which we cling just because it feels good, and looking under our shoes something from which we run- unless a foot catches us from behind and we *feel the heat*. Saul of Tarsus was a Jew of Roman privilege who persecuted the early Christians.  Heaven only knows what possessed this man, not just to oppress other men, but hunt them down, put them in chains and murder them.  Beyond the thrill of power and privilege, a person has to be deluded.  Utter darkness. When Saul was on his way to Damascus, he had a revelation. The story goes that he heard a voice say, "Why are you persecuting...

Life is a solitary cell whose walls are mirrors (Eugene O'Neill ) Much has been written on the subject of narcissism: extending beyond personal boundaries and spreading, uncontained, onto someone else's turf; the inability to appreciate others who are viewed as mere extensions of one's self, or mere reflections. Narcissists are extremely insensitive to others's needs, holding no regard for differences and all but obliterating separateness.  Nobody likes a narcissist! At the other end of the sepctrum are people so exquisitely sensitive to others's needs (perhaps children of narcissistic parents) that they have no filter for someone else's drama.  This is what I call reverse narcissism : the absorption of someone else's problems as if by osmosis.  Reverse narcissists are so thin-skinned that others' realities can be experienced as intrusive or invasive. Just as the narcissist can be so tactless and brash you want to put a mute on him, the reverse...