THE CONVERSATION IS THE OBJECT OF STUDY

 

Mindfulness in Psychoanalysis is a community-based practice that emphasizes the value of intimacy and conversation. Group gatherings and individual conversations are the backbone of the endeavor, With a nod to professional ethics, & confidentially, Mindfulness in Psychoanalysis offers a safe place to evaluate and reevaluate the thoughts & feelings involved in the decisions we make all our lives.

Psycho-Analysis is not an aspect of psychology. It is a more convenient fit with philosophy and literature and medicine.  It practices the art and science of conversation and intimacy. Words and the ever-popular, “turn-of-a-phrase,” metaphors and punctuation, free-association and resistances, and the unconscious, these are the tools for progressive conversation.

In modern psychoanalysis, we aim for authentic encounters, from which we can research the data– words and the collection of words used to describe and understand each other. The conversation is the object of study.

Our methods are not traditional diagnoses like would be found in the Diagnostic Manuals of Mental Disorders. Our aim is to discover what developmental sequences might be uncovered by listening for patterns in the free-association. The models discovered often are a metaphor for the resistance to better health that unconsciously prevents the patient from not being able to get out of his own way.

As a trained practitioner of psychoanalysis, my job is to facilitate conversation based on the contact that the client makes with me. Emotional communication is primarily a method of response to the patient that involves acknowledging the patients feeling and mood, but NOT confronting the defense; rather, mildly acknowledging the defense in a manner that might get the patient interested in the new information.

I want my patients to become very interested in themselves and to share with me what they are finding.  Judgment suspended, the negative energy escapes, leaving room for desires and satisfactions to take on a mental shape.  It is using the energy of the dysfunction to throw light upon awakenings that are stirred and stimulated in the deep, meta-language process used through psychoanalysis.

Psychoanalysis: breath & balance

 

Breath and balance are, as important as anything can be moving us toward self-guided health care, and ever evolving toward emotional maturity, a goal post that moves every now and then.  The mental gymnastics that the ego or conscious mind puts us through is counter-stabilized  with breath and balance. Many people change shift between Urgency and Calm as frequrntly as they change their socks. 

The instincts do not remain in the shadow of the object when the body is consulted for sensations. But that only works from a position of calmness. Getting to still point with mantra and breath is a fundamental aspect of getting to health. Of course, life also happens between sessions in any practice. It is the balance we learn before hand that steadies us in a moment of body-pain. Sometime our own body pain, or even the body pain of others can activate the lack of balance (mental, emotional & physical).

The return of the repressed and the return of the repetition compulsion activates and ignites fear which then takes our breath out of balance and everything feels wrong. We have shut down the light in the inner landscape because we are afraid of what we might see in ourselves that would reveal an aspect of ourseves that we rather not see.

With the crown of your head high, your shoulders relaxed and a deep breath filling all of your lungs, slowly let out more breath than you took in. Breath like you are conducting the figure 8. Do this a couple of times before continuing to read.

Why?  

Because a well analyzed life includes a connection with the body-unconscious where our ancestry, experiences and memories are stored like in frozen ground until some heat, some return of the repressed ignites the muscles, cells, and bones of sensation. Now our fear of doing the next right thing that we need to do for ourselves demands that we pay attention.  The psychic pain will employ the body in order to get the crisis across.  The needle on the gage reads low energy.  Going too much further without replenishing and we risk running out of gas only half way to our destination. We used to call this a Nervous Breakdown. I still do.

 

Below is an example of a meditation–it is constructed of non-mentated gestures and lines that I filled in with color and mood.  Well-being is a state of no effort because it takes as its starting point a moment of stillness. Therefore,  a better chance of leading to clarity than if we attempt to move through chaos….

Granted, when to comes to free-floating creativity some of us find it nearly unnecessary. but, creativity like compassion is not just a definition of who we are, not just a part of us we can ignore. It is invcolved in day to day decision making. The extent to which we feel it is necessary to be right will go to the furthers right position that a psyche can take–sabotage or suicide.

Given the gravity of clarity in determining what we want for ourselves and our loved ones, it is no wonder that folks find themselves with a therapist or a Sharman, people who are devoted to healing as an art as well as practicing out of a body of knowledge that builds in protection for the client. A protection that they simply do not have the desire or the capacity to apply to their own needs.

A characteristic exists, repressed to the deeper unconscious because knowing this part would require facing a condition that appears helpless to render a solutiuon that meets both the needs of the self and of its multitude of fragmented parts.

Helplessness is at the root of all trauma. And we get there by not paying attention to our body. Our only way back to the light is to look at all the parts we have been tripping over in the dark and begin to wonder, not about getting rid of these parts, but about rearranging them so that or mind and body can begin to search for balance.

Thoughts on Christopher Bollas’s, “Generational Consciousness”*

My grandmother left Canada with hope. The potato famine and poverty of Canadian farming pushed them south at the end of the 19th century. Her generation came here with opportunities to cultivate, and with full knowledge that she was leaving the previous generation behind, a loss taken to ensure survival. There must have been great strength garnered from the courage it took to migrate, leaving family, home, and all that is familiar behind for better prospects.

They arrived in America at a time of great innovation and rapid advances. There were no airplanes, no cars; electricity was a new technology when they got here in the late 1800s.

My parents, on the other hand, arrived in their 20’s and, saw the failure of that generation to be able to sustain the progress. They arrived at their generational subculture at a world of a Great Depression, soup lines, stock market crash, and a most devastating world war, culminating by the dropping of two atomic bombs.

My folks inherited the failed dreams of their immediate past. I was born in a time of prosperity. Though my family was poor, the world felt promising. We were the generation that could have its cake and eat it too. We inherited the hope of peace, but just as Boomer generation arrived in the world, our radical peace movement and hippie communes failed to sustain itself, and the cycle started over again, born into a generational failed dream. Generations are defining,  we shape the generation and the generation shapes us.  We bring individual goals and ambitions to the world but in addition to our individual view of our times, the times that we live in have a kind of sociological perspective that becomes a part of our psychic experience.

Bollas points out that it is not until young people are in their 20’s that they begin to identify with the cultural norms of their generation. At about this age, children begin to see themselves as belonging to the future generation. They are accomplishing a transition between where they came from and where they are going in the outside world and in the subjective world of the self.
Christopher Bollas says this:  “The sense of isolation can be severe, but solace may be found through recognizing that he or she is part of a mass sub-culture, a new adolescent subculture forming out of the abyss between generations.” When you are exit-ing your family of origin; and at the same time emerging into adulthood, the process is almost entirely an unconscious one.  The experience is as much about loss as it is about the forwarding movement.

The norms of the New Generation must be incorporated or the child becoming an adult fails the transition process and begins to doubt their ability to become capable participants in the New World Order.  When the anxiety to separate from one generation is difficult to tolerate, the individuation of the child suffers. This process then settles itself into consciousness as a lack of confidence and low self-esteem.

The massive difference between generations is not perceived except in retrospect. In hindsight we radically recognize the difference between the 1950s and the 1960s; yet, 1958 at the time did not look all that different from 1962.  Likewise, if you were born in the 60’s you have a memory of your parents generation and a sense of belonging and remembering first- hand the 70’s and the 80’s.

Christopher Bollas seems to be saying that there is a collective consciousness that assigns us to the generation that we belong too.  If a child assigns himself to the wrong (previous) generation because of fear of separation, success in the new generation becomes more difficult.

To this difficult and natural set of complexes, we can add the generation that you came from makes it difficult for the transition to run smoothly. A consciousness of differences between generational norms allows a parent to assist rather than hamper the transitional process.  On the other hand, jealousy of youth, or fear of separating in the parent can retard the child’s development. The child may fear reprisal and abandonment from the parent’s generation and then attempts to remain the child of the previous generation rather than an adult in his or her own generation.

The consequences of not moving forward, of not letting go, obscure the possibilities of the future. Security and a false sense of safety are sought to mitigate the effects of fear and loneliness.

Christopher Bollas has written a bold new sociological take on the psychoanalytic process of separation and individuation.  His essay goes on to describe, in beautifully written language, the multitude of facts, fictions, and symbols that enter the consciousness of a human during this delicate, but at times violent attempt to become a self.

From readings in, On Being a Character, 1992, “Generational Consciousness”.

poetry in motion

Leonard Cohen has a way of summing things up for me.  Not much more to be said about a life well lived, albeit, very heavy at times; and often, more mindless than mindful.

First there was the meditation involved with creating the template–totally mindless.  I was absorbed in the quality of the feel, as the pen and ink dug into the paper and at times seems to effortlessly glide over the page so that a single stroke felt like it went clear across the pad and down the center to the very bottom of the page.

Then there were those comments when what to write went blank.  It went blank for months.  Gibberish. Then one day the journal was open to this unfinished page and Cohen’s meditation looked like it would barely fit on the page but it did. I thought it might sit well as an edited image.  It comes together as text-and-image and combines a number of moods while fulfilling its mission to be published.

Serenity is the outcome, but it seems too far away when I am carrying a grand-piano down a mountain of theory.  I am sitting with a young girl, fair and beautiful as she crawls to the couch.  I almost do not want to let her go there; but I do, and she emerges walking, maybe a half-inch taller than when she arrived; but how much growth can we really expect in an hour.  I hope she waters a few of the seeds awakened while we sat by the sea, chatting and untangling backlashes from yesterday’s fishing lines.  The wind seems to blow westerly in every season, and to every season we attach a new moment adding them up with an abacus left dusty besides the slide-rule, made of wood and brass. But here, I am the instrument of research.

Her life opened like a book on our laps.  I don’t count the way I use to. I don’t count on things and other objects–no, I think on myself now. And, I  thank myself graciously for the compassionate care that I often find capable of giving to myself.

I settle into that place of relative silence and slowly she enters, tentative at first, willing, ambivalent and scared.  But, she is strong and she does not want to let on that she is so vulnerable that she does not think she can take one more step.  Exhaustion and fear and insomnia and disease and helplessness and hopelessness will devour her if she takes even one more step toward life.  The piano is too heavy to carry.

She is addicted to the tune, that is how I know she will come back.

Making the Body Conscious: Like a River Flows

Understanding is a means toward acceptance.  Herein lies the center of our subjectivity and the center of our serenity.  Enjoying a deep sense of mindful breathing is one tool that we humans have to connect with the source of our mentations and our emotions.

Breathing is our first experience of life in the world beyond the womb.  Mindful breathing is our best attempt at gaining both understanding and acceptance as our mind grows toward maturity and impermanence.  Neither of these concepts are reversible and we either flow or rage toward these inevitable ends.

Because breathing is central to the experience of life making its unconscious, autonomic components conscious is our first step into the wildly active world of the human subjective. Conscious breathing is an experience that brings us closer to the primal sense of the subjective.

As we mature, we bump into life’s many intrusions and obstacles, some so powerful that they derail us from our mission:  to live in peace with ourselves and to the extent possible with those in our world.  Conscious breathing allows us to interpret the natural pace of our lives.  Turning our attention to our breath can add a pause when we are racing, our can add a nudge when we are lost in a status quo.

Breath like a river flows……….

Schedule: Mindfulness in Psychoanalysis 5/1/14

 

Hello–Family, Friends, Clients and Interested Folks:

This is being e mailed to people familiar with my practice or
my writing. It is a reminder of my practice hours and practice days
in Rhode Island, and it includes information on the groups that
are on-going in my practice, Mindfulness in Psychoanalysis.
This memo includes information on how to reach me.

web-site:

About: On-line Consulting, Therapy & Psychoanalysis

Mobile Phone: 401 447 5765

We are leaving St. Augustine in the morning and heading toward
the Shenandoah Valley–my definition of Gods’s Earth. I love photographing
in that region, so we will spend a day meandering through that country side
and we will be back in Rhode Island on Saturday or Sunday this weekend.

Mindfulness in Psychoanalysis will be back in full swing as of Monday May 5th
at 16 Trenton Street in Providence, RI…..
For the time being all my face to face consultations will be held at the Providence office….
The Charlestown site is temporarily closed, as my friend Michael has his music studio
in what had been my Charlestown office. I am enjoying this and as long at it works for Michael and Bernie and I, we plan to continue this arrangement at The Lake.

INDIVIDUAL ANALYTIC CONSULTATIONS:
In-person Consultations: Tuesday Wednesday and Thursdays Providence Office
By phone Consultations by appointment @ mutually convenient times

ANALYTIC GROUPS:
Groups have been operating and there will be no changes in the group schedule
between now and the 20th of June. If you are interested in joining a group or know
someone you want to refer to a group, this is a great time to do this….
Groups operate on
Tuesday Evenings: from 6:30 to 8:00, &
Wednesday Evenings: from 6:00 to 7:30

There will be seven groups between now and June 20th. This is a nice small cluster
of groups if some one is wanting to try this modality. Although these two groups have
been operating for well over 25 years, the core of the group is always changing and
evolving. A seven week trial is a small number of sessions to commit to, enough
groups to be able to tell if you can benefit from the modality; yet, not so many groups
that the commitment feels overwhelming.
You can write to me about this or call any time to discuss an involvement in an
analytic group.

Looking forward to seeing you all in Rhode Island. We will be staying at The Lake
through July 31…..

 

saturated in augustine

dr. al dussault
aldussault@gmail.com

mindfulness in psychoanalysis
web-site:

About: On-line Consulting, Therapy & Psychoanalysis

blog:
http://freeassociations.wordpress.com/

 

 

For a New Beginning, a poem by John O’donohue

For a New Beginning

 

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,

Where your thoughts never think to wander,

This beginning has been quietly forming,

Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

 

For a long time it has watched your desire,

Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,

Noticing how you willed yourself on,

Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

 

It watched you play with the seduction of safety

And the gray promises that sameness whispered,

Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,

Wondered would you always live like this.

 

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,

And out you stepped onto new ground,

Your eyes young again with energy and dream,

A path of plenitude opening before you.

 

Though your destination is not yet clear

You can trust the promise of this opening;

Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning

That is at one with your life’s desire.

 

Awaken your spirit to adventure;

Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;

Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,

For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

 

This is a poem written by a man from Ireland.  From what I understand he was a priest who studied philosophy and was drawn to the mystic, Meister Eckhart.  The man who wrote this poem is:  John O’Doanhue.

 

I like the religious simplicity and I like how this simplicity dovetails nicely with information from the raw materials of the Law Of Attraction.  Of course, I have written in other places that the Law of Attraction dovetails nicely with the laws of the philosophy and science of modern psychoanalysis.  The package is a good beginning for a New Year.

 

“…where your thoughts never think to wander,” is a great phrase.  It reflects the idea that a thought could have a thought.  This is referred to as a meta-thought.  But we are awkwardly close to the medical model provided by John Sarno in his book, The Divided Mind.

 

Listening to ourselves think it is not difficult to subjectively assess that we have competing thoughts.  We call these competing thoughts “ambivalence”.  Ambivalence implies a sort of equal pressure to go this way and to got that way at the same time.  No one can for get the scare-crow who when asked directions by Dorothy picks up his straw filled arms and points them in opposite directions…he felt so ambivalent that he did not think that he had a brain.

Another great line is, “…waiting until you are ready to emerge”.  We are aware that desire and manifestation are nearly equivalent concepts, as one leads rather naturally from one to the other.  The act of wanting something activates in us an urge forward that begins to propel us in the direction of the person, place or thing that we are wanting.  He ends the poem with the very essence of human capability, “For your soul senses the world that awaits you.”  Again, we are able to approach this line from a number of perspectives.  Psychoanalytically the soul might be the unconscious aspect of being human—the emotional autonomic system, if you will.  It might also refer to the soul as that aspect of humankind that contains the ethics that have evolved from the beginning.  The Commandments’ of God made manifest so that human kind might live in societies and civilizations with the least amount of self-imposed destruction.

 

Finally, in Law of Attraction parlance, we hear the phrase, “to allow,” as meaning in addition to desire we must be prepared to let-in, to allow the manifestation to take place.  Wanting something as an empty wish is not at all like desiring in a way that will make the object much more likely to appear.

 

Empty wishes are probably the worst case scenario for we humans attempting to get something for ourselves from the universe.  An empty wish sounds more like a complaint than a desire…”gee, I wish I could do that……..”

A desire has aggression attached it.  I want one of those and I am going to find a way to get it.  I want more love in my life and I am going to find a way to apply more actions of love to the people, places and things in my life.

 

Desire is strong.  It is the first drive, libido, infused with the second drive, aggression.  The fusion of what we want and a motivation to get it creates in us an allowance for the thing to happen.

 

Practice this on something small that you want to acquire.  Practice this activated motivation over a particular food you may want to have.  “I have not had apple pie in ages, I want a piece of apple pie.”  Not, “I never get apple pie, everybody is always out of it when I want some.”

 

Can you hear the distinction, one is ready to search, the later is defeated before it starts.  So, let the unconscious through, allow yourself to let yourself know what you want and allow yourself to go for it, finally, prayer is a wonderful, soft and entirely inexpensive way of connecting to the Great Universal principles….don’t be afraid to pray.  It will not make you less of a man or less of a woman to allow yourself to connect with the soul of the matter—the solemnity of the great mysteries on the universe, all that we do not know.

Dual Drive Theory: a practical application

Below is a link to a recent study that begins to confirm the dual aspect of the human reality.  Good/Bad, Hot/Cold, Blue/Red, the duality of our experience is a subjective experience that is confirmed by sciences that study the subjective…

If the heart and the body are the subjective, then the mind and the ego are the imperative.

Western Civilization has been obsessed with the study of the imperative — wars, conflict, human to human suffering and injustices, these are the imperatives.  The subjective is the feeling a grandparent has when he or she first holds yet another generation in its arms.  It is characterized by hope where the ego is characterized by fear.

The ego evolves keeping pace with survival of the fittest, the heart and the instincts are a portrait of an alligator gently carrying a delicate egg in its mouth as it maneuvers toward a safe spot to lie the egg and wait for the next generation to crack out of its shell.

Even an alligator is a two thing–thing.  It has the capacity to nurture and the capacity devour with rage. The dual drives are the center-piece of psychoanalysis.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/01/03/body-emotions-finnish-study-video_n_4532617.html?ir=Healthy%20Living

a new study suggests that we all have the same bodily sensations associated with our feelings regardless of culture or language — because the mind-body connection is biological, and is linked to our very drive for survival.

It hardly ever ceases to amaze me, the human condition is both ever evolving and static at the same time.  We can only appreciate the complexity of human dynamics when we experience the dual nature of our natures.  The divided mind is a fact of life.  The complexity of the conflict is exacerbated by not recognizing that we are getting two commands at the same time, neither of which is aware that the other is giving a dramatically different solution to the presented conflict.

At a point in time when we are left with two distinct internal voices we often choose to crawl under a blanket and see no light, as if by not seeing light we can stop those voices from overwhelming us.  The voice of the ego, the voice of right and wrong has the fullest presence in our minds.  I like to say that it speaks english, it speaks loudest and it speaks first.

With that dynamic operating the voice of the instinct the subjective tense, if you will, brings us to a less chaotic place.  But it does not appear to have strength behind it.  The voice of the ego is very strong, the imperative tense,  but it sounds like a voice of authority, in fact, often the voice of a punishing authority.

Fearing the consequences of not listening to the ego we can choose to end the ambivalence by simply ignoring the voice of the heart, the body–where the sounds are more sensation than they are linguistic utterances.  The voice of the instinct/heart/body are felt wishes from internal sensations….that come from ancestral knowledge–D N A knowledge.  It might sound like….”Oh…I don’t know if I like that idea…..but what other choice do I have?” This voice is not going to badger us.  It simply says its piece, it tells us something quietly, mindfully.  The heart has no defense to make.  It presents its truth and rests its case.

The heart felt voice is an instinct that a different response is needed than the one we have been use to relying on.  Since our ego has been so tolerant of us and has taught us to walk and talk, and drive a car and get an education and make a living, we had better use it as the default position.  So, we set the ego on default and consequently barely ever hear the sensations speak.

I seem to always return to the same point.  That is because when we come full circle, we do return to the same point.  The ego badgers us with its information and tries to scare us into some dramatic action–let’s have a family intervention, that will wake up the absentee member.  The heart simply lies around inside waiting to be asked for an opinion and when it is asked for an opinion it always gives a simple answer…like, “Yes there is a tremendous amount of drama going on at the moment, but doing nothing is what you need to do for yourself.

When ever we feel an urgent need to act, it is a message from the body/instinct/heart–“Listen to what the urgency is doing to you…do not do what the urgency is telling you to do, the urgency is simply an alert, not a call to action.

Urgency is a sensation that alerts us to we being in a negative position with the world and with ourselves.  Like its partner in crime, “anxiety” urgency is more of a dramatic STOP sign than it is a call to action.

Let the urgency guide you toward a quick meditative 20 seconds of centering.  Forget what it is telling you to do, and instead go listen to its meaning.  It means–stop, look both ways, use caution, proceed slowly!!!!!!!!!!

 

dr. al dussault

aldussault@gmail.com

mindfulness in psychoanalysis

The Compulsion to Repeat vs. Compassion

It is more comfortable to repeat a past performance than it is to construct a new paradigm.  The Compulsion to repeat is a powerful defense and as we know of defenses, they act in service of the ego.  Acting in service of the ego means that they are trying to be helpful to a part of us.  The part of us that has grown and become civilized and has evolved through the ages to become the man who goes to the moon, or the Iron Woman who rules England, or to the creators of the Atom Bomb.  The linguistic aspect of us is the ego.  The ego is that aspect of us that we are most familiar with.  It is what Eckhart Tolle says that we refer to when we call ourselves by our first name.  My ego’s is name Al,  pronounced with no “H” unlike in “Hal,” The computer who operated the guts of the mission to outer-space. In service to its mission, Hal killed the entire crew for its own good–not what the creator had in mind.

The ego and the Heart can become in conflict, especially if the ego feels threatened by an event, by the future or by it losing advantage in any way.  The ego wants the advantage–always.  It is a competitive little snot if you do not grab a hold of it early enough.  It will kill you to prove it is right in the name of trying to help you.

So who is the “you” and who is the “you”?  When we finally arrive at the nearly indisputable fact that what sits on our shoulders is a very divided mind, we can begin to want to make sense over the amount of conflict that we have lived under.  Until then we usually side with our egos, and though it might operate the conflict in our favor, in the moment; we are hardly ever spiritually and dynamically advanced by the egos maneuvers.

It is also of importance that we recognize that each the ego and the heart are unaware of the others presence.  Each system operates singularly.  But the dominant force is exerted by the ego (what western civilization tells us is right or wrong).  The heart, on the other hand, arrived first in the order of evolution, but its quiet and steady path is hardly noticed.  It wants what is best for us which may not be what is right or wrong for us.  This slight shift in perspective can lead us to an overwhelming shift in paradigm.  A shift that can help us to change, not our behavior; but how we perceive the world.  Often the problem is not with the “problem”, but with how we see the problem.      

     Insights provided by the heart, those emotional communications that cry out to be heard over the voice of the ego, are guided by the subjective mood rather than the indicative mood.  Grammar does have a role in who we are and how we behave.  There are languages that do not have a subjective tense.  In those languages the “if’s, the “could have” the “might have” are not existing.  Only the indicative fact of yes or no or black and white exist in consciousness.   People who live simply out of language awareness miss an entire perspective.  The wider perspective of consciousness is omitted.  The silence of consciousness.

In the indicative system ambiguity is omitted.  Nonetheless, because it is omitted, in perspective, does not mean that it does not exist in reality.  A full repertoire of feelings from despair to over-whelming enthusiasm and joy are necessary components to living a full life.  Within the wide range of the subjective we hold all the possibilities of being human in our hearts.  We are not swallowed by anger, but we know anger intimately.  We are not depreciated by grief, we are enhanced buy the knowledge that it is demonstrating the extent to which we loved the precious object, person, place or thing.  Jealousies and hatreds are not foreign to a good-heart.  They do not conduct a good-heart.

Hearts can be over-come with compassion.  Egos need to be right.  The heart can contain the darker side of life as easily as it can embrace the light.  Compassion is a mindful process by which we come to understand our need for human forgiveness.  The act of forgiving the self for its natural condition of imperfection.  And forgiving other for the very same reason.  The awake mind resonates in possibilities.  The closed off mind, the egoic mind, cowers in fear of ambivalence and dodges interpretations that places the ego in less than attractive light.

Understanding that we are of two minds, how do we access the instincts, how do we find the heart within the clamor of all the linguistic noise?  This is a question for our generation to answer.  We need a new answer because secular society has become disconnected from the good, the bad and the ugly.  Although religion plays a large role in some people’s lives, the overall globe is not a religious one.  This is a globe in much conflict:  plague, hunger, famine, homelessness, war, atrocities, vengeance, and greed to name a few.  And although we are not the first generation to have to answer this question, after all, Adam and Eve seemed to have gotten it wrong and it has been down-hill ever since, each new generation gets a shot at the question.  “Is it nobler in the mind to suffer the slings of outrageous fortune….”

Today we may be better poised to ask the question in a new way.  How do I access my heart-felt emotions–good and bad, and how do I harness these emotions into a kind of fuel, a psychic energy that drives us forward with integrity and fullness of spirit.  It is so easy to claim that we have it all until we lose it all.

There are two evolutions happening simultaneously:  1)  the evolution of culture and civilization through our linguistic competence, and 2) the evolution and development of the individual human ego.  Both evolutions reflect each other and are inextricably tied together, but no one knows exactly how.  We are pointing to a Oneness that might help us to understand that we are really one huge organism.  We are the cosmos, we and the plants and the minerals and the elements we are one thing evolving toward infinity.

Are we always only a half truth waiting for the other half of our reality to sink in?  Do we exist among the weeds and are we only several layers away from the alligator brain that sits in the center of our heads.  I think it would be easy to go in that direction.  It’s all a lot of nothing made from nothing.  Except, what do we do with compassion.  How do we understand empathy if it is truly only about survival.

The instincts of the heart never come after us.  We are never chased by the heart the way we are chased by the ego, by the guilt, by the remorse, by the past.  The heart only lies quietly beating.  It is vigilant, patient, kind, honest and in general, good.  But for us to see these attributes we must have the capacity to invite it in.  Unlike the intrusive ego, the heart has to be invited in.  The heart will lie in waiting and will be available as soon as you summon it to your aid, but you must summon it.

You have to be ready to listen to something that your ego will disagree with.  You need to be ready to look out into the vast void of consciousness in order to sense the quiet and the silence that is needed to understand the heart felt messages from our own subjective.

And in the long run, we will die anyway.  That is the cycle of life that we embark upon when we are born.  We are slated to die at some point.  In the meantime we can let our lives be run by Hal, or we can reach into our silence and pull out a hand-full of compassion and say, “here is to one more day where I like life, and I like liking who I am.”

Art as Therapy, or Therapy as Art

Time swirls around us so fast we can hardly believe we stand on a globe that has been on an elliptical pathway for millions of years–a swirling ball of molted gas with a burning interior spinning forever in the darkness of the universe.

The fascinating thing that I find about my craft is the ability that that craft has to set up in me a feeling of competence, compassion, self-acceptance and a non-biased, not judgmental view of the world.  When I sit with my Apple to compose or when I sit with my pen & ink passion, or when I sit with watercolors and acrylics, I experience a rejuvenation of my mental status.

The sub-conscious activities with arts and crafts are similar activities to sitting with an analytic patient.  My mind, my ego is activated and I am in-touch with a silent desire to be present and to let what ever feelings and intuitions that arise come forward and enjoy the light of day.

I know the similarities exist between psychoanalysis and art, but recently I am impressed to hear of more neuro-biologist who are coming on board with sketches of mapped out events taking place in the brain that suggest what we have intuitively known for centuries to be true–intuition feels good and is rarely wrong.

I recently met a person on line who was developing a system of tracking intuition using science, not poetry to display his results.  In the land of poetry and art, our hearts know when we have been emotionally touched.  Our body responds to “Maria’s Cello” as if they were spoken directly to the soul.  A soft, commanding piano piece will send us into a reverie that is comforting, evoking memories that are both loving and sad at the same time.

There is a simplicity to the belief that both art and therapy provide soft cushions on which to rest our ruminative heads.  Making the time to rest our minds from the mechanical pace that they can have is a necessity to health, happiness and success.  We are unable to access the intuitive aspects of our body/brain matrix unless we command ourselves to stop, look and listen.

“Why should I stop and look both ways–there in nothing coming down the track.  It is a waste of time to stop.”  Yes, i agree you just wasted 30 seconds of your life by looking both ways and seeing nothing—but do not think that you can extrapolate from that there there never will be a train rolling down that track.

Stoping and calming the mind of all activity for as little as twenty seconds can be a life saving habit.  Not because a calm happy life guarantees eternal rest, but because momentary rest stops provide relief.

Take several breaths in and release these breaths slowly, eventually letting out verbal sighs as you expel the air.  You have nothing to lose but several seconds if you do not find this a useful manner of allowing the wider consciousness of the mind to set in and provide a moment of clarity.

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1112971504/effects-of-poetry-on-the-brain-101013/