Part 3 comments for ” I’ve Got Your Back”

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PART TWO COMMENTS FOR ” I’VE GOT YOUR BACK”

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I’ve Got Your Back!

Not long ago Barry and I were visiting our daughter Elle in Boston when something rather odd happened. The three of us were sitting outside Elle’s apartment when we noticed a middle aged woman walking directly towards us. When she approached the area where we were sitting I saw she was holding a rather cumbersome mirror precisely and steadily to the front of her face. We watched her as she walked up and down the street in an almost deliberate manner never once moving that mirror from its exact location . Elle explained that this had gone on for years and that she was known as “The Mirror Lady” in and around Boston. Apparently not much has been established about her background but day after day,week after week, relentlessly she would walk up and down the same general area always holding tightly to that rather large mirror, carefully adjusting it until it was in just the right position. Over dinner that night we discussed what might be the meaning behind the behavior. Clearly this was a tragic situation and a highly disturbed individual, but why the mirror? We talked about the possibility that she felt less alone with this image of herself staring back at her or possibly there was something she was searching for or trying to see as she examined herself in that mirror. At some point and with further thought Elle proposed another theory altogether ” I really don’t think it is any of those things, I believe the mirror allows her to see what is behind her” she said. Somehow this rang true for Barry and I, it just felt right, but at the same time we knew we could never really know with any real certainty. Periodically I would find myself thinking about the Mirror Lady and I believe I now know why. Maybe in some way it was not so odd after all. Was it possible that we all walk through life with our own version of that mirror?  That we are all afraid of what is behind us and in our own unique way we too search to find the ability to trust . Feelings of safety and trust do not come easily for most of us and this is never more apparent than in therapy. Many of us are actually quite guarded and maybe a bit suspicious at the start of therapy. We arrive having felt betrayed, unloved and vulnerable throughout our lives and trusting is not usually a viable option. It is the ultimate “Catch 22″ as, ironically, we have to feel some measure of safety to even begin to expose the feelings that brought us to treatment to begin with. Some of the most difficult work done in therapy involves beginning to build some level of trust between the patient and his therapist. Why is that? Because the foundation for trust begins at the earliest moments of our lives.The infant relies on his mother to be there to, protect, nourish and love him and sadly, this can be experienced as the first betrayal. As infants we are completely dependent , our very survival is at risk should mommy betray us and this, of course, will be the relationship that will lay the groundwork for all future relationships. This will, more than likely, be the first of many betrayals as the breakdown of trust begins. From there we will often see that first betrayal re-created throughout our lifetimes with the search for safety and trust seemingly endless. In therapy we will recognize that inability to trust as it manifests in a myriad of ways. The patient is suspicious and frightened by almost everyone who may cross his path. He is defensive and unwilling to hear feedback or to allow for interventions that may be useful. We will observe a person who has had few meaningful relationships and is unable to let anyone get truly close. Conversely, there is the patient who will assure his therapist, repeatedly, that he trusts him completely. He will say this again and again as if this mantra will somehow make it true should he say it enough. He will say it even as his actions indicate that, in fact, he trusts no one.The patient is terrified but at the same time desperately wants to find some sense of safety and finally and at last rest after years of hyper  vigilance. In my view this is the real tragedy because without help, without the ability to trust again, and no matter how desperately he may want to, he just can’t bring himself to put down that mirror.  Gretchen

A Retreat Exercise

A Primal Exercise – As most of you know at each retreat we participate in a variety of “exercises” designed to not only trigger specific feelings but to help activate our childhood memories. Over the years we have not only refined many of these exercises and techniques but experimented with adding new ones that we have found to be effective. At our last retreat we chose a word for each participant which they were instructed to focus on and bring up at some point during the week. The word we chose was not at all random but quite specific for each person. What developed from this simple exercise turned out to be not only interesting but illuminating. The following is a blog from one of our participants describing his experience with his word “Friendship”.  As an aside I don’t believe a single person asked me why their word was chosen for them.  Gretchen       Further Reflections on Retreats – I hope you enjoy our latest blog entry submitted by Steve Miller. I did find it quite thought provoking and I believe it illustrates some important truths about friendship and the long process most of us go through coming to terms with our expectations of other people. The powerful forces of therapy, life experience, and getting older, compel us to face the grief of past relationships, while coming to acceptable terms with the people in our life now. It is not easy and tears must be shed, but the reward for expectations based on reality rather than repressed pain is enormous.  Barry                                                                                                                              My Word – It had been on my mind and was not a complete surprise. In the weeks leading up to a retreat, my brain always has a little extra chatter about the topic of friendship. “Who will be there that I know? Who will be there that I like? Who will be there that likes me?” When I opened the envelop and read that bold word sitting all alone on the card, “Friendship,” I assumed it was a mystery I was expected to unravel. If there were double or triple meanings in this directive, I would surely ferret them out and, as the week progressed, I started to review all the possible reasons the topic of friendship was chosen for me at this retreat. The first thing that jumped to mind had to do with a longstanding friendship of 20 years with someone in the group that had apparently evaporated in the previous few years with no clear explanation or ending. However, as I broadened my search and my observations, one thing came into focus. As I sat in group looking around the room, I was intrigued to discover that the whole spectrum of friendship was represented there. I see the spectrum as two-fold; what I would call the spectrum of importance and the spectrum of lifespan. The first fold is a discussion I’ve had regularly with my best friend and partner, Jeannine. I have formulated a model of friendship that helps me keep perspective on mine. Rather than see friendships in parameters of black and white – either you are, or you aren’t; rather than group people on one team or another – either you are for me or agin me, I see friendship as a spectrum, much like the spectrum of light seen as a rainbow. There are my coffee friends and my movie friends. I have 12-step meeting friends and writing workshop friends. I have friends that I interact with in the context of a particular activity, like sailing. I have been able to admit to some that I love and value them greatly, even though we aren’t best pals. I have been able to admit to myself that I need friends of all stripes, not just full time, never let me down friends. I have some friends that I can reveal the most intimate details of my life to and cry with easily (not necessarily Primal) as well as friends who don’t talk about their feelings, have political views in complete opposition to mine and referred to the retreat as a “Hippie Convention,” yet I love them equally. I have wrestled with the disappointment of having friends I only hear from every few months and have lunch with three times a year, or friends that like to chat on the phone but never suggest a movie or a hike. But on reflection I have realized just how important all types of friendships are; that this just may be the comfort zone for that particular friendship. I had a friendship that included intimate discussions on the phone for years on almost a daily basis. We both struggled through severe bouts of depression and suicidal fantasies only to have our relationship burst into flames and self-destruct as soon as we attempted an extended travel vacation together, a sad and disappointing discovery. When I find myself hopeful or disappointed about a friendship, I try to envision where it belongs on the spectrum. Some friendships evolve and redefine themselves only to appear at a different spot on the spectrum, sometimes up and sometimes down the scale. On the far left of this scale would be the slightly more than casual acquaintance category, on the far right would be the best-buddy-tell-em-everything-friends-for-life category. One great advantage of dispensing with the black or white measure of friendship is the sheer flexibility of the spectrum model. Friends who get mad at me don’t have to suddenly be shifted to the other category. I can empathize with someone despite some previous harsh treatment I have received from them. It is truly liberating to be able to be mad at a friend and yet not have my need or caring for them diminished at all. I no longer have to see people in my life as huge chess pieces I am moving around a war map. Sitting in group that day, the insight that descended on me was profound. As with other topics and facets of life, that group was a microcosm of my life outside and life on the planet. In cosmology, the life of a star is depicted as an arc of phases from white dwarf to red giant and black hole. There in the group room I suddenly became aware that every phase of the life of a friendship was accurately represented right in front of me. I could sense burgeoning relationships and new people I held some hope for and interest in. I could see the middle phases of short and long-standing friendships that were solid but often in flux. I saw the remains of important friendships that, unfortunately, represented black holes whenever I struggled to find resolution to the how and why of their endings. And then, in a dark corner of the sky, I perceived another phase I hadn’t noticed previously. It was the hope of rekindled friendship; a friendship that had faded from my life but, like that sun before it rises, was showing a faint glow along the eastern horizon, thus completing the circle. I saw hope and disappointment as one continuum. Some time back I formulated another theory along the lines of my spectrum theory of friendship that has helped me greatly. Years ago there was an advertising campaign by the Weyerhouser paper company touting the many strengths and uses of cardboard. In the print ad, across a ravine they had constructed a bridge made entirely of cardboard and were driving a heavy tractor- trailer across it. The notion was that you could take a relatively flimsy material and, with the right design and implementation, cause it to have great strength and integrity. I adopted this theory in imagining that, if one were to take a toothpick and stand it on end, it would not have the structural integrity to hold up much weight. However, if one were to gather enough toothpicks bundled side by side, they could theoretically support the weight of the entire Empire State Building. I began to see friendships as toothpicks. Rather than place all of the weight of my needs on one person, putting entirely too much pressure on the relationship, I found I could spread the weight around. Valuable interactions, from acqaintances to seasoned buddies, then became part of a bigger structure. No one member took too much of the weight. I began to value the wonderful, pleasant interchanges I had with people like the woman who cut my hair or the checker at Traders Joes that recognized me each week. I even told one person, “You are one of my toothpicks,” and got a friendly but puzzled smile. I realized that some people might actually be 50 toothpicks in my structure; some were trunks and some were outriggers. The greatest advantage of that was, like the game called Jenga where opponents build a block tower and remove one block at a time until one person causes the tower to topple, in this case one could remove a great number of toothpicks from their friendship support structure and not completely collapse. In contrast, if you have only two good friendships that you lean on heavily it could be like walking with crutches; remove one crutch and you will quickly fall on your ass, or at best, walk in circles. Knowing what I want and what I need out of each of my friendships has been liberating; no longer living a life of constant disappointment but remaining realistic about what people can and want to give me and visa versa. In my relationship, whenever I start to dwell on something I’m not getting, to get on the “pity pot,” as they say in A.A., I try to dig deep and find a way to be especially generous that day. It is an indispensible tool in my arsenal to fight that impulse to let my old feelings destroy good things in my current life. When I am listening to people share their feelings in group there is a range of interest and identification that comes to bear (some touch me more deeply than others, I’m sure for very personal reasons) but I am aware that I care about everyone and always hope that they will get what they need. And though I used to think that one person couldn’t truly feel someone else’s pain (if it was possible, I speculated, then some might chose to hire another person to do their therapy by proxy) I have re-thought this notion. More than at any previous retreat, I found myself crying along with people as they shared their stories. As I shared one day in group, it is one of the gifts of feeling old feelings in this therapy that I am able to experience a profound sense of empathy toward others in the present. I feel truly able to sense and participate in the feeling they are in. It is an empathy that, at times, swells my heart near to bursting. I actually can feel their pain. It one of the gifts that allows me to live up to the platitude; “If you want to have a friend, you have to be a friend.” I no longer have to live in the world of what I should or shouldn’t have or be or give, do or say when it comes to friendship when I realize that the person I may have been yearning for or struggling with to be good enough or say the precise thing or be just the right person to earn their friendship – that this person is someone I don’t even like that much – or – they are someone I love deeply that won’t or can’t ever return the feeling. ps – my word to the therapists – THANKS! Steve Miller 7/11/11

The Stealth Group

It occurred to me recently that I probably get ten questions about group therapy for every one about anything else we do at the Institute. Many of us feel some confusion about the group process and I would guess that most of us have had an inclination to avoid it, at least initially. We tend to not only undervalue group in the therapeutic process but to misunderstand how and why it is so effective. So why the confusion? I think it begins with the idea that group is no different than the individual session only split into pieces to be shared with the other members of the group, a veritable therapeutic pie. Some of us come to group with an agenda, much like we might if we were attending an individual session. We might arrive hoping to discuss a particular issue and then struggle with finding our moment to speak. If group should end before we have taken our “turn” we will often feel we have not gotten our moneys worth. These approaches belie the efficacy of the group experience. I think we need to look at several important factors to better understand how group can make a difference in our therapy. First,how is a Primal group different than the many other therapeutic groups in any community? From a Primal perspective,we see group as a pathway to feeling, an aid in feeling. A trigger for specific memories that might otherwise be avoided within the individual session. Practically speaking,Primal groups are often larger groups then those we might see in the average therapist’s office. They are also much longer as most groups outside of the Institute will be completed in about an hour and a half. On the other hand we have found we need more time to run a productive Primal group. My group for instance runs at least three hours and is affectionately referred to as “The group that never ends”. Perhaps most important of all is that we are not looking to modify behavior based on how our group participants relate to each other. So what is our view? We see group first and foremost as a microcosm.It represents every group in a sense, the family,school and workplace to name just a few. Rather than describe our experiences in those settings we expose them within the group. We do not need to discuss our difficulties in maintaining relationships or our problems with intimacy because eventually,within the group,those concerns will be revealed and accessible. We see group as an absolute treasure trove of clues, all leading us toward the reality of our childhoods and to deeper feelings. As therapists we find so much to observe and process. Who is consistently late? Who sits in the same spot for each group or closest to the door? Who is struggling within each group or refusing to speak? One can see how feelings previously concealed and suppressed will soon become illuminated. Undoubtedly the perception that I will not get the attention I need or that I am having to share my therapist or worse yet that I am ultimately invisible within this setting are extremely painful feelings. At the same time we must recognize they are connected to very specific memories. Would those memories be triggered within the individual session? Yes and no. Yes, I believe more often than not they would be, but possibly not as compellingly or persuasively and no because it is the nature of neurosis that we will avoid what we most need to feel. Group will often conquer that defense with a sneak attack or a re-creation. I remember many years ago a woman who came to my group,we will call her Jill. Within a few weeks of starting therapy she had assigned specific group members the unspoken task of representing each of her family members. Jill would often say things like “Joe you remind me so much of my brother,you speak to me exactly as he did!” or “Sarah you are the embodiment of my sainted mother”. Then one day a couple of months into Jill’s therapy I noticed something about her behavior in group that changed the course of her therapy. In the individual sessions Jill would describe her family and often in discussing her mother something would just not feel right. Something was off but she could not tell me what it was nor could she get close to the real feelings she had about her mom. The only thing she was able to tell me was that she adored her mom and she was a beloved figure within the family. So I am watching Jill in group and I say to her “You know Jill I have a very clear picture of all the members of your family but the only thing you have to say about your mom is how much you loved and admired her. But Jill, I am perplexed, you describe Sarah here as an exact replica of your mother, right?” “Yes,just like my wonderful mother” says Jill. “Then why have we never seen you respond to Sarah with anything other than hostility in group, in fact, if I didn’t know better I would have to say you pretty much hate Sarah…what might that be about Jill?”  Gretchen

Coffee At Figaro’s

 

Recently I received an email from a young woman interested in beginning therapy at the Institute. She explained that she had been given my name by someone who had worked with me several years ago and who believed I might be able to help her. She told me she had been seeing a therapist for the last few years, mainly for depression, but according to her she was at a standstill with her current therapist. She liked her well enough, but at the same time she was feeling the need for what she described as a more authentic therapeutic relationship. She went on to say that she had recently discovered through a friend of a friend that at one point in her life her therapist had also suffered from depression. This was a bombshell of information as far as she was concerned. It was at this point that she began to question whether she could actually move forward with this particular clinician. She reasoned that there had been numerous times when it could have made a tremendous difference had her therapist shared anything at all about her own struggle with depression. In looking back over the years spent in therapy she realized she actually knew nothing at all about this person who knew everything about her. The young woman did make the effort to discuss all this in her next session but the therapist was once again silent. This therapeutic approach was all too familiar to me but at the same time a world apart from my own approach. There is, by the way, a philosophy behind the therapist’s unresponsiveness that goes all the way back to Freud and Psychoanalysis. Briefly the theory was that for the client to fully explore their unconscious the therapist must be a “blank screen” that in no way interfered with the Analysis. As you can imagine this was contrary to everything I ever learned in training at the Institute and frankly conflicted with who I was as a person.  My early training began at the original Primal Institute, which was located in West Hollywood. Down the street was a little restaurant called Cafe Figaro. What does this have to do with training and blank screens? Often while reviewing the tapes we made of our sessions Art or Vivian would say to the new trainee ” It should be as though you are having coffee at Figaro’s”. In some ways it became our mantra; coffee at Figaro’s. There was nothing they hated more than the phoniness of the superior therapist hiding behind their rules about disclosure. They felt our sessions should be conversational and our job was to connect with our patients. The fact that we had all been through the therapy made it easy to relate to what each new person was experiencing – we had been there ourselves. Clearly we always want to keep in mind what is most appropriate for the individual patient. What is useful for one person is not always helpful for another. The skill and experience of the therapist hopefully allows for an understanding of how best to proceed but in Primal we want that to come from the inside and not from the intellect. That being said I personally have found that the boundaries between patient and therapist are, for the most part, increasingly irrelevant, at least for me. Barry said something once that relates to this I think. Of course it is a music analogy, he said to be a good musician you have to know all the fundamentals before you can have the freedom to improvise. The same holds true for therapists in my opinion. You do need an understanding of the basics and possibly it is useful to rely on certain rules when you are a new therapist or your instincts fail you but if you can’t move beyond that to sense what your patient is needing the integrity of the relationship between patient and therapist will always be compromised. The therapist should feel and sense when a boundary is needed or a question should not be answered because it is in the best interest of the individual patient. They should also sense when to be anything less than real and forthright would inhibit and possibly damage the therapeutic process. I have often wondered if there are times when rules and philosophies serve the therapist and not the patient. It allows the therapist a distance or an idea to hide behind, it highlights the therapists need to feel separate and apart and makes clear his deficits, and as a result it can not take in to account the needs of the individual. A psychology teacher I once knew said this about providing effective treatment” When all else fails be silent”. I think when all else fails I’ll just be me.

 

Gretchen

Generosity

If you have ever asked yourself where exactly you stand on the mental health food chain, consider the following; what, if anything, do you truly do for other
people? We all know that pain and suffering constrict our consciousness, and that pain above a certain threshold demands our immediate attention to the exclusion of most everything else. However, once you achieve a little breathing room and are no longer in constant distress, our thoughts and concerns can include others and the world around us. The last thing any of us needs is one more moralizing diatribe on the right way to behave or how to live our lives. The Primal position has always been to think dialectically and as such, views behavior as an organic whole, linked to our internal state and personal history. For many of us, the intuitive appeal of Primal Theory is that mankind, at its healthiest, is basically good at heart. An essential component of Primal Theory is that if our basic needs can be met at the appropriate developmental stage in life, then our true nature, which is peaceful, loving, and life affirming can flourish. This is the bedrock upon which therapy is built. Why else would we bother to go through all the pain, the anger, the loss, the hopelessness, if not to emerge with a sense of self that is less tormented and as a result more deeply connected to the world around us.
What exactly is generosity and why should we care about it anyway? When I
think back to my University days, I recall reading philosophy and religious
based definitions of generosity. Most discussions would tend to focus on either the behavior of giving something away or the reward in self-esteem and happiness that “the giver” can expect in return for their magnanimity. “Giving to get” if you will. Are there other types of generosity? Does the motive of the` giver effect the experience of the recipient? In other words, if you give a homeless man money for food to impress your date, does it matter? Doesn’t the homeless man still get to eat dinner? Win, win, right! This topic will probably raise more questions than can be addressed in a short article, but it is a worthy topic for consideration. Have not philosophers, clergy, psychologists, mystics and great writers all advanced opinions of man’s ultimate aims?
I have read a fair number of autopsies (don’t ask why), and I believe most
medical men would agree with me when I say that no one dies from old age! In
fact, no one yet has ever died of old age. The ultimate aim of medical science is to allow us to die of old age or even better,to somehow discover the secrets to regenerating adaptation energy (life force).  Autopsies teach us (excluding a bullet to the head and traumatic death), that we die prematurely because one vital component has worn out in proportion to the rest of our body. Life is only as strong as its weakest link. With this breakdown we can no longer sustain life as a single living being. This is the price we pay for the evolution of the human body from a simple cell into the highly complex cellular organization we call human beings. One lesson from this is that we must find ways to live that are in harmony with our true biological nature. To the extent that we live in conflict with our true selves, we will age more quickly, vital organs may fail,and our general health and sense of well-being will be compromised.                                                             The complex organization of our bodies is designed to work together, to share the stress of the workload of life. If any one system is called upon to do more than its designed share, for prolonged periods, stress, breakdown or what we call aging occurs. Whether aware of it or not, the typical physician spends his professional consulting time treating the symptoms of this unbalance.
Our Primal perspective understands that the metabolic cost of unmet needs and repressed pain is staggering. The lifetime effects of stored pain may be one of the greatest scientific discoveries of all time. As previously stated, as individuals there will be times when our acute pain and anguish will force us to focus inward. In our quest to find some possibility of healing we discover that we must become selfish.  It seems to me that selfishness has gotten a bit of a bad reputation in modern culture. The true biological reality is that an organism must first and foremost survive for itself, it must do that which will insure and sustain life. All instincts, behaviors and pleasures flow from this elemental truth. What we learn from autopsies, Darwin, and the study of complex systems in general is that all the parts must work together, functioning in sync if the complex system is to thrive. Life, it seems has evolved and continues to progress from the simple to the complex. Consciousness is part of this evolution. The natural and healthy narcissism of infancy and childhood, if all goes reasonably well, matures into a complex consciousness that includes self preservation, individual pleasure and achievement, but also need for, and love of others. Further growth will include a sense of community with friends, family and a profound sense of wonder and belonging to the physical world. Admiring a sunset, or appreciating great art is part of our heritage as is the understanding that we are part of a larger universe.   This evolving consciousness,or Primal consciousness, is made manifest as we heal and resolve the deficits of our personal history. In the course of the development of a species, every member of each generation must relive, as an embryo, the entire history of its ancestors from the primeval amoeba up to the contemporary newborn state. “Ontogeny recapitulates Phylogeny” is an accepted scientific truth. This layering upon layering of complex coordinated cooperation from the cellular all the way to our political and social systems is our biological destiny. Benevolence and a sense of our place in our family, city, country, and solar system are additional evidence of this evolution in progress . For many years now we have incorporated techniques, and I use the term very loosely, at our Retreats that are designed to arouse, promote, trigger, and help resolve feelings that block the inherent , natural self-expression of generosity. It is interesting to me, that for many, this gets translated into the purchasing of a gift. This is not a criticism because for some this may be a first and critically important step. At the same time it is our view that generosity can eventually be expanded beyond gift giving.  As always, in Primal terms, we are more interested in the feeling of generosity or the feelings that interfere with the natural expression of generosity. To feel charitable is to have achieved some measure of success in providing for oneself. To feel an ability to give one must have found ways to confront or conquer acute pain, be it physical or emotional. The continuum of consciousness suggests, and clinical observation of Primal patients supports, that as we resolve personal repressed pain, our sense of connection to people and the world around us deepens. Generosity is a state of being that can only sometimes be viewed in terms of words, behavior, or exchange of material goods. If you have ever had the good fortune to have a simple conversation with a truly giving person, you will understand the following. One feels cared about, as if this person simply and sincerely wants to know who you are and is happy to spend a few moments with you. The actual content of the conversation many not even be of interest to you. Still, one feels, in the presence of generosity, that the person does not seek approval or advantage, but only the chance to be here with you, however briefly, to know you. It is a breathtaking experience and you will know it when it happens. My point again that generosity at the most basic level is a state of being that cannot easily be measured or observed, but that has an unmistakable feel when one is in the presence of it. Giving is a form of self-expression and like
all forms of self expression can manifest in many ways limited only by the creativity of the individual. What to do if you find yourself still in too much pain, if you distrust others and only care about what is good for you?
There are steps one can take toward growth and options worth considering.
Foremost, you must continue your own personal exploration and trauma resolution.  Generosity is our species birthright, so be alert for
even the smallest impulse to give of yourself.  Notice I said, give of
yourself, not give a Starbucks gift card or material currency. I am not poo-pooing these types of gifts, just reminding that self-expression and altruism are part of our true nature and can be expressed in infinite ways. We do things all the time in our lives, and in therapy to stimulate our feeling, why stop with generosity?
If we can be alert to impulses of self expression and giving in all its possible forms, and more importantly, act on those impulses, we further the process of Primal consciousness which means coming just a bit closer to the person we were meant to be. There is no greater joy than being able to give to and love those around us. Our lives in the final reckoning are about the love we have created and nurtured. Possessions, achievements, titles, status, money, matter much less than we allow ourselves to see. Only love, in all its wondrous guises really matters. Don’t let yourself forget, don’t be distracted by all the bells and whistles of our modern chaotic world. The final link in breaking the chain of Primal pain and deprivation can only be realized by the active expression of our generosity towards others.
Connection to others and this world at large is our birthright, pursue it
with all that you have inside and become the person your were truly meant to be.
Barry