Who Cares - What Matters
EVEN IF
ESPECIALLY IF
it’s not worth your attention
it’s not worth your watching
it’s at least worth your effort
to specifically be more
K I N D
to
family
friend
foe
foreigner
(and yourself)
No matter what
the Clock
the Calendar
shows. . .
IT BEGAN WITH THIS PAST MONDAY ON A FACE BOOK POST;
THREE WORDS:
LET US PRAY
followed up with another
FaceBook Post
that sported 248 LIKES
115 Comments
130 Shares:
I would be deeply humbled if everybody on my timeline who believes in the power of prayer would stop what they’re doing, just take a minute to pray this prayer, and then repost it.
“Lord, we need You! Please sweep through this nation and heal this land. Restore our strength, renew our minds, and cast out anything that’s not of You. In Jesus Christ’s name we pray, Amen.”
Pray for our country!
As I’m writing this Blog Post and most likely when you’re reading it
FRIDAY, November 6, 2020
we still don’t have a defined winner
for the Presidential Election
but more it’s
emphasized
and
RE-EMPHASIZED
just how hard it is to
not just be
but consistently be
A CARING CATALYST
It has made us want to be less of a
VERB
and more of a bunch of closely formed
p u n c t u a t i o n marks
!!##$!!%^^&&&*^%!!%&!&!!&!@@)(^**
. . .b u t
now is the time for not just our actions
but our best
A C T S
. . .Life-Changing ACTS
of Kindness
of Compassion
of Acceptance
of Forgiveness
of Care
of Love
of Assurances
and yes,
honest Questioning. . .
Q U E S T I O N I N G
is not only the greatest demonstration of
FAITH
but new beginnings
of a fragile
SURENESS
I am not sure of the world and what’s happening in it
But I am sure of the love I bring to it
I am not sure of the world and what’s happening in it
But I am sure of the kindness I bring to it
I am not sure of the world and what’s happening in it
But I am sure of the compassion I bring to it
I am not sure of the world and what’s happening in it
But I am sure of the care that I bring to it
I am not sure of the world and what’s happening it it
But I am sure of the love
kindness
compassion
and care of others
that I and so many nameless people join together
bring to it. . .
And that is not enough
It is a smidgen past enough
And that has not only made all the difference in this world and what we bring to it
But Continually long past US
what others will contribute to it as well. . .
This is not only historically proven
It’s prophetically Given
And when you’re SURE
the next ACT
is to be ASSURING. . .
Because it’s one thing to be sure
and it’s quite another to be
ASSURING
and both,
both are needed,
I need it now. . .
TRUE OR FALSE:
WE LOVE OUR COUNTRY
Pssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst:
That ain’t political
THAT
IS
BEING
CARING CATALYSTS. . .
SURE
and
ASSURING
THREE WORDS:
let us pray
(to be)
Wait. . .
W H A T. . . ?
IS IT OVER?
Almost feels like we are a scared
Groundhog
who’s way too scared or shy
to stick his head out
of his hiding place
to see his shadow
or dare
to make
o n e. . .
but can it be a time
N O W
that we can
HUMBLY
come together
and be a
Country
again
or in a revolutionary
NEW WAY
Jill Suttie, a journalist who writes for GREATER GOOD MAGAZINE,
shares with us
Many Americans worry about the political divide tearing our country apart. A large percentage are unwilling to engage with people who have opposing political views, and that’s creating more animosity.
This is especially worrying considering how many crises we’re facing—a pandemic, racial injustice, climate degradation—that require cooperation, trust, and solutions a diverse citizenry can get behind. How can we find a way across our divide and come together for common cause?
Jill and her colleagues at Greater Good, have been studying and writing about various ways to bridge divides, putting together tools to help people connect. But there may be one key character trait that’s necessary for applying those tools in a constructive way: humility.
“Humility is a kind of a master virtue that can pull along other virtues if people develop it,” says humility researcher Everett Worthington.
Humility, as Worthington defines it, is multifaceted, involving an awareness of our personal strengths and weaknesses, as well as a willingness to acknowledge those weaknesses while working to improve upon them. It requires presenting ourselves in modest ways, while caring about the well-being of those around us.
A growing body of research shows that being humble may be useful in bridging political differences. That’s because humility helps people let go of defensiveness, take in information that challenges their political views, and see the humanity in people on the other side of the political spectrum. Though it’s not always easy to embrace—especially for those who wrongfully equate it with weakness or a lack of conviction—humility may be what we desperately need right now in the United States.
Considering the research on perception, it’s pretty clear that, when it comes to understanding others, we all have weaknesses that could use improving.
Research suggests we are not always very good at understanding what another person is thinking or feeling, even when trying to “put ourselves in their shoes.” Often, we are better off simply asking people about their experience and being open to listening than trying to second-guess anyone.
Cognitive biases may be partly to blame. For example, the fundamental attribution error—attributing others’ actions to their fixed character traits rather than considering what outside forces contributed to their behavior—can make us misjudge others or believe they “get what they deserve.” This can explain why we label a colleague who falls behind at work “lazy” or “incompetent,” instead of realizing they may be managing difficult issues at home or have too many assignments—or why, when we see people fail to evacuate during a disaster, we call them “stubborn,” even though they didn’t have the means to escape to safer ground.
Our brains often trick us into seeing only what we already believe, too. For example, one study showed that people assigned to watch a demonstration reported different levels of protester violence depending on whether they agreed with the cause being protested. They literally could not see the same events in the same way.
Research has found that people often mistake how large differences are between people without noticing their commonalities. For example, people in different political parties tend to misjudge how far apart they are in terms of their beliefs and hopes for the country. This can create a lot of antipathy, which makes it hard to come together.
As a new book, Perception, explains, many unconscious factors affect how we feel, think, and make decisions, including our personal energy levels, physical abilities, moods, the company we keep, and more. That means we can’t always trust ourselves to see others (or even the world around us) clearly. Seeing our limitations is a good first step in recognizing the need for humility.
It makes sense that knowing we don’t own the corner on truth could help us bridge our differences, lessening our intolerance for diverse opinions and antipathy toward people on the “other side.” And scientific evidence bears this out.
In a study conducted by Elizabeth Krumrei-Mancuso and Brian Newman, participants noted their political affiliation and filled out a questionnaire measuring their intellectual humility around sociopolitical situations (recognizing their limited knowledge around issues like immigration and gun control). Then, they reported how warmly they felt toward Republicans, Democrats, Christians, and Muslims. Those who had higher levels of humility reported feeling warmer toward those who were politically or religiously different from themselves, regardless of political affiliation or religion.
“People that have more humility treat people that disagree with them in better ways and have less animosity toward them,” says Newman.
Why would that be? Newman believes humble people are more likely to think an opponent could know something they don’t know or have experienced something they haven’t experienced. People with less humility, he adds, would consider people who disagree with them to be suspect, unintelligent, or morally deficient—not endearing qualities.
“How I see the infallibility of my own position (and, by implication, an opposing position) determines how willing I am to demonize people that are on the other side,” says Newman.
In a second part of their study, Newman and Krumrei-Mancuso had half of the participants fill out a questionnaire that measured their intellectual humility around the topic of immigration and crime (priming them to consider the limits of their knowledge). Then, all participants were asked how much they agreed with the statement, “In general, immigrants are more likely to commit crimes than those born in the U.S.”
Then, after getting factual information about the topic, half of the people in both the primed and unprimed groups were told they’d be writing an argument for or against the statement about immigrants and crime. The researchers told the other halves of both groups to defend their current position, so they could focus more on evidence that supported it.
Once participants read the information (which explained that, while there is some disagreement among experts, most evidence shows immigrants do not commit more crimes), participants again reported on how much they agreed with the statement. Those who were high in humility and primed to think about it were willing to reconsider the strength of their position when presented with the facts.
“People high in intellectual humility are going to pay more attention to the reasons for their views,” says Newman. “That means they are going to notice the limits of their knowledge and the limits of the evidence in favor of their position, and be more receptive to new information.”
These findings mirror those of Tenelle Porter and her colleagues, who also found a connection between having more intellectual humility and being open to opposing views. In that study, believing in a “growth mindset” around intelligence—that people aren’t naturally intelligent, but can grow in learning through trial and error—was what led to increased intellectual humility, suggesting that adapting a growth mindset could indirectly affect how accepting we are of other views.
According to psychologist Joshua Hook, humility can help bridge differences even when people have strong convictions around their beliefs. In one study, he and his colleagues measured intellectual humility in religious leaders and found that those with higher levels of humility had much more tolerance for religious differences in others than those without humility—regardless of how religious they were or whether they reported being politically conservative or liberal.
“If you have an awareness of the limitations of your own beliefs and how they came to you, maybe you are more in tune with the idea that you don’t have the corner on the truth,” says Hook.
Even though you might expect that religious leaders surrounded by family and friends of varying faiths would be more tolerant of diverse religions, Hook’s findings didn’t support that. Instead, having more religious diversity in one’s social group only led to more tolerance if someone was also high in intellectual humility.
“It depends on whether or not someone is open for their interactions with people who are different from them that leads to religious tolerance or not,” he says.
If that’s true, maybe we need to find ways to increase humility in ourselves and in others. Though the research on how to induce humble states in ourselves is young, there is some evidence that it can be done.
Worthington and his team have developed a do-it-yourself workbook to teach humility that has shown promise. Through various exercises offered in the workbook, people can learn more about what humility is and isn’t, use self-reflections and inspirational stories to examine humility in themselves, and engage in practicing humility in their own lives, among other lessons.
The workbook has been tested in randomized controlled trials, along with other workbooks designed to teach forgiveness, patience, or self-control, or to improve mood. In one study, people who completed the humility workbook were found not only to be humbler according to their own report, but also scored higher in forgiveness and patience—and they had fewer negative moods.
Unfortunately, Worthington had to suspend a large-scale study of humility and civility when COVID hit. However, he’s hopeful that teaching humility could improve political dialogue, as other research has shown that it improves interpersonal interactions in other situations.
Of course, political conversations may be harder to keep civil than other conversations, where there may be more goodwill present. Still, at least one recent study showed that when people are seen as having more intellectual humility, they may help foster better conversations with people who disagree with them on politically charged subjects like the death penalty, affirmative action, physician-assisted suicide, and genetically modified food.
Worthington says there are good reasons to expect more politically humble people to have civil conversations and so bridge divides—even if they are the only ones being humble in a conversation or even if they have very firm convictions. That’s because humbler people don’t need to denigrate others’ arguments or denigrate them as people, which helps reduce defensiveness and opens up the possibility of better engagement with one another.
“Anybody who’s doing their best to be respectful is going to end up having a more positive interaction than someone calling each other names or being verbally aggressive,” he says. “The more politically humble people are able, the more able they are to have civil conversations about political differences, even if they disagree.”
THIS
could make for a
HUMILITY TSUNAMI
that could literally forever change
the geographical landscape
desperately needed
changing
for a
HUMBLING BEGINNING
JOIN ME
The water
(of a new beginning)
is fine. . .
SOUNDS LIKE GREEK TO ME, Right?
The World can humble you
in such a way
that what you know
what you know that you know
what you bet your life that you know
YOU DON’T KNOW AT ALL
. . .kind of sums up
L I F E
and most definitely
2 0 2 0. . .
I F
you could sum up this tumultuous year
or just these past topsy-turvy
2 3 1 days
and our
COVID19, hurricane, civil unrest, wildfires, politically tense
e x p e r i e n c e s
in one word
what would it be:
frustrating
disappointing
deadly
hurtful
devastating
tragic
hopeless
shocking
unbelievable
or the Greek word:
A C E D I A
I first heard about this word when I read an article by Jonathan L Lecher from THE CONVERSATION. Literally, when we’re in the middle of yet another wave of Covid19 and having some communities in rebooted lockdown conditions and movement restricted everywhere else, no one is posting pictures of their sourdough. Zoom cocktail parties have lost their novelty; Netflix can only release so many new series. The news seems worse every day, yet we compulsively scroll through it.
We get distracted by social media, yet have a pile of books unread. We keep meaning to go outside but somehow never find the time. We’re bored, listless, afraid, and uncertain.
What is this feeling?
John Cassian, a monk and theologian, wrote in the early 5th century about an ancient Greek emotion called acedia. A mind “seized” by this emotion is “horrified at where he is, disgusted with his room. . . . It does not allow him to stay still in his cell or to devote any effort to reading.” He feels:
such bodily listlessness and yawning hunger as though he were worn by a long journey or a prolonged fast. . . . Next he glances about and sighs that no one is coming to see him. Constantly in and out of his cell, he looks at the sun as if it were too slow in setting.
This sounds eerily familiar. Yet, the name that so aptly describes our current state was lost to time and translation.
Etymologically, acedia joins the negative prefix a- to the Greek noun kēdos, which means “care, concern, or grief.” It sounds like apathy, but Cassian’s description shows that acedia is much more daunting and complex than that.
Cassian and other early Christians called acedia “the noonday demon,” and sometimes described it as a “train of thought.” But they did not think it affected city dwellers or even monks in communities.
Rather, acedia arose directly out the spatial and social constrictions that a solitary monastic life necessitates. These conditions generate a strange combination of listlessness, undirected anxiety, and inability to concentrate. Together these make up the paradoxical emotion of acedia.
Evagrius of Pontus included acedia among the eight trains of thought that needed to be overcome by devout Christians. Among these, acedia was considered the most insidious. It attacked only after monks had conquered the sins of gluttony, fornication, avarice, sadness, anger, vainglory, and pride.
Cassian, a student of Evagrius, translated the list of sins into Latin. A later 6th century Latin edit gave us the seven deadly sins. In this list, acedia was subsumed into “sloth,” a word we now associate with laziness.
Acedia appears throughout monastic and other literature of the Middle Ages. It was a key part of the emotional vocabulary of the Byzantine Empire, and can be found in all sorts of lists of “passions” (or emotions) in medical literature and lexicons, as well as theological treatises and sermons.
It first appeared in English in print in 1607 to describe a state of spiritual listlessness. But it’s barely used today.
As clinical psychology has reclassified emotions and mental states, terms like “melancholy” can sound archaic and moralizing.
Emotional expressions, norms, and scripts change over time and vary between cultures. They mark out constellations of bodily sensations, patterns of thought, and perceived social causes or effects.
Since these constellations are culturally or socially specific, as societies change, so do the emotions in their repertoire. With the decline of theological moralizing, not to mention monastic influence, acedia has largely disappeared from secular vocabularies.
Now, the pandemic and governmental responses to it create social conditions that approximate those of desert monks. No demons, perhaps, but social media offers a barrage of bad (or misleading) news.
Social distancing limits physical contact. Lockdown constricts physical space and movement. Working from home or having lost work entirely both upend routines and habits. In these conditions, perhaps it’s time to bring back the term.
Reviving the language of acedia is important to our experience in two ways.
First, it distinguishes the complex of emotions brought on by enforced isolation, constant uncertainty, and the barrage of bad news from clinical terms like “depression” or “anxiety.”
Saying, “I’m feeling acedia” could legitimize feelings of listlessness and anxiety as valid emotions in our current context without inducing guilt that others have things worse.
Second, and more importantly, the feelings associated with physical isolation are exacerbated by emotional isolation—that terrible sense that this thing I feel is mine alone. When an experience can be named, it can be communicated and even shared.
Learning to express new or previously unrecognized constellations of feelings, sensations, and thoughts builds an emotional repertoire, which assists in emotional regulation. Naming and expressing experiences allows us to claim some agency in dealing with them.
As we, like Cassian’s desert monks, struggle through our own “long, dark teatime of the soul,” we can name this experience, which is now part of our emotional repertoire.
N O W
the biggest question of all. . .
DOES NAMING WHAT HAS BEEN NAMELESS, MAKE A DIFFERENCE?
WHO WOULD EVER IMAGINE
that the cure
for a Word
you most likely never heard of
3 minutes ago
was
Y O U
y e s:
Last week
AMAZON PRIME
had two
PRIME DAYS
where you could get all kinds of deals
before the
d e a l s
which prompted me
to ask a group of
patients
WHAT MAKES FOR YOUR PRIME DAY?
And there were a host of
NO’S
no pain
no nausea
no worrying
no asking why
no sleepless nights
And there were a multitude of
Another Birthday
Another Christmas
Another anniversary
Another family reunion
And there were an abundance of
Knowing what comes next
Knowing why I was really here
Knowing that my loved ones are ok
Knowing my purpose will outlast me
Knowing that my Matter, really Mattered
And you. . .
WHAT WOULD MAKE FOR YOUR PRIME DAY?
A concoction of all of the above. . .
A smattering of something else. . .
A pinch of what really makes you. . .
W H A T
Makes
for
a
PRIME DAY. . .
A PRIME DAY PRESENT
brought the morning
to my front porch
in a wedge of sunlight
that opened the door
without turning the lock
uncovering a bubble wrapped
n o t h i n g n e s s
that I will for an ever be
PRIMED
to cherish
Pssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst:
The Worst Prime Day ever
is the one
never truly lived
and forever
r e g r e t t e d. . .
Michael W. Smith
is a Christian Artist
with a most worldly
ALL ENCOMPASSING
m e s s a g e
that goes way beyond
a piano note
or nicely worded lyrics:
Oh these days I’m at a distance
Sirens scream but I don’t listen
There’s a million distractions I can’t escape
Like I’m sleepwalking now but I’m wide awake
And the picture I painted I want to change
Right now
Bring me into the conversation
All my walls, you can see them shaking, yeah
I’m staring at you, hanging on every word you’re saying
Won’t you bring me into the conversation
One by one we’re separated
What I thought was love just looked like hatred
I’ve been losing myself trying to prove you wrong
And right now all I know is I can’t go on
So I’m stepping across all the lines I’ve drawn
Right now, right now
Bring me into the conversation (conversation, conversation)
All my walls, you can see them shaking, oh yeah
I’m staring at you, hanging on every word you’re saying
Won’t you bring me into the conversation.
I just wanna talk to you
I just wanna talk to you
I just wanna talk to you
I just wanna talk to you
I just wanna hear what you’re saying
Won’t you bring me into the conversation
All my walls you can see them shaking, oh yeah
I’m staring at you, hanging on every word you’re saying
Oh Won’t you bring me into the conversation
I just wanna talk to you
I just wanna hear what you’re saying oh yeah
I M A G I N E
DARE BELIEVE
UNDERSTAND
KNOW
The world could literally change
Be transformed
Come off it’s tracks
If we just said
“BRING ME INTO THE CONVERSATION”
“I JUST WANT TO TALK WITH YOU”
“TELL ME YOUR STORY”
“I REALLY WANT TO HEAR WHAT YOU ARE SAYING”
L I S T E N
l i s t e n
I just don’t want to talk with you. . .
I want to
Listen
TO HEAR
WHAT YOU ARE SAYING
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm of the Day:
Maybe before you bring me into the
c o n v e r s a t i o n
I need to prove to you
s h o w y o u
GIVE YOU
a reason
to do
S O
IT DOESN’T TAKE MUCH TODAY
. . .just wear a mask
or NOT
and it can be
O N
T H I S
non-confrontational person
who will play peace-maker to any little
squabble that happens to start up. . .
It’s as if we are an overly dry
thirsty forest floor
AND EVERYTHING
is a lit match
just waiting to drop
which is why
I AM LOOKING
READING
SEARCHING
GOOGLING
RESEARCHING
ASKING
for some advice
SOME HOW-TO
for my sincere
WANT-TO
on how to douse
the flames
or better still
DO SOME FIRE-PREVENTION
before having to ever having to do
f i r e f i g h t i n g
by not just learning
but assimilating
The everyday martial art of talking to someone who disagrees with you
an article I recently ready by Don Johnson. . .
Words create our reality. Once we put them out there, we can’t take them back. Expressions like “I didn’t mean to say that” or “I was only kidding” come too late.
So why do couples get into needless arguments? Jeffery S. Smith, MD, writes in Psychology Today:
The cause of arguments and fights is a lack of mutual, empathic understanding. When empathy is not engaged, then people revert to a self-protective mode and become judgmental. The result is a bad feeling on both sides and no happy ending.
People want to be understood, not just heard.
Author Daniel Kahneman’s theory of two different systems of thinking sheds light on why we sometimes lose the ability to be empathetic in our relationships.
Kahneman says System 1 thinking operates quickly, without concentrated effort. It’s more unconscious, irrational, and emotional. We use it when driving a car on an empty road, reading words on a giant billboard, doing something familiar, or something that looks easy, like solving 6+6=?
System 2, on the other hand, involves effort and attention. It’s logical, rational, and conscious. We use it when solving complicated calculations, adjusting our behavior in a social situation, or when searching for a specific person in a crowd.
When faced with familiar and everyday situations, people invent mental shortcuts. If something looks easy, we use System 1, our more unconscious method of thinking. However, depending solely on System 1 can lead to biases toward everyday situations and issues.
This may explain one of the challenges of being in a relationship: We get used to our partner’s thought patterns and behavior; they become familiar and almost predictable. Consequently, it’s easy to go on autopilot and default to System 1 thinking, particularly when we get triggered, frustrated, or stressed. When we’re emotional, we are more apt to make assumptions, jump to conclusions, get defensive, and not listen attentively. Empathy can slip right through our fingers.Healthy Relationships Begin With Knowing Who You Really AreMeditation can help you locate your truest selfhumanparts.medium.com
Here are some strategies that can help you stay out of unnecessary arguments.
While a lack of empathy may be the underlying cause of arguments, the words we use are the delivery system. An opinion presented as a fact is toxic and a surefire way to make someone defensive.
Here are some examples of toxic opinions:
Contrast those with these:
These “I” statements are examples of owning your opinion, a critical element of humility.
It only takes one conscious person to stop an argument.
Opinions are subjective and, when expressed in the first person, constructive. They invite differing viewpoints, laying the foundation for resolving conflict. Using language in the second or third person, by contrast, closes off dialogue and invites defensiveness.
Speaking with humility will cool a conversation that’s getting too hot.
Be present: We’ve all experienced the disappointment of speaking to someone who is clearly busy or distracted and says, “Go ahead, I’m listening.” It feels disrespectful and can derail a conversation quickly. Be fully attentive and look at the person you are speaking to.
Be quiet: If you are aware that you interrupt people, stop doing it. It’s a good sign that, whether you realize it or not, you aren’t listening. It conveys that you are more interested in getting your point across than anything else.
Demonstrate your presence: If you sit silently, like a statue, no one knows whether you’re actually listening. Nodding gently, saying “Mm-hmm” or “Uh-huh” will help encourage the other person to explain themselves fully. Silent attention only makes people wonder if anyone is home.
Get curious: Questions show interest and help the other person feel valued. In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen Covey writes, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.” When something doesn’t make sense to you or you start to feel agitated, ask yourself: What don’t I know? Is there something I am missing? What am I curious about?
Use reflective listening: Summarize what you think you have heard and check to make sure you have it right. “Here’s what I hear you saying and what is important to you… is this correct?” If you don’t have it right, you can try again. You aren’t agreeing—you are just demonstrating you understand.
If you don’t understand, say, “I’m not clear,” or “Help me out. I’m not getting it.” It’s counterproductive to say, “You are not making sense.” This creates more defensiveness and blames the other person.
Aikido is a modern Japanese martial art that uses the principles of nonresistance to neutralize an opponent. Translated to English, it means “the way of harmonious spirit.” Aikido does not offer aggressive or defensive maneuvers but instead uses the energy of an opponent to divert and redirect an attack harmlessly. The philosophy is based on peaceful resolution and self-improvement. It only takes one conscious person to stop an argument.
Arguments are like two people physically pushing on the other. One pushes; the other pushes back. Then the other pushes back harder. Nothing is accomplished, and everybody feels bad. Verbal aikido uses these principles in defusing conflicts and can help both individuals rekindle empathy.
Let’s imagine my wife and I are arguing. She says, “That’s a dumb idea; it won’t work.” If I say, “You’re wrong,” I’m just pushing back on her, creating more friction. If I agree with her, but don’t mean it, I’m not being truthful, and I’ll wind up being resentful.
Verbal aikido, however, can help stop the “pushing.” Here’s how it works:
YIELD: I can defuse the situation by acknowledging her point of view, reframing it slightly to help her recognize and own her opinion. I don’t say anything aggressive or defensive, but I might say, “You think it’s a dumb idea.” Helping her take ownership of the opinion, presented as a fact, is the first step in redirecting the verbal attack.
INQUIRE: Assuming she says, “Yes, I do think it’s a dumb idea,” I can say, “Okay, help me understand why you think it’s dumb?” I want to invite her to share not just what she thinks, but why she thinks that way. I’m curious to understand her thinking and perspective.
SHARE: Then, I explain why I think the way that I do. “I think it’s a good idea because…” This creates balance in the conversation and opens up a discussion not just about our opinions but about what is behind them. Arguments are solved through dialogue.
RESOLVE: As we talk more, if she offers convincing ideas, I can change my mind. If I still don’t agree, I can say, “Let’s find a solution that works for both of us.” We may compromise and move ahead together, or we may decide to disagree, but at least we understand why we think the way we do, and that is a better outcome than arguing.
Arguments are inevitable in life, but by being mindful and skillful, we can speak wisely, listen actively, and bring empathy and love into our conversations — even the tough ones. . .ONLY IF WE REALLY WANT. . .
SIMON BIRCH
one of my go to movies
because this is
ONE OF MY
GO TO SCENES
of all time. . .
I’ve used it in
presentations
Bible Studies
HELP-SELF groups
Workshops
ALL
with the question of
WHO ARE YOU. . .
WHY ARE YOU HERE?
( N O W )
because the answer is ever-changing, right?
Who we were as a child at the end of the hand of a parent
IS A MUCH DIFFERENT PERSON
of the parent the child grows into
at the end of the hand of a child. . .
The Movie came out in September, 1998 and it doesn’t share the title of the book by John Irving because at his request he wanted the title changed because he didn’t believe that his novel could successfully be made into a film. . .
Irving’s book, was his 7th novel (WORTH THE READ) was published in 1989. And both, the book and the movie hover around the
WHY
HOW COME
WHAT FOR’S
of Life
and
OUR PLAN. . .
which brings us to
THE SCENE
after Simon
who’s never afraid to ask the tough questions
and lives much taller
than the dwarf he is
is in trouble for causing a huge ruckus
at the Christmas Eve Pageant
and just wants confirmed
what he believes
but no one looking at him
could ever:
THAT HE IS AN INSTRUMENT
THAT HE HAS A PURPOSE
THAT HE HAS A MEANING
THAT HE HAS A DESTINY
THAT HE HAS A REASON
for living. . .
and when the Episcopal Priest
has an opportunity to affirm him
TO AFFIRM US
he doesn’t by answering
I CAN’T
to the immortal question
“I want to know that there’s a reason for things;
I use to be certain, but now I’m not so sure. . .
I want you to tell me that
GOD HAS A PLAN FOR ME;
A PLAN FOR ALL OF US ?”
The PRIESTNESS
in all of us
are capable of answering
NOT WHAT
BUT THAT
the PURPOSES ARE MULTIPLE
. . .tell me,
share with me
your purpose
now
October 12, 2020
(ESPECIALLY NOW IN 2020)
so we can
c a r i n g l y
Catalyst together
to make
I T
happen for each other. . .
D U G N A D
Say it with me:
dugnad (doog-nod). . .
It’s a Norwegian word I learned this week when I was reading an article by Phyllis Cole-Dai; it’s an ancient word, traceable to the Viking Age, when villagers would labor together to bring ships ashore after long seafaring trips.
That’s dognap. . .
In later centuries, Norwegian farming communities would work together to prepare for harsh winters and to survive other hardships.
Dugnad. . .
In the 1940s, Norwegians rallied to resist five brutal years of Nazi occupation.
Dugnad. . .
Traditionally, dugnad is the collective effort of individual Norwegians who sacrifice their personal desires, and allow their own sense of “normal” to be temporarily disrupted, for the benefit of their community or country.
On March 12 of this year, after the first Norwegian died from COVID-19, Prime Minister Erna Solberg called for a national dugnad. She asked everyone in Norway to band together to reduce the spread of the disease. As a result, the country contained the outbreak, avoiding massive numbers of infections and deaths.
To my knowledge, I don’t have any Norwegians in my family tree. But a concept similar to dugnad lives in my, in OUR DNA. I call it “love of the neighbor,” or “commitment to the common good,” or “civic duty,” or even “patriotism,” in the best sense.
I know. . .one person’s definition and perspective isn’t the COLLECTIVE’S and I’m often hurt and disappointed when I’m naive enough to think so. . .
I credit my upbringing, my spiritual life, and my liberal arts education, my Master of Divinity in Social Ethics and Pastoral Care among other things, for cultivating in me a deep respect for others. But I suspect that I was born with the seed of this sensibility, just as you were. It’s part of our nature as human beings. How could it not be? We’ve had to count on one another to survive since the dawn of history.
Sometimes, though, that seed of US gets buried so far down inside, we don’t even realize it’s there. We lack fellow feeling. We’d rather do our own thing than devote ourselves to a common purpose, even in a crisis. . .and isn’t that what we are currently seeing/showing/feeling over these past few months. . . ?
I keep hoping that we can find ways to strengthen our faith in one another. Maybe we could start, right where we are, by sharing frankly what we believe in—one person speaking at a time, while the rest of us listen. I mean, really listen, without mentally picking apart what we’re hearing. Listening so well that when the speaker finishes, we offer only our thanks, without commentary. We now understand better, and that’s enough.
Let’s try it, shall we?
DARE WE?
I’ll speak first, if you don’t mind, since I’m already at it:
I believe in greeting each new day with a bow of gratitude. In nurturing the promise of children. In being faithful to friends. In being kind to strangers. In trying to love without clinging.
I believe in neighborly potlucks and pots of coffee. In bicycles and flowers and porches; early morning walks or afternoon strolls in silence and solitude. In sanctuaries and wilderness. In letting things be. In sometimes losing myself in order to find myself again. In the necessity of pulling colorful weeds out of sidewalk cracks in the delight of UNPLANTING flowers or just buying them and giving them away. In striking a fine balance between freedom and responsibility. In the power of naming. In the duty to vote. In buying a cup of coffee for the car behind you in line and driving away before they have a chance to flick their lights or honk their horn in gratitude. . .
I believe that the universe is big and our place in it isn’t even a speck, yet what we do and say matters. I believe that joy is fleeting. That life is hard. That equanimity is possible, even in the midst of suffering. That life is a fragile web of kinship. That death is always close. I believe in the smallness of what I know, the value of what you know, the vastness of what we can know together, and the existence of what we can’t know at all. . .
I believe in trees, especially old ones, and in the ever-changing sky, which has no borders, only ongoing, never-ending horizons. I believe that what’s good for me is bound up with what’s good for you. I believe in stepping over the line of what’s nice for the sake of what’s right. I believe in poetry and stories and music and art and dreams—everything that helps us to question who we are and to imagine who we might become, together. . .
I believe in you. . .
D U G N A D
I am often the weakest link
to find the strongest of strong
connections
that hold and support me
when I have fingerless hands
to grab
to hold
anything that’s good
for me and others
Seldom the strongest
frequently the weakest
the mainest of the main
is being a part of the chain
Often am I
the thread missing from the tapestry
the puzzled piece
that completes the jigsawed riddle
the punctuation mark
that ends the sentence
the dot that connects the dots
and in the missing
am I forever found
to be often lost
and found again
and yet found once before
being lost
A connection
A link
not deserved
but owned
all the more
to be extended
to the
dugnad
in you
THIS SIMPLE. . . ?
BE THE OUTSTRETCHED HAND
THAT GUARANTEES ANOTHER’S
NEVER TO BE EMPTY
. . .THAT COMPLETES THE NEVER-ENDING CIRCLE
HAND IN HAND
LINK BY LINK
HELP ME
IN MY WEAKNESS
IN YOUR WEAKNESS
TO MAKE STRONG
WHAT CAN NEVER BE ACCOMPLISHED
a l o n e
IT DOES NOT MATTER. . .
it really doesn’t matter how long you’ve lived
BECAUSE
YOU HAVE LIVED
it’s impossible for you
NOT TO HAVE
PTSD. . .
To put it even more directly,
IF YOU HAVE A PULSE
YOU HAVE PTSD
. . .that’s the thought that hit me
between the eyes
and right straight to the middle of my brain
as I was sitting in Presentation given by a Social Worker
from the VA Hospital in Cleveland, OH
when he stated,
“If you have had boots on the ground, you are suffering from PTSD.”
and the thought exploded inside of me
‘we all have boots on the ground
which soils a seed of pain’
that pesters and haunts us
and yes,
gives us
THE RESILIENCE FACTOR
and this once again
got plowed into me again when I read a recent
New York Times Article by Eilene Zimmerman,
who is author of the memoir
“Smacked: A Story of White-Collar Ambition, Addiction and Tragedy.”
with the message of
because of our previous
TOUGH TIMES
it’s prepared us for this current
TOUGH TIME. . .
It turns out, the article states, that the awful times in our lives have been good training for a pandemic, for political and social upheaval, for economic and financial uncertainty. These experiences have taught us that we never really know what’s going to happen next. We can plan as best we can, but now we’re far more able to pivot our thinking. Especially when it doesn’t always feel like it, we have the capacity to cope with more of life’s unexpected slings and arrows, to accept the difficulties we face and keep going, even though it can be hard and rarely volunteered for. . . .
How we navigate a crisis or traumatic event (and the coronavirus has many characteristics of trauma because it is unpredictable and uncontrollable) depends, in large part, on how resilient we are. Resilience is the ability to recover from difficult experiences and setbacks, to adapt, move forward and sometimes even experience growth.
Here’s the rub: An individual’s resilience is dictated by a combination of genetics, personal history, environment and situational context. So far, research has found the genetic part to be relatively small.More from ResilienceIn a Crisis, We Can Learn From Trauma TherapyJune 15, 2020
“The way I think about it is that there are temperamental or personality characteristics that are genetically influenced, like risk-taking, or whether you’re an introvert or extrovert,” said Karestan Koenen, professor of psychiatric epidemiology at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health.
Professor Koenen studies how genes shape our risk of post-traumatic stress disorder. “We all know people that are just very even-tempered,” she said. “Some of that is simply how we’re built physiologically.” Yet it isn’t true that some people are born more resilient than others, said Professor Koenen, “That’s because almost any trait can be a positive or negative, depending on the situation.”
Far more important, it seems, is an individual’s history.
The most significant determinant of resilience — noted in nearly every review or study of resilience in the last 50 years — is the quality of our close personal relationships, especially with parents and primary caregivers. Early attachments to parents play a crucial, lifelong role in human adaptation.
“How loved you felt as a child is a great predictor of how you manage all kinds of difficult situations later in life,” said Bessel van der Kolk, a professor of psychiatry at Boston University School of Medicine who has been researching post-traumatic stress since the 1970s. He is the founder of the Trauma Research Foundation in Boston.
Dr. van der Kolk said long-term studies showed that the first 20 years of life were especially critical. “Different traumas at different ages have their own impacts on our perceptions, interpretations and expectations; these early experiences sculpt the brain, because it is a use-dependent organ,” he said.
You can think of resilience as a set of skills that can be, and often is, learned. Part of the skill-building comes from exposure to very difficult — but manageable — experiences.
“Stress isn’t all bad,” said Steven M. Southwick, professor emeritus of psychiatry, PTSD and Resilience at Yale University School of Medicine and co-author of the book “Resilience: The Science of Mastering Life’s Greatest Challenges.” If you can cope today with all that’s happening in the world around you, Dr. Southwick said, “then when you are on the other side of it, you’ll be stronger.”
How we cope depends on what is in our resilience toolbox. For some people it might be filled with drugs. For others it can be drinking, overeating, gambling, shopping. But these don’t promote resilience.
Instead, the tools common to resilient people are optimism (that is also realistic), a moral compass, religious or spiritual beliefs, cognitive and emotional flexibility, and social connectedness. The most resilient among us are people who generally don’t dwell on the negative, who look for opportunities that might exist even in the darkest times. During a quarantine, for example, a resilient person might decide it is a good time to start a meditation practice, take an online course or learn to play guitar.
Research has shown that dedication to a worthy cause or a belief in something greater than oneself — religiously or spiritually — has a resilience-enhancing effect, as does the ability to be flexible in your thinking.
“Many, many resilient people learn to carefully accept what they can’t change about a situation and then ask themselves what they can actually change,” Dr. Southwick said. Conversely, banging your head against the wall and fretting endlessly about not being able to change things has the opposite effect, lessening your ability to cope.
Dr. Southwick has done many studies with former prisoners of war and has found that although they suffered profoundly, many eventually found new areas of growth and meaning in their lives.
“Each of us has to figure out what our particular challenges are and then determine how to get through them, at the current moment in time,” advised George Bonanno, a professor of clinical psychology and director of the Loss, Trauma, and Emotion Lab at Columbia University Teachers College. The good news, he said, is that most of us will. Professor Bonanno’s lab reviewed 67 studies of people who experienced all kinds of traumatic events. “I’m talking mass shootings, hurricanes, spinal cord injuries, things like that,” he said. “And two-thirds were found to be resilient. Two-thirds were able to function very well in a short period of time.”
Interviews with large numbers of highly resilient individuals — those who have experienced a great deal of adversity and have come through it successfully — show they share the following characteristics.
So. . .
how do we bring
FACE TO MIRROR
and make things
C L E A R E R
less blurry. . .
Could it be as easy as
LOOKING BEYOND OURSELVES
FOCUSING MORE ON OTHERS
REFINING OUR CARING CATALYST SKILLS. . . ?
How about we prove
that it
DOESN’T
YOU most
RESILIENT FACTOR
