When We Feel Each Word We Utter Holds Another Person in Its Hands: In Making Ourselves Real to Others, We Become More Real to Ourselves

We all know those moments when we so want to talk to a friend. It might be with one particular person; or it might be a cry to just talk with someone, anyone who cares or knows us, and who will listen. There are moments when we realize something we didn’t say, or regret saying. There are moments when something is just turning over and over inside us, shaking the nerve pathways. And we yearn to reach out. There are moments when we wonder, who is it I can talk to that will understand?

 

But I wonder⎼ this drive can be so compelling. What is it we think we gain from sharing? What do we feel will happen or change by the act of opening our mouths and speaking? I doubt it’s just a release of pent-up emotion that we crave. And it must be something more than simply sharing with someone important to us something that’s important.

 

I’ve had some medical issues lately. And part of me wants to keep it all to myself, so in my own eyes and the eyes of the world, I appear healthy. But the questions about how to understand my health abound. What does this pain mean? Is there a diagnosis? The not-knowing can be frightening. A definitive explanation or label, even a scary one, can provide such relief.

 

And this is so true for all that goes on inside of us. When we look inward, hear a thought, feel a sensation or feeling, how do we know with any surety what it means? It’s so difficult to make sense of all that goes on inside us. We can feel our heart beating slowly or quickly.  We can feel tension in our belly, a rawness in our gut, heat in my palm. But there are no bold printed signs on my inner roadways saying, “here I am” and “this is truth.” Our inner world is so vast and elusive⎼ and tricky. Anything we experience can be interpreted in so many ways.

 

And what about the strong impulse to share whatever news we have, about our health or any event in our lives? How much should we share? Our state of health is part of our identity. When we talk, we create a perspective on who we are. In a way, we try to shape reality itself. We select words, images, and create stories with ourselves as the main character. We become the hero or heroine of one version of our lives. This gives our struggles meaning and importance.

 

But to select, we limit and distort. We describe the indescribable; we create walls or boundaries around what is naturally boundaryless. And we think of these boundaries as points of distinction, or separation, even isolation. So, how do we speak so it serves us instead of isolates us?

 

By creating a story of a self, we create something another person can relate to. By selecting a feeling or experience to share, we give another person a chance to enter our experience, to climb inside with us. Boundaries also create points of contact. A hand not only touches but can be touched.

 

And as I said earlier, our inner lives can be so fuzzy and confusing, so vast and limitless. Saying something about ourselves to another person is in a way a personal experiment. How we interpret our inner signals and outer events is crucial. We try one story and see if it holds up and feels right. Not only in the eyes and mind of the other person, but how it feels in our own mouth. We use conversations with others to make the fuzzy clear and give reality to ourselves. In making ourselves real to others, we become more real to ourselves.

 

But we need to be careful here….

 

*To read the whole post, please go to The Good Men Project.

The Most Important Lesson I Learned In College Was The Value of Friendship

After 49 years, I returned this past weekend to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where I went to college. For years after graduating, I dreamed about the place. I dreamed about the people and places I loved, tests I didn’t like, professors that inspired me, and weird twists on all of these people and places. But slowly, the dreams eventually ended. New people and places began to dominate my mind.

 

Like many people of my generation, college changed me. It was a rite of passage, or the closest to such a formal initiation that we had then in our culture. It didn’t lead immediately to a job. But it did nurture my life-long interest in philosophy, psychology and history. It was where I first learned to meditate, acted in my first play, had my first poem and story published, and participated in my first (20) political demonstrations.

 

It was on a school-arranged trip that I first flew to Europe, or first flew on any airplane anywhere.

 

It was also where I met 2 life-long friends, Al and Mark. For the last 41 years we have celebrated Thanksgiving together despite living in different cities. This year will be the 42nd.

 

And this year we decided to do it differently. We would first fly to Ann Arbor the weekend before Thanksgiving, meet with some old friends, see our old haunts, and even go to a football game. I hadn’t been to a football game since 1967. Then we would fly home, and a few days later drive with our families to one of our homes to celebrate our traditional Thanksgiving.

 

One of our old college friends, Steve, came to visit us at the house the 3 of us had rented. I had seen Steve only once since graduation, maybe 15 years ago. So when he came to the door, I was surprised by the joy I felt in seeing him. We hugged with sincere affection.

 

We sat in the living room and talked for hours. Steve led it off, talking about his life, his triumphs and frights. Words had been our door to the depths of our souls and we entered through that door once again. Then I told my stories, then Al, and Mark. Even though I had heard Al and Mark’s stories before, I didn’t feel “I heard all this already.” I felt I was hearing the stories for the first time, with a new twist, or as if their stories were my own.

 

We shared not only memories, but also a way of viewing the world. And a sound track, of Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Judy Collins, the Stones, Beetles, and Leonard Cohen. A few words from a line of this sound track would come to one of us, to explain a feeling or event, and the others would complete it…

To read the whole post, please click on this link to the Good Men Project, which published it.

Ideas, Perceptions and Feelings

We all form ideas about reality. It is a normal and necessary component of experiencing a meaningful world. However, the idea can seem to us as the reality, even though it’s not. I had two experiences recently which brought out this discrepancy. In one case, it turned an inconvenience into a difficult situation. In the other, it converted joy into loss.

 

In the first situation, I had arranged to use a space to hold a class. I had all the paperwork in and had used the space on and off for years. Then during the class session, another group came in half way through the class and said they had the space reserved. I was annoyed at the interruption and astonished by their claim.  I calmed down and let them use part of the space for the last twenty minutes of the class, even though my class was relatively quiet and theirs noisy. Then the next day, I checked in with the person in charge of scheduling the space and was assured the room was mine, not theirs. So, in my mind, I formed this idea that the other group was lying or taking advantage. That was my interpretation of what had happened. When I saw the leader of the group again, he even looked to me like a liar. But I was wrong about him. I later found out the person in charge of scheduling the space had double booked it.

 

In a totally different type of situation, I noticed recently that as I got older, I centered my life less on my work. I thought of friends and family more. I began to see my family more often and wanted to spend more time with friends. And with both, I am lucky. My family is supportive. I have close friends who care about and accept me. When I am with them, there are distinct ups and downs, but generally my moments with them are some of the finest moments in life. But I sometimes add something to the joy that changes its nature. I add this yearning to keep them close to me more of the time. Even though I have my own life and each of them has theirs, I dream of more time together. Instead of taking this dream as simply an extension of the joy and something to learn from, I sometimes take it as an indication that something is missing. Joy is then converted into clinging and loss.

 

Our emotions integrate the different elements of our world. They can do this for good or ill. They begin with what the author and child psychiatrist Daniel Siegel calls an initial “orienting response” or awakening of attention, grows to include memories, likes and dislikes, interpretations, until we get fully ripened emotions and inclinations to act.

 

It can be difficult to spot when distortions in our understanding occur, or understand what the distortion is. But it helps to know how emotions and perceptions are constructed. It helps to be mindful and keep in touch with the feeling underlying emotion. It helps when we notice if we are acting out of fear or a sense of threat so we can step back from the fear and more clearly consider if there is really a threat.  Or step back from an idea and evaluate if it accurately mirrors the situation. To take a breath and ask ourselves: “How am I viewing the other people in this situation? What is motivating the action I imagine?” It helps to realize that the perception I have of others is created along with the idea I hold of myself.

 

Life is so much fuller when I take time to absorb and cherish the reality I am presented with, whatever it is, but especially when it involves the friends and family I am close to.

 

*Photo from Cappadocia, Turkey.