Parenting Perplexes

 Parents can’t help having expectations for their children. Often we expect them to embrace our best qualities and to sift out our worst, like bugs from a cup of flour. This is pretty funny when you think about it. How is this magic supposed to occur?

Not infrequently, children seem to exhibit qualities the opposite of those we consider our best; they seem to absorb our negative qualities like a sponge. Some characteristics we may not even recognize as our own, or ‘fess up to as our own unless we take an honest look at our personal behavior.  (In a previous blog, I wrote how children can reflect a parent  like a mirror.) Alternatively, a child may be so different from us that we are perplexed about how to relate to them.

For example, a son procrastinates while his father lives his life as if he’ll run out of time, attempting to do yesterday what he can do today.

I recently saw the Israeli film Footnote, involving a father, a hard working scholar who prods his son, The son lies around, motivated to do nothing more than hike in the wilderness or ‘veg’ on the couch. Finally the father explodes at his son out of a sense of multiple frustrations.

How to handle this dilemma? Nagging is rarely helpful. Children, and people in general, tune out and discount a nagging voice. 

Each individual has their own sense of time. Some of us live life as if time has no end; others as if there is never enough. The truth is, most often we don’t know how much time we have in a lifetime.

(The line from Terrance McNally’s play Talley’s Folly often comes to my mind:  “However much time there is in a lifetime is a lifetime. “)

Parents may be effective when they offer helpful suggestions. For example, “I think you’ll be happier and your future brighter if you have more education. Advanced degrees give a person opportunities, choice and freedom.” (Maybe interject an example of a famous person who benefitted from following this path?)

A parent can tell stories/anecdotes/parables, fables. For example, Aesop’s tale about the ant who works hard in the field to gather for the future and the grasshopper who plays and has no food when winter comes.

Children also like to hear about how parents learned from their mistakes.  E.g. I’d squandered money on makeup but when I wanted to buy a car, I knew I had to learn to save.

Conclusion: Parenting is more positively effective when a parent:

1. Offers suggestions and encouragement

2. Refrains from criticism and nagging.

3. Saves complaints for therapists and friends and perhaps relatives (who can be trusted to keep your words to themselves).

4. Remember: Parenting is hard work and isn’t limited to a 9 to 5 schedule.  And it requires discipline.  Often a parent must think before speaking.

Dear Reader: I welcome your comments. (jsimon145@gmail.com)

The Voice Within

“….(W)hen there’s no one else, look inside yourself, like your oldest friend, just trust the voice within.-Rolling in the Deep” by Adele.

Adele wrote these words in three hours the day after she broke up with her boyfriend.

The combination of Adele’s great voice, the melody and the message have made her song, Rolling in the Deep, the best selling single of the year.

Adele realized she had to trust herself; the belief that her boyfriend was going to protect her had burst like a balloon. He proved unfaithful.

Her message is profound; she tuned in and listened to her inner voice when she was jolted by the shock of betrayal.

I first heard my inner voice loud and clear when I was ten years old and admitted to myself that I loved and hated my new baby brother. (He was adorable and I looked forward to taking care of him, but I also hated him because he further diluted my mother’s limited attention, and I felt more deprived.)

I was definitely confused and couldn’t share my feelings (of hatred) so I began to write my diary.  The act of concretizing them offered relief, I suppose serving as (a kind of) catharsis.

Our Western culture rarely teaches about this inner voice. We turn to the Eastern culture for the meditative arts. 

Many pioneers in the field of Western Psychology have studied the Eastern philosophies. Karen Horney studied Zen Buddhism, and  Fritz Perls, whom she supervised, also studied Zen Buddhism. He became the father of Gestalt therapy, and wrote, “We must lose our minds and come to our senses.”

Western psychology focuses on being in the world while Eastern philosophy focuses on being with Oneself, meditating and tuning in to our bodies and minds. To obtain the whole picture, we do best to integrate the Western and the Eastern approaches.

A person doesn’t have to become involved in a formal school of meditation.  Setting time away from the daily mayhem; possibly jotting down random thoughts in a notebook or on a scrap of paper, may be sufficient.

The deep voice from within may come when we least expect it. For instance, Harry heard it when he was driving his car because there was no one around to interrupt his thoughts. He realized he needed to spend more time by himself, apart from his conflicted, demanding home life.

This guiding voice benefits from cultivation, like a delicate seedling. The inner voice is nurtured by silence and time and space…It is more likely to emerge when encouraged by consistency; it is like a guest to welcome.  It may be extinguished by interruptions and our superego, demanding us to perform our work (although I think my inner voice helps me order priorities).

This alternate state or meditative consciousness is important to our healthy being, and yet many people in Western culture think they’re crazy when they experience it.

Conclusion: You are your ultimate teacher and possess your own personal truth. The message may come when you least expect it. The goal is to learn to listen and trust this guiding, positive, inner voice.

Dear Reader: I welcome your comments. (jsimon145@gmail.com)

Fridays to Mondays

Dear Readers, I have been advised by a professional blogger to post on Mondays instead of Fridays. (People tend to close down their computers on Fridays in preparation for the weekend.) 
Therefore please check in to read my blog on Monday, May 21 and on future Mondays. I apologize for any inconvenience.

On Mother's Day

 In a future blog I’ll discuss two mental states: the ACTIVE and the PASSIVE. Thinking of active/passive brings up thoughts of my mother, on whom I write a brief meditation. She isn’t here to thank for all she gave.

Ruth B. Simon’s second career was seismology. She had a passion for the subject and hoped to discover how to predict earth quakes by observing cave crickets.

 My mother lived as if pursued by a pack of wild wolves. There was never enough time for her to accomplish what she wanted. Raising five children (especially as a single mother) was challenging.

But she could only ‘give’ what she had. She was long on DOING and short on BEING. She didn’t have the luxury to meditate; to understand the deepest core of human existence ( which I view as  a state of communion and acceptance). 

As a seismologist she studied the earth’s core, and observed its tumult, recorded on seismographs. She traveled the world and wrote a manual for scientists, teaching them to interpret seismograms, records of the earth’s movement, made by scribbling pens on rolling drum of the seismograph.  

She worked at Lamont Geological Observatory under the auspices of  Dr. Jack Oliver, whom she regarded highly. He was the first to document that the core of the earth, composed of tectonic plates, shifts continuously and is responsible for  earthquakes. (Fortunately most of these occur in silent areas under the ocean floor.)   

Thank you Mom for all you gave. If you had more time ( or if you have another lifetime) I know you would have arrived (will arrive) at the state of BEING.

Dear Reader, I hope you too are meditating on the gifts your mother gave, and I hope you have permission, the freedom, to think about what you would have liked that she couldn’t give. I welcome your comments. (jsimon145@gmail.com)

Beyond Diagnosis

             I’ve just returned from two psychiatric meetings in Philadelphia (the American Academy of Psychoanalysis and Dynamic Psychiatry and the American Psychiatric Association) where I was exposed to a wealth of information, including dialogue about the new Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of mental disorders; the fifth edition is to be published in May 2013.

 Diagnosis has undergone many changes since the days of Doctor Benjamin Rush (1745-1813 )  the father of American psychiatry. The first Diagnostic and Statistical Manual was published in 1952.

The history of psychiatry and the evolution of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual manifests the mutability of diagnostic categories which are also linked to cultural changes.

By contrast, what doesn’t change in us Humans is the prevalence of Negative Thinking. Negative thoughts often surface more readily than positive ones, and cross diagnostic categories.

(There is no diagnosis for negative thinking except when accompanied by other symptoms which place it in the category of depression. Negative thinking is more pervasive  and prevalent than clinical depression.)

An example of negative thinking is the person who looses weight but fails to register the accomplishment and  instead, berates himself for not achieving the final goal.

The mind tends to leap from registering achievement to the tendency to self deprecate.

Many of us would benefit from examining and reframing negative, non-productive thinking, which depletes our energy and diminishes our ability to give to other people.

Reframing, a technique of transforming negative thinking and beliefs to positive ones, is used by psychotherapists with diverse training, from individual to family, from cognitive to psychodynamic.

The poet, Stanley J. Kunitz (1905-2006, Poet Laureate in 2000)  expresses the process of sorting thoughts in his poem, The Layers.  (I excerpt it here but you can find the entire poem on the web and hear the voice of Mr. Kunitz on You Tube).

I have walked through many lives,

some of them my own,

and I am not who I was,

though some principle of being

abides, from which I struggle

not to stray.

 …..

In my darkest night,

when the moon was covered

and I roamed through wreckage,

a nimbus-clouded voice

directed me:

“Live in the layers,

not in the litter.”

Though I lack the art

to decipher it,

no doubt the next chapter

in my book of transformations

is already written.

I am not done with my changes.”

The great poet knew he had to sort through and live in the layers, not the litter, which I interpret as the mind’s negativity.

Conclusion: Negative thinking is a universal phenomenon which extends Beyond Diagnostic Labels. Reframing our negative thinking provides us with a more satisfying life, including more energy and the ability to give to others.

Dear Reader: I welcome your comments. (jsimon145@gmail.com)

The Finite and the Infinite

We need the Ego the self-focused, self protective part of ourselves which helps us function in daily life and serves as the central reference point in relationships.  Without the Ego to help us mediate and act in the world, we’d crumble.  On the other hand, if we’re overinvested in our Ego (and experience the world as if we’re the Sun with everything and everyone revolving around us) we may miss a lot of the magnificence of existence.

(Some of us are satisfied to live within the confines of the Ego. My Dad was satisfied with what I regard as the meat and potatoes of life; he didn’t have a need for the ‘Spiritual’ realm.)

How do we  arrive at a point of view beyond the Ego to experience the sense of the Infinite?  Unlike many hats, one size doesn’t fit all. What has worked for me is to free associate as I write a daily journal, jotting thoughts about events, with an open mind to question and reframe. This writing serves as a kind of meditation.

I find myself asking: What is my part? What lies beyond me? I become aware of the fluidity of boundaries between myself and others.

Many years ago, before I developed an awareness, my (un-psychoanalyzed) brother Bob said to me. “Do you know your words strike (and wound) a person (in this case it was my sister in law) like an arrow  as if you know the precise location of  their Achilles heel?”

No, I wasn’t as aware of the impact of my words on other people as I needed to be; listening with the third ear, and scanning with the third eye were valuable techniques I needed to learn and use beyond the office walls.

Back in the ‘70’s, my  psychoanalyst,  Dr. P  asked me to push beyond, to question my actions and words. I sensed I wouldn’t be the same person if I continued on this path, to see beyond the manifest.  I resisted like a bucking bronco, harnessed and saddled for the first time.

I was frightened, sensing I was leaving the plain of the land and venturing into rough terrain, unmapped hills and valleys as I learned to listen with the third ear. The famous psychoanalyst Theodore Reik, Ph.D (1888-1969) discussed this process in his best known book Listening with the Third Ear (1948). My vision was being  irreversibly altered. I sensed this change was different from trying on a new pair of eye glasses which can be removed at will.

 “Do I always have to see things this way…. even after I leave the office?” I said.  Dr. P. seemed startled as if no one had asked him this question before. “Yes,” he replied.

CONCLUSION: In the early morning hours, I write anything which comes into my mind; some of my thoughts seem sacred, as if they emanate from a deeper self; I can hear God’s voice; and at times, the Devil’s too- the Creator and the Destroyer.  When this precious time has passed, nearly every word must be considered before I speak.

Dear Reader, As you step into the unmapped terrain of your unconscious, do not be afraid. Be assured you are like everyone else:  You will step on landmines and you will reap the gold of awareness of self and beyond.

As always, I invite your comments.

POEM: FINITE AND BEYOND

Sometimes my diary

 speaks only to me

and sometimes a message

 shocks like a rock,

breaches the surface

of an ephemeral pond,

stirs up ripples which

  radiate  beyond

yearn for a grand

audience of ears.

Dear Reader: I welcome your comments. (jsimon145@gmail.com)