Classroom Talk
Winter 2002 Archive
Are you ready to change? Posted by John on January 26, 2002 at 10:31:14:
It looks like a two-day job ahead of me. I've got remarks from some one, two, three . . . fifteen postings here that I'd like to weave together if I can—
remarks of my own, Douglas and Deirdre, and Sally. Well, I'll give it my best shot.
And, I'm trying to work my way back to that question Deirdre asked about "What is forgiveness?" and some choice touches by Pauline, Lou, and
others of you.
I wouldn't be much of a coach, Sally, if I didn't have a few more observations about your "Time out!" post. I think you had the right idea then, and
you did the right thing. But if you will look that game tape over, I think you may see that you also "went too far" in the middle part of it—slipping
over from essence to personality, when you brought Bruce into it.
>I feel compelled to come to Douglas' defense here, as it seems to me you have a score on the board so to speak.
Right on! I needed that.
>He hasn't posted in months and ws trying to help Deidre, and I don't see any stingers aimed at you.
Yes, that's true. He didn't say anything to attack me—he was being rather sweet and quite pleasant, indeed. But consider this: if I had score on my
scoreboard, that means that *something* had rubbed me the wrong way. Stingers aren't always, or necessarily, obvious attacks on the other person.
In fact, stingers are sometimes passive. They can come out of pleasantness, too.
Stingers are habitual patterns of personality behavior that rub the other person the wrong way. "Clinging dependently" (Believer) can be an
aggravating stinger, and when Bruce did that it rubbed me and, obviously, some others of you the wrong way. In this present case, "rising above the
other person, acting 'superior,' talking over their head" (Con Artist) seemed to be the stinger involved in my sense of it. That's what I got score on my
board about with Douglas, and what I reacted to with some ego-driven personality one day.
And incidentally, I've calmed down, re-read your posts, and gotten quite abit more understanding of the content of your theories, Douglas.
Obviously, Deirdre got something out of it, too, and was pleased. And I'm really not quarreling with most of your metaphysical model, either,
Douglas! All of you, please remember: it's the *how* we go about what we do that get's people's goats.
By the way, Sally, I didn't see those conversations as Douglas helping Deirdre. I heard all those remarks as both of them attempting to help each
other. And Deirdre, I felt you did a master's job of the part you played in that. You were impecably gentle and yielding, and yet you stood up
strong for the reality of your own experiences. As I saw it: Douglas had ideas that interested you, and you were attempting to show him how he
might be able to make those ideas more understandable for you.
Teaching (of the awareness game) around here doesn't get any better than what you did in that process. And I was proud to see you venturing into
the space of attempting to do that.
>If you sent me this poem earlier I apologize for not recognizing it but either I did not receive it or I did not understand it.
What a decent way that is, to offer a colleague a clear opportunity for a valuable insight into how their gentle friend is experiencing the relationship
with them!
>Though some of the verse is beautiful it does not, at least for me address your earlier puzzle. I explained that I am not good with puzzles and yet you present an even more detailed one.
This is the essence of the Healer helping here. Deirdre is being like "a healing crystal" just by her very human presence, in simply sharing the realities of
her own experiences with Douglas.
>Tends to make me feel (Doormat) that I am somehow inferior to you at some level.. And then you suggest if I need an interpretration I would go somewhere else to get it..(Teacher or Con Artist).
Awesome.
>Do you want to have a conversation with me about this or are you just pointing me away from you?
During the course of their lives, most Con Artists get many, many opportunities for wonderful friendships with both men and women who start out
being interested in them, whom they, literally, *drive away* by rising above the would-be friend and making them feel small or insignificant. In this
way, the unconscious patterns of the Con Artist are like a veritable "loneliness machine."
And not one Con Artist out of a thousand knows why. And they go on acting unrepentently like they're better than everyone else, and go on
believing, ironically, that proving they are superior to others is the way to get friends. I've known dozens of Con Artists who don't have a clue what's
going on. The answer is simply that habitually and unconsciously rising above other people gets them to drift away. Con Artists lose one interested
friend after another because they feel "they aren't good enough for them." If doing things in sleep that convince other people of that isn't getting in a
person's way, I don't know what is . . . . . unless, of course, the person doesn't care about having many wonderful friendships.
Deirdreji (!) went on:
>I am not interested in having a relationship with Bernard Lonergan (dead or alive and however well noted he may be as a poet) I AM however suggesting that we have a relationship here!
This is so incisive, it blows my mind! A poem now and then, or a line or two of beautiful poetry may serve the harmony wonderfully. But, what can
happen, I see, is that when one person speaks *their entire expression* to another person through the medium of classical poets, for instance (or
whatever highly intellectual medium they choose), it *distances them* from the other. The other person may not have the warm feeling that they are
relating with *the real human person* in there. They may feel they are relating with *the person's seemingly dehumanized intellectualizations* instead,
rather than with the living person themself. — And, I might add to that, that intellectualizations, no matter how brilliant they are held out to be, are *
cold*, compared to relating with the real warm human person underneath that veneer.
>I would like to hear from YOU Douglas about what you wrote in the earlier post. What are YOU trying to say in the earlier post.. keep it simple 'cause some of us are {grin}.. and again I am interested in hearing YOUR views and your voice.
Spoken from the essential True Self all the way! What you like, what you're interested in. And . . . . . what would you like best, Douglas?—in terms
of the context of this training—unrepentent pedanticism? or this warm and interested human friendship that is offered?
And that reminds me—and credit to you for it—that you have been calling some of this funny stuff on your Self lately, Douglas.
>As pedantic as ever,
Good one. You were being pedantic that time.
>At this point, one may be forgiven if they should ask: "What the hell does this have to do with anything?"
Good. Always good to Self-reflect on that.
>(Six damn pages later and he still hasn't addressed the question
Yep.
>Time to step off my soap box.
Yep. But, in the next moment you said something in Latin. Heh-heh. I have *no idea* what it means.
>On the one hand, I should like to retract my comment
To which Deirdre responded:
>But THAT was the most interesting thing I have read from your posts.. perhaps ever -- why retract it?
Ha! Goes to show why it's so valuable to have good friends who candidly share their points of view honestly—so we don't become so isolated in our
own.
And, incidentally, while I think of it, my thanks to you Suz, for your excellent contributions to this conversation, sharing frankly of your own
experiences with the point that Deirdre, and later I raised with Douglas. This is getting to be a *REAL CLASS* in yet another new way, Folks, when
any of you students who are trying to catch on to something about your Self, or trying to work through something, can have the benefit of honest,
candid feedback from three or more different people around our circle! I'm delighted to see that starting to happen now. So long as we all can learn
to be careful not to wound the people we are speaking about, that kind of group collaboration is pure gold for having many more meaningful insights
and understandings around here. And you did a fine job of it, Suz. You could say that kind of sharing is what a training group like this "is all about."
And it got a nice response, wouldn't ya' say?
So . . . . . it's apparent to me that you are doing much more Self-reflecting now, than I used to see, Douglas. You are catching your Self . . . reflecting,
and even starting to share with us what you see. I liked your pausing to reflect at one point whether you and Deirdre might be taking up too much
time and space on the bulletin board. It's good to be aware of that question . . . and Deirdre got it right when she said:
>As for taking up too much space on John's area, I don't think he would mind this at all. But perhaps when he is well he will let us know.. my sense is that if the conversation is productive he wouldn't mind at all.
That's at the heart and soul of this class, right there, as far as I'm concerned: Deirdre with her sleeves rolled up, who knows me well in this.
Whatever may come down here in Classroom Talk, if we can work on it, and make it productive, I not only don't mind, I'm delighted with it. A
definition of "being masterful," in fact, could be: "making the objective raw materials of daily human life, whatever they are, productive."
There was a point in your longest recent posting, Douglas, when you itemized a list of ways that Sigmund Freud denoted as characterizing the
thinking mind—denial, splitting, displacement, etc. That's a great gloss, actually—worth understanding thoroughly and remembering, to those who'd
like to use it. And it is a phenomenological gloss independent of the diagnostic function, though of course, Freud also diagnosed his patients, as well.
I could be short-sighted (and maybe you have a few concise examples you could cite that would correct my misunderstanding here), but I have never
seen any evidence that Freud was a mindfulness practitioner. I'm not aware that he included mindful awareness in his over-all equation of human
consciousness. Jung, more apparently, had insights into this. But Freud seemingly did not.
And there was a paragraph of what you said, right after listing those mental "operations" or "defense mechanisms," that troubled me—troubled me
about you.
>And, of course, if we have been successfully socialized, these operations on our experience are commonly not experienced themselves. They are automatic or in the psychoanalytic vernacular "unconscious". Seldom does one ever catch oneself in the act.
What bothers me about this is that it seems so . . . "fatalistic." Freud kept bringing things to the surface, bringing things to the surface. When he
realized how resistant people naturally are (as we've highlighted that subject around here), he tried everything, cocaine, hypnotism, various
techniques, trying to overcome this resistance and keep bringing things to the surface, bringing things to the surface. Using "the couch," itself, was a
technique for doing this. And it was as if—or so it seems to me, NOT an expert on Freud by any means!!!—Freud was trying to accomplish the "whole
job" of treatment on the psychiatry couch. He didn't teach people how to be conscious in their lives (i.e. mindful), or even how to be conscious while
they were there lying on the couch. And yet, through his techniques, he brought much hidden material up before their consciousness on the couch.
Surely, I suppose, he had more successful treatments than failures in his career, or he wouldn't have become "Freud." But . . .
I feel sort of despairing hearing this:
>They are automatic or in the psychoanalytic vernacular "unconscious". Seldom does one ever catch oneself in the act.
Of course that is true! . . . if you leave it at that (as if there's no more good news to be revealed in this story). That is the ordinary human condition of
sleep that all of us grow up in. If one never gets beyond this state, by learning and practicing mindfulness, that's what the rest of anyone's life is going
to be like. But . . . by learning mindfulness, and with any suitable diagnostic gloss to work off of, one CAN start catching oneself in the act! And the
more one takes an interest in this, and the more one practices, the more one CAN catch oneself in the act.
That's what this whole class is about—catching one's Self in the act. That's what the awareness game is about—waking up, checking things out in a
mellow and cool way, without resistance to seeing what's objectively being so . . . catching one's own Self in the act, stepping aside from the funny
stuff of that, catching the other person's Self in the act, and playing on through that funny stuff on the outside with honesty and candor—to get some
heart-to-heart communications going on.
A person can sit there with everything that Freud ever said memorized, every theory, every nuance . . . . . but if they can't wake up and learn to be
objective about their own behavior that is going down before their very eyes in the present, then they can't play the awareness game or have much of
a say in how their life goes from one day to the next.
True, one can't do very much of this in the beginning. It takes sticking to it with practice every day to get very far. But if one catches on that this
kind of practice is do-able, the possiblity of doing it is there.
Imaginary companion as a child? Me, too. Talking to yourself in your head? That's what we all do. That's the thinking mind. Whole conversations in
your head between different people? Normal.
Let's see, isn't this where you talked about "creative apperception?" I can't seem to find the passage. First of all—I asked for this years ago—would
you please define "creative apperception" for me . . . . . in, uh, twenty-five words or less, if possible.
I seem to recall you saying something like that's the only thing that can enable us to change. In my view, the "only thing that can enable us to change"
is if we can recognize and completely understand that certain patterns of our personality formation are getting in our own way, and preventing us
from enjoying happiness that would otherwise be ours. When we are able to realize this, beyond the shadow of a doubt, we may become contrite
about it when we do these patterns again in sleep. And feeling regret, feeling contrite, maybe laughing at our Selves, and feeling bad about it, we may
find an inspiration and a keen inner wishing to grow out of that pattern, and change. Merely knowing about it isn't apparently quite enough. It seems
we have to feel contrite about it in order to take the trouble of doing the work that is productive of actual change.
Well, this is enough about all this for now. You seemed to suggest . . . I think! . . . that if we change our personality patterns that may deprive us
somehow of our greatest creative potential. Did I get that right? I think that's a pet idea of yours, and it sounds to me like—I hate to be suspicious—
like another excuse not to jump in and start doing transformative work (along with the idea that we can't learn to catch our Selves doing our funny
stuff . . . so we might as well not try . . . . . .
The way I think it works is that if we manage to catch our Selves at it, and we change the patterns of our funny stuff, that is, we awarely step aside
from it, on purpose, that *opens up* the greatest creative potential that we humans can have in our lives. But . . . that's for another day.
I guess the chief difference between these two views is the difference between going right ahead, without repenting, and doing our funny stuff
without restraint, and, on the other hand, trying to learn what it takes to start practicing stepping aside from that stuff—even just the little bit that we
can in the beginning—and seeing what happens if we do that.
Finally, now, I'd like to go back to your "Time out!" Sally. Like I said, I felt you did the right thing in bringing my uptight behavior to my attention,
but then, it seemed to me, you went to far. Finally, at the end of your posting, you were back to "doing the work" together, in a strong way:
>where is the forgiveness [i.e. for Douglas] that has been recently expounded upon here in class? I beg to differ, but doesn't one have to "come to class" with a this is a new day,,,,philosophy? Think I have heard that before....hummmmmmmmm....
Heh-heh. Yes, Ma'am! I hear you. (And I *do* hope we get back to that wonderful unfinished topic of "forgiveness" next week!) Douglas *does*
seem rather like a fresh, new person in arriving here again! I can put my finger on it, too. Much more pleasant, more mellow! I see changes in that,
and "progress" in the terms of this approach. But . . . being a dutiful coach, it is also my job to shine a light on the part that seems to be "the same ol'
Douglas as before," so to speak, the area of—he called it—pedanticism, for whatever that may be worth. Perhaps the deepest point here is that I have
failed to give credit for the growth that you *have* shown, Douglas, in the areas of Judge and Rebel. And Sally is *very* perceptive here, in seeing my
speaking of you as "one who rejects me" as part of the same old John. That was my Rebel, for sure! . . . anticipating rejection before it happened in the
here-and-now, and rejecting back in that anticipation.
I do see the funny stuff going on in me here. That is *typical* Rebel behavior. I'm grateful to you, Sally, that you spoke up and brought it to my
attention. You did it in a very skillful way. And I apologize to you, Douglas. You didn't deserve that! I'm sorry, Bruddah. . . . Can you understand
how this happened in me . . . and forgive me for it?
In the middle of your otherwise excellent "Time out!" posting, Sally, for awhile there, you—how can I put it diplomatically?—you seemed suddenly to
go off the deep end.
>Also, you have been monopolized by Bruce for the last 4 or 5 months, and now the guy hasn't posted since you called him on his "stuff".
That's bothering you??? Well, first of all, there appears to be score on your scoreboard here. Previously calm, a rather intense negative emotion has
come up in you at this moment.
As I recollect, I had noticed that a lot of resistance seemed to have come up in Bruce at that point, and I felt he had been in the hotseat long enough,
and I coached him to step out of it and spend a term of reflection on the experiences he has already had with this work. And he followed that
suggestion as he had always followed my instructions throughout that whole period of time. Whatever you feel about those months, Bruce deserves
no blame for choices that I made, for my own teaching purposes, all along that way. His personality may have rubbed you the wrong way. All of
your personalities in this class rub me the wrong way at times, as my personality rubs some of you the wrong way. What else is new? That's the
human condition.
True, Bruce didn't show much contrition, and he didn't apologize for his part in the engagement that happened, let alone reach a stage of forgiving.
But neither did any of the other people involved in that engagement by that point. I felt I left enough time for reconciliation, if it was going to happen
then. But nobody was making any moves towards reconcilation, and in the meantime Bruce, who had sat in that hotseat so bravely for weeks, was
starting to blanch at the confrontiveness of it. I had to make my decision on that.
And here we see what happens when a major engagement like that is NOT processed through to contrition and forgiveness. The unprocessed
"residue" of conflict hangs in the space. It is "unfinished business," as they say in gestalt groups. And we see, Sally, that it is still bothering and
frustrating you. No blame. You are only human. You haven't apparently gotten in touch with contrition for your part in that engagement so far.
And, obviously, you haven't forgiven Bruce . . . or me, for that matter, for my part in the whole event of his being here with us in class.
>Perhaps you were right in pegging him as a Con Artist, but you were reluctant to "go with the flow" so to speak.
Con Artists want to tell you what they know, and they aren't very interested in what you know. Bruce is the opposite of that. He was being
"clutchingly" dependent on what I know. (But he seems to have gotten off that now. I think he's progressed in that.)
With Con Artists, it is all about their image. What Con Artists typically say and do is pegged to getting others to admire them for their superiority.
Bruce isn't like that. I know other impressive things about him that he hasn't shared in class. And I egged him on to tell the class he was working on
his Ph.D. Bruce has been far more interested in doing the work than in conveying an image to others.
Con Artists think of themselves as movie stars, playing the lead role in the movie of their lives. They write a flattering role for their Self, and
persuasively convince others they are playing that part. Bruce plays the part of the ingenue in his movie, the naive novice, and sometimes "the guy
who gets kicked around."
I still don't think he's a Con Artist, as one of the major factors in his conditioned life—though he *does* come across that way sometimes. And I can
empathize with your seeing it like that.
Con Artists are hard to get to know personally, because they are coming so often from their image, the role of being the superior person. Bruce was
easy to get to know—transparent at times, indeed. Unfortunately, we didn't resolve that engagement with contrition and forgiveness all the way
around. Maybe we will be able to do that together some day in the future. If not, it can't be helped. And Bruce may be in the Bleachers, for now,
and maybe not. That's just the way it is. Even if the rest of us have been "left behind," we *still* can work the residue of that engagement in our space
on through, and release its hold on our "pain bodies."
>Now, Douglas has had the balls...and I hope that doesn't "offend" Bruce like pussy did, to post again, without ado
Oh, that's a—heh-heh—low blow!!! It's not about "having balls," Sally. Each of us have got the degree of resistance to doing confrontive
transformative work that each of us have got . . . to face up to, and deal with, if we choose to, as best we can. Being able to sit in the hotseat even for
a series of three or four confrontive sessions with me in a row is a function of how well a student has dealt with their resistance to seeing their Selves.
(The ego hangs on tenaciously in attempting to keep us from seeing our ego-driven Selves as they are!) And, if it *were* a matter of "balls," Bruce
would be the all-time champ in Classroom Talk.
Coach
P.S. A thing comes into my space and has impact. — I blushed in seeing how startlingly appealing the woman in that photo you sent me is, Douglas.
Even though you said you would do it . . . I wondered, "Why are you sending this photo to me?" One possibility that occurred to me is that this could
be an example of the Con Artist, building a kind of p.r. image, so to speak. Far more than the other types who are a little bit this way, Con Artists are
majorly concerned with how their image looks in other people's eyes. With Con Artists, their image is everything! It is an image of their superiority
that Con Artists are *typically* preoccupied with. And, what is the person doing here, in sending this picture? Fundamentally, creating an image in my
mind of him (still unseen by me, by the way), with this beautiful woman there by his side.
Do you see why I hypothesize that this might fit? The idea had never crossed my mind over the years I've known you that you were not a sexy guy
who hangs with sexy ladies in their time. But it came up in you in this situation to create that image of you in my mind. You wanted to get that across
to me, so to speak . . . or so it appears. The gesture may be a kind of a "brag," so to speak, if you see what I mean. (Of course, I do the same sort of
thing from time to time—a poor example, perhaps, and I need to work on that more, too.)
I'm glad for you, I guess I can say. Way to go! I never doubted you in this way. — I *have*, however, fantasied that you might drive some of your
best admirers away by playing such lofty music of pedanticism, as you sometimes do. But that's a different question. Maybe you are "choosy" for
women with an extraordinarily high tolerance for "pedanticism," as you termed it so well the other day. And if that's the case, I can support you all
the way in that Artist/Rebel strategy of your own! Why not?—if you're willing to pay the price of not trying out the strategy that I've proposed—
becoming aware enough to lighten up about that Con Artist act with others—in order to let them in with you—and in particular with yer friendly pals
here in Classroom Talk . . . where we all can practice these kinds of things together.
You would be the one who would know if this hermeneutical guess on my part was reality or not, and not I. Certainly you are intelligent enough to
look it over objectively, and see that it is not far-fetched on my part to imagine that Con Artist "keeping up an image of superiority" *might fit* what is
going on in your sending that picture to me. (And, maybe you might even give me a "booya" for noticing this for you, as a friendly "team-mate" in
doing this kind of transformative work together with you.) Whether or not it is a reality that fits, is really up to what you see.
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