Dear Young Therapist: Consider Your De Rigueur Requirements | The Post-Doctoral Tie Incident

image credit: Nicholas Ruiz. Bow Tie #10. Assembled November 2011.
 Acetaminophen pills, multiple adhesives, plastic knife. Forest Hills, Queens, New York.

The man interviewing me for a postdoctoral fellowship unwrapped the aluminum foil encasing his dry turkey sandwich and proceeded to stuff it into his mouth.

"Do you mind if I eat? Not that you really have a choice. I'm doing the interview and have the power in this situation."

He continued to masticate and fill his office up with the seasonally incongruent smell of Thanksgiving. This was going to be a fun filled interview.

"I'd like to ask you why you aren't wearing a tie today for your interview. Before you answer, I want you to know that as a psychologist I think everything has a meaning. I hope you have thought about the meaning of why you didn't wear a tie. If you haven't, then you aren't what we are looking for in a post-doctoral fellow. We'll end the interview here and I'll wish you good day."

I had a variety of inside-thoughts that I considered sharing. They included:

• Asshole. 
• Drop dead. 
• Who the hell do you think you are? I just had fucking brain surgery, a post-operative infection, and joint damage from an adverse reaction to the antibiotics that treated my infection. 
• Your turkey sandwich is making me want to throw up. 
• I'm scared because I can't find a job. 
• Do you know who the fuck I am? 
• Am I going to fail as a psychologist?

I took a middle course and smiled politely. I noticed the air flowing in and out of my nose. I watched as my agitated thoughts floated like clouds in the wind from the center of my awareness, to the edges of my mind, and then off into places where I can no longer notice them.

Tommy and Buzz: All My Love

I recently came across this picture of Tommy and Buzz. I got to wondering what the story was behind the moment they shared together on the beach. The inscription on the back of the photo is so tantalizing and sweet:

"To Buzz, I'll always remember the times we spent together. All my love, your Tommy."

If Tommy or Buzz are still alive they are now both close to or well into their 80s. The world has totally transformed in the time that has elapsed since this moment was captured on the beach. Do you think they still remember that day?

I've carefully looked at each of the 300+ websites that this image appears on and searched for clues to their identity. There are none. It's likely neither know that their image has been populated around the internet.

Who they are and were--and what times they shared--are likely forever lost to history. If someone had not located this picture and taken the time to digitize it, the entire memory of this experience might have been erased for all times.

 I'm overwhelmed contemplating that thought. It inevitably reminds me that some day I too will be erased from the this world. All that I am will be reduced down to ever-smaller bits of data. Eventually that which is I will evaporate and return to whatever it was from which I emerged from when I became an I. It will happen to you too.

Go back and read that again slowly. 

...and now back to Buzz and Tommy

The Potential Dog Poisoning Misanthrope of Cambridge

Some time ago Maggie the therapy dog and I were taking an afternoon walk through Cambridge. An elderly man, perhaps 80, was walking around in house slippers with black polyester socks on that were pulled up past the hem of his bathrobe. He shuffled down the sidewalk with a plastic bag in hand. The sight of him made me want to cross the street and get away. I felt uncomfortable at the sight of his decaying and disheveled appearance. I also wondered if he was naked under that bathrobe. I wasn't mentally prepared for a flasher.

I couldn't get away fast enough. He asked if he could give Maggie a treat. Hand coming out of his plastic shopping bag, he produced a large sized Milk-Bone. Maggie sat down, tail wagging and eyes making excited contact with the elderly gentleman. Maggie loves treats.

I had just read an article about dogs being poisoned by treats left out on a sidewalk. I was a worried pet-parent. What if he was a crazy deranged dog poisoning misanthrope? I said no thank you, tugged Maggie a bit, and kept on walking. Just as I was starting to feel smug in my self-empowered confident "no" skills I saw the man's face. 

He said to me "Really? It's just a bone." His face, formerly lit up by Maggie's excited eye contact, fell back into a decaying sadness.

My smug pride was tempered by sadness. Not by my actions, mind you, but by a world in which we have to worry about people poisoning dogs.

I ran into the man again just yesterday. He saw us and came shuffling down the sidewalk. While he didn't appear to remember us, I remembered him. He was wearing the same tattered robe. The same style of black polyester socks. The same house slippers. I was again caught off guard by the potential dog poisoning misanthrope of Cambridge.

Again he asked if he could give Maggie a Milk-Bone. I remembered the stories of dogs dead from poisoned treats. I also remembered how his face fell into a lonely distant sadness when I declined his treat the last time. 

Maggie and he locked into an eager gaze and time seemed to stop for a moment. 

A loving dog wagging her tail, an elderly decaying man brandishing a potentially poisoned Milk-Bone, and an anxious psychologist. For a moment I saw everything clearly. My own irrational fears about things that haven't happened. The ugly world we live in were acts of violence happen. My lack of control over those random acts of violence. My own revulsion at the sight of the decaying lonely man who reminded me of my own process of decay.

Perhaps at that very moment a Buddha, living on a dust mote, passed in front of my eyes. There was a moment of enlightenment (don't worry, it'll quickly pass). The thought occurred to me that I have an infinite number of choices that I can make in that moment. Some lead to more happiness, others lead to more misery.  

Great, dust mote Buddha. Give me the right choice. Time can't stand still for much longer.

Buddha of course didn't have a single damned answer for me. He blew away and time started moving again. Both Maggie and the decaying man looked at me. 

He asked "Can I?" 

Maggie gave me an expectant hungry look. The tip of her tail thumped on the sidewalk.

"She's sometimes a little anxious when strangers put their hands near her," I said. "This is very kind of you. Perhaps you can give it to me, and I can give it to her?"

I wanted to make a choice that lead to more happiness and less misery for all involved. Buddha still wasn't helping me out. Now I had a potentially poisoned Milk-Bone in my hand. Would I somehow instantly drop dead? This isn't what I had in mind with the less misery  more happiness thing.

I turned the Milk-Bone over in my hand looking at it. The decaying man said, "Well I've got to go. I just came out to wait for the mailman and saw you two. I wanted to say hi." With that he turned around and shuffled away from me. The potential poison dispenser was slipped into my pocket and we discreetly walked away from the elderly gentleman who was smiling and whistling.

It all worked out.

Thank you, Buddha of the dust mote, for giving me that moment to see clearly that I could choose more happiness or more misery. The first time I met the decaying man I brought violence into the world. I hurt him while trying to protect Maggie. Yesterday I made a different choice. 

I hope you come to see you have that choice too.

_____
Update 8/26/2012

This blog post received some interesting interactions on Twitter. I thought I'd post a three of them here.

I'm not particularly proud of the fact that my first reactions when encountering this elderly gentleman was fear and revulsion. However, this is my true reaction and I think when engaged in self-reflection being truthful is important. We all have parts of ourselves we don't like. I'm reminded today that when any of us engage in public self-reflection of our own shadow-selves we also provide a mirror for other people to see the reflections of their own shadow.

I'm curious if you all find this to be true. When you watch me--or someone else--look at their shadow do you see parts of yourself that are difficult to see? Do you look away? Do you push back and try to denigrate the person who is reflecting? What do you think?

Four Noble Truths: Let's Call the Whole Thing Off

The Treachery of Images

I'm not sure why I haven't thought of this before. I should have. Really. I know this. At least I did at one point.

I'm talking about words here. The words we use represent agreed upon symbols for phenomena that occur in this world. A soda, for example, isn't really a soda. We've just all socially agreed that the substance we experience as a bubbly liquid will be called a soda (unless you are from Ohio, in which case you'll call it pop).

The symbols (words) aren't representative of real things that we have direct knowledge of. Rather, our symbols are representative of perceptions of phenomena that we only have access to from our own senses--not some direct knowledge of a "real" thing.

Have I lost you yet? At best I have a 50/50 chance of getting lost myself.

I've been thinking about this sort of things for years. Sitting under a tree in college (I'm being serious here, and no, it wasn't a Bodhi tree) the class read Alfred Korzybski and learned that the map is not the territory. Words (maps) do not entirerly represent the territory of phenomena that the maps (words) are trying to describe. Later in college I studied Rene Magritte's The Treachery of Images (1928-1929), and learned that the image, like the word, does not represent the "real" thing. Still later I studied Michel Foucault and read his 1968 essay "This is Not a Pipe." I thought more about language being symbolic representations of phenomena that are never exactly "real." Lastly, in my doctoral program I spent an awful lot of time reading and writing about social constructionism. Identities aren't real things, I wrote. Identities are stories we communally create to describe our perceptions of the phenomena that are around us.

I better come back around toward my point. Things get lost in translation. I've known this for a long time. I just forget that I know this.

So here I am up late watching a documentary by David Grubin called The Buddha and was reminded that what we think to be true isn't exactly true. The first twenty times I've learned this lesson was not enough. Apparently I need a little more reinforcement.

The four noble truths of Buddhism, as they are popularly taught, are that (1) Life means suffering; (2) The origin of suffering is attachment; (3) The cessation of suffering is possible; and (4) There is a path of the cessation of suffering.

Suffering, of course, isn't actually suffering. The original meaning here has gotten lost in translation. I know this, or at least knew this, but forgot it at some point or another. The Grubin documentary reminded me once again that suffering is a translation of the word dukkha. Suffering is one understanding of the word--and an appealing one. It's short, simple, and speaks to all of us. Who doesn't want to have less suffering in their lives? Dukka, however, isn't exactly suffering. It means something more akin to dissatisfaction. The word speaks to our experience of never being quite happy--and if we do experience happiness it tends to disappear in an instant. Dukka speaks to our experience of dissatisfaction with the constantly changing experiences of our lives.



You say suffering, I say dissatisfaction. Let's call the whole thing off? Hold on a second more. If you stick with me I might convince you that we better call the calling off, off.

I wonder if the Gershwin brothers were trying to teach us the Four Noble Truths. They certainly captured some of the dissatisfaction that occurs when two people, with two different ways of understanding the world, come grinding together in a relationship (the first noble truth, suffering is inevitable). The brothers also got that we can let go of  this dissatisfaction about day-to-day gripes for a greater goal.

But oh if we call the whole thing off than we must part.
And oh, if we ever part than that might break my heart.
For we know we need each other,
we better call the calling off off,
let's call the whole thing off.

Back to the documentary--the Grubin documentary interviewed the Dali Lama. He said that many read the four noble truths and attempt to wipe out suffering and wipe out desire. "Where does enlightenment fit in without desire? Without desire, how how do we lead our life? Without desire, how can we achieve Buddhahood?" The Dali Lama goes on to talk about being cautious about choosing the right kind of desire. "Desire to be harmful, no that's bad."

I'm going to hazard the guess that the Dali Lama isn't suggesting that the right kind of desire to have here is for wanting the thing of romantic love, as the Gershwin brothers suggest. I'm going to guess that the Dali Lama considers the desire for compassion and joy to be the good desire. 

What's my take home message here? Look toward joy and compassion. Cultivate that if you want to have the good life. 

What's compassion and joy, you ask? I'll have to tackle that another time.