Perspectives: See the Earth, See Yourself

To be able to look back at yourself and see yourself, you are able to change your perspective on everything. Psychotherapy is but just one small way to take this perspective. There are many others.

My friend Tess Morgan for spotting this clip that shows one powerful way to see yourself.

"Once a photograph of the Earth, taken from the outside, is avaliable... a new idea as powerful as any in history will be let loose." -- Fred Hoyle, 1948 (see here for additional information about Hoyle)

OVERVIEW from Planetary Collective on Vimeo.

For another opportunity to explore perspective, check out this previous post about Carl Sagan and the Pale Blue Dot.

Seeking Shambhala in Gallery 280

During a recent visit to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston I discovered a variety of interesting curiosities. One, which I blogged about previously, is the discovery that I don't ever want to own or wear man pants. The main event of this particular trip, however, was the special exhibition in Gallery 280: Seeking Shambhala. The show is up until October 21 so you have plenty of time to catch it.

Shambhala, according to Tibetan Buddhist and Indian Buddhist traditions, is a mythical kingdom hidden somewhere deep within inner Asia. The land is said to be shaped like a giant lotus flower surrounded by eight petals which, in turn, are surrounded by snow-covered mountains. The inhabitants of Shambhala are protected by both the mountains and supernatural forces which ensure the residents are protected from the rest of the world. Those who live here lead an evolved spiritual life and are free from all forms of suffering and strife. Sounds kind of nice, doesn't it?

Prior to this trip to the MFA, the closest I've gotten to Shambhala was a trip to another museum. I think it was in 1997 that a group of Buddhist monks came to the Cleveland Museum of Art and created a sand mandala that was a physical representation of Shambhala. I also got fairly close to Shambhala when a group of monks were in residence at Northeastern University underneath my office in the counseling center. They also were building a sand mandala.

On both occasions I quietly hung out in the back of the room watching the monks carefully build the mandala--sometimes a grain of sand at a time. I also got to watch the ceremony at the end of the creation of the mandala where the sand was swept up and washed away in a body of water.

Impermanence. It gets you every time.

Among the various pieces in gallery 280 I came across this Buddha by Gonkar Gyatso. It was one of those great moments with art--I got drawn into the piece and all the little adornments placed onto the Buddha. Those few moments seemed like an eternity and when I left I saw everything in a different way. I got to thinking of all the little (and big) experiences of our lives that get imprinted upon us and shape our understandings of what comes next. I also got to thinking about the form of what is beneath this surface of impressions.

What might be like to take water and a scrub brush to this Buddha (I wouldn't actually do this, of course, except within my own mind). Might it be possible to wash away these small adornments on the Buddha--these impressions of life--and reveal the true form of the statute? Might it be possible that we can wash away the impressions of life--like the monks wash away the sand mandala--and be left with something pure?

I frequently tell clients who are working through trauma something similar. Trauma work, as I see it, is much like going to the doctor for wound debridement. Every bit of contaminant needs to be located and scrubbed out. I realize that for as many times as I've told a client this, I've never talked about what is left behind.

I'm not sure what would be left. That's probably why I've not thought to talk about it with a client. It's easy to think about what this Buddha would like like with all these impressions washed away. It's a lot harder to think about what people might look like. Maybe we'll figure it out if we ever get to Shambhala.

In the meantime, it's worth it to make a trip into Boston to spend some time with this Buddha. He has a lot to teach.

On opening doors and therapeutic intervention

I've never given much thought about opening doors. It's just something I do. Perhaps it's the Midwestern boy in me: I was taught it was polite to open the door for another. When I was in college, before the days of remote locks in cars, I remember taking pride in unlocking and opening the passenger side door for whomever I was with. I always got such a smile from a friend--or a date--when I took the time to walk to the car door, unlock in, open it up, and gently close the door after my passenger settled into the seat.

I suppose no one really does that any more. A new generation of teenagers going on dates with their young loves won't have the opportunity for the gentle generous act of holding the car door open. 

I remember my first year of graduate school. New York City in 1992. Just barely 20 years old on my first day of classes, I stood outside the crowded CUNY building holding the door open. Silly me. First one person walked through, then another, and another, and another, and another... I might have spent the whole year standing outside holding the door open if I hadn't perfected the art of opening the door, letting one person through, and whisking myself through the door behind them. I just couldn't give up the tradition of holding the door open. I did, however, need to be smart about it.

So it wasn't a surprise when I became a therapist and opened and closed the door for my patients. I never considered not doing it (door opening, such a habit, wasn't a thing I considered even thinking about). For years I opened and door countless times a day for patients without thought. 

Finally during my practicum in the 2000-20001 academic year the door was mentioned. In fact, during that year Glenda Russell, my clinical supervisor, made mention of the door twice. In talking about an upcoming final appointment with a patient Glenda asked how I normally ended my time with a patient. I responded that I'll  tell my patient to call me if they need me, walk to the door, open it up, and then close it behind them. Glenda had asked me what it might be like to have a discussion about the final session and maybe invite the client to open the door themselves and walk out on their own. An interesting thought. 

Several months later Glenda talked about how sometimes she will gently, yet firmly, close her door when a patient who needs a little help with boundaries walks out. "It gently delivers the message that the appointment was over it and it is time to leave."

I noticed that when I walked out of her office that day she gently, yet firmly, closed the door behind me.

I remember years later being mystified by Debora Carmichael, one of my post-doctoral supervisors. We sat in two dark red Windsor chairs. When our supervision ended she would say goodbye and just sort of shut off. She would stay in her chair and look down. I was totally befuddled. It took my awhile before I finally figured out when she did that I was supposed to get up, open the door, and walk out. 

I thought that was strange. Who doesn't open up the door? Deb clearly must not be from the Midwest. I figured it was cultural.

None of this is really my point.

I've been opening and closing my door now for years--decades actually. Things area little different now. I have a dog. I'll send her out into the waiting room to retrieve my patients. She likes doing it, my patients like when she does it, and it is such a playful way for me to say hello. I still open and close the door. Maggie just gives me a little help.

I open and close my door with reason and intention. I want to greet my patients. I want to express care for them by the simple, gentle, and kind act of opening and closing the door. I want to express care for them by walking them to the door and seeing them off into the outside world.

That is my thing, and I do it with reason and intention. It never occurred to me that I would do something different. At least doing something differently didn't occur to me until this past week.

I've felt vaguely uncomfortable for several months now as I walk a particular patient to the door. The feeling was so vague I didn't notice it at first. I figured I was tired and clumsy as her bag gently brushed me. I thought maybe she was tired as she stumbled a bit and pressed against the wall opposite of me. I'd like to say that I spent time thinking about those things and came to insight. That's not really what happened. It was all very unconscious. 

This week what I've apparently been unconsciously thinking about burst to the surface. I realized that I felt uncomfortable as my patient walked out the door. I could think of no reason why I should be. I'm not uncomfortable at the end of appointments. Nothing this patient does makes me feel uncomfortable. Clearly there is something else going on here.

I did what any good therapist does: I used my experience to illuminate a conversation.

"Before you leave, I wanted to talk with you about how you leave. It always seems vaguely uncomfortable to me. I'm wondering if you feel uncomfortable too?"

With somewhat wide eyes (incredulous that I'm talking about the door?) my patient responded. "Yes."

I took a leap of faith and said what I thought here experience might be: I wanted to provide a little scaffolding to help her understand her experience (or give her some scaffolding to tell me I'm off my rocker). "Might it be that I get a little too close to your physical space when I open the door? It's a small space. I'm wondering if maybe you don't feel safe."

"Yes," she said. "I don't."

We talked more and came to the conclusion that she would open and close the door herself now.

This was a small interaction. Just a moment or two of time. I could have easily missed it: we miss these moments all the time in therapy and in life. When we can capture them and harness the energy of the moment for long enough we can illuminate important parts of our experience. The intervention arises from the moment. The intervention arises from the interaction between myself and my patient. Change comes from what is alive and real in the office. Change comes from closely observing what is alive in the moment and wondering together what it might mean.

I'm a Wellesley Girl: Part I

That's right. I'm a Wellesley girl.

I recently had a short exchange with the Public Conversations Project on Twitter. I had commented on a tweet about the Open Circle Program saying that my brief work with that program was an unexpected and influential agent of change in my doctoral work. They asked me to say more about that influence. I'd be happy to, but in order to do so we need to rewind a few years. The work I did with Open Circle was neither the first or last association I had with Wellesley College, the Wellesley Centers for Women, and the Stone Center.

The 2000-2001 academic year was my second year of doctoral work. I survived through the various vicissitudes of relocating to New England from the Midwest, leaving an already active career in psychotherapy, learning how to be a student, navigating my way through a particularly challenging cohort of doctoral students, finding a mentor and advisor, and completing my first training practicum.

The prior year I got my nose knocked out of joint looking for a practicum. I figured this was going to be easy. I'd earned a masters degree two years prior, worked as a psychotherapist for the two years before starting my doctoral program, and worked for nearly five years before that in a variety of mental health related roles.

I also had never interviewed for something that I wasn't later offered.

You know how this story is going to end, right?

I interviewed at just about every college counseling center that was within a commutable distance. I was turned down for every single one of them! I was horrified, demoralized, and also just plain pissed off. I finally did secure a practicum. It was a good one--in fact it was an excellent one.

I digress.

So I went about my search for my second training practicum in the same arrogant way (tempered, a bit, with the previous years' experience). Of course I'll get a practicum. How could I night, right?

Yes. You know how this is going to turn out. Everyone turned me down again. What the heck?

All wasn't lost. I really had my hopes set on doing my training that year at the Stone Center Counseling Service at Wellesley College. Not a problem at all, right. A man, working at a women's college, in a counseling center staffed by women that had never had a male psychology trainee (or from my knowledge, a male trainee of any sort). This is a wise thing to set my hopes on, right?

Who would have thought they would take me on. They did. My life changed. I was the first male psychology trainee, ever. In my training year another man, Stephen, became the first male social work student trainee, ever. They figured they would put us together so we each could have someone to talk with.

So just exactly what so was special about being a man at Wellesley College? It was subtle, it was profound, and it was totally unanticipated. For the first time in my life I discovered myself completely surrounded by people who were different than me. For the first time in my life I found myself a minority. I was a white man surrounded by a sea of women from around the world.

In that sea I found myself. Peggy McIntosh showed my my invisible knapsack of white male privilege and power and safely helped  me unpack it (really now, could it be all that invisible when there were only two men carrying them around?). Unpacking that knapsack didn't hurt. It was freeing. I found my power and started to learn how to spend it wisely.

In that sea I found my courage. Judy Jordan, who always seems to find a pencil tucked in her pulled up hair, consistently noticed my courage. She showed me that it is an act of courage to sit with every patient. It is an act of courage to pay close attention to everything that happens in a room. It is an act of courage to allow myself to be moved and effected (or is that affected--or both?) by the experience of my patients.

In that sea I found my confidence. Robin Cook Nobles, my supervisor who brought just a little fear into my heart by the sound of her fast paced rustle in the hall way, demanded with her ever-attentive mind that I offer up my best--and never doubted that it was possible.

In that sea I found I found fearlessness. Lisa Desai, my supervisor who showed  me how easy it was to encounter differences of race, faith, gender, or sexuality with my patients and how easily and gently it can be spoken about.

Any mention of my first year as a Wellesley Girl is incomplete without mentioning the endless love and support of Ann and Gail, office assistants, candy-enablers, and confidants. They helped me figure out how not to be so scared of the rustle of Robin coming down the hallway (she's actually not scary at all, promise!). Their collective compassion taught my as much about therapy as my supervisors.

Writing this today I'm discovering this is more of a meditation on gratitude for what was offered so freely to me. I would be remiss if I didn't mention the students. You came into my tiny office and sat down in those ridiculous orange chairs. You let me into your worlds as I learned how to let you into my world as a psychology-trainee. The gifts that I carry most of all from this first year at Wellesley College are those gifts you gave to me. The gifts are many: three come to mind right now. An undocumented person who struggled to make a better life for herself, a survivor who finally found someone would would believe her story, and another student who challenged me to think about what it means to be a woman. Each of these three young women, in their own different ways, showed me that psychology can transform.

So that's part one of being a Wellesley Girl. Come back again later for parts two and three.