The Schopenhauer Cure

by Irvin D. Yalom

  here's my question to you: would you be willing to meet with me? Have a talk for an hour? Review our therapy together and fill me in on what's happened to you? It'll be interesting and enlightening for me. Who knows?--maybe for you as well."

  "Um...an hour. Sure. Why not? I assume there's no fee?"

  "Not unless you want to charge me, Philip--I'm asking for your time. How about later this week? Say, Friday afternoon?"

  "Friday? Fine. That's satisfactory. I'll give you an hour at one o'clock. I shan't request payment for my services, but this time let's meet in my office--I'm on Union Street--four-thirty-one Union. Near Franklin. Look for my office number on the building directory--I'll be listed as Dr. Slate. I am now also a therapist."

  Julius shivered as he hung up the phone. He swiveled his chair around and craned his neck to catch a glimpse of the Golden Gate Bridge. After that call he needed to see something beautiful. And feel something warm in his hands. He filled up his meerschaum pipe with Balkan Sobranie, lit the match, and sucked.

  Oh baby, Julius thought, that warm earthy taste of latakia, that honeyed, pungent fragrance--like nothing else in the world. Hard to believe that he'd been away from it for so many years. He sank into a reverie and mused about the day he stopped smoking. Had to be right after that visit to his dentist, his next-door neighbor, old Dr. Denboer who had died twenty years ago. Twenty years--how could it be? Julius could still see his long Dutch face and gold-rimmed spectacles so clearly. Old Dr. Denboer beneath the soil now for twenty years. And he, Julius, still above ground. For now.

  "That blister on your palate," Dr. Denboer shook his head slightly, "looks worrisome. "We'll need a biopsy." And though that biopsy had been negative, it caught Julius's attention because that very week he had gone to Al's funeral, his old cigarette-smoking tennis buddy, who died of lung cancer. And it didn't help then that he was in the midst of reading Freud, Living and Dying, by Max Schur, Freud's doctor--a graphic account of how Freud's cigar-spawned cancer gradually devoured his palate, his jaw, and, finally, his life. Schur promised Freud to help him die when the time came, and when Freud finally told him that the pain was so great that it no longer made sense to continue, Schur proved a man of his word and injected a fatal dose of morphine. Now that was a doctor. Where do you find a Dr. Schur nowadays?

  Over twenty years of no tobacco, and also no eggs or cheese or animal fats.

  Healthy and happily abstinent. Until that Goddammed physical exam. Now everything was permitted: smoking, ice cream, spare ribs, eggs, cheese...everything. What difference did any of that matter any longer? What difference did anything make?--in another year Julius Hertzfeld would be leeched into the soil, his molecules scattered, awaiting their next assignment. And sooner or later, in another few million years, the whole solar system would lie in ruins.

  Feeling the curtain of despair descending, Julius quickly distracted himself by turning his attention back to his phone call with Philip Slate. Philip a therapist? How was that possible? He remembered Philip as cold, uncaring, oblivious of others, and, judging from that phone call, he was still much the same. Julius drew on his pipe and shook his head in silent wonder as he opened Philip's chart and continued reading his dictated note of their first session.

  PRESENT ILLNESS--Sexually driven since thirteen--compulsive masturbation throughout adolescence continuing till present day--sometimes four, five times daily--

  obsessed with sex continually, masturbates to give himself peace. Huge hunk of life spent on obsessing about sex--he says "the time I've wasted chasing women--I could have gotten Ph.D.s in philosophy, Mandarin Chinese, and astrophysics."

  RELATIONSHIPS: A loner. Lives with his dog in a small flat. No male friends. Zero. Nor any contacts with acquaintances from past--from high school, college, grad school.

  Extraordinarily isolated. Never had a long-term relationship with a woman--consciously avoids ongoing relationships--prefers one-night stands--occasionally sees a woman as long as a month--usually woman breaks it off--either she wants more from him, or she gets angry at being used or gets upset about his seeing other women. Desires novelty--

  wants the sexual chase--but never satiated--sometimes when he travels he picks up a woman, has sex, gets rid of her, and an hour later leaves his hotel room on the prowl again. Keeps a record of partners, a score sheet, and in past twelve months has had sex with ninety different women. Tells all this with flat affect--no shame, no boasting. Feels anxious if he is alone for an evening. Usually sex acts like Valium. Once he has sex, he feels peaceful for the rest of the evening and can read comfortably. No homosexual activities or fantasies.

  HIS PERFECT EVENING? Out early, picks up woman in bar, gets laid (preferably before dinner), dumps woman as quickly as possible, preferably without having to buy her dinner but usually ends up having to feed her. Important to have as much evening time as possible for reading before going to bed. No TV, no movies, no social life, no sports. Only recreation is reading and classical music. Voracious reader of classics, history, and philosophy--no fiction, nothing current. Wanted to talk about Zeno and Aristarchus, his current interests.

  PAST HISTORY: Grew up in Connecticut, only child, upper middle class. Father investment banker who committed suicide when Philip was thirteen. He knows nothing about circumstances or reasons behind father's suicide, some vague ideas that it was aggravated by mother's continual criticism. Blanket childhood amnesia--remembers little of his first several years and nothing about his father's funeral. Mother remarried when he was 24. A loner in school, fanatically immersed in studies, never had close friends, and since starting Yale at 17, has cut himself off from family. Phone contact with mother once or twice a year. Has never met stepfather.

  WORK: Successful chemist--develops new hormonal-based pesticides for DuPont.

  Strictly an eight-to-five job, no passion about field, recently growing bored with his work.

  Keeps current with the research in field but never during his off hours. High income plus valuable stock options. A hoarder: enjoys tabulating his assets and managing his investments and spends every lunch hour alone, studying stock market research.

  IMPRESSION: Schizoid, sexually compulsive--very distant--refused to look at me--not once did he meet my gaze--no sense of anything personal between us--clueless about interpersonal relations, responded to my here-and-now question about his first impressions of me with a look of bewilderment--as though I were speaking Catalan or Swahili. He seemed edgy, and I felt uncomfortable with him. Absolutely no humor. Zero.

  Highly intelligent, articulate but stingy with words--makes me work hard. Tenaciously concerned about therapy cost (though he can easily afford it). Requested fee reduction, which I refused. Seemed unhappy about my starting a couple minutes late and did not hesitate to inquire whether we'd make up this time at end of session to get full value.

  Questioned me twice about precisely how much advance notice he needed to give to cancel a session and avoid being charged.

  Closing the chart, Julius thought: Now, twenty-five years later, Philip is a therapist.

  Could there be a more unsuitable person in the world for that job? He seems very much the same: still no sense of humor, still hung up about money (maybe I shouldn't have made that crack about his bill). A therapist without a sense of humor? And so cold. And that edgy request to meet at his office. Julius shivered again.

  3

  _________________________

  Lifeis a miserable thing. I

  have decided to spend my life

  thinking about it.

  _________________________

  Union Street was sunny and festive. The clatter of silverware and the buzz of animated luncheon conversation streamed from the packed sidewalk tables at Prego, Beetlenut, Exotic Pizza, and Perry's. Aqua-marine and magenta balloons tethered to parking meters advertised a weekend sidewalk sale. But as Julius strolled toward Philip's office he barely glanced at the diners or the outdoor stalls heaped with the leftover designer clothes fr
om the summer season. Nor did he linger at any of his favorite shop windows, not at Morita's antique Japanese furniture shop, the Tibetan shop, or even Asian Treasures with the gaily colored eighteenth-century roof tile of a fantastical woman warrior that he rarely passed without admiring.

  Nor was dying in his mind. The riddles connected with Philip Slate offered diversion from those disquieting thoughts. First there was the riddle of memory and why he could so easily conjure up Philip's image with such eerie clarity. Where had Philip's face, name, story been lurking all these years? Hard to get his mind around the fact that the memory of his whole experience with Philip was contained neurochemically somewhere in the cortex of his brain. Most likely Philip dwelled in an intricate "Philip"

  network of connected neurons that, when triggered by the right neurotransmitters, would spring into action and project an image of Philip upon a ghostly screen in his visual cortex. He found it chilling to think of harboring a microscopic robotic projectionist in his brain.

  But even more intriguing was the riddle of why he chose to revisit Philip. Of all his old patients, why choose Philip to lift out of deep memory storage? Was it simply because his therapy had been so dismally unsuccessful? Surely there was more to it than that. After all, there were many other patients he had not helped. But most of the faces and names of the failures had vanished without a trace. Maybe it was because most of his failures had dropped out of therapy quickly; Philip was an unusual failure in that he had continued to come. God, how he continued! For three frustrating years he never a missed session. Never late, not one minute--too cheap to waste any paid time. And then one day, without warning, a simple and irrevocable announcement at the end of an hour that this was his last session.

  Even when Philip terminated, Julius had still regarded him as treatable; but then, he always erred in the direction of thinking everyone was treatable. Why did he fail?

  Philip was serious about working on his problems; he was challenging, smart, with intelligence to burn. But thoroughly unlikable. Julius rarely accepted a patient he disliked, but he knew there was nothing personal in his dislike of Philip: anyone would dislike him. Consider his lifelong lack of friends.

  Though he may have disliked Philip, he loved the intellectual riddle Philip presented. His chief complaint ("Why can't I do what I really want to do?") was an enticing example of will-paralysis. Though the therapy may not have been useful for Philip, it was marvelously facilitative for Julius's writing, and many ideas emerging from the sessions found their way into his celebrated article "The Therapist and the Will" and into his book Wishing, Willing, and Acting. The thought flashed though his mind that perhaps he had exploited Philip. Perhaps now, with his heightened sense of connectivity, he might redeem himself, might yet accomplish what he had failed to do before.

  Four-thirty-one Union was a modest stucco two-story corner building. In the vestibule Julius saw on the directory Philip's name: "Philip Slate Ph.D. Philosophical Counseling." Philosophical counseling? What the hell is that? Next, Julius snorted, it'll be barbers offering tonsorial therapy and greengrocers advertising legume counseling. He ascended the stairs and pressed the bell.

  A buzz sounded as the door lock clicked open, and Julius entered a tiny bare-walled waiting room furnished only with an uninviting black vinyl loveseat. A few feet away, in the doorway to his office, Philip stood and, without approaching, beckoned Julius to enter. No handshake was offered.

  Julius checked Philip's appearance against his memory. Pretty close match. Not much change in the past twenty-five years except for some soft wrinkles about the eyes and slight flabbiness in the neck. His light brown hair still combed straight back, those green eyes still intense, still averted. Julius recalled how rarely their gaze had met in all their years together. Philip reminded him of one of those supremely self-sufficient kids in class who sat in lectures and never took notes, while he and everyone else hustled to jot down every fact that might make an appearance on an exam.

  Entering Philip's office, Julius considered a wisecrack about the Spartan furnishings--a scuffed cluttered desk, two uncomfortable-looking, nonmatching chairs, and a wall adorned only with a diploma. But he thought better of it, sat in the chair Philip indicated, played it straight, and waited for Philip's lead.

  "Well, it has been a long time. Really long." Philip spoke in a formal, professional voice and gave no sign of nervousness about taking charge of the interview and thereby switching roles with his old therapist.

  "Twenty-two. I just looked over my records."

  "And why now, Dr. Hertzfeld?"

  "Does this mean we've finished the small talk?" No, no! Julius chided himself. Cut it out! He remembered that Philip had no sense of humor.

  Philip seemed unperturbed. "Basic interview technique, Dr. Hertzfeld. You know the routine. Establish the frame. We've already set the place, the time--I offer a sixty-minute session, incidentally, not the fifty-minute psych hour--and the fees, or lack thereof. So, next step is to move to purpose and goals. I'm trying to be at your service, Dr. Hertzfeld, to make this session as efficient as possible for you."

  "All right, Philip. I appreciate it. Your 'why now?' is never a bad question--I use it all the time. Focuses the session. Gets us right down to business. As I told you on the phone, some health problems, significant health problems, have resulted in my wanting to look back, appraise things, evaluate my work with patients. Perhaps it's my age--a summing up. I believe when you reach sixty-five you'll understand why."

  "I'll have to take your word on that summing-up process. The reason for your wish to see me or any of your clients again is not immediately apparent to me, and I experience no inclinations in that direction. My clients pay me a fee, and, in return, I give them my expert counsel. Our transaction ends. When we part, they feel they got good value, I feel I gave them full measure. I can't possibly imagine wanting to revisit them in the future.

  But, I am at your service. Where to start?"

  Julius characteristically held little back in interviews. That was one of his strengths--people trusted him to be a straight shooter. But today he forced himself to hold back. He was stunned by Philip's brusqueness, but he wasn't there to give Philip advice. What he wanted was Philip's honest version of their work together, and the less Julius said about his state of mind, the better. If Philip knew about his despair, his search for meaning, his longing to have played some enduring instrumental role in Philip's life, he might, out of a sense of charity, give him just the affirmation he wanted. Or, perhaps, because of his contrariness, Philip might do just the opposite.

  "Well, let me start by thanking you for humoring me and agreeing to meet. Here's what I want: first, your view of our work together--how it helped and how it didn't--

  and, second--and this is a tall order--I'd like very much to get a full briefing about your life since we last met. I always like to hear the end of stories."

  If surprised by this request, Philip gave no sign but sat silently for a few moments, eyes closed, the fingertips of his two hands touching. In a carefully measured pace, he began. "The story's not at an end yet--in fact my life has had such a remarkable turn in the last few years that I feel it's just now beginning. But I'll maintain a strict chronology and start with my therapy. Overall, I'd have to say that my therapy with you was a complete failure. A time-consuming and expensive failure. I think I did my job as a patient. As far as I can recall, I was fully cooperative, worked hard, came regularly, paid my bills, remembered dreams, followed any leads you offered. Would you agree?"

  "Agree that you were a cooperative patient? Absolutely. I'd even say more. I remember you as a dedicated patient."

  Looking again at the ceiling, Philip nodded and continued: "As I recall, I saw you for three full years. And much of that time we met twice a week. That's a lot of hours--at least two hundred. About twenty thousand dollars."

  Julius almost leaped in. Whenever a patient made a statement like that, his reflex was to reply "a drop in the bucket." An
d then point out that the issues being worked on in therapy had been problematic for so much of the patient's life that one could hardly expect them to yield quickly. He often added a personal note--that his first course of therapy, an analysis during his training, had been five times a week for three years--a total of over seven hundred hours. But Philip was not his patient now, and he was not there to persuade Philip of anything. He was there to listen. He bit his lips in silence.

  Philip continued. "When I started with you I was at the nadir of my existence; 'in the trough' might be more apt. Working as a chemist and developing new ways to kill insects, I was bored with my career, bored with my life, bored with everything except reading philosophy and pondering the great riddles of history. But the reason I came to you was my sexual behavior. You remember that, of course?"

  Julius nodded.

  "I was out of control. All I wanted was sex. I was obsessed with it. I was insatiable.

  I shudder to think of the way I was, the life I led. I attempted to seduce as many women as possible. After coitus I had a brief respite from the compulsion, but in a short while my desire took over again."

  Julius suppressed a smile at Philip's use of coitus --he remembered now the strange paradox of Philip wallowing in carnality but eschewing all four-letter words.

  "It was only in that brief period--immediately after coitus," Philip continued, "that I was able to live fully, harmoniously--that was when I could connect with the great minds of the past."

  "I remember you and your Aristarchus and Zeno."

  "Yes, those and many others since, but the respites, the compulsion-free times, were all too brief. Now I'm liberated. Now I dwell in a higher realm all the time. But let me continue to review my therapy with you. Isn't that your primary request?"