Stefan felt sad, bereft and lonely. He knew fear was at the root of it.
Dancing and poetry
“What happened to our wildness; what happened to make us stop trusting our aliveness? We have all ‘left home’ and gone into a trance. We all imagine some invisible membrane separates us from reality - the ‘me’ in here not connected with the ‘world’ out there. To survive, we organise ourselves. We must protect the ‘me’ inside and achieve recognition in the big out there. As soon as we have devised this kind of scenario, the primary mood of our little separate self is fear.”
Tara Brach
After a long day with clients, Stefan created a new file called Fear and wrote as if his life depended on it.
Tara’s not talking about the kind of fear that puts us in the grip of terror, she’s talking about the fear that accompanies us when we feel at sea. We are navigating as best we can, but we are far too concerned about the little ‘me’ inside us to make life pleasurable. This ‘me’ is living with the tension that comes from the fear that we might not get what we need and something out there could be threatening our chances. This fear is exacerbated by families and our peer group, where life is competitive and there are standards to live up to. We quickly get the sense we are falling short of the mark, that we must do more to prove ourselves. That’s the kind of fear she’s talking about. I have that fear. I’m not good enough, not good enough to be a husband or even a boyfriend.
It occurred to Stefan that in ‘the big out there’ he oscillated between rules and lawlessness. He didn’t want to call it anarchy, but it felt like anarchy. He wanted to express it more positively.
What I call lawlessness is my dream to engage a complex mix of approaches alongside psychotherapy. Alex manages to achieve something like this in his writing. Zen Buddhism, psychotherapy, art, music, poetry, yoga and alternative medicine - they all have something to offer. They can’t necessarily blend together, but they can be called upon to address what is needed at the time. Orthodox camps would hate this, but when it comes to measuring success, scientific methodology is less important than the relationship between therapist and client. Empathy is the component that changes things most dramatically. Life is the best teacher for this. What we do in life, how we deal with other people, what we construct and play with; it all prepares us for our next therapy session. The way I deal with my Superego, the way I knit my components together, defines what I do in therapy.
Stefan thought about his supervisor. Clive’s view was that the wall was only there to provide structure and support not to restrict potential. He could hear Clive declaring how his hopeless addiction to wandering aimlessly was nothing but a hindrance to professional practice. “I am indeed lost,” he wrote, “but in many stories this is always the place to start.” He vowed to ask Kathy how she discussed her position with Clive and continued to write his notes.
There’s more than theory in our business, there is friendship and love. Therapy might facilitate emancipation and personality development, but this also occurs outside the wall. If the wall is our Superego, then we have to negotiate with it, not allow it to partition us and reduce us. Many who work inside the walls have strolling Superegos and imagine they are making judgements with ‘ultimate knowledge,’ but what they call judgement could also be called inference. Attitudes and theories in our practice aren’t as clear cut as most practitioners presume. It takes bravery to look for connection in dissimilarity rather than resemblance. We should try to adopt a loser, more open attitude or we’ll never properly relate to the lyrical language that dreams are so fond of.
I need more poetry in my life. Denis Donoghue quotes Rousseau’s ‘Essai sur l’origine des connaissances humaines.’ He says this of the place of poetry.
“Figurative language was the first to arise, proper meaning was found last. Things were not called by their true name until they were seen in their genuine form. At first, only poetry was spoken. Only long afterwards did anyone take it into his head to reason.”
Denis Donoghue believes that “the first language had to be figurative because it was implicated in feelings, desires, fears and illusions; it was not occupied in making straight-forward statements or in pointing to objects.”
Oh to be living when the first language was spoken. Mr. Donoghue’s book continues to save me from drowning.
The following morning Stefan woke with an extraordinary dream hovering round the edge of his unconscious.
I am standing in a grand ballroom. An assembly of lights rise up over abundant drapes into an elegant dome. They are like swathes of cloud reaching up to the heavens. I see an old woman, heavily clad in rags. The elaborate scene is inviting her to come out of the hole she has spent her life in. She moves closer to the dance floor. A tear trickles down her cheek, but it is a tear born of joy; the look on her face is elation.
Dancers glide by. I am standing next to her; hoping my presence will encourage her to dance. I want to tell her that if she wished she could unite her divided self here, in this collective world of the dancers. I see a glimmer of imminent release in her, as if she is about to be reborn here on the dance floor. I feel certain this place will lift her out of the oppressive anxiety that has filled her days, out of the arduous, unremitting struggle it has been for her just to stay alive.
Now the woman is bending her knees and straightening them, bouncing up and down to the rhythm of the music. The intense spirituality of her delicate movements is poetic - way beyond any facility I have to describe them. There is a beaming smile on her face and I believe she is becoming a child again; a magical child. Not wishing to shroud the ecstasy of her actions in obscurity, she stretches her arms behind her, like an impressive pair of wings, allowing her coat to fall from her. I see her now as an angel. I offer her my hands and the old woman takes them. Very slowly she shuffles one foot forward and then the other. This noble encounter is like a gift of abundant moisture from a virile earth. My primitive life is glowing with intensity. Bliss must surely be close at hand.
The woman stops and frees her hands. Once again she is intent upon bending and straightening her knees. She is moving with the joy of an infant and the physical beauty of her movement is sacred. This is her redemption. It is an action that will change her life. This is a movement she will be able to hang her dreams on. This is the motion that will cause her heart to know love, a love that will be well beyond the realms of legend.
After writing out the dream Stefan wrote the words, “I hereby make myself a promise. I must never evade love.” Then he wrote a series of notes.
In this dream an old woman becomes a child by moving her knees; an old woman and a young child have transformed into a single person. The final scene has a warm bright energy about it, the kind of energy one can feel when the superego and the creative child fuse together. This energy is the ‘Self,’ the result of the different aspects of the small ‘self’ combining together rather than living their antagonistic lives apart.
Before the dance, this woman’s old self and her young self were far apart and in conflict, but by dancing, the activity where a man and woman come together, the woman has been able to bring her two selves together to make her new ‘Self.’ Through dancing, she experiences change; her actions have a benevolent effect on her psyche and this melts her conflicts. It reminds me of the Rwandan’s comment; “we need to dance in the sunlight and feel the warmth of the world rather than sit in darkened rooms.” It reminds me of the man with the broken nose in The Rain of the Dancers. The singer’s gracious words about dancers changed the world from a place where there was no pleasure, only denial, to a place where he could become a child again. He returned to innocent optimism and felt the healing effects of the rain.
Is the old woman my feminine side? Has my feminine side just discovered its inner child? I think I have just caught a glimpse of the light at the end of the tunnel.
This was the beautiful and profound dream Stefan had been yearning for. He wondered if he would be happy to
talk with Clive about it. He didn’t want him treading on his little seed. He came to the conclusion that he would keep it to himself. Suddenly he had no need of a restricting supervisor; he was happy living with his own superego. This truly felt like he was stepping outside of the walls. Time to find a new supervisor and therapist, he told himself. He had moved beyond Clive and his over-formalised set of opinions.
Admissions and revelations
Don’t carry your bag on your shoulder when you travel. Place it on the floor and trust that it will arrive at the destination at the same time as you do.
Ramana Maharshi
Over the following month Alex and Stefan met together on three further occasions. After this time they no longer regarded their relationship as a strange anomaly. At their second meeting Alex asked Stefan to elaborate on the subjects Kathy was teaching at University.
“You mentioned something last time about awareness and mindfulness,” he said. “Can you tell me more about these?”
“Awareness and mindfulness come under the umbrella of self-experience. Many techniques, over the centuries, have been conceived for bringing awareness and mindfulness into our lives. It starts in the East with ancient spiritual practices, but these days psychotherapists are equally keen to use these techniques.”
“You’ve completely lost me with these words.”
“A full awareness of what is going on, here and now, is deeply important in Kathy’s practice. I’ll tell you a story.
Many years ago Kathy and I shared a night shift at a psychiatric clinic. In the middle of the night a young man was brought in. He was aggressive and arrogant and we all found him menacing. Not Kathy. She went up to him and said in a cool, friendly manner, ‘You have been brought in here in the middle of the night because you are suffering, because you desperately need help, but sadly there is only a bunch of assholes in here to talk to you.’
‘Don’t be stupid,’ he cried, ‘how can assholes help me?’
‘They can’t. So it would be better if you didn’t treat us like assholes, because we are the only ones here to help!’
“I’ve never seen a crazy guy get calm, so quickly. She simply tuned into his wavelength, connected with him and brought him straight back to our world.”
“Brilliant, I like Kathy and this self-awareness business. In Hinduism they achieve this through meditation don’t they?”
“Yes, awareness and mindfulness have a spiritual dimension in the traditional path to self-knowledge. It teaches that if we are aware of the relatedness of all things, then the Self can be placed in a bigger field of cause and effect. Its aim is to help us lose our overbearing notion of self-importance. Modern behavioural therapy takes a secularized approach. It uses awareness and mindfulness techniques to help patients become calm and experience a better connection between their mind, emotions and body; it is a tool for emphasising the acceptance of the Self as it is here and now.”
“So the modern and ancient ambitions are different.”
“Yes and no, psychotherapy wants to induce self-experience, it wants to help us find our complete Self, believing that we are lost in a maze of value systems. The Eastern spiritual practices want to help us get rid of the Self, believing that it is only an illusion.”
“So are they fighting it out to win the argument?”
“Well, as far as Kathy and I are concerned, life flows between both notions of the Self. We should regard them as useful oppositions and we should look for opportunities to practise them both within and outside the monastery walls. If we work with intention and attention, there are any number of places where we can learn how to oscillate across the length of these two polarities. Our self can become a heavy weight on our journey so it is beneficial to know it and handle it well. We can find and discard the Self as and when the situation requires it. Love tells us we are somebody and knowledge tells us we are nobody. It is always better to keep moving between the two poles. We can only be richer if we experience these things in many different situations.”
Alex loved this conversation. He wished Kathy could be with them and contribute to it, but he didn’t say so. Afterwards Stefan wrote in his diary.
If anyone regards my friendship with Alex as a crazy decision, then I’m ready for crazy.
At the third meeting Alex, having read Stefan’s invented account of Mrs X, offered his response.
“You have her figure wrong,” he began. “She’s not one of those half-starved models, all skin and bone, but on the whole your description was brilliant. I found it exhilarating and uncanny. I was totally convinced by the princess scenario. It helped me understand the character I created. I really must thank you. I felt supported and validated by your insight. I also felt enormous sympathy for Mrs X. Had she been real I would have wanted to sooth her pain and make her loneliness go away. That’s like loving her, isn’t it?”
Stefan wanted him to expand on the caring feelings his text provoked, but at this point a bizarre confusion arose between them. Stefan thought Alex had said… “Most of what you invented about Mrs X’s family life couldn’t have happened,” insinuating that he knew her (that she was real) but Alex insisted he had said… “Most of what you invented about Mrs X’s family life could have happened.”
When Stefan questioned Alex about the reality of Mrs X, Alex’s reply showed signs of a stammer until he gained his confidence. He then eulogised Stefan’s ability, referring to his creation as an inspiring and believable story. To get Stefan off the scent of this strange new contradiction, Alex initiated a conversation about how stories and facts are equal in terms of their contribution to realty. He related a story about a grandmother’s blue dress and Stefan remembered that Kathy has sent this to him. Stefan was greatly entertained by Alex’s monologue on the place of fiction in life, but he could not shake off his desire to know the real truth about Mrs X.
At the forth meeting, which took place in Stefan’s house, Alex offered a new admission. He confirmed Stefan’s suspicion about Mrs X. He made an extraordinary effort to sound calm, but it was nevertheless clear to Stefan that Alex was feeling the strain of his lies.
“I didn’t invent the character of Mrs X,” Alex offered. “She exists, just as I described her in my initial statement. What I did invent is me; all that stuff about inner voices and the birds and bees. That isn’t true. I’m sorry. Are you shocked?”
“No, knowing how you feel about stories and truth I can see that for you the two are intimately intertwined and difficult to differentiate. I would like to know why you wanted to change your mind about her existence though.”
“Because when we became friends I was afraid you would ask to meet her and I didn’t want this to happen. I was also fed up with talking about my obsession and stupidity.”
“Why do you refer to your actions as stupidity?”
“Because they are stupid. I should pull myself together, but I can’t. I can only continue to live with my pain and humiliation.”
“So why is it OK for me to know she is real now?”
“Because I trust you now. I’m no longer afraid about what you will discover about me. Whenever I’m new to a relationship I try desperately hard to convince people that I have a great personality; that I’m interesting and stimulating to be with. I’m terrified of being an embarrassing bore.”
“You will never be regarded as a bore, Alex. So tell me, which of your descriptions of Mrs X is real?”
“They are all real. She is as I described her. She’s a stupid woman who refuses to accept my love. I’m truly miserable about it. Why are there so many irreconcilable differences between us? Why can’t she give me something? The smallest little thing would be a miracle?”
“Differences in relationships are inevitable. They are also functional, but this doesn’t help you. I cannot explain why opposing feelings exist between people. None of us are sure what we mean by love; I can’t explain it to you and you can’t talk about the love you have for her, other than you find her sexually enticin
g.”
“But that’s the kind of love I have for Mrs X; the love of overwhelming attraction. I look at her voluptuous curves and I go week at the knees. It’s desire. Now I must live without it. I must take unquenchable desire out of my life. I have to learn how to set boundaries, give up my passionate responses and still keep some semblance of my essential spirit intact. It’s impossible. Why must I be the miserable character in a mixed up story?”
“There are many contradictions to love, but you can at least try to talk about your frustrations and discuss why things might be going wrong.”
“I’m aware of the contradictions, but there must be some truth to the idea that physical desire is love. Maybe you love someone for her intellect, but I loved Mrs X because I found her attractive - and I don’t need a lecture on the dangers of beauty, I just need a bit of luck to make it real.”
“I accept your right to say so and if this subject is too painful for you then we’ll stop the discussion.”
“No, let’s have the discussion. You think that physical attraction should not count for so much, that beauty is an illusion, a mirage to be avoided at all costs don’t you? Good, and I think that beauty is essential; that love is impossible without it. State your case and I’ll state mine.”
“OK. Well, the problem with beauty is that you can never be certain what you are gazing at. This condition is the one Narcissus struggled with. You think you are gazing at beauty but you are gazing at yourself. You see love, but it’s a reflection of yourself, your fetish and your fantasy; it has no substance. Throwing your love at someone like this is like throwing riches to the wind; it serves only to make you poor.”
The Analyst Page 9