The Whole is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts: Part I - Body Image, Our Thoughts, and the Art of Sculpting

Circus Arts, Our Storied Lives, Radical Acceptance, Vulnerablity, and Finding Joy in the Meantime (and “Talking Heads”, too).

“Time Isn’t Holding Us.” The Talking Heads

And you may say to yourself, “My God, What have I done?” – The Introduction

It was close to a year ago, bright and early one Saturday morning, that I found myself standing at a scaffold, or plank, leaning forward over a net that seemed to be thousands of feet below me. I had a tight belt around my waist, which served as a harness supposedly to keep me safe – that was the idea anyway. Some guy I had just met was standing with me on the scaffold, holding a metal loop attached to the back of the belt I was wearing. I was also somehow belayed to a person standing below me on the ground to the side of the net. As I leaned forward, looking down into what seemed like an endless gulf, to a barely visible net, this guy I had just met seemed to be the only thing keeping me from falling to my death. I looked across the gulf, a distance that seemed like miles, and noticed another plank, much like the one I was standing on…but barren. I then reached out my arms to grab a bar that was hanging down, from ropes at each end, in front of me. I have no idea what the ropes were attached to (something above me), but the plan was that once the guy I had just met – that’s right the one who was seemingly attached to my life, and determined it’s fate at the time – yelled “Hep,” I was supposed to grab the bar and swing out over the net at the bottom of the endless gulf. It gets worse: Once I was in about the middle of the two rims of the gulf, my job was to put both of my legs over the bar at the pits of my knees, and then hang upside down, and swing over the gulf. Then, I was to reach back up, grab the bar, bring my legs down so that I was hanging from the bar, holding on to it with my hands. Soon it would be time to dismount. And, if I felt like it at that point, I could swing my legs and do a flip before landing on a net near the bottom of the gulf. But first, before all of this, I stood scared on the plank at the top of the gulf, attached to a belt that this guy I just met was holding. I stood on the plank and leaned forward toward the hanging bar, when - as sometimes is the case when I am scared or stressed - my fear culminated into a song popping into my head. It was some lyrics from that Talking Heads song, Once in a Life time, that seemed to run through my mind – specifically these three lines: 1)“You may ask yourself, well, how did I get here?” 2)You may ask yourself, how do I work this?” 3)You may say to yourself, “My god, what have I done?” Yea…especially that line. I was expecting to wake up at any minute. But unlike my last blog entry, this was not a dream. I was wide awake. And in fact, was probably more awake than I ever have been.

I waited with anticipation for what seemed like an eternity, when at last (or too soon), the guy I just met yelled, “Hep.” And I grabbed the bar, swung out to the middle of the gulf, put my legs over the bar, hung upside down, swung for a bit, reached up and grabbed the bar again with my hands, brought my legs down, then dismounted – doing a flip on the way down to the net at the bottom of the gulf, before landing. Still alive. And I loved it.

Unlike my last blog entry, this was not a dream. At 45 years old, I somehow (for real) found myself at this very particular moment in my life, flying on a trapeze. I should say, this wasn’t really over a deep gulf – I’m not that daring and frivolous with my life. This was at the Trapeze School of New York (TSNY) in Washington, DC. Probably I was flying just about 25 feet above the ground. This was my first time. So, you may be wondering, “How did you get here?” And why on earth…

So here is where this story begins: It all started when a friend of mine, a circus arts performer, announced that he was planning to hold some classes. He would be teaching movements on static trapeze, lyra, and silks…all aerial apparatuses.  I quickly told my friend that this sounds like so much fun, and that I know my two kids will thoroughly enjoy this. I told my friend that I would sign them up right away! It was then that I seemingly had an out of body experience. It almost felt that I was watching myself as my words deterministically came out of my mouth without my permission: “So…Are these classes for adults, too?” And they were.

I signed up my two kids, and I signed up myself. I also gathered up a couple of friends who I figured might also enjoy these classes. And that was the start of a new chapter in my life.  - A renewed chapter in my life.

The old chapter wasn’t so bad – in fact it was probably in so many ways, the best, because it was the chapter that birthed my two children (my youngest having just started kindergarten at this time), as well as my move from a group practice (just one year after the birth of my first daughter) to a solo one. With being a full time mom and a full time counselor, the only thing missing from this chapter at that time, it seemed, was me….or my own space and time to enjoy. And even prior to this chapter, I spent much of my life striving. First working to prove my independence. Then college, grad school (and work). Then more work. At some point in the midst of all of this work, I got married. But I would say, coming from a family with a strong work ethic, teetering on addiction… much of my sense of self worth was tied into productivity. And this I know, is by far, not unique to me.

This blog essay is about breaking rules and re-writing stories. Specifically those rules and stories that don’t work for us and/or keep us stuck. It is about movement through time and emotions. It is about finding freedom and joy in the meantime, the time between now and then. It’s about being a kid, in between the lines of our adult lives. In between the lines of the Talking Head’s song, “Once in a Lifetime.”

2)“And you may ask yourself, Am I right? Am I wrong”? -The rules and roles of culture and language : I have long been fascinated by how we understand ourselves and others through the constructs of culture and language. And how the stories that surround us in our own cultures, communities, and families become internalized and constructed into our internal mindscapes – in a way that shapes what we know to be our “realities.”

Early in my counseling career, I developed an interest in Narrative Therapy. This approach is one that has helped shape me as a counselor. Narrative Therapy, founded  by David White and Michael Epstien, is essentially a socially conscious approach to therapy - with roots in social constructivism and literature analysis - that seeks to “free” the identity of the person from oppressive and hurtful internalized “stories.” It does this by "externalizing" and "deconstructing" self-defeating narratives (more on this later). Narrative therapy is rooted in the belief that individuals’ identities develop within the context of their culture, including the language of their culture. Narrative approaches thus aim to help clients “re-author” their lives, in part by helping them to recognize and see themselves a part from the problematic stories that have been bestowed upon them, and inside them.

 Narrative therapy has it’s roots in concepts from post-structural philosophers - in particular Michel Focault and Francis Derrida. In this section of my essay, I will discuss some of the ways in which language and aspects of culture keep us defined, trapped in roles, and imprisoned.  I will also explain how narrative therapy works. I will talk about how narrative therapy concepts, such as “externalizing the problem”, “finding unique outcomes”, “deconstruction”, and an “audience” all help to free clients from their prisons of stories. I will also include some concepts from Focault and Derrida.

Focualt, Dominant narratives, and Unique Outcomes:

I recently had the fortune to attend a training headed by psychologist and prolific writer, Mary Pipher, Ph.D. Pipher is probably best know for her 1993 book, “Reviving Ophelia, Saving the Selves of Adolescent girls,” in which she chronicled many of the struggles of adolescent girls in the culture of the early nineties. The training I was attending pertained to a new/ updated version of this book (which will be coming out soon), about the struggles of adolescent girls in the context of our current times. Excited to even be in the same room with Mary Pipher, I arrived early to secure a good seat. I then started conversing with the woman next to me. She herself had two girls - one in college, the other a college graduate. I proudly told her that I have two girls myself, currently ages 10 and 7. She smiled, then gave me a look of sympathy, shaking her head.

“Oh no”, she said, “Just wait till you have two girl teen-agers on your hands.”

 Reflecting back on my acknowledgement of her comment, I imagine handing over a part of myself to her with a friendly smile and a laugh, then saying “I know”…these two words coming out of my mouth in just that fashion that expressed, “I’m doomed. Help me.”

 We shared this “knowledge” about “girl drama,” and in a way…her and I both having girls… may have used it for a connection between us. The thing is, though, it wasn’t really true. Not for me, anyway.  I didn’t really feel scared, or at all concerned about having two girls, or having two girls that would one day be teen-agers at the same time. But, what does, “Oh no,” you have two girls mean?” And my smile, friendly laugh, and nod toward her, what was that saying? That girls are “drama.” That’s the knowledge right there. “Girls are drama.” Because why…they have “emotions?”  And who makes up the rules about emotions? And girls and drama, anyway?

We live in a storied world. By this, I mean there are many stories happening at once. Some stories are known to the majority of us; while other stories are left untold and unheard. Thus, cultures carry with them through time a number of “master narratives.” These master narratives serve to determine peoples’ perceptions of reality – for example, what is “true”, what is “false”;  what is “normal”, what is “abnormal;” what is “right”, what is “wrong;” what is “beautiful”, what is “ugly;” what is “good”; what is “evil.” I could go on…

Michel Focault believed that the ideas which become patterned into dominant narratives of a culture are perpetuated through “discourse,” which includes both written and spoken communication. In other words, the master narrative assumptions, held as “truths,” are perpetuated in our day to day conversations – like my conversation with the woman about “girl drama.” These narratives are so engrained in our culture’s dominant belief systems that most of us do not notice them in our day to day conversations – we converse as if these “assumptions” were truths. According to Stephen Madigan and Jude Law (Praxis 1998), "Focault suggests that discourse refers not only to the actual words and statements themselves, but to their connection with the complexities of social and power relations which prevail in a given context, and which constrain what is said."

In other words, our conversations carry with them these assumptions of power and hierarchy.  Our conversations carry with them ideas about what we should or shouldn’t be doing, based on the dominant narratives of our culture about gender, age, race, etc. They carry with them assumptions of how we should look, how we should act, how we should be living our lives. Our conversations carry with them a slew of assumptions based on what we’ve internalized as truth. That girls are beneath boys, for example. That “logic” is above emotions and separate from emotions. That emotions are “drama.”

Along with this prevailing of dominant ideas is the understanding that other narratives, or stories, (termed “unique outcomes) go unnoticed. In general, people tend to remember events, rather than “non events.” Unique outcomes are the “non-events,” or “news of difference.” Unique outcomes are the experiences that fall outside of the dominant narratives. They are present even in the telling of history, which primarily empowers the narrative and perspective of the white man, while much less is told about other genders and races.

Dominant narratives and unique outcomes exist everywhere – our cultures, communities, families, and within our own individual mindscapes.  Here is an example of how a dominant narrative might play out in a family: If a child is known in his family for having anger outbursts, often these “outbursts” will be the events that are remembered, remarked upon, and storied; while the times the child will be able to refrain from outbursts, or do something different, go un-noticed. Uniuqe outcomes, in this case, are the times the problem is not happening, or the times the problem has been resisted.

Here are some simple examples of how the prevailing of dominant narratives and the dismissal of unique outcomes might play out in the construction of the stories you tell yourself: If you believe yourself to be not good at math (your dominant narrative about your mathematic abilities), you will probably be more prone to noticing the times you struggle with math, vs the times you don’t. If you believe yourself to have problems managing anxiety, you will probably be more prone to recognizing the times that anxiety gets in your way vs the times it doesn’t. If you believe yourself to be bad at managing money, you will probably notice the times that you “mess up” with money management vs the times you don’t. If you believe yourself to be a failure, you will probably be less likely to notice the times that you succeed. And by the way, where in the first place did all of these beliefs you have for yourself come from?

Derrida, deconstruction, and relationships:

“The grammar of our language itself is set up to argue for or against something-it can never be neutral.” Stephen Madigan

Post structural philosopher, Frances Derrida has often been referred to as the “father of deconstruction.” Deconstruction basically means, “to question assumptions.” Derrida believes that we understand things in relation to other things. Within our language, words themselves hold their meaning within their relationship to other words - the meaning of one word cannot be comprehended without the other. Furthermore, Derrida also termed the concept of “binary opposites,” which essentially means that words exist in a binary and hierarchal relationship - where one word means the opposite of the other, and also that one word holds power or privilege over the other. Here are some examples of binary opposites: success/failure; right/wrong; normal/abnormal; beautiful/ugly, thin/fat; man/woman; adult/child; logic/emotions, all/nothing.” So….An example of deconstruction of these binary opposites would be flip and question the"hierarchal binaries." For example (this is my attempt at this), with “right/wrong:” What is really wrong about “being wrong.”  Maybe being wrong connects us to others; demonstrating our humanity. Maybe being wrong shows more free thinking; not prescribing to the dominant knowledge of that idea. Or maybe we are wrong, because everyone else who is right…is really wrong.  Or, maybe we are wrong because the question isn’t just that important, and we’ve got better places to put our mental energies (try telling that to your teachers). Maybe being wrong opens us up to hear about other ideas and stories – maybe there are different stories that are just different…not right or wrong. Maybe if it were more ok to be wrong, we would ask more questions that would give us a better understanding of others...that would change our initial assumptions. And what does being wrong mean, anyway? And is being “right” always “right?” I could go on…

Deconstruction would also involve looking at the possibilities of what might lie in between these binaries…like the middle ground. It is interesting to me that cognitive distortions – thinking patterns that can contribute to depression and anxiety – may in fact be in part an internalization of language. “All/nothing,” or “black and white” thinking for example, seems to me to be a binary opposite that just so happens to be engrained in our language. Things are just “one way or another.” So maybe this “disordered” pattern of thinking that we all have at times is in part an internal representation of the way we use language, as well as the way we view our world through the lens of language. Really... linguistically speaking, things are pretty all/nothing; black and white; right and wrong. We typically learn to see things from one side, or the other. Middle grounds, at least in our English language don’t often exist. Later in this paper, I will also discuss dialectical behavioral therapy, and the practice of holding two seemingly opposing forces at the same time.

Just as words are understood in relation to other words, people also tend to define themselves based on differences with other people in their lives. We have a tendency to see things one way or the other, in a hierarhcial relationship. This often lends to our comparing ourselves to others, and judging ourselves off the hierarchy of that comparison - She is smart; so I am dumb. He has more; I have less (more on that later). I also often see this same structure playing out in families struggling to differentiate  – how can I be who I am, for example, if you aren’t different. Siblings are often assigned roles: the smart one, the pretty one, the problem one.  Unique outcomes ignored, and these dominant beliefs upheld, only to keep the person defined, locked within the walls of these roles…like a prison.

Narrative therapies use of externalization, deconstruction, finding unique outcomes, and an audience

“One of the most crippling prisons is the prison of reduced identity.” (John O’Donohue, Eternal Echoes (101).

Again, the goal of narrative therapy is to help liberate the person from the problem by the way we use language. This is done through techniques of “deconstruction”, “externalizing the problem”, “finding unique outcomes”, and the use of an “audience”. Often it is cultural beliefs, or knowledge/power constructs, that trickle into our families' belief systems from our culture. When an individual is defined a certain way…such as to be the “problematic” person in the family, other “stories” about that person (that aren’t the dominant narrative) get lost. Narrative therapy approaches thus aim to deconstruct the constructed identity of the person by acknowledging these “unique outcomes,” or times that the problem isn’t present. It also aims to “externalize” the problem from the identity of the person.  In a sense, it aims to help individuals and families “story” their lives and construct a better “reality” for themselves.

One approach to narrative therapy’s “deconstruction of the dominant discourse” is to “externalize” these narratives from the individual. – “The person is not the problem; the problem is the problem.”

"In practice, externalization involves the collaboration of the person (who was assigned as the “problem”), by coming up with a mutually acceptable name for the problem, personifying the problem, and investigating how the problem has been disrupting, dominating, or discouraging to the person". (O’Hanolin, 1994 ). Jennie Schaffer’s book “Life Without ED,” is probably one of the most known books about recovering from an eating disorder. In this book, Jenni Schaeffer compares the eating disorder (ED) to being in an abusive relationship. Recovery for her involves being able to recognize the difference between the thoughts and stories that are ED’s (i.e. “you are so fat, and that is wrong,” “don’t eat this or you will get fat”, and “no one will love you if you are fat”) and her own “rational mind” thoughts. ED’s thoughts, by the way, are interestingly exaggerated (from anxiety) internalizations of our cultures beliefs pertaining to beauty, appearance, and what makes us valuable.

Deconstruction again means “questioning assumptions.” This most often involves questioning the assumptions of problematic internalized dominant narratives. These can include the dominant narratives of our culture, family, and selves. Often, it is all three.  Deconstruction can be done by helping to increase the client’s awareness of the context of their stories by asking questions – “Where”, for example, “did you get the idea that you need to look a certain way?” “Why is it that your voice and opinion shouldn’t count as much?” “Where is it you heard that girls are drama?” “That emotions are drama?”  Deconstruction of stories also involves noticing the unique outcomes. The times, for example, that the person was able to stand up to the problem. In the case of a person with anorexia, this may be pushing through the anxiety of Ed’s voice, and eating lunch. The very nature of deconstruction allows us to find meaning, and construct a story that is our own. It can often be helpful to check in with ourselves about “whose script we are following.”

According to Derrida, just as words hold their meanings in relation to other words, so may be said the same about people… which brings me to the last important (yet often overlooked aspect of true narrative therapy), which is the audience. Because, essentially, we know our selves in relation to other people. Without others, we would have no meaning of self. When I first learned about narrative therapy, about 20 years ago, in graduate school, I learned of what is called a reflecting team (“the audience”). A reflecting team is comprised of several other therapists who basically watch your counseling session. Often this takes place, with the clients consent, behind a one-way mirror. After the reflecting team watches your session, they then have a conversation about your counseling session, while you watch their conversation. I have to say I have only done this – as both a client and a counselor- in graduate school. The job of the reflecting team is to generate a number or perspectives, unique outcomes, and/ or alternative stories…as well as bearing witness to the courage and strengths of the story-teller, or client. I could write a whole paper on just this.

“Since all stories have a beginning (or a history), a middle (or a present), and an ending (or a future), then the interpretation of current events is as much future shaped as it is past determined” (White and Epstpn, 1990). Again, it is the “storying” of our experiences that helps to define the meaning ascribed to these experiences. This is how we make sense of our lives. Stories have beginnings, middles, and ends. According to Epston and White, the way that we have “storied,” or made sense of, our lives also provides for us expectations and interpretations of future events. They believe that the success of this storying of experience is essential to providing people with a sense of continuity and meaning in their lives.  Language and culture transform throughout time – thus, the “problems” persons experiences throughout time will do the same. The next section of this essay is a “little lighter,” but is a demonstration of a word, the change of it’s meaning over time, and how the use of this one word might just affect how you feel about yourself. Especially if you are a millennial

3)“And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack” -The social Time Line and “Adulting”

When my precociously creative youngest daughter, now age 7, was between the ages of about 2 and 4, she coined a term that became a nonstop every day phrase in our family. This was the phrase, “adult/kid.” Here’s the context of her phrase:

Me: “Hazel, it’s time for bed.”

Hazel: “I don’t’ have to go to bed now mom – I’m an “adult/kid.”

Me: “Hazel, get in your car seat.”

Hazel: “I don’t have to get in my car seat, mom – I’m an “adult/kid.”

Me: “Hazel, it’s time to turn of the TV.”

Hazel: “I don’t’ have to turn off the TV mom - I’m an “adult/kid.”

Obviously, Hazel’s perception of adults was from the perspective of a 3 year old – that us adults do whatever the heck we want. We stay up late, watching TV all night long. Probably non-stop episodes of “My Little Pony” and “Paw Patrol”. Probably eating whatever we want. And when we need money, all we have to do is go to the bank.

One night I said to my husband, regarding Hazel’s deconstructive phrase, “adult/kid:” “If only “adulting” was that easy”. If only “what” were that easy.

“You know, “ADULTING”, I said.

“That’s not a word,” he said.

“It is a word,” I said. “The twenty and thirty some year olds I see in my practice use it all the time.”

“That’s not a word,” he said.

“Look it up,” I said.

The online Oxford English Dictionary defines the word, “Adulting,” as:

“The practice of behaving in a way characteristic of a responsible adult, especially the accomplishment of mundane but necessary tasks. It feels really good to take a step back from adulting and have someone else cook dinner for me.”

Here is the urban dictionary definition:

Adulting (v). “to carry out one or more of the duties and responsibilities expected of fully developed individuals (paying off that credit card, settling that beef without blasting social media, etc). Exclusively used by those who adult less than 50% of the time”.

An online time.com article (Katy Steinmetz), described how this word, in part came about, because millenials, in general seem to be doing things – such as marrying and owning a home – later in life, termed “delayed development,” than recent past generations. This same article describes how this word, through its “jokey way of describing one’s engagement in adult behaviors – whether that is doing your own taxes, buying your first lawn mower, staying in on a Friday, being someone’s boss or getting super pumped about home appliances – can help those millennials acknowledge and/or make fun of and/or come to grips with that transition (or how late they are to it).”

Though I believe it is true…that Millenials as a group are doing some things later in life than previous generations as a whole…I also wonder, “who the heck says there should be a time line for our constructed accomplishments”. Hmm.

A dominant narrative that stands behind this concept of “adulting,” is that of the socially constructed time line. The social time line in essence pertains to the unspoken rules that dictate the order and way in which we should proceed in our lives. In essence, it dictates “what makes us an adult.”  It tells us that there are certain things we should do – go to college, get married, purchase a home, have kids, work hard – and when we should do them. These narratives about how we should do things, and the order of how we should do them, really only serve to create doubt and esteem problems for those of us who are out of step with the time line. A funny scene from the movie, “Bridget Jones's Diary” pops up for me… about a woman at a dinner party feeling quite bad about herself, because she is the only one at the party who is single. Interestingly, this movie itself to some degree perpetuates the concept of the social time line, as well as other dominant narrative constructs…that you should get married at a certain time (or at all)…because (though I did like the movie), what it is about is a young woman who feels bad about herself because she is STILL SINGLE. She also believes herself to be overweight… and not as worthy of having a relationship as someone who is thinner – her own internalized narrative about what makes women worthy. And if my memory holds correct, Bridget does at that end of the movie get some validation from a man (of course) that she is OK…”just the way you are.”

I’ve talked with countless young adults who have felt bad about themselves because they weren’t quite “ready” to start college, or weren't sure they even wanted to pursue college. Or (young women, especially), who are “still single.” Or couples and families - living in the countries wealthiest county, where these narratives are extreme – who don’t own a home. I could probably write an entire paper on the struggles I have seen people have (including some of my own) with this time line. In essence, the social timeline really just serves to fuel our anxiety…about potentially “running out of time.” This narrative also assumes a heterosexual, cisgendered, middle to upper class white America normative. The assumption, for example, is not just about the fact that we should get married and when we should get married, but who we should marry. The narrative of the social time line tells us that if we aren’t doing things in this order, then we aren’t doing something we should be, which is “Adulting.”

In essence, certain uses of this new word, “adulting,” may also serve, not necessarily deliberately, but by the nature of it’s use, to deconstruct some of the silly ideas about what it means to be an adult…that adults are just boring people who do boring things with their lives, and do it with accuracy each day of their “ground hog day” prisons of their mundane lives. While kids are joyously free and frivolous. I have a feeling that Derrida may have approved of my daughter’s combined efforts of these two words, adult and kid. It will be interesting to see where the continued evolution of this word, adulting, might take us at it evolves throughout time.

And by the way the way, speaking of evolution of this word throughout time, According to Merriam-Webster.com, “if we go back to the infancy of the verb adult, we find another meaning entirely: as a jocular verbal form of the noun adultery – in other words, as a synonym of to commit adultery.

In so many ways, the ways we internalize and construct our own realities from the social time line can feel like a prison. It can cause us to feel like where we are now in our lives is not where we should be. Sometimes where we are in our lives can be a truly difficult and devastating time and place. If where we want to be in our lives can’t be achieved quickly, or if where we are now feels miserable, then the gulf between “now and then” can feel frustrating and sometimes intolerable. The “now” of time can feel like a prison. Or maybe also, a seclusion room…

4)“And you may ask yourself,  Where does that highway go to?”- When “where we are” is not “where we want to be”: Radical Acceptance and Longing in the Meantime.

In a 2011 New York Times article, Marsha Linehan, therapist, researcher, and founder of Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) – an approach used extensively in the treatment of  individuals struggling with a wide range of problems from suicidality, self-harm, and addictions to trauma, anxiety and depression – came out with the story of her own struggle. She shared how she had been hospitalized at the age of 17, exhibiting self-destructive urges and behaviors. She was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, and described in the article how at that point in time she felt “totally empty.”

“I was in Hell,” she said in her interview with the New York Times. Linehan shared that during this hospitalization she had been “the sole occupant of the seclusion room,” a room  (still I believe used in some state hospitals) often with padded walls, but otherwise with nothing in it. It is called a seclusion room because individuals who are deemed a danger to themselves or others are locked inside…until they are otherwise deemed “safe.”  In the isolation of this room, Linehan’s  “urge to die only deepened.”  She described feeling empty and out of control. The article describes how Linehan, while hospitalized, went through a series of “treatment,” including the use of the anti-psychotic medications and electroshock treatment. Eventually she was released.

 Several years later, still struggling, Linehan described almost an epiphany moment, which for her, occurred in a church. The moment was that of which she called Radical Acceptance, accepting herself as she was. The article states how Linehan had tried to kill herself many times because, “the gulf between the person she wanted to be and the person she was left her desperate, hopeless, deeply homesick for a life she would never know. That gulf was real, and unbridgeable.” This acceptance, she described, allowed her to view her symptoms as “making sense.” Acknowledging her suffering, rather than fighting it, allowed her to care for herself and to slowly take control over her life.  Linehan, later in her life, as described in this interview, created a form of therapy that she felt could have helped her at the time she was suffering the most. And, part of what helped her through her suffering while institutionalized was the vow she made to herself to one day help others.

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Sometimes we don’t know where we want to be. We only know we want out of this moment. Linehan’s version was extreme. But most of us throughout our lives struggle at times and to degrees with a sense of angst…that frustration that comes with knowing that where we are now is not where we want to be. Whether we are lonely, feeling a lack of meaning in our work and our lives, or are disconnected from our selves in a way that we are not who we want to be (common precipitating factors to this angst), the time between now and the future we hope to see ourselves can be difficult to tolerate. It is when we feel too far away, too distant, from the life we long for - paired with a sense of hopelessness - that we feel despair. Stuck or trapped in a present moment that may feel, at the time, like an eternity. We long to be anywhere else, away from the now of time, which can feel like a prison.

The times that we struggle to tolerate the present moment are also times when some of us might find ourselves engaging in unhealthy behaviors. Addictions, compulsive behaviors, or self-harming behaviors often involve avoidance of pain, or a ceaseless fight against it. Addictions can serve to fill the void between the now of time and the future we long for. Addictions also distance us from the parts of ourselves that are wounded. Drugs, alcohol, work, eating…if done compulsively temporarily fill the gulf of the painful meantime…the time between now and then…while simultaneously keeping  us stuck and motionless in and endless “meantime.” Typically, the more we fight our struggles, the more stuck we become. Like Linehan in the seclusion room, we despairingly long to be somewhere else, away from the now of time.

This longing comes from within, and is a force that can move us. But time doesn’t just launch us to the place we long to be. First we must accept where we are, as well as the uncertainty of not knowing the future. So how do we accept what feels like an intolerable present? How do we embrace the uncertainty of the future? How do we tolerate the anxiety of the meantime? How do we accept ourselves as we are in our lives while simultaneously knowing that we need things to change; that we need to change?

The concept of Radical Acceptance is now a dialectical behavioral therapy skill, implemented by Marsha Linehan. Radical acceptance is originally derived from Buddhist practices, which hold the belief that “all life is suffering,” and that relief from pain, or “peace,” involves acceptance of suffering. Radical acceptance requires us to stop fighting our pain. It also requires us to accept the things that we currently can’t change, as much as we might want to. Radical acceptance thus involves holding the tension of acceptance and change in the same breath. To radically accept ourselves and our situations, we are acknowledging what at the moment we can’t change. This includes our selves. Psychologist, Carl Rogers, founder of the humanistic approach to counseling, wrote: “The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” Radical acceptance, thus, is the acceptance of ourselves in the “now” of time. Radical Acceptance also involves the balance of understanding that events through time have landed us where we are…that we are partly responsible for where we are currently in our lives, and that we are partly not responsible for where we are in our lives. In order to truly accept ourselves, we must also have awareness of the context of our lives.

We live in a culture that is increasingly disconnected.  And that is a part of the context. I believe that part of this disconnection results from a dominant narrative script, which reads, “Individuals are solely responsible for their successes. And individuals are solely responsible for their failures.”This script probably works well for those of us who don’t want to take responsibility for our friends and neighbors. And to further this, our system is set up in a way that it is difficult to even find the time in our lives to sometimes help our friends and neighbors. 

Our past experiences are also part of the context of our lives. Gabor Mate’s book, “In the Realm of the Hungry Ghost,” references the traumatic childhoods of drug addicts he’s worked with on the streets of Vancouver. I recently had the privilege of seeing Mate speak, and he referenced the psychiatry field’s use of diagnoses…as an example of how the problem is put on the individual. Context, thus, also includes the taking into account ….that mental health “disorders” most often don’t just pop up because people are “disordered”…they pop up because much of what individuals who receive diagnoses have gone through is “disordered” itself. The narratives in our culture are a part of the disorder.  In fact, the name of Mate’s keynote speech was “the Myth of Normal in an Insane World.” Enough said.

This context of “disordered” often includes the pervasive dominant narratives of our culture. Anorexia, for example, has often been referred to as a mental illness that is “an exaggerated normal.” We are socialized in a way to believe that we need to be certain ways in order to be “OK.” When we are not these ways, we often tend to assume that there might be something wrong with us, as opposed to something wrong with the messages. Our American way is set up in a fashion that we are prone to see a narrative as “people as problems,” rather than the system and structures that surround us. We internalize aspects of our culture. “Externalizing” these “outside-in” messages, as well as increasing our awareness of them can help.

Our culture also bombards us with narratives that lead us to believe our happiness is dependent on “getting more.” Writer, social commentator, and professional bank robber, Stephen Reid, in his documentary, “Inside Time,” talks about how "we are always waiting for the next fix.” For example, “things will get better when I make more money”, “when I lose more weight”, “when I have this or accomplish that”…this drive can be continuous and consuming, and never fulfilling (because there will always be more to obtain)…causing us to lose track of our footing and our ability to experience joy in the "meantime". In the here and now. Reid further states, "desire is the cause of all suffering, and it's because desire takes 'you' out of 'you'. It takes you out of your time, your moment, and puts you into the moment of what you desire, and that's the whole crux of Western markets. To make people desire these things and think that's what they really want. Then they're outside of their own time ."

It is only in the here and now of the time and places in our lives that we are truly able to connect with others, and that we are truly able to connect with ourselves. Unfortunately, many and most of our culture’s messages ultimately serve to pull us outside of ourselves…in a way that we often find ourselves motionless, in a spinning world that surrounds us.

English poet and philosopher, David Whyte, wrote in a fairly recent article for the Psychotherapy Networker, about connection and the balance of the “three marriages:” work, other, and self. The importance of the relationship with self is one that is often overlooked. Whyte writes in his article, “In the midst of seemingly endless life, however, we can spend so much time attempting to put bread on the table or holding a relationship together that we often neglect the necessary internal skills which help us pursue, come to know, and then sustain a marriage with the person we find on the inside. Neglecting this internal marriage, we can easily make ourselves a hostage to the externals of work and the demands of relationship”. Remember me at the beginning of this paper?

The balance and interplay amongst what I believe we truly yearn and long for in our lives can also well be summed up by Celtic poet and philosopher, John O'Donohue. In his book, “Eternal Echoes", O'Donohue writes, “Every heart is full of longing. You long to be happy, to live a meaningful and honest life, to find love, and to be able to open your heart to someone; you long to discover who you are and to learn how to heal your own suffering and become free and compassionate. To be alive is to be suffused with longing.” 

Even once we find love; friendship; connection…our intimate relationships can hold a constant tension of what O’Donohue refers to as longing (or “distance”) and belonging (or “closeness”). He writes: “There is some strange sense in which distance and closeness are sisters, the two sides of the one experience. “Distance awakens longing; closeness is belonging. Yet they are always in a dynamic interflow with each other.”   That is, our relationships…like a see saw at a child’s playground…encompass constant movement, a dance, between distance and closeness, between self and other…which is in constant motion.

Radical Acceptance, as well as including the tension of holding both acceptance and change, can also include that tension of holding longing and belonging, or distance and closeness between self and other.

Again, radical acceptance – accepting ourselves in the “now” of time – also involves an understanding of the context surrounding our lives. For Marsha Linehan, it involved the understanding that her “symptoms made sense”…given the context of her life.  By accepting herself as she was at the time, she was able to hold the tension of both “acceptance and change;” the tension of belonging and longing; distance and closeness. Radical Acceptance also involves acknowledgement of the concept of time…that we, ourselves, are constantly in flux.

David Whyte, in the same article I mentioned above, also writes: “What is heartbreaking and difficult about this inner self that flirted, enticed, spent time with and eventually committed to a person or a career is that it is not a stationary entity, and immovable foundation; it moves and changes and surprises us as much as anything in the outer world to which it wants to commit”.

Remember…the more we fight our struggles, the more stuck we become. The more we accept our struggles, the more we become. And once we accept where we are, we are then able to move through our emotions as we move through time…

5)And you may ask yourself, well…How did I get here?

Connection….whether to others, ourselves, or our work…typically involves going out on a limb and knowing that there might not be anyone there to catch us. Connection entails vulnerability. In her book, “Daring Greatly,” Brene Brown describes vulnerability as “uncertainty, risk, and emotional exposure.” She shares in a TED talk, “The Power of Vulnerability,” how true connection with others involves allowing ourselves to feel vulnerable. “We live in a vulnerable world,” she states. “And we numb vulnerability”…through drugs, food, and other addictions and behaviors. Brene furthers this, “When we numb those…we numb joy, we numb gratitude, we numb happiness”…

Brown describes that connecting with others means that we must “love with our hearts, even though there is no guarantee.”

 One of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies, “Adaptation”, involves the conversation between the main character, played by Nicholas Cage, and his alter ego twin brother, also played by Nicholas Cage. In this scene, Cage’s character and his brother are hiding together (from the “bad guys”) behind a fallen tree in a gator filled swamp. They are quite possibly on the brink of their deaths, and are having a heart to heart about their lives. Cage’s character shares a memory of witnessing a conversation with his brother and the girl, Sarah Charles, whom his brother was madly in love with in high school.

 Cage says to his brother, “She started making fun of you when you walked away. I heard them. How come you were so happy? She thought you were pathetic.”

To which his brother responded, “That was her business. Not mine. I loved Sarah Charles. It was mine – my love. I owned it. Sarah didn’t have the right to take it away. I can love whoever I want.”

Cage’s twin brother took things a step further, loving Sarah Charles with all of his heart, even though he was pretty certain that his love would not be received by her. That was the “guarantee” for him.

We are vulnerable because life is uncertain. Many therapeutic approaches to treating anxiety utilize a concept of “leaning into uncertainty,” of leaning into the “not knowing.” Because really…we never know. Our fears and vulnerabilities must come with us.

 One of my favorite metaphors about this concept came from Steven Hayes, Ph.D (founder of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy ) during a training I attended. The metaphor is this: What we most long for and what we most fear in our lives are two sides of the same coin. Take, for example, the person who has been burned in relationships (most of us have), or have had childhood experiences of rejection…What they long for is connection (top half of the coin), but what they most fear is rejection (bottom half of the coin). And the metaphor is about how we so often run away from the bottom half of the coin (our fear of rejection)…often through avoidance tactics – like addictions or numbing behaviors -and by not taking the risks of opening our hearts to others that come with connection. By running from the bottom half of the coin, however, we are simultaneously avoiding the top half of the coin. Thus, the whole coin must come with us. We must allow our fears to be with us in order to grow. In order to connect. We must lean into our fears. Leaning into our fears, leaning into uncertainty, moving through our emotions as we move through time…that is how we get places.

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The Lyra

You may now feel like you’re on a road to nowhere. But remember that one day you may find yourself on a flying trapeze...or a lyra.

It’s been almost two years since I signed myself up for “circus classes.” And this essay has been in my mind for almost the same amount of time. Had I completed it last year, this essay would have been different…it likely would have been about the “therapeutic benefits” of play, for adults as well as children. It might have been about embracing vulnerability and uncertainty through the use of experiential therapies – the therapies of expression and connection that transcend the language of talk therapy. It might have been about my research into the potential benefits of circus arts therapy, and my discovery of one such center in Atlata GA, run by a woman by the name of Carrie Heller, who is a licensed clinical social worker, registered play therapist, AND a circus arts professional. And about how she uses circus arts therapy – aerial arts (trapeze, lyra, and silks), tight rope walking, juggling, and more - as an experiential form of therapy to address individual therapy goals, such as decreasing anxiety, and improving confidence and self-esteem to working with families to improve attachment and connections.

It might have been more about how us adults most often express ourselves through the constructs of language.  And how for children, expression of self is most often reflected through “play,” and a more “felt” understanding of the world and their place in it - apart from language – through the attunement and mirroring of caregivers. It might have been about the importance of play for adults. In his book, “Play Therapy – The art of the Relationship,” Gary Landreth writes, “Play involves the physical, mental, and emotional self in creative expression and can involve social interaction. Thus, when the child plays, one can say that the “total” child is present”. Play, for adults, too can be a type of expression that frees us from the constructs of language, while simultaneously reinforcing our connection with self and others.

This essay last year might have been about how “adulting” also means allowing yourself to be a kid again. And how, for me, these initial circus arts classes also symbolized a reunion with my inner child…one who liked to climb up trees, hang upside down, and trapeze down from the limbs. One who at the most joyous times in my childhood life fully embraced uncertainty and adventure, without the words or knowing that I was doing so, and ran barefoot through a field behind my home to a special place in the woods, which I named, “fantasy land.” This because the sun somehow always shined through a particular cluster of trees, of which hung many vines, surrounding a small creek that ran through it. This was the time and the place of the joy of my childhood “here and now.”

As time changes, so do our stories…because time is a part of the context, too.

Time is the ocean we swim in; time is our dance (on a lyra, quite possibly) – it is the eb and flow of distance and closeness with all three of our marriages; work, other, and self. The movement of time changes meaning and perception. With the movement of time, things that were once wrong become right; things that were once right become wrong. Things that were once ugly become beautiful. Things that were once nothing become everything. Things, ideas, people…become.

Over time, our own ideas and stories change, and so does the audience. Time changes our meaning made of our past. Time moves us to the outside of our internal prisons (or locked seclusion rooms). Time delivers us. And often as we age, our own stories become more clear…and constructs such as the social timeline (our culture's narrative about how we should proceed through time), rather than fueling our anxiety about “running out of time,” turns to sand like details…falling though our hands.

The knowledge of “running out of time,” knowing that one day we will die, can in fact help us to pursue what is truly meaningful in our own lives. Writer and existential psychotherapist, Irvin Yalom, writes about how the knowledge of our own impermanence can itself bring joy and meaning to our lives. In his book, “Staring at the Sun,” Yalom writes, “ Once we confront our own mortality, we are inspired to rearrange our priorities, communicate more deeply with those we love, appreciate more keenly the beauty of life, and increase our willingness to take the risks necessary for personal fulfillment”.

The iphone app, WeCroak, according to their website, is inspired by a Bhutanese folk saying: “To be a happy person, one must contemplate death five times a day”. And so, five random times a day (death is random), this app gives you a notification, “Remember, you will die,” and you can open the ap to “reveal a quote about death from a poet, philosopher, or notable thinker” – like the quote that just came up an hour ago on my phone, by the Dali Lama, “Analysis of death is not for the sake of becoming fearful but to appreciate this precious lifetime”.

And a quote from Mary Oliver, which I have not yet seen on my WeCroak app, about sums it up. It is the last line in her poem, “The Summer Day”….

“Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

And so, when we are near the end of our lives…at the brink of our own possible deaths - like Cage’s alter ego twin character in “Adaptation” - maybe it is who we decide to love, and how we decide to give ourselves to this world that will really matter.

And to do this, we must allow ourselves to be fearful and take the risks that scare us. The fear; the vulnerability has to come along for the ride.

Stephen Reid, in the documentary, “In Time,” expresses, “The real key to life is not so much cycles, but spirals. When we break cycles, when we stop repeating habits and behaviors and routines, then we spiral…so we are still cyclical but we are moving. That is I think part of the frustration of modern life…that we’re aware of these psychological, emotional, spiritual dead ends that we are hitting all the time because we’re not taking that risk which leaps us into that spiral, and that we will live with the devils we know as opposed to taking a risk”.

And as I look back in time to my initial circus classes almost two years ago, I find myself on the lyra.

And on the lyra, I remember the joy of leaning into the uncertainty.

And…

On the lyra,  I spin around: To face the past. And I wonder if Marsha Linehan could talk with her past self…locked alone in a seclusion room. Would she look her younger, adolescent self in the eyes? Would she speak to her softly, letting her know, “One day, you will be a famous doctor, helping others. The pain and suffering you are having now will be a source of strength. It will make sense. But first, you must know that you…in the here and now of who you are…you are OK. And this all makes sense. And time…time is part of the context, too. Because one day, you will arrive”.

On the lyra, I spin around: And I realize in the now of time, as I write this, that for me these circus classes, as they happened to occur in the particular time in my life that they did… were a much needed reminder of that surprising connection with myself, the marriage to myself; always in flux, always moving. As it should be.

On the lyra, I spin around. And proceed to spiral.   I remember my instructor saying, as I seemingly fell through time on the lyra, touching just the right spot on my leg to the bottom portion of the lyra…”That’s the sweet spot,” he said. Meaning the spot (the time and the place) where the balance is “just right,” for the trick and the landing. The sweet spot, meaning the moment you know that longing and belonging have merged - with past, present, and future – and all is right with your world.... if just for a moment.

 “Time isn’t after us”

The End (but not really)….

References:

White, M & Epston, D. (1990). Narrative Means to Therapeutic Ends. Adelaid, Australia: Dulwich Centre

Madigan & Law (1998). Praxis - Situating Discourse, Feminism and Politics in Narrative Therapies: Vancouver Canada: Yaletown Family Therapy

O'Dononhue, John (1999). Eternal Echoes - Celtic Reflections on Our Yearning to Belong (1999) New York, NY 10022: HarperCollins Publishers Inc

Brown, Brene (2012). Daring Greatly - How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead: New York, New York: AVERY - and imprint of Penguin Random House

Mate, Gabor (2008): In the Realm of the Hungry Ghosts - Close Encounters with Addiction: 

Yalom, Irvin D (2008). Staring At The Sun - Overcoming the Terror of Death: San Francisco CA: Jossey-Bass

Landreth, Gary L ((2002). Play Therapy - The Art of the Relationship: New York, New York: Brunner-Routledge

O'Hanlon, B. (1999). What's the story: Narrative therapy and the third wave of psychotherapy. In S. O'Hanlon & B. Bertolino (Eds.), Evolving possibilities: Selected papers of Bill O'Hanlon (pp.205-220). Philadelphia, PA: Taylor and Francis.

Young, Jason ( 2007): Inside Time -  Documentary with Stephen Reid

The Talking Heads Song, Once in A Life Time

With special thanks to Mark Harding, my circus trainer :)

(a couple more references are on the way)