Gotta Be Right

It goes way back, this need to have things our way. As infants, we are self-centered as much from survival instincts as from our narcissistic tendencies. One of the first steps in child development is our ability to distinguish ourselves from the rest of the world, to deal with the others around us as separate from us.
But there are grown-ups today (see, I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt) who still act as though the world revolved around them. Charming people, some of 'em, with a self-assurance and confidence that is quite alluring. They can be found in the arts, running businesses and especially in politics. (In fact I suspect that's part of the job description for politicians.)
These are the people (you know who you are!) who are never wrong. And when they are, it is someone else's fault. If fact, they react to being found wrong by doubling down and becoming wrong at the top of their lungs! The trouble is not with these charming people, but the collateral damage they leave in their wake: the abused, confused, misused folk who feel vaguely guilty and ashamed just for being in the path of such forces of nature! And that doesn't even take into consideration those who respond by taking on the mistaken doctrines of their abusers: the woman who defends her alcoholic abusive husband, the young person molested by an adult they still idolize, the soldier who, even after several tours of duty and traumatic experiences, tries to justify the mistaken military policy that put so many in harm's way.
The important step is to embrace our own errors, to admit that I might be wrong, you might be right. Sure, there are certain beliefs in everyone's life which end up as non-negotiable. But even there, can we accept that someone else can see things differently without being personally threatened by it, by needing to either convert them or eradicate them just so such a difference is no longer a dissonance in our world?
Of course, that's just my view. I could be wrong.

The Proper Beliefs

There has been a lot of ink spilt over Freedom of Religion, especially in the wake of the recent decision on contraception. What, you don't know it? Well, see the White House decided that contraception (that's birth-control  medication to you) would be made available under health insurance policies to all women, even those who worked at Roman Catholic organizations. But after the cardinals frowned upon this, the White House revised this, and said that the health insurance policies for the employees at such places would simply offer this as an option. This way, it would be up to each individual female employee to take advantage of this part of the health insurance policy. Most Roman Catholic officials were willing to accept the compromise, although bishops still frowned.
Then some politicians, especially those for whom President Obama could do nothing good, grabbed hold of this and lo and behold! the whole thing was really about Freedom of Religion. Not about an individual's right to get the medical help necessary, y'see, but a nefarious plot against all Christianity in general and the Roman Catholic church in particular. The United States Circus, uh, Congress even held a side show with clowns and such; a hearing on women's issues where only men spoke and one woman who tried to testify was not only refused but later publicly maligned and pilloried by still another clown.
The thing that has been missing in all this is that there are already laws on the books regarding certain limits: the banning of polygamy for Mormons, the required use of transfusions for Jehovah's Witnesses, the restriction of faith healing with many conservative groups. Or say some person believes all illness is caused by demonic possession, and denies someone the medical care they need, well that can be charged as murder, not Freedom of Religion.
When Thomas Jefferson wrote about the separation of church and state to those Baptists over in Danbury, he wasn't trying to abrogate the role of ethics in civil discourse, nor  to excuse people of faith from being accountable to the society around them. We also draw consciously or otherwise on our beliefs in whatever we do as individuals. But let us not claim discrimination because others will not accept our particular perspective on our particular beliefs. To paraphrase somebody or other, I may not agree with your views, but I will defend to the death your right to be a heretic!

What are you so mad about?

Everyone has 'em: the pet peeve, the hot button, the trigger that makes us howl at the elements like King Lear. It could be something big that pushes us out into the streets to march and chant and wave signs; it could be something seemingly insignificant that throws us into the dungeon of despair while everyone around can only guess at our mood. "Anger management" has become a common expression in so many forms, from the requirements of the courts to the human resource departments of many businesses.
It takes many forms as well. From the viciousness of a political campaign (fill in the candidate of your choice) to the road rage of the everyday rush hour, anger has becomes the commonest, if not the most socially permitted of emotions. Whether we are talking about the twisted criminal who tortures and kills or the well-intentioned (but bigoted) citizen who thinks the different is dangerous, anger is now more visible generally than, well, since we all had a common enemy we could join in demonizing and vilifying like the Nazis or the communists.
Anger, like all emotions, is not logical, so all the well-meaning pundits who point out the irrationality of these angry people miss the point. Rather than refuting their point of view logically, we need to find out the root cause of their anger.
Anger is what is known as a "secondary emotion." We are born with certain basic survival-based emotions: fear, love, hunger. Then, as we grow older, emotions become more complex. That's where anger comes in; we get angry based on a primary emotion. Think about it: we don't just get angry. We get angry because. When we are scared, when we are feeling unloved, when we have been rejected, then we get angry. We might not be willing to admit it, even to ourselves at first. But when we are forced to face that empty place inside of ourselves, we resent it and, sometimes, resist. In other words, we get angry.
But what about those almost instinctual, even instant, feelings? That person you dislike almost immediately after you meet? Well, let me introduce you to your doppelganger, someone who is close enough to you to be well-nigh your twin in certain ways. But this man or woman personifies those aspects of yourself you least like, resist even acknowledging to yourself you have. Carl Jung called it your shadow.
And sometimes the other represents something you have been fascinated by, but fought valiantly against. The homophobic person may be struggling with latent (or not-so-latent) homosexual urges. The person obsessed with success and earning money may have a deep fear of failure, and shows it by a nasty attitude toward low-income people.
Please understand: I am not saying anger is bad  per se. Like any other feeling, anger is not intrinsically good or bad. Like any other feeling, it is what we do with it that matters. But that's another story.

So What Do I Do Now?

Okay, so you know your problem. You saw a professional who gave you a diagnosis, or you read something somewhere, or you had a person you deem trustworthy suggest something. Some of the people I see collect the many possibilities indiscriminately, almost taking pride in the various tags that have been hung on them.
And there is a kind of comfort in putting a name to what's wrong, however accurate or inaccurate that name might be. It would seem better to know even the worst prognosis than to wander in the darkness. Once we know, hope seem possible again.
But that still leaves us with the unanswered question: whaddya gonna do about it? Fatalistically accept it? Try to ignore the obvious for as long as possible? Run away, far away? Jump from this possible solution to that, like a frantic flea at a dog convention? Yes, try enough potential solutions, and one of them is bound to help, like the old idea that an infinite number of monkeys with an infinite number of word processors would eventually produce the works of Shakespeare.
Of course, there are more forms of remedy today than there ever were, today, and some of them actually do some good! We try to quicken the search by asking, but that takes us back to all those monkeys! Or we can determine just what form of help we are willing to accept, and look only there. It must be a man/woman, religious/secular, trained/well-meaning. We are entitled, even encouraged to seek the helper we decide is right for us. Yes, this means a lot of dead ends and false starts, as well as a colossal waste of our valuable time, but it is better to find someone you like rather than settling for who you can get. (Some have the same issue with relationships!)
But we actually get something out of this search: we take responsibility. We are not blindly taking the next one in line. Nor are we stuck with whomever we were assigned to. As annoying and frustrating as it might seem to my fellow clinicians to have a client population so tremendously choosy, at least they are no longer so passive nor helpless. They are there because they made the decision to be on their own.
Now our job is to help them determine what they do now.

And God Frowned

NEWS ITEM: In Ecuador, there is a state-supported mental health clinic that purports to specialize in curing homosexuality. Filled with mostly women patients, the use of torture, sexual abuse and old-fashioned brain-washing to make these people "straight" is given approval by the government.
Okay, no secret: I have a very personal bias in favor of the different. This means male/female, skin colors, ethnic/national, tall/short, and, um, sexual orientation. Yet some would question that, averring that the only proper, acceptable child of God is the white Caucasian  straight male, preferably with blond hair and blue eyes. At least, that's the model we see in the media (TV shows, movies, ads both printed and shown.)
Following that same reasoning, there should only be certain breeds of dog, certain kinds of houses, certain careers and limited forms of spiritual expression. What's more, divergences from such norms are not merely differences, but are wrong, condemned by the divine, and should be eliminated forthwith and ASAP!
Well, if ya insist on being such a pigheaded bigot, that's yer right (if we expect others to tolerate us, we gotta tolerate even those we can stand the least!) But know this: there is no explicit condemnation of the different in the scriptures (of whatever faith you choose). Sure, in the Christian writings there are prohibitions against male temple prostitutes, and strong support of traditional marriage as against the common behavior of the time to marry for convenience but then have as many lovers (of any sex and any age) as possible.
So when people come to me for therapy regarding their sexual orientation, I'm going to help them deal with it as they would deal with any issue causing them undue anxiety and distress. I am not going to "cure" their homosexuality. That would be like the awful things children went through many years ago when teachers decided right-handedness was the only acceptable way to write, so they strove to "cure" left-handers of that behavior.
Yes, people come to me to be "cured" of their sexual orientation. Well, if the husband of a certain presidential candidate can run a clinic for doing exactly that, I'm not surprised that people struggling with their sexual orientation might not give in to certain social pressures and look for a "cure." But this is similar to "curing" eye color by tinted contact lenses, or like "curing" hair loss by a toupee, or like counting on high heels to "cure" being short.
My God does not differentiate or discriminate based on outward appearances. (In fact, that was one of the earliest insights for the Christian church.) God does not frown on some and smile on others, any more than the rain falls on only a select few, nor the sun to shine just in certain places at certain times. Put away those carefully chosen Bible verses and recognize them for the defenses against your own homophobia that they are. (We'll talk another time about picking and choosing what in the Bible we decide to follow and what the psychological aspects are of that.)
If we really affirm God as love, should we discriminate as what sort of love that should be?

But Some Are more Equal Than Others...

In our society today, there is much energy being expended on the issue of inequality, especially the fact that many people (most, in fact) earn far less, have fewer resources, work in less-prestigious jobs than a smaller percentageof the population. This has led to demonstrations, occupations and much, much discussion. Yes, I am in sympathy with the young people who are involved in this movement, and I wish them the best (was something like what I did, back in the day.)
But there is some confusion here regarding the issue of equality; some folks who are in a position of authority are threatened by such talk. They have difficulty distinguishing the idea that all people are of equal value from the fact that some have greater knowledge, more academic credentials, broader life experience than others. A parent is of equal worth to any child, even though the parent has the authority to decide the best way of life for that child. A doctor may not be any better as a person than a given patient, even though that doctor has the ability to help that the patient might seek out. The judge is just as human and limited as any lawyer or defendant, even though one might rule legally on the other.
The confusion arises when someone with expertise in one area offends by condescension to a person in another area altogether. Yes, I have my areas of expertise, but that should not guarantee me deference in any other area, however strong my opinions or ardent my feelings in that area.
So does that mean that we should listen to all, give equal consideration regardless of their knowledge and understanding? Well, yes, with the common assumption that we are all equally aware of who is worth taking seriously and who is not. I hate the idea of giving the people I disagree with equal voice and time, but unless I know my opponent, I do not know what I am facing. It becomes like chasing a black cat in a dark room, and constantly crying, "Here it is! I have it!"
All people created equal: that is what we proclaim. It doesn't mean we should all be cookie-cutter-copies, nor that we pretend not to see differences. But it does mean that I am of the same worth as you, and you as me, regardless of what bank balance or job title we respectively have.

Who You Gonna Trust?

There was a time when it was obvious who the trustworthy were supposed to be: family, friends, religious and civic leaders, to name just a few. These were the people we counted on, those we were sure would never betray us or lead us astray. No one told us of the darker side of these people, and even should we catch a glimpse of "that man behind the curtain", we would still give them the benefit of the doubt.
Trust today has become an endangered aspect of life. In fact, the very people we used to trust well-nigh unconditionally are the same we now reject almost automatically. It seems that trust is a difficult load to carry, and tempting to take advantage of. The politicians we looked to as founts of wisdom are now seen as self-serving buffoons. The clergy we looked to for guidance are now seen as abusers. Doctors are seen as only out for the buck, not for the health of the patient. Teachers, community leaders, others we sought direction from, all are now seen as having some secret motive, some hidden agenda.
Granted, I am painting with a very broad brush. There are many, if not most, in each group who are sincere, competent people that deserve our trust and work hard to earn it. But the average person pays no attention to the exception to their personal rule; they (whoever they might be) are simply not to be trusted. And, unfortunately, there have more than enough instances to make us feel that our bias is valid.
The only solution to this conundrum is to trust. Otherwise, it becomes a problem preventing its own solution. We don't trust others, who therefore resort to the very behavior we didn't trust the for (because, after all, why not? they already don't trust!) and this confirms us in our decision not to trust. But if we would reclaim trust as important to our lives, we must take the risk. Trust is like a muscle: if you want to strengthen it, you must use it. And the only way to exercise is, uh, to trust!
This is not a quick solution; much water has gone under this particular bridge and change will come gradually. But there is another side to this. They must act in such a way as to prove trust worthy! Which might mean acting in the same way as they already do. But when people realize that it might be in their best interests to behave in a more trustworthy manner, they will seek to make the things they do more obvious.We sometimes don't trust people not because of what they do, but because of what we assume they might have done.
Please do not assume the above is only social commentary: one of the biggest issues couples bring into marital therapy is trust! It applies to couples, families, friends and neighbors.
Of course, there are those whose entire life is built around not trusting anybody. And there are those who should be treated with an excess of caution. But we cannot get anywhere in society if we assume such are the common breed around us. You can begin on the right path by trusting everything I just said.