Monday, November 29, 2021
I read a few pages of Seven Story Mountain each night before I go to sleep. I work my way slowly through books. I'm more of a writer than a reader. However, I am currently reading four different books, each in its own circumstance. I read Dahaene's Math Sense over dinner; I read Brainscapes before I take a nap; I read Gladwell's David and Goliath on my kindle when I have to wait in a line or for a medical appointment, and, of course, I read Seven Story Mountain before I go to sleep.
Last night, I read a passage in Seven story Mountain where Merton describes his feelings at his moment of decision to become a priest. He said there was no yearning involved; it just was right. I remember that's how I felt about Mike. There was no overwhelming attraction of any sort; it just felt right. It was a wonderful clear moment. I compare it to the moment you heard the coin drop in the old payphone. Sometimes, the coins didn't go through and would be rejected. When the coins went through, there was a distinctive sound. You knew you were good to go. My response to Mike was the same. Everything else was okay, in some cases better than okay, but nothing was overwhelming. It was so relaxing, so right. I never changed my mind in our forty-five years together.
It was dark when Elsa and I started our morning walk, and it was dark when we returned home.
I did some of my box walk: grapevine to the left, walk with a mule kick, grapevine to the right, and walk with a knee lift. I can feel the increased range of motion as well as the areas of continued restriction. I only did a little before I just did my regular walk. I got 2,000 before we went home.
Judy hadn't called yesterday. She's on daily duty with me. About six months ago, she lapsed into not calling me daily. I got depressed. I asked her to make it a commitment. I don't need her to do it every day as much as I need her to be committed to doing it every day. Does that sound confusing? When Mike was alive, we had daily contact, well, almost every day. When he traveled, there might be a day we missed here and there. I missed being on someone's all-the-time list. It made me feel so lonely. Judy happily accepted the burden.
We talked about my upcoming birthday Zoom meeting. It triggers great sadness, not because of Mike's absence but because of poor family relationships. I've had to let a number of them go because they're uncomfortable around me, which makes me uncomfortable around them. The assumption is that something is wrong with me. These are folks who are not willing to work things out. To do so would require them to acknowledge that they have a role in the relationship. Not doable. I have to choose between being sad because I don't speak to these people or being sad because every time I speak to them, I am aware they think I'm a terrible person they have to tolerate. I understand it's normal to not want to be around people who don't like you, don't enjoy you, and think you're a terrible person.
I have a track record with therapists who also react that way. Mike and I went to a family therapist. Without asking a single question of either of us, she faced me down and declared that I couldn't deny Mike sex; I had an obligation as his wife. Mike and I looked at each other in confusion. We both looked at her and announced that we did have sex; that wasn't the problem.
She apologized but didn't change her opinion about me. Three of four other assumptions she made were factually wrong, all premised on my being a self-centered, dysfunctional person. She was the worst, but there were others. People assure me it's because therapists are often sick themselves; that's why they went into the profession. They can't heal themselves, but they think they can heal others.
Mike never saw me as a selfish person. He saw me as a saint for all I did for him. I gave what I gave him and my mom joyfully. Yes, it was all selfish. But I believe we do everything for selfish reasons. It's impossible not to. Anyone who denies that is a hazard. Even if we sacrifice our lives for others, we do that for selfish reasons. When we sit there forcing ourselves to do something for others that makes us uncomfortable, we do it for selfish reasons. Even when others see us as unselfish, we are doing it for selfish reasons. Some care to be of value to others and those who don't care about it. Some of the most self-centered people I have known have been people who view themselves as self-sacrificing. They are the most manipulative. In my experience, people who do not face their own selfish motivations are terrified of accepting their own negative impact on others. They're frightened of seeing themselves in a negative light. They have to see themselves as endlessly giving with no thought of themselves. I say impossible.
Others can judge the impact of our behavior on them. That's certainly valid. But we can only see ourselves as self-centered. We are the center of our universe. Some think they should also be the center of everyone's universe. Their needs, their values, their perceptions, their memories are the only valid ones. Others should know what they think and feel without being told. Now those I find themselves self-centered and often selfish because they never really take others into consideration. Oh, they may take their image of others into consideration. But for these folks, others are characters they have created in the drama of their own lives.
Judy is closer to my point of view than others, but even she balks at my belief that everything we do has a selfish motivation. She cited times when she did things for her kids when she didn't want to. Don't we all do that? Well, maybe not all, but certainly everyone in my life. I come from people for whom morality is an issue. Everyone tries their best- in their own light. I argue you can never be your moral best if you don't acknowledge your own shadow side. Impossible. You are freer to be a caring person if you are realistic about your own needs and drives, what motivates you to do anything. Just because something makes you uncomfortable does not mean you're doing it for unselfish reasons.
I read a few more pages of Brainscape before I went down for a nap. I am not enjoying the book. I assume it is because I am familiar with all the ideas, and I'm not learning anything new. There is one new thing I learned. Neurons form their connections in utero by following chemical traces. It reminded me of what plants do as their roots make connections with each other. It's an amazing concept that individual neurons have built-in specific instructions, all generated by two haploid cells. Wow!
Someone else responded to my email announcing the videos on my reading method, the man who manages the Stem Cell Institute in Hawaii. He was concerned that someone was using my email address to advertise their own stuff. Once that was cleared up, I asked him if he could pass it on to others. He said his wife was involved in a home-schooling group. Perfect. While this method will help anyone improve their reading, my real goal is minority populations who don't use the standard pronunciation. Teachers hear their pronunciation is different than theirs and believe they can't learn. This method allows people to use their pronunciation, whatever it is. The other day I had a tutor in my Reading Office hours say her student's primary problem was pronunciation. I gave her my spiel. One other person was on the Zoom meeting; she was foreign born and spoke with an accent. She chimed in to say I was correct. When teachers emphasize correct pronunciation and grammar before someone can learn to read, they teach class structure, not reading. My accent, a distinct Bronx one, never gets challenged. No one assumes I can't be a good reader because of it. Or at least I don't think anyone thinks that.
Today, I only one person signed up for my Reading Office Hours. She never showed. I sat at the computer for an hour in case she decided to sign in. This is one of the wonderful aspects of Zoom. I can do something else. I worked on the updates, but I could also have worked on restringing my windchime.
I didn't have much to do today. I finally got to work on editing the original reading article. Boy, was that ever anxiety-provoking. It sounded good to me, but I'm hearing my own voice. Who knows how it sounds to others? How do people write well without an outside voice?
We have been without rain for several weeks. The grass is brown; shrubs are wilting. There was a strong breeze for most of the day. It feels great, but it sucks every bit of moisture out of the ground. There were two short downpours. With the breeze, the ground was dry again within ten minutes. Some rain came down during one of my walks. The sun was out, the drops felt cold hitting my skin, but they evaporated before they hit the ground. I saw some evidence of the rain on my car roof. It didn't need the water.
I had adolescent D in the afternoon after school. As usual, I asked if he had done any reading in school. Yes. He had to copy something, and he read it. He doesn't usually do that. Did he do that deliberately? Yes. How did it feel? Not good. Interesting! I asked him if anything bad had happened because he did that. No. Did realizing that make him feel more relaxed? Yes. Ah, I think I know why people don't like to change.
All forms of change evoke feelings of strangeness, ergo the word strange. Change can be good, or it can be bad. We are inclined to remember bad events more vividly than good events. That's the way it's supposed to be. As we evolved and lived in the wild, something 'bad' could be life-threatening. If we didn't remember a source of danger, we could die. Good things were great but were never life or death events. The good we remember would be attached to something bad. We got away from that tiger; that escape felt good. Someone smiled, assuring us we wouldn't be banned from the tribe. That felt good. Being banned could have been a death sentence. The good was associated with the bad.
Likewise, any form of change can either be good or bad. The feeling is the same; it feels strange or weird. In our lives where we are 'good learners,' we associate this feeling with an opportunity to learn something new. We label it anticipation. If we associate feelings of change with something bad, we call it confusion. It's unpleasant. We have to use our conscious minds to determine if a new experience is a source of danger. That is easier to do with changes in circumstances. I feel weird because I'm in Paris among people I don't know who speak a language I don't speak. But I have this situation covered. I know what to expect. I am still me. Even though our nervous system is modified with every experience, with every thought. If it's an old thought, we lay down another layer of connection, strengthening the pathway. All familiar, all reinforcing. If we have an unfamiliar thought if we see someone, our circumstances, life, the human condition, in a different way, oh, boy. That is if we allow it to touch us. It will make a small dent, but we avoided real change. Phew! I'm still me. I'm still the person I thought I was. Here's the news. You're always yourself. You can't escape that no matter what kind of changes you went through internally or externally. "Wherever you go, there you are" is more than a statement warning someone running from themselves to a new environment. This is true for all change.
I sent out emails with the blurb advertising my reading method during the day. I got through the Ms. I got lots of daemon mailers back but no other "who the hell are you" emails. I checked the number of views on YouTube periodically. I noticed that the views of the Phase I video go up, but the views of Phase II remain the same. It suggested that people are not sufficiently impressed with Phase I to bother watching Phase II. Sad. Well, I've done the best I can. I can only hope that the appreciation of it will improve over time. It took over a year for the blog numbers to increase. When it started, the numbers ran between zero and two per day. Then they went up to something above five. Now, there are days when over two hundred people sign in. As I said before, since I think these numbers reflect class assignments, I expect them to drop.
I finished watching Hard Love. Eh! It wasn't absolutely terrible. However, there was no chemistry between the main characters. Okay, she didn't get him, but he knew he wanted her. There was no longing from him, even in the final scene, no chemistry.
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