This morning I have officially become a blogger for, of all things, Psychology Today! I, who have utterly failed to benefit from countless attempts at a zillion different kinds of therapy for over three decades….
You can find it here:
It’s 1976, and I’m speaking to Karen, my partner at the time, bemoaning my lack of commitment to anything. All of my close friends over the years, up to and including my wife, Shari, will attest to the fact that I am a habitual bemoaner. (Be·moan: “To express grief or disappointment about something.” In Yiddish, it is translated to “kvetch,” which adds the elements of whining and complaining. It could be argued that, depending on my audience, I am both a bemoaner and a kvetcher.)
Lovely writing. I totally agree and would add that once we accept ourselves and our life just as it is, then we have it all
.
Annie, do you ever get the feeling that you’re the only person reading my blog? Maybe I should just start writing you directly and cut out the middleman!
LoL. Your comment drew out some more of your fans
.
hey, Bosco, not so fast with cutting out the middleman. Your audience is growing (grew, anyway) exponentially (2^1) the moment I was able to actually locate your article. Take note, the link has an extra “blog/” in it and required nearly an endless search to find it. Here is the corrected url:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-99th-monkey/200906/suffering-seeking-sanity
As always, I enjoyed your writing, your insight and your humor.
I think I’m one of those who has been blessed with receiving the right Buddha package when I arrived…except for occasionally when I reminisce about something or other, usually about a family member in the past, and sense this insatiable longing to return to that moment in time to re-experience it knowing that it can never be. I literally have to mentally distract my mind to extricate me from the reminiscence. Somehow, my formula works and I can return to my Buddha package.
Count me among your regular readers!
Eliezer, I am continually amazed by all the different places your writing shows up. Obviously, your career goes beyond just suffering (and bemoaning and kvetching). Now that I think about it, there are many people who make a career out of complaining about their suffering to others–many comedians fall into this category. But your writing is far different–in addition to the humor, it gives great insight into your experiences. This blog entry reminds me of the vastly different experiences of life that people have, with a few who feel ‘deep down fine’ and many who feel deep down that something is horribly wrong. It reminds me not to judge the people I see around me so harshly for the unpleasant (to me!) ways they try to deal with their suffering. It’s too bad more of them don’t read your blog.
Thanks Hal! I wondered about you the other day, wondering if you were still checking in here… Will I see you next week?