Posted in Uncategorized on November 7, 2009 | 1 Comment »
(NOTE: If you are on my personal email list, you’ve already heard all this!)
MOM FLIES OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST:
Just Another Hospital Horror Story
Several weeks ago my mother, in her eighth or ninth year of Alzheimer’s Disease, and 63rd year of marriage, began wielding knives and trying to stab people, verbally threatening to kill [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on October 16, 2009 | 1 Comment »
“All manner of things shall be well.”…So chill out!
When Thoreau was on his deathbed, his aunt asked him if he had made his peace with God, and he responded, “I was not aware that we had quarreled.” Someone else once said—I don’t recall the source—that “The most salient characteristic of an enlightened being is not [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on September 27, 2009 | 2 Comments »
The Eternal Puer and Facing Reality
Somewhat miraculously, I have managed to reach the age of 57 without experiencing the grief and loss over the death of any immediate family members. My parents—married nearly 63 years—along with my 60-year-old brother and I, recently sat around the family dinner table in the house I grew up [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on September 3, 2009 | 9 Comments »
Gabrielle Roth
I spent last weekend in a very deep workshop that provoked a lot of tears and feelings, both of which are often in short supply for me. It was a “5-Rhythms™”-based group, the healing-through-movement practice developed by Gabrielle Roth, a work that I have been engaged with, on and off, for 30 years, (and [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on August 20, 2009 | 2 Comments »
August 20, 2009
“Suzanne Takes You Down…”
No, not that Suzanne; not Leonard Cohen’s lady by the river whose perfect body he touched with his mind. My Suzanne is a 96-year-old woman I visit in a nursing home once a week, whose body is somewhat less than perfect: she is blind, wheelchair-bound due to crippling arthritis, [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on July 29, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
On wasting time and accomplishing nothing.
The Batesville Day Parade in Batesville, Virginia is a throwback to an earlier time. The mayor usually drives by on his power lawn mower, the local church group throws candy from their “Jesus Loves You” float, a slightly scary militia movement marches by with flags and weapons, twelve-year-old Little Ms. [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on July 19, 2009 | 1 Comment »
July 19, 2009:
Contribution & The Fear of Everything
Spiritual teacher David Deida has suggested that hidden within our biggest fear lies our greatest gift. The road to our most meaningful and powerful contribution in life often travels through the precise territory we most wish to avoid. I have found this to be true in my [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on July 10, 2009 | 6 Comments »
The Power of Context
Getting beyond labels and limitations.
From my Psychology Today Blog
In my early twenties, I worked one summer as a security guard at Alexander’s Department Store and I learned the power of uniforms. On the day prior to beginning work, I got locked out of my car in the Alexander’s parking lot [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on July 2, 2009 | 3 Comments »
(Some of you may have already seen this…it came out the other day on my Psychology Today blog .)
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MOURNING THE LOSS OF AN ONLINE IDENTITY
George Gurdjieff, the inscrutable Armenian mystic of early last century, insisted that we humans are constantly bearing false witness against ourselves, by glibly using the pronoun “I” to refer to who we [...]
Posted in Uncategorized on June 19, 2009 | 1 Comment »
By Eliezer Sobel on June 19, 2009 – 5:07am in The 99th Monkey
DOES MY THERAPIST NEED A THERAPIST?
There was an episode of Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm in which Larry felt it necessary to discontinue therapy as a result of running into his therapist on the beach and seeing him wearing a thong [...]
