The Ground of Joy

A common theme that emerges in my work with clients is a belief that we should somehow feel differently than we are feeling. This can be particularly true around the holidays. In a time where our culture loudly shouts “Be merry! Celebrate!” and the inner experience is anything but merry, what do we do with that kind of tension? Feel even worse for feeling sad/mad/stressed? Or hold tightly to despair, as a reaction against the push to be happy? While the pressure towards happiness can be burdensome, so too can the gripping of pain. How can we learn to allow ourselves to experience the full range of our emotions, and also not get stuck in negative feelings?

These questions are ones that many forms of psychotherapy seek to address. The one I am exploring here is the possibility of joy as a settling ground, upon which all other seemingly contradictory emotions can land. This notion of joy is different from that of happiness. Where happiness is temporal and often related to our circumstances (a new car! a promotion!), joy is a more subtle experience of lightness, fullness or peace. Joy is not dependent on life aligning with what our egos want, and it is also not a denial of painful emotions and experience. Rather, the way to access this ground of joy is by accepting whatever emotions might be resting with it (including unpleasant ones).

This hidden depth of joy comes from learning to live a willing life— not a “smooth” or “fortunate” life, but a willing one. This might mean allowing ourselves to experience heartbreak, speak a truth that might end a relationship, or love a dog with total commitment to a finite life. Psychologist Rollo May writes in his book Freedom and Destiny: “Joy is a release, an opening up; it is what comes when one is able genuinely to let go.” Joy is a practice of letting life in and being moved by it. It can be laughter, certainly, but also the quiet inner warmth of witnessing a sunrise, accomplishing a long-held goal, or experiencing the first smile after a long period of grief.

In a time where many of us are glued to our phones, and preoccupied with avoiding boredom or discomfort, we unintentionally miss the ground of joy. We forget to notice the way the light shines on snow, or see the kind eyes of a stranger as they walk past us on the street. Joy is there, but many times, we scroll right past it.

For some of us, who have had past stressful or traumatic experiences, being open to joy can go against every conscious and unconscious protective mechanism we have. Likewise, for someone currently in the midst of deep pain, the idea of joy can feel preposterous, or even offensive. When we have been wounded by others or by life circumstances, being open does not feel smart, or safe. If this sounds familiar, or reminds you of someone you love, please be patient. Consider seeking out a skillful therapist. Remember that even if the painful event has passed (it could have been many years ago), our bodies and psyches sometimes need support in order to consider joy a real possibility. This kind of support is something that every person is worthy of receiving.

Individuals like The Dalai Lama, writer Maya Angelou, and poet Mary Oliver, appear to know joy intimately, but not because they were given a lifetime pass on pain and suffering. Rather these are people who have lived through immense hardship, who have been forged in the fires of trauma and have somehow learned to be open to life anyway. They embody a true paradox: Joy and Suffering are both inherent to growth. So how, as imperfect humans, can we develop the psychological muscle to hold this paradox without hardening against the fluctuations of life? By practicing what I call persistent gentleness; relating to ourselves with kindness as we allow both painful and pleasurable emotions to claim us, humble us, and eventually leave us for whatever is coming next. Joy then becomes the outcome of relearning over and over again that it is possible to have a heart that be can broken open, rather than closed.

A few wonderful things about the flexibility of joy:

  • The ground of Joy isn’t demanding or impatient. We will not miss it if we get caught in stress or sadness. It simply waits until we are ready to open ourselves to it.

  • Joy permits us to feel multiple emotions simultaneously. It fits nicely with grief, wears well with sadness, and can even offer an accessory to despair. We do not have to forsake seemingly contradictory emotions—we are wonderfully complex beings!

  • Joy expands when it is shared. If you want to amplify your experience of joy, seek out others who regularly practice it, like children and animals.

  • Joy requires no skill. We are all born ready for the experience.

A reminder that if this is a difficult time for you, and joy feels far away, know that you are not alone. There is no right or wrong way to feel. Family, friends, mentors, or licensed therapists may be helpful resources at this time.

If joy does feel within your reach, I leave you with the wisdom of Mary Oliver from her book Swan: Poems and Prose Poems:

“If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give in to it… whatever it is, don’t be afraid of its plenty. Joy is not made to be a crumb. (Don't Hesitate)”

To Your Health,

Megan

How We Fall

The leaves on the trees around my home are making their fiery grand finale. They flash red and gold and tilt homeward toward the earth. I sit looking out the window, and reflect. We are living in intense times, many of us enduring high-highs and low-lows and shockingly sudden changes. The political and social scene seem to mirror the magnitude of personal challenges all around and within us. As I sit with here, my head full of cloudy ideas, and my heart beating with human ache, I ask silently of the trees: "What lesson can we learn to help us in this current world?" 

A single maple leaf, bright yellow, makes a funerary descent from it's high branch to the wet ground. What we need now, is to learn how to fall.

A Cultural Void

Most of us have never explicitly been taught about endings, loss, failure and grief. We experience these things in our lives and tend to diminish them, push them away, feel ashamed. We tell ourselves that we are weak if our creative project falls flat, or our relationship falls short, or our business deal falls through. When we make mistakes as individuals, communities, and corporations, we bail ourselves out, or convince others to do so, to avoid the pain of humiliation or disappointment. We hide our failings and our heartbreak, we smile or laugh and say we're fine. But the truth underneath is clear:

We are not fine. As someone funny and wise once said to me; "The best thing I ever heard from my therapist was "it's ok to not feel ok". And it's true. 

When we grieve the state of our divided nation, our history of oppression, the prevalence of violence, the declining environment and economy, we are grieving because something is broken. When we become angry over innocent lives taken, or freedoms revoked, or toxic food and water being consumed, we are feeling real, measurable losses.

So how have we been managing these realities in a society where there is such little space for personal and collective grief and accountability? We blame. Check out the presidential debates to see the blame complex in action. We blame others or we blame ourselves when we meet the difficult emotions stirred by the truths of our world, or to distract from our own shortcomings. Blame often gets a pretty bad wrap, and yet we do it all the time in our personal, professional and social lives.

Why We Blame

Now, before we go blaming blame for all our troubles, let's explore it's purpose. Blame has a psychological function like all defenses do--it protects us when we need it. Blame is like a turn out in the road. Its a place where we can pull over and pause after something truly shocking or agonizing has happened. But we are not meant to build a homestead there. Blame is a place we go to turn away from the pain of reality, until we can bear the reality of pain.

If we never learn to bear this reality, blame erects walls around us that create divisiveness in a time where most of us desperately need connection.  Blaming prohibits us from productively using the energy of grief. When we habitually blame "them" (whoever they are), we lose our sustainable agency and ultimately our intimacy with pain. 

Why on earth would we want to be intimate with pain? Because the heart of pain is where love, mystery, and hope also live. It is no coincidence that "falling" is used to describe a process of loss, but also a process of love. There is an intelligence that arrives only after we allow ourselves to fall into the true experience of whatever we are facing. If we never accept the falls which are inevitable to a human life, we risk becoming cut off from one another, and from the very ground upon which we stand. As writer Yasmin Mogahed eloquently puts it "Never curse a fall. The ground is where humility lives". The ground is also where connection lives. As social worker and researcher Brene Brown states "The two most powerful words when we're in struggle: 'me too'." When we have the courage to open to ourselves and to trusted people during difficult times, we may learn that there is a steady ground of belonging that lies underneath.

In Hebrew, the word Qal which means "to fall", and "to fail", also means "to prostrate " or "to bow in reverence upon the ground". So, falling could bring us to the end--of a life, a dream, an identity. But it also might bring us down to the place where everything new begins. Which means that the fall might just be the thing that saves us.

 

Here are some helpful tips for enduring these intense times, and honoring whatever kind of fall you might be going through:

  • Create a practice for marking endings: (ending of relationship, job, a death, a move, a change in identity, watching children grow)
    • Listen to a favorite piece of music, or read or write a story or poem, light a candle, walk or sit in a peaceful place, look at photos or watch a movie with meaning to you.
  • Know your technology limits: how many commentaries do you need to read about politics before you and your nervous system have had enough for now?
  • Connect. With your people, nature, faith, creativity, humor--whatever makes you feel alive.
  • Notice essential good-heartedness--in children, pets, neighbors, strangers, partners, yourself.

                

 

To your resilience, courage, and ability to endure the descents of life. Happy Fall.

 

 

To Your Health,

Megan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Seeds

Slowly at first, ascending from the trunk and sweeping upwards through the chest, filling itself out in the branches of the arms and neck, rising and swelling with a vitality independent of the body. The sensations powerful enough to cause a slight pitch forward of the chest, as if the arms of the heart are reaching ever towards a satisfying light.

Longing.

From the epic poems of Homer, to the sonnets of Shakespeare, longing has been a theme captured by the greatest poets, musicians, and painters throughout time. We are reminded by the lilting sounds of the violin, by shadows and textures of paint, by films that leave us with a slightly opened mouth, tasting the essential hungers of the soul.  While art continues to be a home for the yearning impulses of the heart, our current culture seems to be missing an acceptance of this deeply human experience. 

We function in a belief system that says "if you want something, then do something about it", or the equally action-oriented "if you want something badly enough, you'll make it happen". There is a hearty landscape in our culture for intention and manifestation and the development of actionable steps. This is how we achieve and develop many parts of our lives. There are certain longings that can be met by this kind of approach. But what about the ones that cannot be "fixed" by our own action--what about the ones out of our control?

 Our culture often suggests that longing itself is a weakness, a problem to be solved, and we are the ones with the power to fix it. We forget that longing is an intimate experience of human existence, and yearning is a sacred part of life.

Longing expresses itself in many forms: the desire for a homecoming, or finding love, grieving a loss, creating a family, escaping oppression, restoring health.  To manage the discomfort of longing--particularly those not easily addressed, we adapt with a variety of strategies. We might ignore it, suppress it, numb it with food or drink, or become overwhelmed by its intensity so that it veils all of life in a desperate lens.

These are some of the ways we struggle with longing. These are some of the ways we are human. The longing for love, freedom, acceptance, and creativity move through our human bodies as vital impulses. It is important to remember that longing is not weak or pathological. It is however, vulnerable. It takes courage and understanding to acknowledge our longing or let other people witness it. This is particularly true when we experience the kind of longing that goes unmet.

Working with young children in the foster care system has taught me a great deal about the sacred nature of this kind of longing. They are involuntary experts on the subject. It is humbling to witness the ways in which children express their deepest desires for connection, love, and family. Longings that are so basic, essential, and sometimes trembling in their intensity. For some kids, there is a sort of resolution, and the chapter of their lives labelled "foster care" ends with a safe enough environment where they are cared for by adults--either birth parents or others. But other times, children must live with their longings unanswered. They must go to school, learn to tie their shoes, adapt to different houses and rules, while continuing to live with an ongoing and staggering yearning. One that is not so different from anyone else's--to feel connected, to love, and be loved.

An intervention I sometimes facilitate with young children during the springtime is to plant seeds. The kids come into my office and scoop soil into a cup, choose their seeds, and carefully tuck them into the dirt before watering them. We talk about what seeds need in order to grow, and what children need in order to grow. They find sunny spots in the office for their cups. The next several weeks are often punctuated by excitement about the growth of the seedlings and culminated when the kids and their caregivers agree to take the plants home to plant in their own gardens.

Although this intervention is something I have done many times with children and families to work on themes of relationships, needs, and growth, it was not until very recently that a new and bittersweet understanding came to me. Yesterday, I read this line by poet Khalil Gibran: 

"Every seed is a longing".

Of course. That is what each child has been planting all along. So, it is their teaching, with the help of a Lebanese-American poet and some sunflower seeds, that I put into words and pass on to you:

Our job is to give our deepest desires a home. To tuck our longings into the earth of our bodies and to care for ourselves with kindness. To give ourselves water and sunlight. This is how we endure. This is how we thrive. Whether the longing is met, the dream realized, or the possibility frozen in time, the seeds have a home. Let them have a home. 

 

 

 

To Your Health,

Megan

 

 

 

Megan Baker Welles, LMFT 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Towards Freedom

Light the match in the dark

and see the shackles are already unlocked.

You are not tethered to misery,

(although this may feel true)

You are the keeper of the key. 

Believe in your own brokenness

That there is a healing balm.

Redeem your whole heartedness--

Your flame.

Expect the glory of the brightest light,

Carry kindness in a cup

Listen to the silence

That whispers all the time

"You are enough". 

A Demanding Invitation

There are times in life, when pain and hardship are so acute that the act of breathing feels monumental. Sometimes the news, the doctor's appointment, the long days waiting for the phone call, take all the strength we have to keep ourselves upright. Sometimes staying upright is impossible, and the only place to be is under the covers, in the dark. 

Born within all of us are survival mechanisms and processes to help us psychologically endure these kinds of experiences. Going blank, feeling numb or sleepy, jumping into busyness and action--these are all ways we cope. Human beings are designed to survive. Even when our egos tell us we cannot withstand one more ounce of pain. 

If you or someone you love are enduring the unendurable, this offering is for you. It's really for all of us, because at some point in life, we all come face to face with the untenable. Giving advice, or making meaning of someone else's loss is not always the best salve for this kind of suffering. So here are some things to communicate--with words or actions--to yourself, or to the ones you know who are enduring...

"There is no right way to do any of this." 

"You are surviving, and that takes tremendous physical and emotional work. You are doing what you can; you are doing enough."

"I offer you my gentleness, so you might carry this pain softly and not alone."

"How about a little tea, or some food? How about some fresh air?"

"There will be time later, to come back and wrap your mind around this inconceivable thing. Now is the time to pass the moments, with as little harm to yourself and others as possible."

"Denial, bargaining, and rage are all valid. Lets make a place for those things to exist--in a journal, on a canvas, out in a field, in a hot shower, or counseling room."

"The waves of pain may come and go. You might even forget the anguish for moments or hours, or overnight. That's ok."

"Your body and mind are doing their best."

"Be here, however you need to be here."

"I am with you."

Pain is an experience that is both intimate and universal. When we experience it's blinding heat, we are immediately connected to everyone else in the world who is also scorched by it. This is why empathy is so powerful--when we are willing to come near to someone else's pain, we come closer to our own vulnerable participation in life. 

As poet David Whyte says, "Pain is the first proper step to real compassion; it can be a foundation for understanding all those who struggle with their existence". Pain is a demanding invitation into our humanness. It takes us to the edges of our tolerance and endurance. It is the shadow side of relationship, the underbelly of mortality, the bedfellow of love.

If you are experiencing a level or duration of pain that feels beyond you, or your ways of coping result in more pain, this is an opportune time to seek out a therapist or counselor. You are worthy of support. 

I offer you my gentleness, so you might carry this pain softly, and not alone.

 

To Your Health,

Megan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To Your Health

The news is sobering. Any time you open the newspaper, your laptop, or social media page, you can find people discussing serious issues about their health, like chronic disease, depression, anxiety, childhood illness. Its possible these things are happening with you or someone you love. Many of us are concerned with our health, and the health of our families, communities, and world. We are rightly concerned.  

We live in a time when diagnosing illness is quicker and more accurate than ever before. We are becoming so familiar with what it is to be unwell, but have forgotten that the system that treats our bodies and minds for these issues, is in its essence, about improving and sustaining health.

But what does "Health" actually mean? 

For many years, I have been searching for a better understanding about the notion of health, and what it means to live with (or without) it. I have pondered such questions as "Is health about longevity or quality of life? Is it a destination, or a conversation? Is psychological health separate from physical health? Can dying people, be healthy people?" It is these questions that led me on my journey to become a psychotherapist. 

After receiving my bachelor's degree in psychology, I was drawn to careers in health and wellness but found myself struggling with the singularly focused nature of so many courses of study. It was a time in my life when I was yearning to better understand myself, my relationships, and the health of the world around me. The longing that drove me towards a graduate degree was the same longing I recognize in many patients with whom I sit: A search for Wholeness. 

The struggle for me in pursuing a field of study, reflected a dilemma I have experienced many times since becoming a therapist. If my belief is that health is the movement towards wholeness, then why do so many healthcare approaches divide us up into parts?


I chose a graduate program in Counseling Psychology with a concentration in Somatic Psychology, because it addressed my concern by drawing the mind and body together in one field of study. Somatic (Body-Centered) Psychology as I would come to understand, is a field that studies the relationships of the psyche and the human body, within the larger "bodies" of family, community and culture. 

Although my education had a holistic lens, my appreciation and understanding for the need for healthcare specialties is significant. The ability of clinicians to develop their expertise in focused areas allows for greater depth of understanding. The benefits to this kind of approach--highlighted in treating acute or emergency conditions are essential and sometimes life-saving. For example, in mental health, treatment of individuals living with thought disorders such as schizophrenia, have benefited from targeted interventions improved by scientific advances in medicine.

As many who have experienced frustration with their healthcare already know, the gains of modern medicine have also come with losses. One of these losses is an enduring forgetfulness of a basic and essential truth of humanity.  The truth that we are not just parts, but interdependent beings made up of tissues, organs and systems which are inextricably linked, interacting within a world that is also sustained by interdependence. To be concise: we are more than science can measure us to be. This means that healing most often requires more than single intervention--whether that be pharmaceutical, or otherwise.

What is often missed in conventional care, is the understanding that Gestalt Psychologist Kurt Koffta coined (and is often misquoted) as "The whole is other than the sum of its parts". Our health depends not only on treating discrete symptoms, but exploring the interactions between psychological, biological, relational, and spiritual functioning. 

A Rooted Evolution


To help us in our current forgetfulness, we can go back to the roots of health and wholeness to remember. As Michael Fine and James Peters discuss in their book The Nature of Health: How America has Lost, and can Regain, a Basic Human Value, the root word hal or heill coming from Middle English and Old Norse, has several related words in modern english including: health, heal, wholeness, and holiness. These words, which pertain to our bodies, psyches, and souls, help us return to our essential knowing--that there is an indelible totality that exists in every one of us. This is our health and our birthright.

To have an evolution of mainstream healthcare (which we desperately need) requires both a particulate, as well as a holistic approach to care. It is comfortable for us, as a culture, to split things into categories of good vs. bad. I see this happen in discussions about health and healthcare all the time. Divisiveness happens (within ourselves, and in systems) when we cannot hold together paradoxes. Examples include "I can't express anger because I'm a nice person, or  "I can't believe in the benefits of conventional healthcare because I believe in alternative practices". True maturity, however, is developed by forming a capacity for "both/and" rather than "either/or". Developing this capacity is often something we work on in therapy. This is also the exciting direction that many healthcare providers and researchers have been heading with their work to provide more comprehensive care.

The Science of Wholeness
 

Dr. Daniel Siegel, attachment researcher and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA, has studied the theory of the mind for over twenty years. In his essay, The Self is Not Defined by The Boundaries of the Skin (2014), he describes his understanding after many years of collaborative study with scientists from various fields:

I believe (and cannot find any science to disprove) that an important aspect of the mind can be defined as an embodied and relational, emergent self-organizing process that regulates the flow of energy and information both within us and between and among us.

As Dr. Siegel reminds us, we are embodied. This is so often a neglected truth of mental health. Our emotions, sensations, responses to stress, and behavior all occur in our physical form. I believe that attempting to heal psychological issues without turning towards the body is like trying to tune an instrument without ever playing it. You can talk at a guitar all you want,  but you have to make contact with it if you want it to change. The same is true of us. We must contact ourselves, and learn to develop a capacity to experience the myriad feelings and sensations that occur--even the uncomfortable ones. Buddhist Psychologist Tara Brach calls this "Embodied Awareness".  In her work on this topic she states "when we disconnect from the aliveness of our body, we are in a trance that prevents us from living and loving fully." It takes time to learn to allow ourselves the wholeness of our experience. It also takes compassion.

The development of self-compassion is learned by experiencing the presence of a compassionate other person, who then mirrors to us our own innate goodness. The relational aspect of our mental health has been strongly supported by attachment and infant mental health research. Dr. Allan Schore, is a clinician and scientist, who, like Dr. Siegel has developed his work through interdisciplinary study. He shares his findings which integrate psychological and biological models of emotional and social development across the lifetime. Dr. Schore identifies that as infants, the maturation of the limbic system, which is responsible for mediating our ability to cope with stress throughout life, is directly dependent upon the quality of the relationship with our primary caregivers (Schore, 2001, p. 13). This means that brain development occurs in a biological, environmental, and social sphere. 

With this information, we can then understand that in order to heal psychologically, a relationship with a safe, compassionate other person is needed to provide the brain (and body) with what it needs for growth. So, next time you or someone you love, denies yourself support because of the cultural myth "I should be able to handle this on my own", remember that your brain is wired for connection--it is a necessary element for its growth and healing. 

Towards Integration
 

The final aspect of Dr. Siegel's description of the mind I would like to explore as it pertains to health is the "emergent self-organizing process". Although Siegel adopted the language and definition of self-organization from the field of mathematics, it is a notion that is reflected in many wisdom traditions including Christianity, Judaism, and Buddhism. Every one of us has an inherent impulse towards growth, cohesion and organization. This emergent property of the self can be optimized, according to Siegel, by the act of integration. To simplify the notion of integration, it can be understood as "separate, but connected". It is the wholeness of distinct entities linking together to become something greater. Integration allows for dynamic relationship, while not losing any of the uniqueness of each part. Integration is a goal that we can work towards within ourselves, in our relationships, our healthcare system, and in our local and global communities.

If you are seeking greater health, or searching for a way to be with challenges within you, or around you, I encourage you to seek the support of a therapist or counselor. Therapy is by its nature an integrative process, one that may help you develop links between all the parts of you, in a safe place, led at your own pace, and guided by your self organizing process and innate wisdom.

To Your Health,
Megan