When the Soul Cries

July 12, 16May 1, 19 ~ DC ~ 2 Comments

When the soul cries, our personal tolerance has weathered another trial. I voice a deeper form of expression that is not just an ordinary form of bereavement, nor is it just another melancholy place or a despondent desolation that is common to many people dealing with a depressed state of mind; The cries of the soul are unique to each and every one of us because we all have different ways of dealing with this inner pain. The human condition gives us an infinite number of examples in which we bring ourselves down to a primal form of mortification. There are many reasons for the soul’s demarcation of this circumstance. Every single human being has experienced something that they can all share among the community because we are all part of a feeling, emoting, thinking, people. We are reactive beings.

When we do not receive the essential and fundamental communicative expressions of human needs from others, our inner selves want to burst out and scream to the world even if we close ourselves off and say or do nothing. If you look closely enough, “we cannot not communicate.” The first principle I learned in a speech communications class which profoundly changed my life was that we as humans are expressive and our inner selves will always show signs (even if it is the micro-expressions on our faces that many people do not notice). This first principle deliberated by Paul Watzlawick (July 25, 1921 – March 31, 2007) an Austrian-American family therapist, psychologist, communications theorist, and philosopher. A theoretician in communication theory and radical constructivism, he commented in the fields of family therapy and general psychotherapy. Watzlawick believed that people create their own suffering in the very act of trying to fix their emotional problems. He was one of the most influential figures at the Mental Research Institute and lived and worked in Palo Alto, California.

One cannot not communicate: Every behavior is a form of communication. Because behavior does not have a counterpart (there is no anti-behavior), it is impossible not to communicate. Even if communication is being avoided (such as the unconscious use of non-verbals or symptom strategy), that is a form of communication. “Symptom strategy” is ascribing our silence to something beyond our control and makes no communication impossible. Examples of symptom strategy are sleepiness, headaches, and drunkenness. Even facial expressions, digital communication, and being silent can be analyzed as communication by a receiver.

If we give credence to this principle, than I would like to direct the reader next to Abraham Maslow and his model of Human Hierarchy of Needs.

Abraham Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs — Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

We are expressive creatures. We create artistic expression and have a complex language that allows us to communicate in intricate ways. Maslow contended that we cannot reach a higher level on the needs hierarchy if are lower needs are not being met. It is my belief that when we do not have enough support in some of our psychological struggles, we will stir until we express ourselves in some way; a signal to the world that we are in some vexing situation that will lead us to cry out and emote this hardship. Our cognitive skill in negotiating this dilemma is ours to take ownership of. Sometimes we just cannot think or feel our way out of it. The cognitive dissonance will drive us to emote a message.

We find many examples of expression through music and the arts. Just some of the many instances where we can voice an inner dimension that can touch people on deeper levels. We can see when the soul cries out in a blues song and when the soul sings rejoicing in a happy ephemeral moment! Both polar dimensions that can have powerful expressive abilities but by in large they originate from the inner sanctions of the soul.

I use the soul as defined including our emotive expressive abilities along with our rational thinking abilities. We cannot treat the human being on just the logical rationale because we are more than just rational beings. We are feeling and expressive beings that have multi-variables in determining our conditioning and outcomes of behavior.

Each of us has an expressive nature that is determined by our level of skill in communicating the outcome. It may seem that some of us are just quiet people who do not flex these expressive emotional and cognitive muscles which may seem true, but on deeper levels I theorize that we all have this expressive nature, and some are better at concealing it than others. If Paul Watzlawick’s principle is true, than only people close to the less expressive people may be able to find their subtler forms of expressive communications.

When the soul cries

When the soul cries

The expressive nature of all

When the soul cries

Another gloomy day, another gloomy call

Money’s tight

It’s cold outside

Can’t pay my rent

Gotta swallow my pride

Broken romance

Can’t fix my car

Misunderstood relationships

Better wish on a shooting star

Chances are dim

If I keep on this path

Break my silence

Or face the wrath

Outta luck

Outta time

Forever in ruin

Brother can you spare a dime?

We all have needs

We all need hope

Faith and love

Gotta have these to cope

So if you see me

And I’m in despair

How will I tell you?

How will you care?

When we see what we want

We don’t see the whole

Only part of the picture

Only part of the soul

…

DCG

Disconnected: Tales and Talisman

July 29, 15July 29, 15 ~ DC ~ Leave a comment

There are times when we begin to have self-doubt about much of what we have tried to carry out in the world. When reflecting upon our lives and wondering if we have made a difference in the world, we sometimes neglect that which makes our spirits lighter. We often become detached from a healthy lifestyle by allowing routines and small matters consume our lives. When one reaches this place, we begin to reflect upon that which will take us to another state of being, a place that is usually provoked by something we love, something that will transform our thinking and bring about happiness…..For me that element is…playing some music.

Unfortunately we can often become distracted, and become over time practice behaviors that become habits that will lead us down a darker road than the one we should have liked to walk. Sometimes the habits of our thinking can distort the nature of ‘things-as-they-are’, and we become disconnected to fundamental healthy living choices. There are many tales and talisman of those who become “disconnected”. If our focus is too narrow, or too broad, we just may be leaving much of our experience to the realm that erodes these experiences. We then little by little become stricken with a decay in our thought on how we should relate and live in the world. Thus we begin a process of alienation that started with an imbalance somewhere in our own habitual routines which ultimately pull us away from what is truly important in our lives.

“If you can’t explain it to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself.” – Albert Einstein

Take a look at the cases for addiction. One can become addicted to any number of things based on our “perception of being!” We are profoundly affected by the environments we accommodate. I posit this claim on the history of psychological studies in the fields of human motivation, developmental psychology, behaviorist conditioning, cognitive and gestalt findings, from Jean Piaget, Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, (et. al.), and the Eastern influences of Taoism, Buddhism and Confucian teachings. This is also noted in studies of the Enneagram with conclusive findings supporting my following claim.

Addiction is not caused only by the drugs themselves. Addiction is caused by a sense of isolation and disconnection in the addict. It’s not the drugs—it’s your cage.

Causes of Addiction – A Revealing Truth

So our placement in the world, our views about the world can somewhat determine our “Being” in the world. Our decisions about how we live, are ultimately important when finding meaning in our relationships.

When we become disconnected from

Nature
Social events
Values not based on ego / self
Music
Harmony
Humor and Laughter
Family

we may be heading towards hurtful discord and disharmony.

Being Disconnected is an anti-Taoist state of being

The quintessential question we often displace is about being! How does one fit into the world? We can become distracted, overstimulated by our passions, but there may be some consequences to our choices that we make about our relationship to the world and in the world. We must first understand what in this world is critical for our “Being!” How should we relate to it, the people in it, and what sources should we align ourselves to?

Through the process of immersion one can reconnect to the world. If we follow paths that lead us down a meandering road full of distraction, such as problematic learned behaviors, maladaptive dissonant behaviors, or faulty poor environments which damage our awareness and dissuade our better natures; then we may find ourselves in an existential bewilderment.

One must use all of our senses and abilities to “Feel” this immersion. It is not purely intellectual. It is also emotive and felt from the “Heart”! I cannot stress the importance of this connection since much of our “detachments” derive from within the mind, but are not solved without the heart being involved. A disconnection can be largely caused by our will’s overpower other parts of our sensing apparatuses. Thus we become lost, yet still don’t know why we have disconnected our way from the things that sustain our being the most: family, friends, hobbies, music, et cetera. We give into our ego, and distort our other relationships that alienate our Being. Alternately we can become lost in our passions, and leave our intellectual judgements at home on the porch. Like the saying ….”If you don’t wanna run with the big dogs, than stay on the porch!” An anachronism that seems to fit in this case.

There are many instances in which one can alienate themselves from that which sustains them. Sometimes it is from powers outside of their control, yet they have to deal with the aftermath of burdens of such events such as parental alienation. How we cope with the events in our lives is our decision. We are responsible for seeking out solutions that will bring about our salvation. Part of the process of healing, is directing ourselves to open our hearts again to receive the natural positive vibrations the universe has to offer us. When we close ourselves to this, we risk the chance of becoming overloaded and thus become jaded!

So what’s your Muse? What will bring you home again if indeed you stray from source of your fulfillment and well-being?

“Here is the vicious circle: if you feel separate from your organic life, you feel driven to survive; survival -going on living- thus becomes a duty and also a drag because you are not fully with it; because it does not quite come up to expectations, you continue to hope that it will, to crave for more time, to feel driven all the more to go on.”
― Alan W. Watts

“To forget the whole world is easy; to make the whole world forget you is hard.”
― Zhuangzi, The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu

“Who acts in stillness finds stillness in his life.”
― Lao Tzu & A J Girling – translator

“Society, as we have constituted it, will have no place for me, has none to offer; but Nature, whose sweet rains fall on unjust and just alike, will have clefts in the rocks where I may hide, and secret valleys in whose silence I may weep undisturbed. She will hang the night with stars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole.”
― Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

“Simplicity, patience, compassion.
These three are your greatest treasures.
Simple in actions and thoughts, you return to the source of being.
Patient with both friends and enemies,
you accord with the way things are.
Compassionate toward yourself,
you reconcile all beings in the world.”
― Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

The Need to Belong

September 7, 14September 8, 14 ~ DC ~ 1 Comment

I have discovered an imperative truth that is sadly not often discussed and escapes many of our relationships. It is seldom realized in endless human encounters, and is responsible for many of our failures to connect with others. I write of a principle that has such a profound impact on us emotionally that we ironically are not very aware of its importance and we are often out of touch with this phenomenon’s impact on our daily lives. There is a dynamic correlation between the success of our relationships. The level of intimacy we experience depends upon the level of our connection to the person, namely: our sense of belonging. The clarity of this in a person’s mind will define them in the end.

The element most craved in human relationships, or at least most appreciated in the relationship is the feeling of Belonging! If you look towards many family interactions, much of the disconnect felt is happening when one or more of the members are emotionally apart, feeling alienated, detached, and sustaining a feeling of non-belonging that disrupts the emotional attachments to that family. I’ve heard about this contingency with comments from various interviews with Gang members expressing their motivation to join a gang in that they were alienated from the rest of their associations, and they felt that they “belonged” to the gang they joined; despite however disruptive, violent, and oppressive that gang happened to be. These examples show just how powerful this dynamic is in human relationships.

Abraham Maslow suggested that the need to belong was a major source of human motivation. He thought that it was one of 5 human needs in his hierarchy of needs, along with physiological needs, safety, self-esteem, and self-actualization.^[3] These needs are arranged on a hierarchy and must be satisfied in order. After physiological and safety needs are met an individual can then work on meeting the need to belong and be loved. According to Maslow, if the first two needs are not met, then an individual cannot completely love someone else.^[4]

Other theories have also focused on the need to belong as a fundamental psychological motivation. According to Roy Baumeister and Mark Leary, all human beings need a certain minimum quantity of regular, satisfying social interactions. Inability to meet this need results in loneliness, mental distress, and a strong desire to form new relationships.^[2] Several psychologists have proposed that there are individual differences in people’s motivation to belong. People with a strong motivation to belong are less satisfied with their relationships and tend to be relatively lonely.^[5] As consumers, they tend to seek the opinions of others about products and services and also attempt to influence others’ opinions.^[6]

According to Baumeister and Leary, much of what human beings do is done in the service of belongingness. They argue that many of the human needs that have been documented, such as the needs for power, intimacy, approval, achievement and affiliation, are all driven by the need to belong. Human culture is compelled and conditioned by pressure to belong. The need to belong and form attachments is universal among humans.^[2] Those who believe that the need to belong is the major psychological drive also believe that humans are naturally driven toward establishing and sustaining relationships and belongingness. For example, interactions with strangers are possible first steps toward non-hostile and more long-term interactions with strangers that can satisfy the need for attachments.^[7] Certain people who are socially deprived can exhibit physical, behavioral, and psychological problems, such as stress or instability. These people are also more likely to show an increase in aiming to form new attachments.^[2]

Often when we do not feel a belonging to a part of the group, we will take our exit. This can be true for any relationship we happen to be associated with. The greater the lack of connection, the easier it is to leave, and conversely, the more of an emotional connection, the more passion and feeling of belonging we will experience. If our interest levels fade, then our emotional connection will eventually be extinguished the longer this diminishing dynamic persists.

Scores of psychological data will show that alienation from a group will have a dramatic impingement upon the party that is estranged. One can easily turn to a song about such matters of the heart and relate in some way, or one can turn to the cases of families where their children are disassociated from the family, they are therefore trapped within the constrains of how our cohesion vaporizes in relation to the need to belong. If the child feels apart from the family, so too will they want to dismiss it, leave it, or move on to another family of their making.

Isolation, loneliness and low social status can harm a person’s subjective sense of well-being, as well as his or her intellectual achievement, immune function and health. Research shows that even a single instance of exclusion can undermine well-being, IQ test performance and self-control. What is the opposite of loneliness? Is it belonging?

Because as humans, we need to belong. To one another, to our friends and families, to our culture and country, to our world. Belonging is primal, fundamental to our sense of happiness and well-being.

If you have a question about someone in your family that you just don’t understand, ask yourself this question; how do they fit into the equation of belonging in the family? Do they seem detached, indifferent, or isolated more than you would like? Are they not interested in any family activities and choose to go their own way? If anything, make the time to show them that they belong, teach them the meaning of this by your actions and not your words. Reaching out to those we used to be close to, can be very painful, but if we take action and show them how they fit into our world, I bet we can make a difference to the people we love. Don’t be caught bottling yourself in.