A little anecdotal tale about demons and goblins from my early days as a therapist. Happy Halloween!!!

This Tuesday is finally Election Day.

I can’t wait until this latest (dreadful) foray into the worst caverns of our sorry political process has passed and I can go back to pretending that our system is somehow not ruined and that the people we elect to “serve us” in making the democratic matrix successful are really good people doing good things for good reasons. Wince. Gasp. Where’s the Single Malt.

I am taken back to high school politics because it is where I first learned about shadow government and because I’m still surprised that the idea of a “best candidate” is somehow separate from politics. I was a fringe candidate. I was not the most popular nor was I the loudest. Yet, part of me believed I had the ability to make a difference in something as vital to our collective well-being as the senior prom.

It was a time in my life when I cared about things like the senior prom. I cared about the color of the table cloths and the official theme song of the 1988 Senior Prom (Hold On To The Night by Richard Marx). The rocker dude who was elected president was promptly surrounded by close friends (conveniently elected to the supporting junta) thus creating a sense of balance in the world to a small conclave of constituents. To be honest, I don’t remember my prom but I look happy enough in the pictures.

By the time I got to college I could care less about running for office and focused more on what the people elected to offices were doing poorly. I chose not to enter the fraternity system at a school that was over 70% Greek.Instead, I lived in a vegetarian co-op called the Peace House where we hosted meetings for PETA, various anti-war and anti-nuclear organizations, Took Back the Night and lambasted fraternities when another woman was raped or another student died from hazing. I thrived on feeling disenfranchised. I was good at it, too. On the other hand, I drove to Burger King for meat fixes and a non co-ed bathroom on a regular basis.

I studied political science in college and even did a semester abroad in Geneva, Switzerland where I studied International Relations and took my lunch at the World Health Organization’s cafeteria (where food was cheap). I often sat and listened to frustrated global aid workers discuss their inability to effect change due to a seemingly endless bureaucracy. Many of these folks appeared resentful that they had committed their lives to making a difference “out there” yet they seemed to question how big a difference they truly made on a daily basis.

After college I got an internship at the Anti-Defamation League in Manhattan because I wanted to pursue a career in documentary film making and the ADL had seemingly effective public service messages on television where they reminded society to be nice. On my third day, a major story broke accusing the ADL of conspiring with the FBI and foreign governments to rid the world of bad people who say bad things about minorities. I mistakenly got off on the third floor returning from lunch and walked into a massive document shredding party. Wrong floor. Interesting, useful, somewhat disheartening window into organizations meant to do good in the world. I was removed from the project I had been working on and instead transcribed hours of anti-Semitic rants perpetrated by a Nation of Islam radio station out of Harlem. That was not fun. I had my own opportunity to consider whether my time and energy was being well served.

I was elected president of my class in graduate school largely due to a dearth of challengers. Not surprising, my fellow counseling students were less concerned about the mechanism of change and focused more on feeling and being heard. I organized opportunities for students to air their dissatisfaction with course selection processes and facilitated more areas on campus for students to study and relax. It wasn’t much, but I took it seriously and listened to what students wanted and helped people feel they had a voice in the system. I felt good about my role and considered the system to be a relatively functional process.

So, as a practicing psychotherapist, I’m pretty removed from the day to day political process in this country. I don’t canvass for candidates and I don’t subliminally insert my picks for office in the minds of my clients as they speak about this or that. I do, however, care about my community. In fact, I always have. Even when my input meant Richard Marx would somehow steal the official song status for the prom, I felt like my vote mattered. Things have gotten really grown-up since those days have passed. Issues of immigration, taxation, and legalization have made their way into my home. Matters of the heart and the mind, the body and the soul, have crept into a personal discourse between my consciousness and that of the tribe.

I do care. I believe things should be one way and not the other and I also believe that the majority matters. I also feel the frustration of a stubborn itch in my mind that suggests my voice doesn’t matter. I watch the political process in this country being hijacked by home grown terrorists who don’t want a real dialogue but simply want to steer us all into pillars we have erected and see if they fall. Then they win? Is that what it’s all about? The truth is, I don’t care which songs played at the prom but I do care about how we treat one another in the process of decision making. I’m not sure if my vote really matters this week. I’m not sure if I can effect change in our society by choosing one candidate over another. However, I believe passionately in process. And right now, this whole election thing is our process. If I don’t, at least, cast my vote, then I remove myself from the process and wind up either silently disgruntled or a terrorist in the making. So for now, I vote.

It doesn’t take the sudden death of a three week old goldfish to prompt stirrings of the meaning of life for a five year old child. Issues of life and death bombarded me from birth and likely will unto death, from the chicks hatching inside the nursery school incubator to the disintegration of multi-colored Pac Men. We won’t even get into the relationship of said Pac Men with floating bright red cherries as they are swallowed by supposed greater beings.  It is virtually impossible to avoid the matter of life and death, but for a small child it is inevitable that the matter be conjoined with the question of God.

And isn’t it one of THE questions for a young one? Adults are often so strong and matter of fact in their beliefs and emotions with regard to God, yet no one truly explains the matter in enough detail and with enough seeming precision as to settle the issue completely. So, we little one’s improvise. 

All knowing, all seeing, all powerful. These are the Super-human qualities that seem to get bandied about quite readily when it comes to discussing this God entity. Already a committed Superman adherent at three, common descriptions of God very closely challenged my associations with the Prince of Krypton, a hero who always impressed, astounded and fulfilled my expectations. I depended on Superman a great deal as a boy. Not even simply as a boy. I still admire the Man of Steel…

Transcendent. Able to appear and disappear at will. Dissolving and coagulating. These abilities bumped God above Superman as I had never seen him perform such feats. Another devoutly revered superhero, Batman, was able to appear and disappear, dropping in and leaping out of situations at will, however when measured by the suggested definition of transcendent, the Dark Knight didn’t come close either. Transcendent was suggested by a teacher as something akin to rain falling from the sky on a summer afternoon and the ensuing absorption of said water by the ground, the bugs and each blade of grass. Transcendent.

In fact, as more and more of God’s qualifications were recorded, it became increasingly challenging to find anyone that resembled him or her in my personal experience. I include “her” for my love for Batgirl was already warm and sublime at a young age and I would have welcomed her into the God running.

So many adults, when queried, are adamant that they enjoy personal relationships with God, that He is a fixture in their lives and that He personally saves them from all sorts of villains and evils. However, there was no God comic book, no Saturday morning cartoon, no Underoos. Whomever this God character was, he clearly needed better P.R. The closest I could find was a quirky, low budget animation program on Sunday mornings called “Davey and Goliath.” The consistently low-key “boy and dog” show seemed to address the sorts of questions I was also concerned with, but in the end, they were just as puzzling in their determinations.

In the end, the question of God remained a puzzle. The greatest approximation I found within myself was a hybrid crossing Mr. Clean with the Jolly Green Giant. This was the figure that seemed to seep into my dreams, speaking with a commanding voice, acting in a controlling, all-knowing sort of way. I had visions of waves of grain and green pea pods behind him as he encouraged me to be nicer to my little brother, tie my shoes faster and eat more of the frozen peas on my plate at dinner.

In fact, this early childhood version of God didn’t come with a cape or “underwear that was fun to wear;” she didn’t fly, didn’t drive a cool car or fight evil. Indeed, the manifestation of this transcendent being in my dream life and increasingly, my waking, conscious awareness, supported the rather confusing case of God.

If anything, I emerged from childhood with a unique association with God that approached a patriarchal, agricultural and extremely sanitary giant. This perhaps explains my subconscious preference for frozen vegetables and shiny floors and helps me better understand the radical right.

Why do any of us ever feel stuck?

It’s not because we’re incapable of doing anything we set our minds to. It’s not because of the perceived obstacles in our way. It’s not because we didn’t go to the right school or school at all.

It is often because we believe we don’t have enough information to start.

“What if I make a mistake?” “But I’m just not sure if this is the right thing, right now…”

We have all been there at one point or another, and yet some of us truly get off on the feeling of stuckness! Yup, just don’t know what to do with this job, this relationship, this depression….

So, keeping this simple, today, I will just tell you what I tell people every day: START MOVING! Choose something small, and just do it. Push yourself to do something absolutely ridiculous or simply the safest thing you can think of, but do something. The beautiful thing to remember is that you can always change your mind down the road and change course, too.

Does it mean that you go from happily moving along in your marriage to DIVORCE in a heart beat? No, of course not. Should you just give your two weeks at work? Don’t be silly. HOWEVER, push yourself out of the rut by doing something different today! Invite your partner out to go line dancing if you haven’t gone out in three years. Take an extra day off work this week to do something totally out of the box like roam around the Art Institute alone and bring your journal so you can write your inspirations down!

Get the picture? And don’t forget the most crucial piece of this: Be Gentle With Yourself. It’s a process, not an end.

“…in the midst of death, life persists, in the midst of untruth, truth persists, in the midst of darkness, light persists.” Mahatma Gandhi

Eighteen years ago I graduated from university and headed for Israel. I was twenty-one years old and after four years of college, thoroughly confused as to what was truly important anymore. Several hours into life beyond the shelter of my parent’s roof I entered higher education with the intention that it would give me the tools and the degree necessary to set out in the capitalist way and make lots of money.

Like many recent college graduates, I returned to my parent’s home after graduation with the tassle, the degree, skills I never imagined receiving from a place of higher learning and some well soiled laundry. I remember the feeling of walking into the house I had left four years earlier and sitting down at the kitchen table. I stared at the overstocked napkin holder at the center of the table and instantly felt empty. The desperation of having accomplished something yet not knowing what it had really been for left me feeling anxious and alone. I had been home a couple of hours before I realized that no matter what I did, I had to do something and do it quick. It was no longer my home but I didn’t know where or what my home was, either.

A few hours later I was packing for Israel. I knew deep within that I was ready to discover what it was I had caught glimpses of in the past that felt akin to “numinous” experiences. Twentieth century German philosopher, Rudolph Otto, popularized this term, numinous, as describing the power or presence of some higher being, perhaps God. I was startled to find that as I walked off the plane, there was no flaming chariot, no cherubim, no pillar of clouds to direct me toward my spiritual experience. Very disappointing.

In fact, my time in Israel was very challenging for several months. I was surrounded by people wherever I went; buying, selling, pushing, pulling. Everyone smoked cigarettes, drank sludgy coffee and seemed really wired and intense. I sat on the beach in Tel Aviv, knife in hand before a huge watermelon wondering if there was anything “numinous” left in the Middle East. It seemed like the power and presence was only to be found in the throngs of young Israelis in uniform with machine guns slung over their backs, or in the cliques of super religious Jews, Christians and Moslems whose connection to their respective faiths all felt very distant and inaccessible from where I sat.

Yet, something did happen. I was quite literally pulled to a small northern town called Tsfat. I won’t get into the details here, but suffice it to say that I had never heard of the place before so as the bus wound up the mountain that hosted the ancient city, I was a bit startled to feel something, almost, well numinous, growing within and without me. My time in Tsfat changed my life in countless ways and opened up doors that continue to require explanation and interpretation.

One of the earliest and most profound experiences was at the Ari Mikva. This is an ancient cave named after The Ari, an esteemed Kabbalist, or magical mystic. The enormous cave carved into the side of the mountain beneath the city contained a deep, cold pool of mountain water. Mikva’s are ritual immersion pools and can be found all over the world, sacred to many faiths and traditions. I had been in Tsfat no more than a few hours when some new friends insisted that I join them in this amazing pool. Before I knew it, I was stripped down and nervously following my guides into the cave. As we moved deeper into the rock, the giggles and chatter of the young men seemed to fade and like the last moments before sleep, I felt as if I were in a dream. If it hadn’t been for the ice cold water at my ankles, I’d have fallen over in some sort of trance.

The water rose higher with each step and the light slowly disappeared. I felt the gentle hand of my new friend on my shoulder and heard his whisper “Get to the center of the pool and dunk yourself in all the directions while you listen.” In an instant, I was chest deep in the icy water, surrounded by the darkest darkness I have ever witnessed. There was silence except for the occasional gasp of air and the coarse, gutteral rumbles of unknown men. I considered that just a few months earlier I was in a college classroom in upstate New York but this was something more than a world away. In that moment I knew this was why I had come to the Middle East. I was strangely calm and slowed my breathing in order to relax my shivering body.

I closed my eyes even though there was nothing to see, and plunged myself down into the blackness. As my head broke the surface of the water on my way back up, I was startled at the strange sensation. I could have been under there for hours or seconds, but it felt like an eternity. I was conscious of a deep feeling of quiet within myself, a sensation of knowing, of connection. I shifted my body to the next direction and dipped down again. Same thing, just more intense. I felt every drop of water trickle down my face as my state of awareness seemed miles deeper than it had minutes earlier. I plunged myself into the dark and wet space three more times, each time allowing myself to push myself deeper into the space.

If ever I had been “in the moment,” this was it. If ever I had understood the kinds of quotes that people like Gandhi or Jung are best known for, this was it. If ever I felt the deep, penetrating connection to something numinous, this was it. Carl Jung spoke passionately about the Conjunctio, a marriage of sorts, between the numinous and humans, between two lovers, between the sacred feminine and sacred masculine, etc. Yet, in order to experience this meeting between my Self and something bigger, deeper, wiser, etc., it required a certain sense of consciousness.

Consciousness allows me to experience the difference between myself and that “something else” as well as gives me the opportunity to have a unique, personal interpretation of that experience. Someone else would have offered a very different account of submerging in the Ari Mikva, not because it wasn’t true for me but perhaps because they are telling the experience from a different consciousness.

I am committed to understanding, or even just getting to know aspects of my own sense of consciousness, i.e. the voice in my head, the unique way I feel about things in my life, the way I personally experience my heart loving someone. This allows myself the opportunity to know the difference between what I know to be true in the world and what you know. We may have similar ways of relating to the world, but your unique version or texture of understanding will never be the same as mine. Isn’t that delightful?

Conjunctio is a love story. It is the meeting of two parts at some intersecting point where everything that is, was and will be, come together and come apart. It is the place where I experience you experiencing me and it is my consciousness that allows me to register the moment, hopefully using it to grow and connect with myself. There is something about plunging into a dark pool of water that is mysterious and interesting. However, there was something about my experience plunging into that water that changed my life because I was, at that second, able to be present for it.

There have been thousands of moments in my life when I was not fully present, but that one, I was really there. And it has helped me be more present in moments that followed because my consciousness deepened as a result. So, I want to challenge you today when it comes to being fully present, in the moment. What would it be like to encounter someone special in your life and bring your consciousness to it, your full presence, as you plunge deeper into that conjunctio, that intersection of worlds?