Bert’s therapy: Dancing

So, I did what you suggested.

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With Felicia?

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Yes.  I stopped trying to appease her.

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And I asked what she’s really angry about.

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How did she react?

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She stopped talking to me.

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Oh.  How’s that feel?

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Not sure yet.  I don’t miss the criticism.  But the silence scares me.

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Why?

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It makes me think she’s even angrier at me than she was.

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Maybe.  But probably you just confused her.

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Confused her how?

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You stopped dancing.

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Come again?

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Like most couples, you two have developed a predictable way of coping with conflict.  I call it your dance.

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And you know this how?

You described it to me last time.  Apparently it starts when she’s unhappy about something, and expresses it with a complaint or a demand.

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To which you respond by trying to appease her. To which she responds with a new complaint or demand. And so on.

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That does sound familiar.

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How long does this dance usually last?

 

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Two, three days.  Sometimes a week. 

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And how many times have you done it?

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Hundreds.  Thousands.  It never accomplishes anything.

Well, in a way it does.  It keeps things predictable.  Discharges the tension, gives you a sense of control. 

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But doesn’t solve the problem.

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True.  Dancing just maintains the status quo. 

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I’m sick of the status quo.  What do I do now?

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You already did it.  You interrupted the dance.  Now it’s her move.

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And I just wait?

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Right.

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And do nothing?

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Right.  See what happens.

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How do you feel about that?

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Like dancing.

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* * *

 

 

 

 

 

It all boils down to how you view what goes on within your relationships, specifically your significant ones.

First and foremost, marriage is designed to help you grow up. 

It’s not about happiness.

It’s not about becoming more complete, despite what Hollywood and popular press would like you to believe.

Marriage is about growing. Happiness will accompany you at times along the way, but it’s not the ultimate goal.

And second: your growth – your responsibility; your spouse’s – theirs.

When you keep this in mind you realize that all you can control in a relationship is yourself.

 ~ Corey Allan, Relationships are easy

 

* * *

No Oscar?

No Emmy?

No Tony?

Cheer up.

 You can still win a Bert.

 

Join the hundreds (well, dozens) who’ve already entered the Bert Mug contest.

Not only will you get a chance to own an authentic Bert Mug (isn’t it lovely?), but you’ll be the first to hear of all our new Monkeytraps projects — like the forthcoming, breathtaking, heartwarming, mindblowing Monkeytraps 101: Bert’s Crash Course in Control.

To enter, just

(1) Join the Monkeytraps mailing list by sending us an email at fritzfreud@aol.com with the word SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Include your name too, so we know who to credit with such cleverness.

(2) In the same email, suggest a caption about control addiction for the Bert Mug.   

If you’ve already sent us a caption, send another.  (It gets easier with practice.)

And remember: 

Nobody in Hollywood has one.

 

Bert’s therapy: Gorilla warfare

Felicia’s pissed at me.

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What about?

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I’m not really sure.

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therapist-2

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Monday she said I don’t make enough money.

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th

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Tuesday she complained I’m not home enough.

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Wednesday she called me an “uninvolved father.”

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Thursday she called me a slob.

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Sounds confusing.

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Bet your ass.

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How did you respond?

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Well, let’s see. Tuesday I went in and asked my boss for a raise.

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Wednesday I came home early with flowers.

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Thursday I helped Junior with his science project.

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And Friday I did two loads of laundry and cleaned the bathroom.

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Did it work?

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No.  Now she tells me I’m fat.  What’s going on here?

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Gorilla warfare.

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Don’t you mean “guerilla” warfare?

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No, gorilla.  It’s a control thing.  Your two inner monkeys are battling it out. 

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bert-14

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Happens all the time in split-level relationships.*

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2*What’s this?  Click here.

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bert-14

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One partner seeks satisfaction by complaining or making endless demands on the other.

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The other seeks relief by trying to appease the first.  But it never works.

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Why not?

Because they’re ignoring the real problem, whatever that is.  Pretty common in couples who haven’t learned to talk to each other.

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Well, I hate feeling beat up.  What can I do?

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Less.

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Meaning…

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Give up control.  Stop appeasing her. 

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She’ll get angry.

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She’s already angry.  Same result, less work. 

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Okay.  Anything else?

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Give up control in another way.  Ask what she’s really angry about. 

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She may not know at first. That’s fine. Be patient.  Be curious.  Be brave.  Keep asking.

 

 

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That I can’t do.

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Why not?

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She might actually tell me.

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Oh.  Well, in that case…

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There’s always Weight Watchers.

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* * *

 

The term control has come to have a negative connotation. 

People are not supposed to control, dominate, exploit, or manipulate each other.  We are told to accept others and to take responsibility for our own needs. 

This popular philosophy, although having a certain validity, violates an important human truth. 

People require a certain minimum of staisfaction to make a relationship tolerable.  They also require a certain minumum of control. 

Individuals need to have a way of asserting their needs, making complaints, bringing issues of concern to their partners’ attention, correcting problems, and in general getting through to and having an effect on their partners if their relationships are to be viable.

~ Daniel B. Wile, Couples therapy: A nontraditional approach (John Wiley & Sons, 1981).

 * * *

Hey.  You.  We’re waiting.

The first-ever Bert Mug Contest is completing its second week..

And we’ve collected some pretty cool entries so far.

But we’re still waiting for yours.

Come on, already. 

Send us your caption about control addiction.

Not only will all entrants get a chance to own a Bert Mug, but they’ll also be the first to hear of all new Monkeytraps projects — like the forthcoming 6-part Monkeytraps 101: Bert’s Crash Course in Control.

To enter the contest, just

(1) Join the Monkeytraps mailing list by sending us an email at fritzfreud@aol.com with the word SUBSCRIBE in the subject line. Include your name too, so we know who to credit with such cleverness.

(2) In the same email, suggest a caption for the Bert Mug.

If you’ve already sent us a caption, well, send another. 

Stop pretending you have more important stuff to do. 

Bert’s therapy: Controlapy

Okay, I give up.  You’ve convinced me.

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Of what?

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That control addiction is my biggest problem.

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What did it?

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Last session.

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therapist-3

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Afterwards I realized that I really do feel like I’m always walking six dogs at once.

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Good.

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So what do we do now?

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Controlapy.

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What’s that?

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Control therapy.  My nickname for it.

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“Controlapy”?  That’s stupid.

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Yes.  But catchy.

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And I suppose that makes you a…

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Controlapist.

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(Sigh.)

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therapist

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And what does “controlapy” involve?

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Learning three things.

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First, what control addiction is and how it infects all of us.

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Second, where you personally have problems with compulsive controlling.

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And finally, how to replace control addiction with healthier coping methods.

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And you set the agenda?

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Mostly I react to what you bring in.  But I decide which sort of learning we need to focus on.

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Isn’t that, well, controlling of you?

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I suppose.

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bert-16

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But also controlapeutic.

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* * *

 

 

 

 

 

The idea of control controls the controllers; we are not in control of the power of control.

~ James Hillman, Kinds of power: A guide to its intelligent uses (Doubleday, 1995).

x

Addiction, to anything, is always searingly narcissistically injurious. Something else has power over the self; feelings of shame, humiliation,and guilt are ineluctable. That’s saying too little. The self-hatred of the addict is the essence of his problem. Feeling powerless, he or she can only recover through a paradoxical admission of powerlessness — powerlessness over the addictive substance or activity.

~ Jerome David Levin, Slings and arrows: Narcissistic injury and its treatment. (Jason Aronson, 1993).

x

We want to be more alive and feel more, but we are afraid of it. Our fear of life is seen in the way we keep busy so as not to feel, keep running so as not to face ourselves, or get high on liquor or drugs so as not to sense our being. Because we are afraid of life, we seek to control or master it.

~ Alexander Lowen, Fear of life (Collier Books, 1980).

 

* * *

 

“Should I worry?”

 

Concerned about someone’s drinking, but not sure if you should be?

Check out Crossing the Line:

 

And what is this “line?”

It represents the three stages of drinking briefly described below:

• Alcohol Use = “low-risk” or moderate drinking [Myth 1]
• Alcohol Abuse = repeated binge drinking and/or routine heavy social drinking [Myth 9]
• Alcohol Dependence = alcoholism, one of the brain diseases of addiction [Myth 10]

Most people are unaware there is a line comprised of these three stages of drinking, believing instead that drinking is either “normal” or “alcoholic.”

Most people are unaware there are increments along the line itself, that 35% of American adults never drink alcohol, or that 37% of American adults always drink within “low-risk” drinking limits.

Thus examining and challenging the common myths from a scientific perspective can help readers recognize what it takes to cross the line from alcohol use to abuse to dependence and what it takes to stop the progression.

~ Lisa Frederiksen, Crossing the Line

 
Author of nine books, including Loved One In Treatment? Now What! and If You Loved Me, You’d Stop!, Lisa Frederiksen is a national keynote speaker with 25 years experience. She has been consulting, researching, writing and speaking on substance abuse, addiction, education, prevention, intervention, treatment, dual diagnosis, underage drinking, and help for the family centered around 21st century brain and addiction-related research since 2003.  Check out her website Breaking the Cycles. 

The Kindle version of CROSSING THE LINE ($3.99) is available now on Amazon.com (click here).
Other eReader versions coming soon.

 

 

* * *

What do you mean, you haven’t entered yet?

The first-ever Bert Mug Contest is rip-roaring along.

And you haven’t entered yet?

What the hell?

Send us your caption about control addiction, please. 

It can be wise or stupid, healthy or neurotic, conservative or radical, we don’t care.

Not only will all entrants get a chance to own an authentic Bert Mug, but they’ll also be the first to hear of all new Monkeytraps projects — like the forthcoming 6-part Monkeytraps 101: Bert’s Crash Course in Control.

To enter the contest, merely

(1) Sign up for the Monkeytraps mailing list by sending us an email at fritzfreud@aol.com with the word SUBSCRIBE in the subject line.  Include your name too, so we know who to credit with such cleverness.

(2) In the same email, suggest a caption for the Bert Mug. If at all possible, make it adorable.

Multiple submission permitted.  Encouraged, even.  Knock yourself out.

Please. 

Bert’s therapy: Leashed

There’s something I don’t understand about control addiction.

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What’s that?

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You say everyone is addicted to control?

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Right.

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Doesn’t that mean this “addiction” is really just human nature?

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Well, I’m not sure what “human nature” means.  So I’d put it differently.

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bert

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It’s perfectly normal for human beings to be addicted to control.  It just isn’t healthy. 

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“Normal” and “healthy” aren’t the same thing?

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Oh no.  How many normal people do you know?

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Lots.

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And how many healthy people do you know?

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Hm.  I take your point.

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therapist-7

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But I still don’t see what’s “normal” about being a control addict.

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Do you ever worry about the future?

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Of course.

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You’re addicted.  Do you ever fret over the past? 

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Sure.

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You’re addicted.  Ever hide your feelings for fear of how others might react? 

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All the time.

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You’re addicted.  Ever worry about whether people will like or love or accept you?

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Constantly.

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You’re addicted.  Ever lie, or manipulate, or distort the truth to get what you want? 

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Okay, I get it.

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Ever avoid annoying people or uncomfortable situations? 

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I said, I get it.

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Ever plan?  Strategize?  Analyze?  Fantasize?  Agonize?  Dream?  Ruminate?  Obsess? 

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You can stop now.

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Just making my point.  Controlling is so utterly ordinary that most of the time we barely notice we’re doing it. 

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bert-16

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Until it traps us, that is. 

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And how does it trap us?

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Have you ever walked six dogs at the same time?

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No.

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You set out thinking that you’re walking them.  But before long you realize the dogs are walking you.

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Meaning…

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Whatever we try to control controls us.  And the more controlling you are, the more out of control you feel.

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* * *

 

 

 

 

Make other people do what you want them to do. 

Make them behave as you think they should.  Don’t let them behave in ways you think they shouldn’t, but probably would without your “assistance.”  Force life’s events to unravel and unfold in the manner and at such times as you have designated.  Do not let what’s happening, or what might happen, occur.  Hold on tightly and don’t let go.  We have written the play, and we will see to it that the actors behave and the scenes unfold exactly as we have decided they should.  Never mind that we continue to buck reality.  If we charge ahead insistently enough, we can (we believe) stop the flow of life, transform people, and change things to our liking.

We are fooling ourselves.

~ Melody Beattie, Codependent no more

* * *

Not recommended.

Enter yet?

The first-ever Bert Mug Contest is in full swing.

So send us your caption already.

Funny, philosophical, profound, superficial, silly, salacious, we don’t care.

Not only will all entrants get a chance to own an authentic Bert Mug, but they’ll also be the very first we notify of all new Monkeytraps projects — like (TA DA) the forthcoming 6-part Monkeytraps 101: Bert’s Crash Course in Control.

To enter the contest, merely

(1) Sign up for the Monkeytraps mailing list by sending us an email at fritzfreud@aol.com with  the word SUBSCRIBE in the subject line.

(2) In the same email, suggest a caption for the Bert Mug.  Make it cute.

Submit once.  Submit twice.  Hell, submit daily.   We’ve cleared our schedule for this.

Win a BERT MUG!

*

This blog was launched

on March 30, 2011.

 

Happy birthday to us.

 

To celebrate,

Monkeytraps

announces its first

BERT MUG

contest.

The Bert mug. Striking, no?

*

A classic collector’s item in toilet-bowl white with the iconic visage of the inimitable Bert etched in jungle-rot green.  Oh, okay.  It’s an ordinary coffee mug with a monkey cartoon on it.  But it’s free.  And we promise you’ll be the only person you know who has one.

*

 

*

The Bert Mug has many uses:

One use.

Another use.

Not recommended.

 

 

*

 To enter the contest, just:

(1) Sign up for the Monkeytraps mailing list by sending us an email to fritzfreud@aol.com.   Include your name and the word SUBSCRIBE in the subject line.

(2) In that same email, suggest a caption for the Bert Mug having something to do with control addiction. 

It can be serious or funny, poignant or pungent, clean or dirty, silly or profound.   For example:

*

All I want is total control. 

 

Is that a banana in your pocket?   

 

I control, therefore I am. 

  

Hey, that’s not the reality I ordered. 

 

Like that. 

Entries will be judged according to what makes the judges laugh loudest, cry hardest, think deepest, or experience instant remission of all codependent symptoms. 

Just kidding.  Send whatever you think sounds cute. 

*

CONTEST JUDGES:

STEVE

Therapist, writer, cartoonist, codependency theorist, and co-author of Monkeytraps.

2

 

3

BERT

Inner monkey, career codependent, co-author of Monkeytraps, and the mug’s poster boy.

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FELICIA

Bert’s wife, soon to appear in a series of ”Bert’s Therapy” couples sessions. She asked to participate in this contest, and Bert can’t say no to her.  (Should give you an idea of what the couples sessions will be like.)  Refused to be sketched for this post (“With this hair?  Are you insane?”).

 

COME ONE!!

COME ALL!!

 TELL YOUR FRIENDS!!

TELL YOUR FAMILY!!

(MOM ESPECIALLY!!)

GET THE LEAD OUT!!

THIS MEANS YOU!!

YES, YOU!!

Bert’s therapy: Monkey

I have a question.

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Shoot. 

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What’s my single biggest problem? 

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Addiction to control.

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Not depression?

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Well, that’s related to the addiction.

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Not anxiety?

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Related to the addiction.

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My overeating?

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Related.

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My overworking?  Fear of other people?  Fear of my wife?

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Related.  Related.  Related. 

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All my problems are related to control addiction?

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Pretty much.

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I sound pretty screwed up.

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Actually you’re pretty ordinary.

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How so?

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We’re all addicted to control.  And it causes most of our emotional problems.

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Explain.

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There’s a part of each of us that craves control. 

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bert-11

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It’s always awake, usually scared, and constantly trying to control stuff.

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What stuff?

Everything.  External stuff, like people, places and things.  And internal stuff, like our own feelings, thoughts and behavior.

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Because it can’t accept reality as it is, it spends all its time fighting reality.  Which, of course, is a war it can’t win.  Which leaves us depressed, anxious and addicted.

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I call this part the Inner Monkey. 

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Interesting.  But it doesn’t sound like me at all.

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Have you looked in a mirror lately? 

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* * * 

 

 

 

 

Because we are afraid of life, we seek to control or master it.

~ Alexander Lowen, Fear of life .

*

The person who is possessed by fear expects to be hurt. Expecting to be hurt, he works out a way of life that is primarily a way of playing safe; and all his attitudes and actions become progressively expressive of that way.

~ Bonaro W. Overstreet, Understanding fear in ourselves and others.

*

Control, for all its self-assured position of command, relies on a defensive vision, and the traits ennumerated — enorced loyalty, exactitude, suspicion of the hidden, watchfulness — are paranoid traits.

~ James Hillman, Kinds of power: A guide to its intelligent uses.

 *

Each of us has our own silent War With Reality…. Yogis came to call this duhkha. Duhkha means, literally, “suffering,” “pain,” or “distress.”…. This silent, unconscious war with How it Is unwittingly drives much of our behavior: We reach for the pleasant. We hate the unpleasant. We try to arrange the world so that we have only pleasant mind-states, and not unpleasant ones. We try to get rid of this pervasive state of unsatisfactoriness in whatever way we can — by changing things “out there.” By changing the world.

~ Stephen Cope, The wisdom of yoga: A seeker’s guide to extraordinary living.

*

Do you want to improve the world?

I don’t think it can be done.

The world is sacred.

It can’t be improved

If you tamper with it, you’ll ruin it.

If you treat it like an object, you’ll lose it.

                                    ~ Lao-tzu, Tao te ching.

Bert’s therapy: Garbage

 

I remember my panic attack on the first day of kindergarten.

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therapist-1

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I remember the bully who made me eat ants on the playground.

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I remember dad getting drunk and fighting my uncle on our front lawn.

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I remember running away from summer camp because I was so homesick.

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I remember telling a girl I loved her, and her answering “Thanks.”

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What the hell are you doing?

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Remembering.

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Why?

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I don’t know.  Bad memories just come up when I feel stressed.

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Well, stop chewing on them.

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Why? 

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It’s bad mental hygiene.  You’re like a cat poking through a garbage can.

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So?

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There’s nothing nourishing there.  And you’ll just stink up your present.

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But I’m only…thinking.

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Not really.  Most of what we call thinking isn’t thinking at all.

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What is it, then?

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Random mental activity.  Automatic, aimless, illogical.  Remembering, projecting, ruminating…

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bert-12

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…obsessing, fantasizing, worrying — waste of time, mostly.  Some of it does more harm than good.

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How?

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By triggering bad feelings that have absolutely nothing to do with your current reality.

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Oh.  That.

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It’s the main reason we’re such neurotic monkeys.

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Can I do anything about it?

You can train your mind.  Meditation’s the best long-term solution.  And there are short-term tricks you can learn, like Thought Stopping.  But remember two things.

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What two things?

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Your mind has a mind of its own.  And even the sanest mind is a little nuts.

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So…

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So chew gum, not garbage.

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

 

Brain: An apparatus with which we think we think.

— Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary

* * *

Most of us believe that we are always thinking; it’s not true. The bulk of what we consider thought is just the mind going through its normal process, drifting past our consciousness like a river, full of debris that has been dumped there in the past.

From “Thinking that gets in the way of recovery” at the Anxiety Care UK website.

* * *

So when you’re in monkey mind you’re having all these feelings — often painful ones, anxiety and anger and such – that have nothing to do with what’s really happening in your life at the moment. It’s like being trapped in a nightmare, unable to wake up. 

From “Bert is nuts” by Bert.

* * * 

From Joko Beck I learned to label thoughts when they come up (eg, thinking how much I hate meditating), which lets me to detach from my own thinking and go back to breath-following.  Another writer (can’t remember who) taught me to half-close my eyes and defocus my vision so I retain some connection to the outside world. And I think it was Philip Kapleau who taught me to keep a half-smile on my face, as a sort of secret reminder that the scary noise in my head is not to be taken too seriously.

From “Why I hate meditating, why I do it anyway,” also by Bert.

* * *

One effective and quick technique to help you with the intrusive negative thoughts and worry that often accompany panic disorder, anxiety and agoraphobia is called “thought stopping.” The basis of this technique is that you consciously issue the command, “Stop!” when you experience repeated negative, unnecessary or distorted thoughts. You then replace the negative thought with something more positive and realistic. 

From “What is thought stopping and how does it work?” by Sheryl Ankrom.

 

Bert’s therapy: Balls

bert 1

1

2

3

How are you?

1

2

3

Overwhelmed.

1

2

3

By what?

1

2

3

The usual.  Work.  Bills.

1

2

3

therapist-3

1

2

3

The marriage.  The kids.  The house.

1

2

3

therapist-4

1

2

3

Plus a hundred other things.

1

2

3

therapist-5

1

2

3

The leak under my sink.  The hole in my roof.  The racoon in my attic.

1

2

3

therapist-6

1

2

3

My car needs a tuneup.  My lawn needs reseeding.  My dog needs a vet. 

1

2

3

therapist-7

1

2

3

I’m fat and should exercise.  I’m anxious and should meditate.  I eat crap and not enough vegetables.

1

2

3

therapist-7

1

2

3

And on and on and…

1

2

You do seem to be juggling a lot right now.

1

2

3

bert-9

1

2

How have you handled this is the past?

1

2

  

I try to keep all the balls in the air.

1

23

How’s that work? 

1

2

 3

I exhaust myself.  The balls drop.  I get depressed.

1

23

I see.  Want a suggestion?

1

2

 

3

Please.

1

2

3

Drop the balls now.

1

2

3

Deliberately?

1

2

Yes.  For today.  Drop all but two.

1

2

3

 

Which two?

1

2

First, get more rest.  Second, lean on someone. 

1

2

3

Lean how?  On who?

1

2

3

Someone who’ll give you permission to be selfish.  

1

 

2

3

Isn’t selfish bad?

1

2

No, selfish is essential.  Selfless is bad.  Depression’s worse.

1

 

2

 

Can I lean on you?

1

2

3

Sure.  

1

2

3

bert

1

2

3

Now go take a nap.

1

23 

 

* * *

Relax much? 

A body is not a machine

It can’t chug along endlessly. 

It needs down time. 

So relaxation is essential to self-care.

Luckily, relaxation is a skill that can be learned.

Here’s one way — simple and effective — to learn it.

 

A deep muscle relaxation drill

1. Find a quiet environment.  Lie on your back or sit comfortably.  Close your eyes.

2. If you’re right handed, begin by tensing your right hand for a count of ten.  (If you’re a lefty, tense your left hand.)  Tell it to be heavy and warm. 

3. Then continue up the right side of your body, focusing in turn on each part and telling it the same thing, as follows:

~ Wrist:   Heavy and warm.

~ Forearm: Heavy and warm.

~ Elbow: Heavy and warm.

~ Upper arm: Heavy and warm.

~ Shoulder: Heavy and warm.

4. Then move down to your foot and continue:

~ Foot: Heavy and warm.

~ Ankle: Heavy and warm.

~ Lower leg: Heavy and warm.

~ Knee: Heavy and warm.

~ Upper leg: Heavy and warm.

The entire right side of your body should now feel heavy and warm.  Wait for these feelings.  

5. Now repeat steps 2-4 on the opposite side of your body.

6. Next relax the muscles of your hips.  Let a wave of relaxation move up from your stomach to your chest.  Tell these muscles to be heavy and warm.  Your breathing should slow and start to come from your diaphragm.  Wait for this breathing change.

7. Next let the wave of relaxation move into your shoulders, neck, jaw and face.   Pay special attention to the muscles controlling your eyes and forehead.  Tell all these muscles to be heavy and warm.

8. Finish by telling your forehead to feel cool.

Practice this drill twice daily.   Fifteen to twenty minutes is ideal, but even three minutes is better than nothing if that’s all you have time for.   With practice you should be able to attain deep muscle relaxation in as short a time as two minutes.

~ Adapted from Burnout: The cost of caring by Christina Maslach (Prentice-Hall, 1982).

The birth of Bert

(Steve speaking:)

Not long ago a new Monkeytraps reader sent me an email asking, “So where did Bert come from, anyway?” 

I took that as an invitation to repost Bert’s story of his own birth, which originally appeared here in 2011 in two parts under the clever title “Bert’s born.” 

It’s a little long.  But Bert likes to tell it because, well, it’s about him.  And as we say,  scratch a codependent, find a narcissist.

*

Steve was born in 1950.

Me, I’ve no idea when I was born. I do, however, remember my first public appearance.

It was on Steve’s first day of kindergarten.

Actually no, it was Visiting Day, the spring before kindergarten started, when kids visited for half a day to get their first taste of public education.

Steve has vague memories of the classroom — bright banks of windows, colored plastic chairs, fingerpaintings on a corkboard, voices rattling off the walls — but no clear memory of how he felt. Not hard to deduce, though, given what happened.

He panicked.

Walked in, froze up. Stood rooted to the tile floor like a stump in a stream, while the other kids bustled and flowed around him.

After a few moments the teacher called the kids over to her desk, and they clumped and moved obediently in that direction. Except Steve, who stayed rooted.

He was shy kid, inexperienced, insecure, especially in new situations. This was certainly one of those, and he found himself flooded with feelings he had not expected and could not begin to control.

At which point, Ta Da, I took over.

“Go to the corner,” I whispered.

He did.

Piled there beside the coat rack was a stack of oversized building blocks, hollow wooden cubes painted bright colors.

“Take down on the blue one,” I told him.

He did.

“Put it on the floor.”

He did.

“Sit on it,” I said.

He did.

“Now don’t move,” I said.

He did, staring blindly ahead.

The teacher came over. Nice lady, print dress. Soft voice. Steve never saw her face because he was staring at her shoes, which were brown.

She said something to him. He shook his head. She said something else. He shook his head again. She waited a moment, then walked away.

We spent the rest of the morning together there in the corner. First we sat perfectly still and tried to be invisible, convinced that if we moved or even breathed loudly someone would notice. After thirty minutes it became clear the nice teacher was content to ignore us, and we began to relax. The roaring in our ears died away. Our hands warmed up. We looked around at the room. We watched the teacher playing with the kids. We watched the kids playing with each other.

After another hour this got boring.

I noticed him eyeing a triangular block, off to one side. It was yellow.

“If you put that behind you,” I whispered, “you could lean back on it.”

The idea of reaching for the block and becoming visible scared him all over again, so we argued about it for a while.

I can’t remember how I changed his mind. But eventually he bent his upper body sideways, grabbed the yellow block and slipped it behind him. Then he leaned back and waited for someone to notice.

Nobody did.

He found this interesting.

Maybe this place was more tolerable than he thought.

Ten more minutes passed.

“You could put your feet up,” I whispered.

He stood and reached for another block.

                                   *

The next block Steve reached for was red. He placed it on the floor in front of the blue one, sat down and put his feet up on it. Feeling highly visible, even daring, he waited for the room to react.

The room ignored him.

“More,” I muttered.

He found a yellow block next, and put it beside the red one. Then he found a green one and put it on the other side.

He made a line of blocks, a little wall. Then sat nervously down to await developments.

None developed.

No one in the classroom noticed, or if they did, they didn’t let on.

He went on building. He made a second tier of blocks, and then a third. When he was done the little multicolored wall rose to his waist and enclosed a small triangular space that felt oddly safe and protected. He sat back down and examined the wall happily. It felt like some sort of achievement.

I think Steve wants to add something here.

Coming to mind is a passage from a Hemingway story. It’s about a traumatized war veteran making camp in the Michigan woods. “Nick was happy as he crawled inside the tent. He had made his camp. He was settled. Nothing could touch him. It was a good place to camp. He was there, in the good place. He was in his home where he had made it.”

Yes. It was that sort of achievement. No small thing, creating safety for yourself in a dangerous world.

That’s about it for my story. Nothing else interesting happened. We stayed behind the wall until we went home.

So why did I tell you this?

Well, I’m introducing myself. As I told you last week, I’m Steve’s inner monkey. The part that seeks control. The part that tries to protect him by changing reality, transforming it into something more like what he wants, or needs, or prefers. You just saw me at work.

But I’m also introducing the subject of this blog, which is not a simple one. Control is a slippery fish.

I’ll let Steve have the last word on that:

For a long time after I began examining control I didn’t distinguish between the simple impulse to control and the addiction to controlling. I saw it as a problem, not a solution. A confused attempt to avoid discomfort or pain. Trying to change realities beyond their control seemed to be the main way people made themselves (and others) sick, exhausted and miserable.

But it’s more complicated than that. Controlling is defensive, sure. But it’s adaptive too. Building that block wall may have cut little Steve off from the class, but it also gave him a way to stay in the room.

So controlling can be both irrational and necessary, avoidant and creative. A problem and a solution.

As Bert says, a slippery fish.

* * *

The meaning of control

“A blog about control,” it says at the top of this page.

So what are we talking about here?

What is control, anyway?

What does the word mean? What does the idea mean?

We must think we know. We use it often enough.

This morning, for the hell of it, I Googled “control.” Google replied with 225,000,000 items. That’s million.

I tried the same thing at Amazon.com. Amazon coughed up 168,459 books with control in their titles.

So what is this thing that so fascinates us?

Good question.

There’s an old story about blind men brailling an elephant. One feels the elephant’s side and says, “Ah, I get it. An elephant is just like a wall.” Another feels the elephant’s leg and says “Ah, I get it. An elephant is just like a tree.” Another feels the trunk and decides an elephant is just like a snake. Another feels the tail and decides an elephant is like a rope. And so on.

Control is an elephant. Big, big elephant. Many parts, many contradictions. After fifteen years of studying it I sometimes still feel like a blind man, groping my way towards the truth, one wrinkly body part at a time.

Join me.

                                                                              ***

control: The capacity to manage, master, dominate, exercise power over, regulate, influence, curb, suppress, or restrain.     ~ Judith Viorst

That’s fairly broad, as definitions go. My definition, which you won’t find in any dictionary but stands behind everything I write here, is broader:

                    The ability to dictate reality.

Dictate as in  direct, determine or define. 

Reality as in, well, everything. Everything under the sun. All the nuts and bolts of the world as we experience it, both the external world (of other people, places, and things) and the internal world (of our own thoughts, feelings and behavior).

By control, then, I mean nothing less than the ability to edit reality, transform it into whatever we need or want or prefer.

And by controlling I mean everything we do towards that end, whether or not what we do is effective, or healthy, or if we even know that we’re doing it.

First question: Is control the best word for what I’m describing?

I don’t know. But I’ve tried and can’t think of a better one.

The Buddhist term attachment probably comes closest to what I mean. As does a Tibetan word Pema Chrodron writes about, shenpa. But control is so much more important in English (Google lists only 16 million items for attachment) it seems the best label for what I’m interested in describing here.

Next question:

What are the most important parts of this elephant?

Well, the first two things you notice about control are

(1) It’s enormous.

and

(2) It’s invisible.

“Some things you miss because they’re so tiny,” Robert Pirsig writes. “But some things you don’t see because they’re so huge.”

Control is one of those invisible huge things.

The urge to control explains a ridiculously wide range of behaviors. Often we think of controlling as bossing, bullying or nagging, or a controlling person as someone like Hitler, Donald Trump or Mom. But that’s like mistaking the trunk for the whole elephant.

We’re controlling whenever we scratch an itch. Comb our hair. Mow our lawn. Salt our soup. Spank our child. Balance our checkbook. Change channels. Stop at a red light. Vote. Punch someone’s nose. Flatter someone. Seduce someone. Lie. Disguise our true feelings. Get drunk. Worry. Dream.

You get the idea.

We’re all controlling, and we’re controlling all the time.

We chase control all our lives, waking and sleeping, out in public and deep in the secretest crannies of our mind. We chase it consciously and unconsciously, creatively and destructively, wisely and stupidly, from birth until death.

We can’t help it. Control-seeking is the default position of our species.

At the same time, because it’s such a given of human experience, we barely notice we’re doing it.

Control isn’t like a tool we pick up and put down. It’s more like breathing, or blinking, or the way your knee jerks when the doctor taps your patellar tendon. Constant, automatic, involuntary.

Nor is the wish for control like a faucet we can turn on and off. The need to control flows through us continuously, saturates all our behavior and feelings, infuses everything we desire and fear.

It not only drives our behavior, it structures our thinking. What is most of our thinking, if not an attempt to somehow change some circumstance, shift some piece of reality closer to what we’d prefer? What else do you call problem-solving, planning, analyzing, fantasizing, worrying, obsessing?

The idea of control makes up the psychological sea in which each of us swims.

And most of the time we barely notice we’re wet.

Bert’s therapy: Stuck

I’m stuck.

1

2

3

How so?

1

2

3

I don’t like myself.  I really want to change.

1

2

3

therapist 2

1

2

3

But as hard as I try, I can’t seem to.

1

2

3

Change yourself?

1

2

3

Right.  Any advice on that?

1

2

3

Yes.  But you won’t like it.

1

2

3

How do you know?

1

2

3

Nobody likes it.  Nobody listens.

1

2

3

Why not?

1

2

It’s counterintuitive.  Contradicts what they want to believe. 

1

2

3

Well, I’m desperate.   Try me.

1

2

3

If you insist.

1

2

3

Bert 8

1

2

3

The way to change yourself is:

1

2

3

Bert 9

1

2

3

Stop trying.

1

2

3

Stop trying what?

1

2

Stop trying to change.  That’s how you change.

1

2

3

You’re confusing me.

1

It’s called the Paradoxical Theory of Change.  “The more you try to change yourself,” it says, “the more stuck you become.”

1

2

3

Bert 12

1

 

“But the moment you accept yourself as you are, change happens by itself.”

1

2

3

That makes no sense.

1

2

Didn’t you just say that pushing yourself to change has gotten you nowhere?  

1

2

3

Yeah.

1

2

3

There’s a reason for that. 

1

2

3

bert

Force yourself to change, and another part of you rises up in resistance.  An internal war starts.  Neither part wins.  You end up still stuck, just more tired.

1

2

3

 

That does sound familiar.

1

On the other hand, accepting yourself frees up all sorts of energy.  You feel stronger. Braver.  Hopeful.  Creative.  Growth follows.

1

2

3

That makes sense, I guess.

1

2

3

therapist

1

2

3

But I like believing in will power.

1

2

3

therapist.

1

2

3

I like thinking I can chart my own course.

1

2

3

therapist

1

2

3

That I’m the master of my fate.

1

2

3

therapist

1

2

3

That I’m the captain of my…

1

1

2

See? Nobody listens.

1

2

………………. * * *

 
Dear reader,

I need a hand here. 

This guy’s an okay therapist, I guess.  But as you can tell, sometimes we just doesn’t get each other. 

Maybe feedback from you would help. 

What’s your view of personal change? 

Do you believe in  willpower, or self-acceptance?

Or, put another way:  Below are two poems and two poets.  Which view appeals to you more?

Thanks,

~ Bert

PS: If you ever need help with your therapist, let me know.  

   

211111111111111 * * *

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

 ~ William Ernest Henley 

 

 

 2

 

When the tides of life turn against you

And the current upsets your boat

Don’t waste those tears on what might have been

Just lie on your back and float.

 

~ Ed Norton 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bert’s therapy: Holes

Bert 1

1

2

3

4

What’s with the hat?

1

2

3

I just felt like wearing it.

1

2

3

4

“Hole”?

1

2

3

It’s how I’m feeling lately.

1

2

3

4

therapist 3

1

2

3

Like something’s missing.

1

2

3

4

Something in you?

1

2

3

Yes.

1

2

3

4

What triggered this?

1

2

3

Remembering my childhood.

1

2

3

4

Oh.

1

2

3

4

Dad’s drinking.  Mom’s depression.  How they fought.

1

2

3

4

therapist 7

1

3

4

How they weren’t really there.

1

2

3

4

And the hole that left in you.

1

2

3

4

Right.

1

2

3

4

Well, I have a present.

1

2

3

4

A present?

1

2

3

4

Yes.  See that box by your foot?

1

2

3

Yes.

1

2

3

4

Open it.  It’s yours.

1

2

3

Thanks.  Not sure it fits.

1

2

3

4

Just listen for a moment. 

1

2

3

Bert 13

1

2

3

4

We all have holes.  All of us. 

11

 

bert

1

2

3

But you’re nobody’s kid now.  Your parents are gone. This is your life. 

 

1

2

 

Bert 14

1

2

3

4

And you can wear any hat you want to.

1

2

3

Really?

1

2

3

4

Really.

1

2

3

I don’t know.  This still feels a little large.

1

2

3

4

You’ll grow into it.

1

2

3

……………….  * * *

 

Being born is like being kidnapped. And then sold into slavery.

 ~ Andy Warhol

 

All of us start out weak in the hands of the strong, and a parent inclined to exploit that discrepancy can teach a child that any transgression of rules will yield pain and humiliation. Such an early education can bring it about that in later life, long after the tyrant is dead, any tentative reaching for power will be aborted by anxiety.

 ~ Allen Wheelis

 

Are we driven by fear or by joy? Are we driven by a terror of the magnitude of life and an attempt to make our lives small enough that we feel safe? Or are we driven by a longing to become big enough and strong enough to endure the larger life that is possible for us?

 

~ Donna Farhi

 

A bit of advice
Given to a young Native American
At the time of his initiation:

“As you go the way of life,
You will see a great chasm. Jump.
It is not as wide as you think.”

― Joseph Campbell

………………. * * *

Bert’s therapy: Irritated

Bert 1

1

2

3

What’s wrong?

1

2

3

Nothing.  I’m fine.

1

2

3

You don’t seem fine.

1

2

3

What do you mean?

1

2

3

You seem irritated.

1

2

3

I’m not.  I’m fine.

1

2

3

Okay.

1

2

3

Bert 5

1

2

3

If you say so.

1

2

3

Bert 6

1

2

3

therapist 6

1

2

3

What?

1

2

3

therapist 7

1

2

3

Jeez, let it go, will you?

1

2

3

therapist 8

1

2

3

Okay.  Okay.  I’m irritated.

1

2

3

How come?

1

2

3

Hell, I don’t know.  I’ve felt irritable for two days.

1

2

What are you doing about it?

1

2

3

Nothing.  Ignoring it. 

1

2

3

So I gathered.  You own a car?

1

2

 

Sure.

1

2

 You know the red light on your dashboard?

1

2

 

The one that lights when my engine overheats?

1

Yes.  What do you think of a driver who covers that light with duct tape?

1

2

3

Stupid.

1

2

3

For ignoring the warning, right?

1

2

3

Sure.

1

2

Well, irritability is your body’s red light.

1

2

3

 

What’s it mean?

1

2

Something wrong under the hood.  Some imbalance.

1

2

3

bert

1

2

My point is, don’t tape over the damn light. 

1

2

 

bert

1

2

Don’t mask it with work, or food, or alcohol, sleep, or tv, or giving to other people.  

 

1

 1

 

1

 

2

Pay attention to yourself.

 

3

Or end up on a lift or something?

1

2

3

You wouldn’t be the first.

1

 

 

                              * * *

Want more?

Being a friend to yourself might be the hardest work you ever do.

For a time, it might feel like you are turning your back on your family, being selfish, sacrilegious and unfriendly.  You won’t get kudos from your support groups.  You won’t be noticed or hear thank-you very often….

Being a friend to yourself means caring for the specifics of your body, your simple needs that lead to complex outcomes. Your exercise, your sleep, your diet, water and air are all worth fighting for.

These things you do for yourself become your currency. You find that the better friend you are to yourself, the better you become for others.

At this new place of safety for you, where you give less, you give more to those you love. You discover the mystery that no one can give what she doesn’t have.

Just like any bank, we deposit and withdraw and must protect our basic assets before we are taken over and lose the freedoms because we were poor managers of this one body that God gave us.

 ~ From Self-Care Works You, Pushes You, Tires You Out Until You Are Happily Spent On Your Friend – You by Sana Johnson-Quijada MD

  do. Fo

                              * * *

 

What self-care is not

Self-care is not self-pampering — not that there’s anything wrong with self-pampering — pedicures, dark chocolates, and other luxuries.  That is, as long as you can afford luxuries.  Spending money that you don’t have is self-indulgence.

Self-care is not self-indulgence.  Popularly, the terms self-care and self-indulgence are used interchangeably, as in “Oh, go ahead, indulge. You deserve it.”  We tell ourselves that we are practicing self-care when, in fact, we are engaging in self-indulgence.

Self-indulgence is characterized by avoidance of the effortful and substitution of quick and easy antidotes.  We tell ourselves that the stresses of the day have drained our energy and that vegging on the sofa with a quart of ice cream or a six-pack of beer is all we can expect of ourselves.  Rather than shouldering the hard work of self-care, we settle for temporary and largely symbolic fixes — some of which actually stress our systems further

How to practice self-care

Self-care means choosing behaviors that balance the effects of emotional and physical stressors: exercising, eating healthy foods, getting enough sleep, practicing yoga or meditation or relaxation techniques, abstaining from substance abuse, pursuing creative outlets, engaging in psychotherapy.

Also essential to self-care is learning to self-soothe or calm our physical and emotional distress. Remember your mother teaching you to blow on the scrape on your knee? This was an early lesson in self-soothing but the majority of adults haven’t the foggiest notion how to constructively soothe themselves.

From “Self-care may not be what you think it is” by Christine Meinecke, Ph.D. in Everybody Marries the Wrong Personback on your family, being seWhether the 

Bert’s therapy: Selfish

bert 1

2

3

4

How was your weekend?

2

3

4

Lousy.  Felicia and I fought.

2

3

4

What about?

2

3

4

I took a nap.

2

3

4

You fought about that?

2

3

4

Well, she wanted to go shopping instead.

2

3

Oh.

2

3

4

She called me selfish.

2

3

4

Do you think you’re selfish?

2

3

4

I guess so.  Mom always said I was.

2

3

And Mom thought “selfish” was a bad thing.

2

3

4

Of course.

2

3

4

Funny thing about that.

2

3

4

About what?

2

3

4

People who call other people selfish.

2

3

4

What about them?

2

3

4
They’re usually pretty good at being selfish themselves. 

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bert

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What they seem to mean is “Don’t take care of YOUR self.  Take care of MY self instead.”

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bert 10

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Ever notice that?

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Not until now.

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And how are you at taking care of yourself?

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Terrible.

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Scared someone will call you selfish?

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Yeah.   

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So you end up not selfish enough?

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Yeah.

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Well, don’t feel bad.  It’s a tough manipulation to defend against.

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bert 

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Then again, if you don’t take care of yourself, who will?

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Probably not Felicia.  Or mom.

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Be my guess.

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Bert

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How are you feeling right now?

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Like I deserve another nap.

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*************** * * *

 

 

Selfish (adj.):

Devoid of consideration for the selfishness of others.

~ Ambrose Beirce, The devil’s dictionary

 

 

 

Most of the problems which the adjusted American experiences reflect his profound misunderstandings in yet another area — which we shall term the self needs.

American culture provides neither a clear understanding of these needs nor adequate customs for satisfying them, and the adjusted American thus experiences both chronic and acute deprivation without really understanding the needs that are being deprived.

The anxiety, boredom and insecurity which are normal in American life are related to the deprivation of self needs much as hunger is related to the need for physical sustenance.

The self needs are the crux of normal neurosis in American culture. 

~ Snell Putney & Gail J. Putney, The adjusted American: Normal neuroses in the individual and society.

 

Bert’s therapy: Happy

 

bert 1

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Still unhappy, I gather.

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Yeah.

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Why do you think that is?

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I don’t know.  Because I don’t have what I want, I guess.

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 And what do you want?

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Well, a job that pays better.

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therapist 1

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A less angry wife.

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therapist 1

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A son who can pass Math.

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therapist 1

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And a reason to smile occasionally.

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therapist 1

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Any suggestions?

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Yes.  Redefine happiness.

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Redefine how?

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Stop thinking of happiness as getting what you want.

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bert 1

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Try thinking of it as having what you need.

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What difference would that make?

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 Would you rather be underpaid or unemployed?

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The former.

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Would you rather have an angry wife or live alone?

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Again, the former.

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Would you rather have a Math dunce for a son, or no son at all?

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I’ll take the dunce.

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Congratulations.  It seems you already have what you need.

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bert 1

 

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bert 1

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Plus a reason to smile.

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*************** * * *

Want more?

 

 

People are about as happy as they make their minds up to be.  

~ Abraham Lincoln

 

 

*************** * * *

The Second Noble Truth of Buddha is that craving anything is suffering.

Often it is translated as “the cause of suffering is craving,” but I think that misses the point.

Cause sounds like something happens first and produces a particular result.  It could be construed as “crave now, suffer later.” 

I believe it is “crave now, suffer now.”

I once heard someone say that a sign of enlightenment was the ability to say (and mean it) in any moment, “Well, this isn’t what I want, but it’s what I got, so okay.”

~ Syliva Boorstein, It’s easier than you think: The Buddhist way to happiness (HarperCollins, 1997).