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Unraveling the Confusion about Thinking and Feeling

Monday, April 8th, 2024 by Adrian Segar

I am not a psychologist or neuropsychologist. However, I have spent thousands of hours as an amateur, supervised by therapists, leading small group workshop explorations of individuals’ struggles to make sense of their lives. And I’ve learned that confusion about thinking and feeling is common.

Especially for men.

As I wrote in 2010:

“…when I was growing up my education emphasized thinking…However, the educational agenda allocated no time for understanding or expressing my feelings…All of us in school had feelings, of course, and they greatly affected how and what we did. But no one encouraged us to talk about or explore them…Over the years I’ve learned to be more in touch with my emotions.”

Expressing Our Feelings In Public, April 5, 2010

Here are my personal experiences and observations. Yours may be different.

Thoughts, emotions, and feelings

Our brains provide physiological experiences that we typically label as thoughts and emotions. Experiments show that thoughts and emotions originate in different places in our brains. Feelings are our conscious awareness of our emotions. Both thoughts and feelings give us information about the world.

Both thinking and feeling are critical activities that affect our behavior.

Most of us are aware that we’re thinking most of the time. What we’re often less good at is noticing how we’re feeling.

For example, during conversations we process what we’re hearing from others. We spend time thinking about how to respond. The feelings that arise when having more than a superficial conversation aren’t so obvious.

Noticing and talking about feelings

Most people are good at noticing facial and body language that telegraphs emotions. However, such observations may be largely unconscious. But even when we sense how someone may be feeling, we frequently don’t talk about their perceived emotional state.

Often, there are valid reasons for avoiding talking about feelings. Doing so may take a conversation to a level of intimacy that requires more time to explore than is available, or might be inappropriate under the circumstances. (Though, for example, telling a stranger that you’re sorry they seem to be having a hard day can be a small but highly positive action.)

These days, when I notice an emotional response during a conversation and it feels like an appropriate thing to do, I say something like:

“How do you feel about that?”

Then I shut up and listen.

And that’s when I often hear confusion about thinking and feeling.

Q: “How do you feel about that?” A: “I think…”

I lost count long ago of the number of times I’ve asked someone:

“How do you feel about that?”

And they responded:

“I think…”

The responder continues by analyzing the situation that evoked the feeling, completely sidestepping my request to name how they’re feeling. Even repeating my question—sometimes more than once—continues to evoke an “I think…” response.

In my experience, men are far more likely to respond this way than women. This may surprise you if you’re not a white, England-born, baby boomer like me, but until I was in my 20s I don’t remember anyone ever asking me how I felt! The thousands of words available to describe our feelings were rarely spoken to me or by me. I was given little to no opportunities or role models to introspect about how I felt, even though, like almost all human beings I’ve always been awash in emotions.

Consequently, I didn’t start asking “How do you feel about that?” until my 50s.

Given such socialization, is it any wonder that some people are confused about thinking and feeling?

Negative(?) feelings

I was sparked to write this post by a discussion topic offered for one of my men’s group meetings. (Yes, we’re all old white guys.)

‘Let’s take a look at our personal negative feelings. How do you experience negative feelings? Do you slide into depression? Do you feel “blah” and lose interest and energy to move forward? Do you retreat and “escape” from negativity? How are you able to recover from negative thoughts and spaces? Do you have a “recovery plan” that can lift you out of negativity?’

The phrase “negative feelings” immediately caught my attention. The phrase implies that some feelings, some emotional states, are negative. During the two meetings we discussed this formulation I said that feelings aren’t “negative”, because they are appropriate responses to experiences. For example, feeling sadness is appropriate when bad things happen, feeling anger is appropriate when injustice occurs, and feeling shame is appropriate when you do something you know or believe is wrong.

For me, using “negative” to describe certain feelings is a way to relegate them to “bad” or “avoid this” experiences. This allows us to excuse ourselves from exploring them. It can prevent us from fully accepting them as an important component of our lives.

The other members of my men’s group did not seem to be convinced by this point of view. They talked mainly about ways to escape or move on from negative feelings. While I, too, make choices that are likely to change how I’m feeling—listening to music I love is a favorite—I try to notice how I’m feeling, sit with it, and perhaps, explore what I can learn from how I’m feeling.

Historical and current perspectives on the importance of thinking and feeling

In 1637, René Descartes famously wrote “Cogito, ergo sum“, “I think, therefore I am.” Thinking was everything.

His contemporary, the philosopher Baruch Spinoza, popularized in this century by the neuroscientist António Damásio, challenged Descartes’ view, persuasively emphasizing the perspective of “I feel, therefore I am.”

Perhaps a better formulation is, “I think and feel, therefore I am.”

The other day, one of my meditation teachers ended her daily session with the words:

“May all beings find peace in their hearts.”
“May all beings find wisdom wherever it may be found.”
Helen Narayan Liebenson

I interpret this as a desire to find peace—a feeling state—and wisdom through our thinking and feeling.

What are your experiences of thinking and feeling?

Were you socialized to ignore or minimize experiencing your feelings?

Do you find that women are more likely to be aware of and talk about their feelings?

What are your experiences? I would love to hear perspectives (especially from women). Please share your thoughts and feelings in the comments below!

Tags: feelings, thinking, thoughts| Posted in life lessons | No Comments »

Lessons from Anguilla on returning after four years away

Monday, February 19th, 2024 by Adrian Segar

After a four-year gap due to the COVID pandemic, we eagerly returned to Anguilla for a two-week vacation. We love this tiny Caribbean island and have taken a welcome break from Vermont winter for fifteen years. I have written many posts about lessons from Anguilla gleaned during our visits, and this trip uncovered more.

The trip

For the first time in many years, Celia and I stayed in Anguilla without company. In the past, family members, and Celia’s women friends would join us for a week. But flights were so expensive that we couldn’t afford to bring family, and Celia’s friends couldn’t come for various reasons. The villa where we’d stayed previously was up for sale, so we looked for another place to stay.

We love the East End of the island and found a wonderful Airbnb in Island Harbor. Right on the northern coast, it featured two decks overlooking the North Atlantic, without a speck of land between us and Nova Scotia, 3,000 miles away.

Here’s the view from the large deck outside our apartment.

And here’s the view from the lower deck.

Lessons from Anguilla: Photograph of our deck overlooking the North Atlantic, including the author's feet — The same deck with the author’s feet included

We loved our new accommodations (read below for more reasons) and hope to return there next year.

So, what lessons from Anguilla did I learn on this trip?

Lesson 1—Don’t make assumptions

The third agreement of Don Miguel Ruiz’s classic book “The Four Agreements” is

Don’t make assumptions.

I’ve spent so much time in Anguilla that, understandably, I make assumptions about what a new visit will be like.

I think I’m a little wiser about making assumptions these days. One thing I now know is to not assume that something I’ve experienced in the past under certain circumstances is likely to occur when those circumstances are repeated. Great initial experiences may not be so good the next time.

For example, on our Anguilla vacation, a memorable restaurant could go out of business or somehow lose its allure. Perhaps, a perfect beach is now covered with seaweed. The Nurse Boy Carwash and Thick Madam clothing store are no more. The perfect bartender who knew your names and made the best rum punches left for better pastures.

The day we arrived offered a good example. We’d had some charmingly idiosyncratic meals and good times at a little shack, Lime Keel House, that was within walking distance of our new island home.

Lessons from Anguilla: The former Lime Keel House — The former Lime Keel House

But when I passed it on my morning walk, it was clear that the restaurant was closed. A woman working inside the building told us they were renovating it into a tourist store.

Well, since it had been four years since we’d last been on the island, I assumed that some things that we had loved would be gone. Smart, huh!

Don’t make assumptions!

Over the next two weeks, we found that the vast majority of places and experiences were just as wonderful as we remembered!

Goats still roamed everywhere!

Our favorite restaurants were still around and just as good as ever!

Lessons from Anguilla: Photograph of the menu and serving windows at Blanchards Beach Shack — What do you want to eat?! The menu and serving windows at Blanchards Beach Shack

The view from the Sandbar Restaurant in Sandy Ground, Anguilla

Once again, the sunsets did not disappoint.

And the beaches were just as gorgeous as we remembered.

OK, the Nurse Boy Carwash and Thick Madam clothing store were, sadly, no more.

But they were pleasant memories, nothing we needed to experience again.

And Ruthy’s Yum-Yum and Fruity Web were still thriving!

Photograph of Ruthy’s Yum-Yum courtesy of anguilla-beaches.com

Lessons from Anguilla: I learned that sometimes the present can turn out to be quite like the enjoyable past.

Lesson 2—Stay open to new possibilities!

We’ve been visiting Anguilla for the last twenty years, so we’re pretty familiar with the island. With an area of just 35 square miles, 16 miles from end to end, and 3.5 miles at its widest, it’s eminently explorable. Over the years, I think we’ve walked or driven down every rocky road. So it was easy for me to assume that there wouldn’t be any major surprises on this trip.

Yeah, I know.

Don’t make assumptions!

The world outside the vacation

Just because you’re on vacation doesn’t mean the outside world can’t come crashing in. We got some unexpected upsetting family news early during our stay. There was not much we could do about it, and we were able to (mostly) let it go. But this was a reminder that vacations aren’t a sealed hermetic pleasure bubble that nothing can penetrate.

Hermit crabs

OK, we were not expecting this. As we walked down the concrete path into our new home, we saw a lot of these guys moving out of our way…
They’re called hermit crabs, and we’d seen them before on the island. What was different, we soon realized, was the sheer quantity of these creatures that lived around the building compared to our previous sightings. There were hundreds, perhaps thousands of them. (Later, a local friend told us that island fishermen used to come to the area where we were staying and use the crabs as bait for their lobster traps.)

We quickly became attached to these odd creatures. They move around surrounded by a shell they’ve found that fits their bodies. When they sense potentially dangerous circumstances, like us, they either scurry away from the open or withdraw into their shell. As we walked on the path we could hear the clink of their shells hitting the concrete as they moved or retreated. When the path wasn’t level, their retreat often turned them into a shell ball that rolled entertainingly down the path.

Hermit crabs are omnivores that feed voraciously on anything available. After watching them for a few days, we put out a piece of melon rind and made a 30-second time-lapse video of what happened when we retreated for fifteen minutes. The crabs leave at the end when we approach to retrieve the camera.

Enjoy!

Unexpected weather

We have always visited Anguilla at some time between February – April. The weather is generally delightful. Rain is light and occurs for short periods and rainbows abound. Hurricane season occurs during the fall, so we’ve never experienced bad weather on the island.

Until this trip.

Midway during our stay we experienced two days of torrential rain. All the boat ferries between Anguilla and St Martin had to stop running (which hardly ever happens) and the island was cut off from the outside world except by air.

That was OK; we could stay outside on our large deck, watch the ocean, and stay dry. But when we went out to dinner, it was a different story. Night had fallen, and driving the length of the island turned into a very scary experience. Visibility was so poor it was almost impossible to anticipate the frequent expanses of water of unknown depth that would suddenly appear around a corner. We are used to driving on winding Vermont roads in icy conditions, but our 45-minute drive to dinner and our return were perhaps the most challenging driving we’ve ever done.

Later, our landlord told us that the two days of bad weather were very unusual for February. They were more like hurricane-season weather when a big hurricane goes nearby. (I wrote this post about what happened when Hurricane Irma hit Anguilla in 2017.)

But we made it to dinner and back home safely. The trips became a memorable experience, and we gained a new respect for what it’s like for Anguillians when they live through hurricane season each fall.

Unexpected experiences

Yes, Anguilla is a tropical island so there are coconut trees. While relaxing on Shoal Bay East beach one day, this guy ran up the tree right next to me…
…and chopped down a coconut.

He wanted a drink.

Two spots for meditation

This was a small unexpected treat, but regular readers of this blog know that I meditate daily. I can do it anywhere, but it’s nice to be in a supportive and beautiful environment. Imagine our delight when we found our apartment had a little meditation deck (not included in the listing), clearly made with us in mind.

Our lower deck (pictured at the start of this post), surrounded by the ocean and enveloped in the sound of breaking waves, turned out to be a wonderful place to meditate too!

Lessons from Anguilla: I learned that, even though you’re very familiar with a place you love, I can still discover new things there.

Lesson 3—Sometimes things unexpectedly improve

We’ve seen Anguilla beaches change so much between our trips. When we first visited Shoal Bay East Beach, the east end of it featured Gwen’s Reggae Bar and a small resort called Serenity. The beach in front of these properties was beautiful, and our former landlady and many tourists and locals danced to live music at Gwen’s every Sunday at lunchtime.

But over the years the east end of the beach shrank drastically. The palms in front of Gwen’s that once held hammocks fell into the sea and the beach disappeared…

…and Gwen’s had to be abandoned and rebuilt down on the west end of the beach (where it remains to this day).

In 2020, the last time we’d visited Anguilla, right before COVID decimated tourism on the island, walking down to the old Gwen’s from the main Shoal Bay East beach was a slightly perilous undertaking. At high tide, waves could dash you against the rocks. At low tide, you’d certainly get pretty wet. The sea had essentially eaten the small beach at Serenity.

But on this trip, the beach was back! Once again, we could walk the entire length of Shoal Bay East, rounding “proposal point” and enjoying the white sand down to Serenity, which has once again installed beach chairs and umbrellas.

The beach came back!

We’d experienced the resilience of Anguilla after Hurricane Irma but had thought of it as the remarkable resilience of the Anguillian people. But Nature is resilient in surprising ways too, and this was a pleasant lesson to learn during our vacation.

Lessons from Anguilla: Nature can be resilient as well as people. I’m thankful that we live in a world which still has some buffers to the increasing climate emergency we are now experiencing.

Any other lessons from Anguilla?

These are the three lessons from Anguilla I picked up on this delightful trip. But perhaps you’ve learned more? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

Tags: Anguilla, beach, don't make assumptions, hermit crabs, lessons, meditation| Posted in Lessons from Anguilla, life lessons | 2 Comments »

My contract with myself

Monday, December 11th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

Long ago, I participated in and later staffed a series of workshops that profoundly affected my life. They led me to create a contract with myself that is still important to me.

Creating a contract with oneself is a common way to motivate yourself toward achieving desired goals. There are plenty of resources available for writing such contracts. (Here’s one that’s slanted toward event professionals.)

The workshop where I created my contract for myself took a deeper perspective. It included guided visualizations, based on the work of John Bradshaw, designed to help us connect with and reclaim our magical inner child. (Here’s a recording of John Bradshaw running one of his “Home Coming” workshops.)

Toward the end of one of these guided visualizations, the workshop leader invited us to meet our magical child. I “saw” a large glowing black rock floating in space, sparkling with veins of fire. The rock embodied power, my power.

Later in the workshop, this experience helped me develop my contract with myself. In the workshop context, such contracts emphasize fundamental positive aspects of oneself with which we’ve struggled, for a variety of reasons.

Though the workshop process of creating a contract is unique for each person, mine evolved directly from my visualization experience. It seems obvious in retrospect, but it involved some hard work!

“I am a glowing, powerful, and complex man.”

That is the contract I wrote for myself in August 2005. Reminding myself of it helps me to stay in touch with these important aspects of who I am, which I sometimes lose sight of.

My contract with myself remains vibrant and relevant to me to this day.

Tags: contracts, life lessons, visualizations| Posted in life lessons | No Comments »

49 years together — so far, so good

Monday, November 6th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

49 years ago I met Celia at the wedding of mutual friends in the heart of the English New Forest. I moved in with her ten days later and we’ve been together ever since. We married in 1977… …and moved to the U.S. the same year.

We have been through so much together: wonderful times and hard times. Along the way our family grew; we now have three (adult) children and three grandkids.

A few years ago we were in Anguilla for two weeks and I decided I would tell her each day something that I loved about her. It was easy to do.

What have I learned from Celia?

Unconditional love

Like most couples, we were infatuated with each other from the start. Unlike other relationships I’d had, our mutual infatuation lasted years, rather than weeks or months. It was over a year before we had our first argument.

We participate in a daily dharma meditation on Zoom on weekday mornings. Recently, our teacher quoted the Buddha’s words about the liberation of the ego through love. Celia has been a great teacher to me of that. Loving kindness cuts through the murk of identifying with a belief about who I am, as opposed to being who I am. Having someone love me unconditionally despite my imperfections is a great blessing.

Noticing and sharing feelings

Celia helps me learn to share more about how I feel and less about what I think. This has helped me overcome (to some extent!) the effects of a quarter-century of being taught that thinking is the only important motivator of action. We’ve helped each other get better at sharing feelings and becoming less scared about doing so. She’s really good about supporting me when I do.

Family

I’ve always loved being with children but never spent significant time with little kids. Celia has worked with kids for most of her life, first in after-school programs and later as a pediatric occupational therapist in our local schools. She has taught me a lot about being with kids, about having kids, and bringing out my childlike, joyful, playful side.

She has helped me develop what it means to me to be a family.

Mutual support

Celia teaches me how, together, we can weather hard times that would be so much harder if we were by ourselves. She tends to go into how she’s feeling about a situation before I do, at which time I can support her. When I’m down, Celia’s very supportive.

She has helped me learn about myself through being seen through her eyes. She is often insightful about me and others in ways that take me some time to appreciate.

Honesty and generosity

Celia has taught me about honesty and lack of guile, while still being circumspect and respectful of situations.

I have learned about generosity from her. There have been plenty of times when I’ve been influenced by her generous spirit in responding to situations. I think I have got better at being generous, thanks to her.

I don’t know if I’ve learned this from her, but Celia can simply say just the right thing at the right time. Sometimes she discounts this superpower. I continue to tell her how important it is.

Aging well

Celia has been a model for me in how she looks after herself as she ages. She has transformed how I eat and always supports me exercising.

Learning from each other

We have learned from each other about:

Our spiritual journey together.
Illuminating each others’ shadows, allowing us both to grow.
Giving each other the freedom to do what we want to do as individuals, and negotiating well how we want to plan our future together.

We complement each other so well. I am blessed to have her in my life.

Tags: commitment, Learning, love, relationship| Posted in life lessons | 6 Comments »

Mindfulness and embodied awareness

Monday, July 24th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

Growing up, I was immersed in an environment that worshipped feats of mind, to the almost total exclusion of the body. Apart from compulsory school sports on Thursday after school, I spent 5½ days each week studying, studying, studying. Perhaps that’s why I eventually gravitated toward practicing mindfulness in my 50s. But recently, my mediation teachers have been suggesting a slightly different approach, one they call cultivating embodied awareness.

Embodied awareness: A photograph, taken in 1964, of Adrian Segar (standing, fourth from the left) at age 13 with his school rugby team. — The author (standing, fourth from the left) at age 13 with his school rugby team

“Embodied awareness” evokes for me what meditation is about.

Here’s why.

Mindfulness and embodied awareness

The word mindfulness nudges us to focus on our mind’s experience. Being unattached to those pesky thoughts that come and go when we meditate.

In contrast, the description embodied awareness reframes meditation as encompassing both mind and body. It encourages us to extend our awareness to include moment-to-moment bodily sensations. Aware of a muscle ache, the tick of a clock, and a breeze on our skin without getting snagged by these impressions. Being aware that we are living embodied.

Yet we are not just our mind and our body. To me, meditation is experiencing the mystery of who we are and being this mystery. My meditation practice is to notice but avoid attachment to my thoughts and sensations.

Have your heart be where your feet are

For some time, I have been working on developing a daily practice for living more in gratitude. Accepting loving kindness and feeling gratitude are additional dimensions of my meditative and living experience, rooted in both my mind and my body. While cultivating embodied awareness, my teachers have prompted me to “have my heart where my feet are”, a teaching of Muhammad, the founder of Islam.

To me, this is a helpful suggestion that highlights another facet of meditation that connects my mind and body.

Meditation as embodied awareness

There is no universal definition of meditation. And that’s OK. But I now practice to experience embodied awareness when I meditate—and as I live my life.

Tags: embodied awareness, meditation, mindfulness| Posted in life lessons | 2 Comments »

We are all Donald Rumsfeld

Monday, June 19th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

In a Pentagon news conference on Feb. 12, 2002, United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld gave a now-famous response to a question about the lack of evidence linking the government of Iraq with the supply of weapons of mass destruction to terrorist groups:

“…as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say, we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don’t know we don’t know.”
—Donald Rumsfeld, “There are unknown unknowns.”

For full context, here’s the whole exchange. Though it has been widely criticized as an evasive non-answer to an important question, Rumsfeld thought highly enough of his remark that he borrowed from it for the title of his controversial memoir, Known and Unknown.

Rumsfeld’s remark includes three of the four boxes of what’s often called the Rumsfeld matrix, which pops up in all kinds of fields, such as the epistemology of knowledge, risk assessment, project management, strategic planning, and, as illustrated below, creative design.

A different take on the Rumsfeld matrix

All of the examples above apply the Rumsfeld matrix to explore different kinds of analysis. What no one discusses, as far as I know(!), are the potential pitfalls of Rumsfeld’s categories. So, my take on the Rumsfeld matrix is—what if you’re wrong? Here are the consequences of incorrectly assigning one’s belief about one’s knowledge to the wrong box.

What you know you know

It’s great to know what you know. Until you’re wrong, either because you don’t actually know what you think you know, or because what you “know” is wrong.

Because everyone makes mistakes. I’m sometimes wrong about what I think I know, and since you’re probably, like me, not perfect you are too.

For example, I tell a client that I know how to do something, and then when they ask me to do it I discover that I can’t. Or, I confidently give incorrect advice.

This is obviously dangerous. Misplaced confidence in one’s knowledge has caused countless tragedies. We have a word for this: hubris.

What you know you don’t know

There are times when you’re wrong about knowing that you don’t know. Sometimes it turns out that, when the chips are down, you do know! (See the next section below.)

For example, fifty years ago I had four years of French classes in school and have barely used it since. My French is terrible. Nevertheless, every once in a while, the French word for something I would have sworn I didn’t know just pops into my head.

The good news is that believing that you don’t know something that you actually do is not dangerous. Underestimating your abilities is, at most, mildly embarrassing.

What you don’t know you know

This is the matrix box that Rumsfeld didn’t mention, though he refers to it in his memoir. Surprisingly, there’s a lot of stuff you don’t know that you know! In fact, there are probably more things that you don’t know you know than things you know you know! (I’ll wait while you figure out that sentence.) This box is about tacit knowledge, which I wrote about here.

For example, I never learned to touch type. If you asked me to list the QWERTY keyboard layout I’ve been typing on for fifty years, I’d have a hard time deriving it from memory. Despite this, I can type with three or four fingers far faster than the hunt and peck I used for the first few months on a typewriter.

Tacit knowledge is a bonus. It’s not dangerous. Thank goodness for that!

What you don’t know you don’t know

Finally, we get to the most dangerous region of the Rumsfeld matrix. When we are born, we don’t know what we don’t know. And we’re helpless, completely reliant on other humans for our survival. Slowly we pick up knowledge, making discoveries constantly. But there are always things we don’t know that we don’t know. They bedevil us our whole lives. This has been true for every culture throughout history, including ours right now.

By definition, I can’t give you a current example of what I don’t know I don’t know! That’s what makes this box so dangerous. But we can extrapolate from the past. For example, look at the history of our beliefs about what causes illness. Cultures believed that illness was caused by evil spirits and gods, or an excess of blood in the body. Today, these are rare beliefs.

In 1968, Stewart Brand wrote on the title page of his first Whole Earth Catalog, “We are as gods and might as well get good at it.” In my opinion, he was wrong, though on the back page of the final Catalog he wrote, “Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish“, which I see as a partial repudiation. What we can learn from this box is that, as Shakespeare has Hamlet say, “There are more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” We need to remember that we don’t know all the right answers; we don’t even know all the right questions!

In other words, we need to remain humble in the face of a universe that has not shared all its secrets.

We are all Donald Rumsfeld

We are all Donald Rumsfeld. We are all susceptible to hubris and overlooking how little we actually know in the likely scheme of things. If we strive to avoid hubris and stay humble, our world will be a better place.

Image attribution: www.team-consulting.com

Tags: Donald Rumsfeld, hubris, humility, knowledge, Rumsfeld matrix, tacit| Posted in life lessons | 1 Comment »

Assholes, potholes, and black holes

Monday, May 29th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

Here are my suggestions on how to handle three kinds of metaphorical holes.

Assholes

We’ll begin with assholes. They are people (usually men in my experience) who reliably exhibit mean, uncaring, selfish, disrespectful, and contemptible behaviors. Most of the time, they are pretty easy to spot.

The best way to deal with assholes is to avoid them whenever possible. If you can’t, then don’t confront them; assholes love that. Instead, ignore them. If you have to interact with an asshole, set boundaries on the time you’ll be with them and what you will tolerate. This can be tough, so remember that their assholeness is their problem, not yours.

A couple more points.

First, everyone acts like an asshole sometimes. While waiting to pick up a prescription in a pharmacy the other day, I talked for five minutes to a clearly stressed woman in the line. As the pharmacist filled my order, I heard screaming and turned to see the woman smashing the credit card terminal next to me. Based on our conversation, I’m pretty sure this woman was behaving as a temporary asshole due to circumstances, and I was happy to see staff and customers give her some slack and support.

And second, remember that assholes are not happy people. Though it’s hard to do, if you can feel compassion for an asshole you’re with it will help you deal with their behavior better. And it may (don’t count on it) help them be slightly less asshole-like with you.

Potholes

holes A large pot hole on Second Avenue in the East Village of New York City, deep enough to contain a traffic pylon and several bags of garbage. As of August 16, 2008, it had been there for around two weeks. — A physical pothole.

Everyone experiences metaphorical potholes—setbacks, disappointments, bumps on the road of life—once in a while. They are always unwelcome and usually unexpected. A pothole is your problem to deal with, but don’t take it personally as it may be nothing you could have done anything about. When you encounter a pothole, try not to get stuck. And be open to asking for help if and when you do.

Remember that you’ll almost always be able to get out of a pothole. As Sufis say, “This too shall pass.”

Sometimes, anticipating a potential upcoming pothole will help you avoid it. The trick is to anticipate potentially serious potholes while not trying to plan for every possible eventuality, which leads to analysis paralysis. (Meeting designers and facilitators like me get plenty of practice at this balancing act.)

Finally, learn from your pothole experiences so you are less likely to fall into the same pothole again. If you do, there’s more learning needed.

Black holes

Thankfully, unless faster-than-light travel becomes possible, you’ll never have to interact with a physical black hole. They’re too far away. But metaphorical black holes exist, and they can seriously affect your well-being. They are about unhealthy attraction to other people, whether it’s romantic, physical, sexual, emotional, intellectual, platonic, aesthetic, or sensual. These kinds of attraction intersect and overlap, and each of us experiences and prioritizes them to varying degrees. Additionally, attraction can be fluid and can change over time or in different circumstances.

There are, of course, many positive aspects to attraction. It fosters one of our most important needs: connection and intimacy with others. Attraction elicits positive emotions which can contribute to overall well-being and satisfaction. And it can be a powerful motivator, driving us to pursue our goals and aspirations, and increase self-confidence.

Mutual attraction is usually a positive experience. But metaphorical black holes only involve one-way attraction. They attract so strongly there is no escape. You become obsessed and besotted with another person, causing distress and interfering with other areas of life. Such extreme attraction is rarely reciprocated, typically leading to feelings of rejection, sadness, and heartbreak. Black hole attraction may also trigger feelings of jealousy or insecurity and provoke biases or prejudices.

Avoiding black holes

So, like assholes, you should avoid black holes. This is especially challenging because black holes attract no matter how far you’re from them, while assholes are generally only a problem when you’re with them. It’s also often difficult to determine whether the attraction we initially feel is or will become obsessive. As a result, you may not realize you are too close to a black hole before it’s too late.

To avoid being sucked into a metaphorical black hole, you first have to notice you’re in danger. One warning sign is becoming aware that an attraction to someone has become a constant obsession to the extent it’s significantly affecting your other relationships. Romantic obsessions of this kind are called obsessive love disorder.

A mild obsession with someone can often be lessened by choosing to spend more time doing things you like, focusing on other relationships, practicing mindfulness, and meditating regularly. Mental health counseling is recommended when these approaches aren’t working, especially if you notice a pattern in your life of obsessive relationships.

The Law of Holes

Finally, there are other kinds of holes you may find yourself in from time to time, such as foxholes and rabbit holes. Whatever kind of hole you might encounter, the following two Laws of Holes can be useful:

“If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.”
—The First Law of Holes

“When you stop digging, you are still in a hole.”
—The Second Law of Holes

I wish you good luck dealing with all the metaphorical holes in your life!

Pothole image is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

Tags: asshole, black hole, laws of holes, obsession, obsessive love disorder, pothole| Posted in life lessons | 3 Comments »

Life can only be understood by looking backward

Monday, May 8th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

The philosopher Søren Kierkegaard once said that life can only be understood by looking backward, but it must be lived looking forward.

Looking backward: A cartoon by Tom Gauld: "The musings of Kierkegaard" — The musings of Kierkegaard, by @tomgauld, New Scientist November 19, 2022

I agree!

Understanding by looking backward

In my 7th decade, I think I better understand some of the mysteries of my youth.

Feelings

Paradoxically, one of the things I now understand better is the importance and influence of my feelings. Growing up, no one talked about feelings in my family. I got the message that feelings, especially uncomfortable ones, were taboo to discuss and best suppressed. So, I focused on understanding the world and my life by developing my rational understanding and knowledge of the world as a physicist. I had little understanding of how my feelings were influencing my life and decisions.

Over the years, I’ve realized that how I feel determines what I do far more than what I think. Though it’s still a struggle at times, I work to be more aware of how I’m feeling and how it is affecting my behavior. Doing this helps me to minimize being “stuck” in feelings that are associated with my recent or distant past. This leads to another understanding…

This too shall pass

These days, I find myself better able to deal with life’s ups and downs. I wouldn’t say my life feels easier overall. Increased financial security comes hand in hand with the infirmities of old(er) age. But over time I’ve internalized my understanding that “this too shall pass”.

Perhaps this is because I have more experience knowing that bad or good times don’t last forever. Perhaps I have become more resilient, or more accepting of the reality that some things are beyond my control. Or, maybe, it’s simply that my short-term memory is worse so it’s easier for me to live in the present!

Forgiveness

As I age, I’ve become more tolerant of imperfections in myself, others, and the world. I am better able to forgive myself and others, having learned that everyone makes mistakes and that it’s not fair to hold anyone to impossibly high standards. I’m more empathetic, tolerant, and understanding than I used to be.

Many of the certainties of my youth have given way to respect for diverse opinions and a greater acceptance of imperfections in the world around us.

One specific example of this is forgiving the flaws and limitations of my parents, of whom I was so intolerant in my youth. I now see them as imperfect people rather than the all-knowing, all-powerful figures they appeared to me as a child. As a parent and grandparent myself now, I recognize the sacrifices and efforts they made on my behalf. I’ve gained a deeper appreciation for their love and support, despite their imperfections.

Everything else

The older I get, the more I realize how little I know compared to what there is to know. Paradoxically, I’m increasingly surprised by what I do know when circumstances bring it to mind. Most of my knowledge is tacit. Though my slowly deteriorating memory bugs me at times, I’m fundamentally at peace with remembering and understanding stuff that I used to know. Coming (mostly) to terms with my frailties as I age is a blessing.

Living looking forward

Until I die, there’s always the future—which hasn’t happened yet! I think the trick of experiencing the future as fully as possible is to work on minimizing the effects of past experiences that get in the way of being in the present. I’ll never completely succeed in this, of course, but it’s a worthy goal. Living looking forward is tough because…

…looking backward evokes feelings

Looking backward helps us to understand our past in ways that were previously hidden from us. In addition, thinking about the past often reinvokes feelings associated with that time. Sometimes this is a positive or healing experience. But sometimes it leads us to wallow in the past, stuck in unresolved trauma. That’s why looking backward with therapeutic support is often useful. It’s something I’ve done numerous times over the years which has paid rich dividends.

Living in the present

Here’s a final thought about living in the present by a meditation teacher:

“Let thoughts about the past be known for what they are: thoughts about the past. Let thoughts about the future be known for what they are: thoughts about the future.”

Tags: feelings, forgiveness, life review, living in the moment, living in the present, looking backward, looking forward, mistakes, understanding| Posted in Learning, life lessons | 1 Comment »

Reincarnation in this life

Monday, March 13th, 2023 by Adrian Segar

During a recent meditation session, teacher Narayan Helen Liebenson shared that it was Parinirvana Day, the day when the Buddha is said to have achieved complete Nirvana, upon the death of his physical body. She explained that you don’t need to believe in the concept of reincarnation to be a Buddhist. And she talked about the fact that many of us have experienced, often more than once, reincarnation in this life.

I don’t believe that I possess a non-physical essence that will, after my death, begin a new life in a new body. When we die, the atoms of our bodies remain. They continue to be incorporated into other forms of matter, including bodies of people yet to be born. And I don’t believe that anything else remains except perhaps in the hearts and minds of friends and family who are still alive, their descendants, and occasionally an ongoing influence on our culture.

While I don’t believe in traditional reincarnation, I have experienced reincarnation in this life more than once. You probably have too.

What do I mean by reincarnation in this life?

I remember a life history that stretches back to my childhood. But I do not see myself as being the same “person” throughout my life. I’m skeptical about the concept of moments of enlightenment that radically change a person. Yet I can identify distinct periods in my life, and I interpret the transitions between them as a kind of reincarnation of my being.

I describe these phases and their dominant characteristics as:

Early childhood: being intensely curious and playful.
Childhood through adolescence: focusing on an intellectual approach to the world, emphasizing thinking over feeling.
My 20s – 40s: moving toward a more balanced integration of the role of thoughts and feelings in my life.
My 50s – the present: discovering the primary importance for me of connection with others, coming into my power to create my life, and desiring to use my talents to make a difference in the world I inhabit.

Though there aren’t clear boundaries between these chapters of my life, looking back after each transition I experienced myself as a significantly different person compared to who I was before.

The future

Will I experience another reincarnation during my lifetime? I don’t know and want to stay open to that possibility. Whatever happens, I think the concept of reincarnation in this life is a useful way to think about one’s personal lifetime evolution. Perhaps it will be thought-provoking for you.

Feel free to share your thoughts on reincarnation in this life in the comments below!

Image copyrighted to Himalayan Academy Publications, Kapaa, Kauai, Hawaii. Licensed for Wikipedia under Creative Commons and requires attribution when reproduced, CC BY-SA 2.5, Link
Animated gif attribution.

Tags: curiousity, meditation, playfulness, reincarnation| Posted in life lessons | No Comments »

Movement

Monday, October 3rd, 2022 by Adrian Segar

Yesterday, my trusty Apple Watch told me that I had surpassed my daily move goal every day for the last three years.
“Movement is life,” said Captain Mac Elwin in Jules Verne‘s A Floating City.

I’m glad to be alive!

Today, I’m tired and achy, recovering from yesterday’s COVID booster. So I replaced my daily run with a long walk.

I continue to move.

My Twitter bio includes that I love to dance, sing, and meditate. All these are different ways to move. For me, dance evokes the very essence of movement in my body. Singing requires the movement of my vocal cords, forming moving sound waves in the air. And even meditation involves movement as I watch breath move in and out of my body.

More than life

In fact, movement is more than life. At a deeper level, everything is moving. Every lifeless atom—whether in a bar of copper, a vat of mercury, or a tank of oxygen—is constantly changing position. At the deepest level, quantum mechanics tells us that no particles in the universe are static; all exist in a probability cloud of possible positions.

I am grateful for the movement in my life, both for the joy it gives me and movement’s constant reminder that I am alive.

Image attribution: Fka Twigs Dance GIF By Sarah Wintner

Tags: change, gratitude, movement| Posted in life lessons | No Comments »