Masters of Illusion

““Hush, Dorothy,” whispered the Tiger, “you’ll ruin my reputation if you are not more discreet. It isn’t what we are, but what folks think we are, that counts in this world.””

— Frank Baum, The Road to Oz

Early on, we unconsciously learned to present certain things to the world (like a powerful man in sunglasses) so the world will accept us. Oscar-winning director Barry Jenkins sums this up brilliantly about the transformation of his character Chiron in his film Moonlight, "Over time some people become less and less themselves and instead turn into this thing that they feel like they need to be in order to survive."

So we hide in plain sight. We keep our true selves tucked away beneath layers and layers of the false images we portray. Carlin Flora's Psychology Today article, "Unlocking the Vault", dives into our propensity to hide. She interviews Barry Farber, Professor of psychology and education at Columbia University, who explains, "A struggle plays out constantly between a wish to be known and helped on one hand and the avoidance of feeling the shame of acknowledging pieces of ourselves we're not pleased with." Like the Tiger, we want to present ourselves in the best possible way that causes others to think highly of us because that is what "counts in this world". And somehow, being human with faults, fears and wounded histories doesn't fit into that equation so we bury those parts of us into the recesses of our soul.

“To quiet the noise of incongruence between the mask and the man, it’s easier to assume the mask is the man.”

To hide our humanness, we put a lot of energy to maintaining these facades. So much energy is given to employing these covers and keeping them in tact that we can't hear what is happening inside us.

To quiet the noise of incongruence between the mask and the man, it's easier to assume the mask is the man.  We lose track of who we are and unknowingly allow the self-protective ways of relating to take over. You wear this mask long enough and become known this way so it seems foolish to take it off. If you took it off, who would you be? Would you even recognize yourself? And would you be accepted without it? 

Yet, you're tired. You're tired of being different things to different people. It's exhausting wondering if you'll be exposed. Ultimately, it's lonely being a stranger in your own skin. Something inside longs to breathe, to connect, to love, to belong, to be known. That part wants to be real, wants to be authentic, wants to be true. Being true means accepting yourself as human and loving and seeing those parts you deemed unworthy. 

We can only test the climate of authentic revelation in a safe environment of compassion, kindness, patience and understanding. Without this, the masks and the belief of their necessity will be reinforced. As you shed those false layers, you'll come face to face with the painful reasons that caused those layers to originate. This uncovering is uncomfortable and can feel disruptive but it is necessary. You're knocking down what you've falsely built your world around in order to rebuild something true. This is wildly vulnerable.

But if you are willing to give yourself the gift of your own humanity you will learn like the Skin Horse, that "real" is a "thing that happens to you". When you are really loved, then you become real. Becoming real takes time "but once you are real you can't become unreal again. It lasts for always."

That sounds like a comforting invitation to me. Will you accept what being real can offer you?

“Once you are real you can’t become unreal again. It lasts for always.”

— The Velveteen Rabbit

Befriending the Stranger

“Before we can become who we really are, we must become conscious of the fact that the person who we think we are, here and now, is at best an imposter and a stranger.”

— Thomas Merton

Manipulating and mastering one's image is crucial these days. Social media let's us present the outward looking face we want. We determine what someone sees and knows through various filters because there are great rewards to be had (follower increase, "likes" which studies have showed increase our dopamine levels-our brain's reward system). But maintaining for the sake of reward has its dark side. Think about public personas and their falls from grace and how quickly contracts are dropped in order to disassociate from their now marred/soiled image. (Hi, Ryan Lochte.) Which is usually followed by PR attempts to reassemble and salvage whatever can be done from the charred remains.  

When we unwittingly show we are less than perfect in some way, we pay a price. While our mistakes may not take on the depth of public scrutiny as celebrities, we have all certainly felt the sting of someone's disappointment, their judgment and in some cases, even relationships ending. This is not new...we've talked about this before. But it's worth continually revisiting. 

Because we determine to get around in the world as unscathed as possible, we layer our personality with various masks to protect our authentic selves from any form of harm that will leave us feeling rejected, misunderstood, shamed, lonely.  We become enslaved to our defenses and feel naked without them.

Ian Morgan Cron sums it up well, "Made up of innate qualities, coping strategies, conditioned reflexes and defense mechanisms, among lots of other things, our personality helps us know and do what we sense is required to please our parents, to fit in and relate well to our friends, to satisfy the expectations of our culture and to get our basic needs met...[Our adapative strategies] get triggered so predictably, so often and so automatically that we can't tell where they end and our true nature begins." 

“The line of truth and facade becomes so blurry. Over time, we lose ourselves and don’t recognize the person staring back at us in the mirror.”

These masks are quite successful at keeping us well guarded from painful relational interactions so we continue to rely on them. So much so that we forget they are masks and assume they are us. The line of truth and facade becomes so blurry. And who we are actually gets buried underneath the layers. Over time, we lose ourselves and don't recognize the person staring back at us in the mirror. 

This is a sad and sobering consequence. To not know one's self is truly a tragedy because you cannot be known and if you cannot be known, you cannot be loved wholly. We'll continue this ongoing conversation but I want to leave you with this beautiful exchange from The Velveteen Rabbit. May we all learn to have the courage to be made real. 

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?" 

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real." 

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit. 

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt." 

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?" 

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand." 

"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. But the Skin Horse only smiled. 

"The Boy's Uncle made me Real," he said. "That was a great many years ago; but once you are Real you can't become unreal again. It lasts for always.” 

“May we all learn to have the courage to be made real. ”

A Blessing, Finding Good in Pain

Painful as it may be, a significant emotional event can be the catalyst for choosing a direction that serves us- and those around us- more effectively. Look for the learning.

                                                                            -Louisa May Alcott

Hygge it out

I know I'm late to the hygge game. My apologies. While there isn't an exact translation in English, as best as authors can explain, the Danish word means feeling cozy, "like you've gotten a hug, just without the physical touch" (Meik Wiking, The Little Book of Hygge), or "an appreciation of the simple pleasures in life" (Signe Johansen, How to Hygge). 

The qualities that define hygge are simplicity, happiness, balance, beauty and quiet. Along the way we've decided that the pursuit of hygge is the pathway towards happiness. 

Happiness has become a barometer of how well we're doing at life. If this is true, the majority of Americans are failing. The World Happiness Report ranks the U.S. at 19th among the 34 countries measured. This would make one think the appropriate step is to find ways to curate more happiness in one's life.

But what if the point is not to secure individual happiness? What if happiness is actually the source of the problem?

In an interview for Scientific American, Emily Esfahani Smith explains, "The happiness frenzy distracts people from what really matters, which is leading a meaningful life. Human beings have a need for meaning. We’re creatures that seek meaning, make meaning, and yearn for meaning. The question is—how can we lead a meaningful life? The route to meaning lies in connecting and contributing to something bigger than yourself—and not in gratifying yourself and focusing on what you, yourself, need and want, as the happiness industry encourages us to do.”

To be clear, Esfahani Smith "[doesn’t] think there’s anything wrong with feeling happy, but [she] think[s] that setting happiness as your goal and relentlessly chasing it can lead to problems."

“Because so many of us are struggling to understand our ‘why’, I think we’re turning to false substitues for meaning.”

— Emily Esfahani Smith

She expounds on those problems. "Research shows that there are millions of people who are unsure of what makes their lives meaningful—and that rates of suicide, depression, anxiety, loneliness, and drug addiction have been rising for decades. Because so many of us are struggling to understand our ‘why,’ I think we’re turning to false substitutes for meaning—like technology and the pursuit of happiness—to fill our existential vacuum."

We, as a culture, are restless, overloaded, consistently battle FOMO and consume to fill what is empty. Esfahani Smith finds that meaning evades us because we deny ourselves moments of reflection. It is difficult to reflect when you're constantly taking in and consuming. 

If reflection leads to meaning and meaning gives my life purpose, how does one acquire meaning? A requirement for a meaningful life is "being reflective, being present and aware of others" and this occurs through storytelling. Esfahani Smith explains, "Storytelling is the act of taking our disparate experiences and weaving them into a coherent whole—a narrative. Psychologists say that one of the building blocks of a meaningful life is coherence or comprehension. That means that people leading meaningful lives don’t conceive of their experiences as random and disconnected. They have worked hard to understand how their experiences fit together into a narrative that explains who they are how they got to be that way."

The concept of hygge is ultimately to be intentional towards giving and finding spaces to discover your narrative. Many people live disparate stories and it's reflected in their chaotic, busy and noisy comings and goings. Taking the time to sit to make meaning of one's experiences can lead to a life of simplicity, happiness, balance, beauty and quiet. In a culture that praises busyness, you must fight to have moments of togetherness, reflection, and quiet. Often times and for many people, this happens sitting across from a counselor who empathizes, supports, and holds your process as you seek to make sense of it.

And as you learn and grow to reflect and become a storyteller, perhaps meaning making will coincide with Fike (Swedish word for sitting down for coffee and cake).

“How will you create daily rhythms of reflection in your life?”

A Blessing, Acceptance

The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves, the resolution not to twist them to fit our own image. If in loving them we do not love what they are, but only their potential likeness to ourselves, then we do not love them: we only love the reflection of ourselves we find in them. 

                                                                                      -Thomas Merton

Happy Happy, Joy Joy

I recently read an article by a journalist who tracked her happiness for a year in an effort to see what motivates her. She did this in order to incorporate more of these happy generating things into her life. That's smart...science really is relevant. I appreciated her intentionality to document and track because it can be easy to minimize everyday simple pleasures.  As an anxious culture, we rarely sit in the here-and-now. This reality contributes to our difficulty to be presently engaged with ourselves and others (and I've already noted the actual health risks in a previous blog post). There is something to be said about taking time to capture the various here-and-now moments, collecting them, and reflecting on them. This benefits us by adding a level of conscious awareness. This is important if we want to lead fulfilled lives. 

While I have not kept an actual jar (though I like this idea), I do keep a monthly account of things that were particularly special and meaningful to me, from coffee with a friend, trying a new restaurant, a fun date, or getting an interview for a dream job. Even if there might have been something sad or stressful, I'll jot down the flowers a friend sent or the text messages that blew up my phone to comfort me. These are things I want to remember and be thankful for; it reorients me back to what I have in front of me in this given moment in time. My perspective shifts from what I lack to what has been given.

At the end of the year, I look back on each month and reflect on different things that were highlighted and otherwise would have forgotten. Because I've written it down, I can remember the great weather the day my friend and I walked Town Lake and the funny anecdote she told. It's a form of journaling that informs me of things that I value and give my time and attention. Because there are often repeated themes each month, I can be more diligent in how I choose to spend my time and focus. I can gauge how well I am doing at incorporating people and experiences that contribute to my overall mental and emotional health. Was this month particularly stressful or rejuvenating? The answer can be correlated to what did or did not make the list. This awareness reminds me I'm responsible for my own self-care and can take active steps to lessen my anxiety and stress simply by initiating with a friend to go for a walk or have coffee. While life will still be stressful, I do not have to feel helpless by those events or situations. I can take ownership of what I can change, what is within my jurisdiction and sometimes, that's a step in the right direction.

What are things that would make your jar/list? 

A Blessing, Restore

One day we will dance with no restraint, and we will love with no fear. For when the King returns, it will be as though our pain was but a dream and our hope is the only reality we know.                                                                                                                                   -T.B. LaBerge

Inside 'Inside Out'

A few years ago, Pixar knocked it out of the park (yet again) with Inside Out. This special film creatively depicted the significant role our emotions play in our day to day interactions with the world. It showed that each emotion is necessary and vital. Even more impactful, the film discussed the importance of grieving our losses. 

“[We have] to have this full complement of emotions to develop. I think we all need to remember that. This is a weakness in Western culture and the United States. You need sadness, you need anger, you need fear.”

— Dr. Dacher Keltner

Dacher Keltner, leading scientist in the study of emotions and a professor at the University of California-Berkeley, was one of the psychologists who served as a consultant for Pixar's Inside Out. He shared in a PacificStandard magazine interview with J. Wesley Judd, "Well, I think that the film really got a couple of big ideas about emotions right. One, [emotions] are really critical to how we look at the world — our perception and our attention and our memories and our judgment. They guide us in our handling of really important life circumstances, like moves and developmental changes...People in different traditions like to refer to emotions with a social idiom or a grammar of social interactions. Emotions are the structure, the substance, of our interactions with other people. If I’m falling in love with somebody, everything that I do in that euphoria of love — buying flowers, reciting poetry, touching the individual’s hair — it’s textured by the feeling, and it sets up these patterns of how we relate to each other. Those scenes in particular with Riley’s fights with parents and running away and coming back are all about sadness. That’s what it really got right. Emotions shape how we relate to other people."

One thing I personally and professionally appreciated about the film was its portrayal of Sadness. The film normalized an emotion often discarded because it is uncomfortable and is often a response to a loss. Often times, people will come into my office struggling with their sadness. Their sadness confuses them and they want to ostracize or minimize it. But it's a real emotion and true to the human experience.

Keltner and his colleague, Paul Ekman, professor emeritus of psychology at the University of California, San Francisco, wrote a New York Times article entitled, "The Science of 'Inside Out'" explaining that sadness is a healthy part of emotional development.

Dr. Keltner says, "One of the things I really resonated with is that we have a naive view in the West that happiness is all about the positive stuff. But happiness in a meaningful life is really about the full array of emotions, and finding them in the right place. I think that is a subtext of the movie: The parents want Riley to just be their happy little girl. And she can’t. She has to have this full complement of emotions to develop. I think we all need to remember that. This is a weakness in Western culture and the United States. You need sadness, you need anger, you need fear."

“1. Emotions organize- rather than disrupt- rational thinking.
2. Emotions organize- rather than disrupt- our social lives.”

— Dr. Dacher Keltner

He writes, "The real star of the film is Sadness, for "Inside Out" is a film about loss and what people gain when guided by feelings of sadness."

The articles continues by explaining insights from the science of emotion, "First, emotions organize- rather than disrupt-rational thinking. Traditionally in Western thought, the prevailing view has been that emotions are enemies of rationality and disruptive of cooperative social relations. But the truth is that emotions guide our perceptions of the world, our memories of the past and even our moral judgments of right and wrong, most typically in ways that enable effective responses to the current situation." 

"Second, emotions organize- rather than disrupt- our social lives. Studies have found, for example, that emotions structure (not just color) such disparate social interactions as attachment between parents and children, sibling conflicts, flirtations between young courters and negotiations between rivals." 

""Inside Out" offers a new approach to sadness. Its central insight: Embrace sadness, let it unfold, engage patiently with a preteen's emotional struggles. Sadness will clarify what has been lost (childhood) and move the family toward what is to be gained: the foundations of new identities, for children and parents alike."

Sadness purposefully contributes something beautiful to life. Keltner explains the "vital function of Sadness" is to guide the main character "to recognize the changes she is going through and what she has lost, which sets the stage for her to develop new facets of her identity." 

As a counselor, I want to help clients become acquainted with their sadness, their grief, by identifying and acknowledging their loss and its affect. In doing so, over time, their grief can add new textures and significant meaning to their lives. There is strength in the sorrow and beauty in the tears.

“Sadness can be one of our best teachers. We have much to learn from her. Will we be willing students?”