"On Healing" June 2002

Posted on Mon, June 17, 2002
Experiencing pain, not avoiding it, can help heal
By Dan Gottlieb

The Buddha is believed to have said that life is suffering. Certainly parts of life involve suffering, sometimes terrible suffering. But while life involves suffering, the avoidance of suffering is like death.

Several people have asked me what the survivors and families of victims of the World Trade Center bombings will face now that the official work at ground zero has ended. For all of us, the rescue activity in those first days offered hope that some people would be found alive. When that hope dissipated, families hoped that their loved ones' remains would be found. When that hope was lost, the activity at the site gave the survivors a sense of purpose and community - a place to mourn. Now that the work crews have left, the pain that they once felt was unbearable may just get worse.

That's because the work at ground zero became a national mourning ritual.

Most cultures and religions throughout history have had mourning rituals. Often these are designated periods of grief with guidelines about how to act and what to do. We need ritual because death is so traumatic that we must have help to cope with the pain.

When my father died several months ago, I sat "shiva," a traditional Jewish mourning ritual. For several days I stayed at home surrounded by friends who cared for me and shared stories about my father's life. The pain was great, but being taken care of by my immediate community allowed me to experience my suffering in a safe environment and not worry about my other responsibilities.

When there is a severe trauma to the body, the first thing a doctor does is treat the shock. Mourning rituals are a way of treating emotional shock.

So what happens now that the mourning ritual at ground zero has ended? As anyone who has experienced trauma knows, the first day back to work is often the most painful: The condolence cards have stopped coming and telephone calls to offer support are less frequent; you are expected to return to your daily routine. As the support network slowly dissipates, loved ones are left alone with their pain. They return to routines that appear unchanged, but the people are very different than they were before. In the moment of trauma or loss, the pain is searing.

Many survivors say to themselves: "Yesterday, I was a mother, wife, husband or partner. But who am I now? Yesterday, I went to work as a whole person and although I might look the same to the outside world, today a part of me is missing." We need time and space to find our new identity. The rest of the world, however, expects us to have "accepted it." And yet people look at us differently.

The sad smiles or false compassion often add to our sense of alienation.

They try to say things to make us feel better but only make us feel worse. All of this makes it harder to keep the pain at arm's length.

Sometimes even depression is a way of protecting oneself from the pain. Depression is a way of not feeling. When the suffering is too intense, we bury the feelings inside. But at a cost: irritability, anxiety, substance abuse, insomnia or a variety of other experiences. We bury emotions because they are too painful and overwhelming to face. Eventually, we become fearful of experiencing any pain at all. Carl Jung, the noted psychiatrist, once said: "Neurosis is the avoidance of legitimate suffering." In other words, underneath many of our symptoms is a great deal of pain that has not been experienced.

There is a great deal of pain specifically as a result of unresolved mourning. A death we never really recovered from. A lot of family discord is because people have not mourned the death of their dreams or their expectations of one another. So they argue or feel resentful or get depressed.

Underlying it all is often significant pain that simply has not been experienced.

We live in a culture that does not tolerate severe pain. We spend billions of dollars on medication that makes pain go away quickly, and we judge and criticize those who have trouble moving on when they are in pain. The truth is, when there is trauma or loss, severe pain is inevitable. I was at a funeral a few years ago for a woman I loved. I was in agony, searing pain. I looked skyward and said, "I just can't take any more pain."

The response came back: "Sure you can. You just don't want to."

I know that at times the fear of the pain is far worse than the pain itself. It's easy to believe that if we open the floodgates of pain the outpouring will never stop. But if we keep the water backed up behind them, we will devote our lives to worrying about floodgates.

So, what will happen to the survivors now that the work at ground zero has stopped? We don't know. They may experience unfathomable pain, loneliness and emptiness. They may feel this off and on for the rest of their lives.

Most who have experienced dramatic loss feel occasional pain forever.

I hope that when the pain comes, they can simply allow themselves to experience it. True freedom is when we've learned we can tolerate pain - not when we think we've devised ways to avoid it. As awful as pain is, the alternatives are worse.

Posted on Mon, June 03, 2002
Thoughts are just thoughts, not truth
You can examine them, and learn to free yourself from misperceptions.
By Dan Gottlieb

Lately, I have been thinking a good deal about our thinking.

Most of us believe that our thinking is an accurate reflection of our history, our environment and our experience. Therefore, when we have a thought, we value it as truth.

The truth is, thinking is something our minds do, it is not who we are. Most of us don't actually think about our thinking; we just assume it is accurate and let our thoughts guide our lives. Well, the real truth is that emotions, other thoughts, amount of sleep, stress or well-being, and dozens of other factors influence our thoughts.

Some days I ride to work thinking about how lucky I am to have pretty good skills at my chosen career. Other days I ride to work thinking that I am a fraud who has yet to be discovered. Think about that; it is the same person driving the same route thinking about the same career and yet having opposite thoughts.

Our thoughts are so malleable, and yet they often determine whether we are happy, depressed, anxious or peaceful. One day when my father was living, he told me that some days he was so depressed he was ready to leave this Earth. When I asked him what was so painful about those days, he said: "Those are the days when I am thinking about the fact that my wife and daughter are both gone and my son is in a wheelchair." Knowing that those facts were true every day, I asked him about the days when he didn't feel depressed: "Simple," he said: "On those days, I am thinking about other things."

Thoughts can control our behavior, and yet they are quite elusive and changeable. Anyone who has been divorced knows that. A divorced woman recently told me: "When I married my husband I was attracted to him because he was like a rock. Towards the end, he was more like a brick wall!" It sounded to me as if the most profound change in her marriage was her thinking.

Since the psychology of thinking is an integral part of Buddhist philosophy, I contacted Scott McBride, a Buddhist lama, and asked him how these things we call thoughts actually work inside our minds. He said, "Thoughts are shaping your experience all of the time, so that your approach to your self and other people and to all of the things you do in your life are being shaped by what you think from moment to moment. Sometimes those thoughts think one thing and sometimes another thing. Often we are buffeted around by our thoughts and the ensuing feelings that get attached to them."

I know that sometimes my thoughts are very dark, and just take me from problem to problem. I asked McBride if our goal should be to control our thoughts.

"Not to control them," he said, "but to become aware of them and begin to understand what they are and how they have been affecting you."

When asked how, he responded, "To begin with, you can just take a few minutes every morning and begin observing your mind. You can watch the ebb and flow of your thoughts and notice whether they are dark, demanding, happy, etc. It is important that you just observe and not try to change anything. This can be done in a formal meditation practice, or sitting in an easy chair. This will help you begin to develop a relationship with your thoughts. This will also help you look at your thoughts more objectively rather than simply being the subjective 'experiencer' of your thoughts."

It seems to me that despite the fact that these things called thoughts are changeable, fickle, and frequently unreliable, most of us live inside our thoughts and respond to them without question. I wondered whether, if we could sit back and observe our thoughts, they would lose some of their power over us. McBride agreed: "It helps us shift our position relative to our thinking, and we begin to see thoughts in a whole new light. Eventually, we begin to see our thoughts as just fleeting temporary events. This is even true with obsessive thoughts that dominate our attention. If we can look at them carefully, we can see that we keep returning to the same thought dozens of times rather than staying on it. This means that you are also leaving the obsessive thought dozens of times. But understanding this requires being able to carefully and dispassionately observe your thoughts."

He went on to explain that in order to do this effectively, we must be in an environment that is quiet and away from stimulation. We must be willing to make a commitment to sit and literally do nothing for a period of time. This goes against many people's instincts, as most are afraid of their thoughts and feelings and rarely sit quietly for fear of facing their demons. Just sitting inside one's skin might be the most difficult part of the work.

McBride finished our discussion by explaining that if we become able to sit and observe our thoughts, eventually there is a shift in power inside of our minds. We discover that we are not our thoughts. Many start to notice that most of our thoughts are safe and unique to one's individual mind, rather than objective truth.

As the late columnist Darrell Sifford used to conclude many of his columns: "What do you think?"

Saturday is "Change Your Mind Day" sponsored by Tricycle, the independent Buddhist review. Talks and music will be held in Clark Park at 43d Street and Baltimore Avenue from 12:30 to 5:30 p.m. Scott McBride will be a speaker. For information: Dave Christy, 610-287-7749; or James Reis, 215-369-5095.

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