Setbacks
It seems that many of us are like the Japanese holdouts, soldiers, many of whom were discovered in the jungles of Southeast Asia and the Pacific over the decades following the end of World War II in 1945, who, due to their remote locations, had not gotten word that the war was over. The last verified holdout, Private Terou Nakamura, surrendered on the island of Morotai in 1974. We are still fighting the war of our childhood and the bombardment we face is that of the Saboteurs. We originally developed these as tools of survival. In that respect they have served us well. The question today is: `Are they still serving us well?´…
Disconnection
Loss of meaning is yet another widespread social phenomenon and an affliction of the modern workplace. In his latest book, `The Myth of Normal,´ (page 290), Gabor Maté writes that: Just 30% of employees in the US feel engaged at work, according to a 2013 report by Gallup; across 142 countries, the proportion of employees who feel engaged at work is only 13%.
`For most of us, work is a depleting, dispiriting experience, and in some obvious ways, it’s getting worse,´ wrote two leading economic consultants in the New York Times.´ Draw your own conclusions…
Halloween
For our Celtic ancestors, the Festival of Samhain (Halloween) marked the beginning of winter, and it heralded the start of the new year. For many of us, the encroaching darkness brings a shiver, not so much from the cooler temperatures, but more from anticipation of the shorter, colder days and the long, silent nights ahead. The green of the once fresh leaves is giving way to shades of brown, bronze, russet, and red. They will soon have fallen, leaving behind the skeleton-like silhouettes of the majestic crowns they once mantled.
Music
Dad died, the world went dark and, for a time, punk and grunge took over, The Jam, Lou Reed, and Joy Division providing the material for the crest of this wave. Through college and beyond, my tastes mellowed and broadened such that, when asked about my musical tastes today, I reply that I love everything bar operetta and Bavarian umpapa `Volksmusik´…
False Cares
The first half of any human life is about `setting up shop´ in this material world of ours. In my case this consisted of finding and defending my place in the hierarchy of a large extended family, doing my best to `earn´ the physical and emotional attention that young children need as much as they need oxygen, in order to survive…
My Tribe
And the man told how he had been ailing so long and was still waiting to get into the bath first, upon the waters being moved, in order to be healed; but for these thirty-eight years he had been unable to get in first, others always getting into the bath before him. And Jesus saw that he was old and said to him: `Do you wish to get well?´ He said: `I wish to, but I have no one to carry me into the water on time. Some one will always get into the water before me.´ And Jesus said to him: `Awake, take up your bed and walk´. And the sick man took up his bed and walked…
Dance
The ancient Irish had a saying: ‚You don’t give a man a weapon until you’ve taught him how to dance.‘ In other words, a different kind of learning is required before someone can be truly trusted with social power and potent things like weapons. If a man does not know the wounds of his own soul, he can deny not just his own pain, but also be unmoved by the suffering of other people. More than that, he will tend to put his wound onto others. He may only be able to see the wound that secretly troubles him when he forcefully projects it into someone else, in forms of abuse or violence…
High & Dry?
My Victim Saboteur seizes its opportunity, first thing in the morning, when I wake up. `So this is it, this is how you will begin the rest of your days, alone and not mattering´, it whispers into my ear. The ability to identify and intercept that voice, accept, indeed embrace its existence, and recognise it for what it is, namely a phantom with a comprehensible nascency, is key to a sober start to the day…
Defenselessness
At home, there was no vocabulary for the realm of feelings. Doors were slammed, eyes were rolled, the air was constantly filled with emotional static, and, for the most part, the basic childhood needs of my generation went unmet, just as had been the case of many of the children, like my parents, who grew up during World War II…
AMDG
The smell of freshly waxed parquet floors intermingling with the culinary fragrances from the kitchens in the subterranean levels impressed etched itself on my memory, when I had occasion to visit the Jesuits’ offices and rooms on the far side of the incorporated church which divided school classrooms from living quarters…
