Grief

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From In an Unspoken Voice (2010)

  We seem to be caught in an intractable contradiction here. In the case of loss, it may be that only by moving through (by feeling) grief can we transition toward a tolerance and courage that allow us to love again, while holding the haunting awareness that, inevitably, time may yet again claim our newly beloved for its own. Similarly, a certain amount of anger can help us remove obstacles in our lives, while habitual and explosive anger is almost always corrosive to relationships and the pursuit of what we truly want and need in life. It even frequently puts the pugilist or soldier in a compromised position. To help resolve this apparent paradox, we must first of all understand that emotions (which are reactive) and feelings (which are rooted in fluid internal sensations) are quite different. They are different in their respective functions and in the way they color our lives. From a functional point of view, bodily/sensate feelings are the compass that we use to navigate through life. They permit us to estimate the value of the things to which we must incorporate or adapt. Our attraction to that which sustains us and our avoidance of that which is harmful are the essence of the feeling function. All feelings derive from the ancient precursors of approach and avoidance; they are in differing degrees positive or negative. Sensation-based feelings guide the adaptive response to (e)valuations. Emotions, on the other hand, occur precisely when behavioral adaptations (based on these valuations) have failed! Contrary to what both Darwin and James thought, fear is not what directs escape; nor do we feel fear because we are running from a source of threat. The person who can freely run away from threat does not feel fear. He only feels danger (avoidance) and then experiences the action of running. It is solely when escape is prevented that we experience fear. Likewise, we experience anger when we are unable to strike our enemy or otherwise successfully resolve a conflict. I don’t expect you to accept this proposition as true but only ask you to keep an open inquiring mind. What has happened, you might ask, to our instinctual emotions, as described by Darwin? The answer is simply that they are still there. However, the critical intermediary steps that Darwin failed to recognize were later discovered by the carriers of his legacy, the ethologists.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  Objection 3: Further, “Satisfaction,” as Anselm states (Cur Deus homo i) “consists in giving due honor to God.” But this can be done by other means than penal works. Therefore satisfaction needs not to be made by means of penal works. On the contrary, Gregory says (Hom. in Evang. xx): “It is just that the sinner, by his repentance, should inflict on himself so much the greater suffering, as he has brought greater harm on himself by his sin.” Further, the wound caused by sin should be perfectly healed by satisfaction. Now punishment is the remedy for sins, as the Philosopher says (Ethic. ii, 3). Therefore satisfaction should be made by means of penal works. I answer that, As stated above ([4857]Q[12], A[3]), satisfaction regards both the past offense, for which compensation is made by its means, and also future sin wherefrom we are preserved thereby: and in both respects satisfaction needs to be made by means of penal works. For compensation for an offense implies equality, which must needs be between the offender and the person whom he offends. Now equalization in human justice consists in taking away from one that which he has too much of, and giving it to the person from whom something has been taken. And, although nothing can be taken away from God, so far as He is concerned, yet the sinner, for his part, deprives Him of something by sinning as stated above ([4858]Q[12], AA[3],4). Consequently, in order that compensation be made, something by way of satisfaction that may conduce to the glory of God must be taken away from the sinner. Now a good work, as such, does not deprive the agent of anything, but perfects him: so that the deprivation cannot be effected by a good work unless it be penal. Therefore, in order that a work be satisfactory it needs to be good that it may conduce to God’s honor, and it must be penal, so that something may be taken away from the sinner thereby. Again punishment preserves from future sin, because a man does not easily fall back into sin when he has had experience of the punishment. Wherefore, according to the Philosopher (Ethic. ii, 3) punishments are medicinal. Reply to Objection 1: Though God does not delight in our punishments as such, yet He does, in so far as they are just, and thus they can be satisfactory.

• From In an Unspoken Voice (2010)

  They were designed to alleviate the boy’s uncertainty and terror. It worked. However, the words alone would not have sufficed without what was obvious in the body language, presence and tone of the female FBI agent. She either instinctively knew (and/or was perhaps coached) how to hold Elian only as tightly as was necessary to protect him but loosely enough so that he wouldn’t feel trapped. With a very gentle rocking, brief eye contact and a gentle calm equipoise, she spoke—with one voice—to Elian’s reptilian, emotional and frontal brain, all at the same time. This unity of voice and holding most likely helped to prevent excessive traumatization and scarring to this child’s delicate and vulnerable psyche. In different ways and in various forms, this is what good trauma therapy does, as we saw in Chapter 8. Some years ago, I witnessed another example of the instinctive use of human touch with soothing words to ameliorate suffering. I was in the Copenhagen flat of my friend, Inger Agger. Inger had been the chief of psychosocial services for the European Union during the carnage in the former Yugoslavia and was no stranger to trauma and humanitarian catastrophe. So, when the BBC World News, which was on in the background, announced coverage of the East Timor conflagration, we turned to see images of refugees who were clearly dazed and disoriented as they wandered aimlessly into a refugee camp. Posted at the entrance to the camp were a group of rotund Portuguese nuns dressed in white habits. It was clear to both Inger and me that the alert nuns were instinctively scanning and “triaging” for the refugees, particularly children, who were the most disoriented and in shock. The nun closest to that person would move swiftly, though noninvasively, to that dazed individual and take him into her arms. We watched, with tears streaming down our faces, as the nuns gently held and rocked each one, seemingly whispering something into their ears. And we imagined what they might have been saying—in all likelihood something similar to what the FBI agent had told Elian. However, in stark contrast to what these images were portraying, the BBC commentator pronounced that “these unfortunate souls would be scarred for life,” implying that they would be sentenced to live forever with their traumatic experience. He was missing the point graphically being made by the body language of the nuns and the refugees who were fortunate enough to be enfolded in the goodness of these compassionate women. This powerful scene illustrates just what it takes to help people thaw, come out of shock and return to life—to set them on their journey of recovering and coping with their misfortune. The work of my nonprofit organization, the Foundation for Human Enrichment, whose volunteers responded in the aftermath of the devastating tsunami in Southeast Asia and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the United States, was a more immediate and personal example.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  I answer that, Habit comes between power and act: and since the removal of what precedes entails the removal of what follows, but not conversely, the removal of the habit ensues from the removal of the power to act, but not from the removal of the act. And because removal of the matter entails the removal of the act, since there can be no act without the matter into which it passes, hence the habit of a virtue is possible in one for whom the matter is not available, for the reason that it can be available, so that the habit can proceed to its act—thus a poor man can have the habit of magnificence, but not the act, because he is not possessed of great wealth which is the matter of magnificence, but he can be possessed thereof. Reply to Objection 1: Although the innocent have committed no sin, nevertheless they can, so that they are competent to have the habit of penance. Yet this habit can never proceed to its act, except perhaps with regard to their venial sins, because mortal sins destroy the habit. Nevertheless it is not without its purpose, because it is a perfection of the natural power. Reply to Objection 2: Although they deserve no punishment actually, yet it is possible for something to be in them for which they would deserve to be punished. Reply to Objection 3: So long as the power to sin remains, there would be room for vindictive justice as to the habit, though not as to the act, if there were no actual sins. Whether the saints in glory have penance?Objection 1: It would seem that the saints in glory have not penance. For, as Gregory says (Moral. iv), “the blessed remember their sins, even as we, without grief, remember our griefs after we have been healed.” But penance is grief of the heart. Therefore the saints in heaven have not penance. Objection 2: Further, the saints in heaven are conformed to Christ. But there was no penance in Christ, since there was no faith which is the principle of penance. Therefore there will be no penance in the saints in heaven. Objection 3: Further, a habit is useless if it is not reduced to its act. But the saints in heaven will not repent actually, because, if they did, there would be something in them against their wish. Therefore the habit of penance will not be in them. Objection 4: On the other hand, penance is a part of justice. But justice is “perpetual and immortal” (Wis. 1:15), and will remain in heaven. Therefore penance will also.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  Reply to Objection 2: Some say that the boy of whom Gregory tells this story was not lost, and that he did not sin mortally; and that this vision was for the purpose of making the father sorrowful, for he had sinned in the boy through failing to correct him. But this is contrary to the express intention of Gregory, who says (Dial. iv) that “the boy’s father having neglected the soul of his little son, fostered no little sinner for the flames of hell.” Consequently it must be said that for a mortal sin it is sufficient to give consent to something present, whereas in a betrothal the consent is to something future; and greater discretion of reason is required for looking to the future than for consenting to one present act. Wherefore a man can sin mortally before he can bind himself to a future obligation. Reply to Objection 3: Regarding the age for the marriage contract a disposition is required not only on the part of the use of reason, but also on the part of the body, in that it is necessary to be of an age adapted to procreation. And since a girl becomes apt for the act of procreation in her twelfth year, and a boy at the end of his second seven years, as the Philosopher says (De Hist. Anim. vii), whereas the age is the same in both for attaining the use of reason which is the sole condition for betrothal, hence it is that the one age is assigned for both as regards betrothal, but not as regards marriage. Reply to Objection 4: This agreeableness in regard to boys under the age of seven does not result from the perfect use of reason, since they are not as yet possessed of complete self-control; it results rather from the movement of nature than from any process of reason. Consequently, this agreeableness does not suffice for contracting a betrothal. Reply to Objection 5: In this case, although the second contract does not amount to marriage, nevertheless the parties show that they ratify their former promise; wherefore the first contract is confirmed by the second. Reply to Objection 6: Those who row a boat act by way of one cause, and consequently what is lacking in one can be supplied by another. But those who make a contract of betrothal act as distinct persons, since a betrothal can only be between two parties; wherefore it is necessary for each to be qualified to contract, and thus the defect of one is an obstacle to their betrothal, nor can it be supplied by the other.

• From Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence (2006)

  In the twenty-five years that Marguerite and Ian have been together, they’ve had periods of total exclusivity and episodes of hurtful infidelity. “When I found out about Marguerite’s affair I was devastated,” Ian explains. “It took me months to realize I was also jealous. Not of her lover, but of her. Here I’d been resisting other women for years. When she came clean, we took stock. We decided to stay together but open the gates.” Marguerite adds, “We’re trying to come up with something that works for us. It isn’t meant to be a recipe for others.” When I ask her if her open marriage isn’t painful, she answers, “Sometimes it is. Sometimes it’s not. But monogamy—which we never negotiated, by the way—was painful, too.” Skeptics scoff at these arrangements, and question the level of commitment in these relationships. “I’ve never seen an open marriage last.” “Try it for a while, then get back to me.” “It’s selfish.” “Self-indulgent.” “When you play with fire someone always gets burned.” Yet it’s been my experience that couples who negotiate sexual boundaries, like the ones mentioned above, are no less committed than those who keep the gates closed. In fact, it is their desire to make the relationship stronger that leads them to explore other models of long-term love. Rather than expelling the third from the province of matrimony, they grant it a tourist visa. For these couples, fidelity is defined not by sexual exclusivity but by the strength of their commitment. The boundaries aren’t physical but emotional. The primacy of the couple remains paramount. The couples stress emotional monogamy as a sine qua non, and from there they make all sorts of sexual allowances. But far from being a hedonistic free-for-all, these relationships have explicit contracts which are renegotiated periodically, as the need arises. Marguerite and Ian emphasize that their arrangement is both clear and flexible. “We have our rules—no ongoing affairs, no lovers in the city where we live, no affairs with mutual friends—and as long as we stick to them things seem to be OK. If we need to renegotiate later, we’ll do that.” It’s interesting to note that although these couples bring a new meaning to the concept of fidelity, they are nonetheless susceptible to betrayal. Trust is crucial in any relationship, and this is no different for those who invite the third into their intimate space. Infidelity lies in breaches of the agreement, in violations of trust. Even though the rules themselves may look very different, they are breakable, and breaking them has equally painful consequences. In this sense, sexually open couples are no different from their monogamous counterparts.

• From Momma and the Meaning of Life (1999)

  Coming to the upstairs window, he stares out and discovers what she has been looking at. He is surprised he has never noticed it before. “The little graveyard where my people are! So small the window frames the whole of it. Not so much larger than a bedroom, is it? There are three stones of slate and one of marble, Broad-shouldered little slabs there in the sunlight On the sidehill. We haven’t to mind those. But I understand: it is not the stones, But the child’s mound———” “Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t,”she cried . With that, the wife slips past him, goes downstairs and turns on him “with such a daunting look,” and heads for the front door. Puzzled, he asks, “Can’t a man speak of his own child he’s lost?” “Not you!” she answers. Nor perhaps can any man, she adds, reaching for her hat. The farmer, asking to be allowed into her grief, continues with these unfortunate words: “I do think, though, you overdo it a little. What was it brought you up to think it the thing To take your mother-loss of a first child So inconsolably—in the face of love. You’d think his memory might be satisfied———” When his wife remains aloof, he exclaims, “God, what a woman! And it’s come to this, / A man can’t speak of his own child that’s dead.” His wife responds that he doesn’t know how to speak, that he has no feelings. She watched him through her window as he briskly dug their son’s grave, “making the gravel leap and leap in air.” And after finishing digging, he went into the kitchen. She remembers, “You could sit there with the stains on your shoes Of the fresh earth from your own baby’s grave And talk about your everyday concerns. You had stood the spade up against the wall Outside there in the entry, for I saw it.” The wife insists that she won’t have grief treated in this fashion. Nor let it be lightly dismissed. “No, from the time when one is sick to death, One is alone, and he dies more alone. Friends make pretense of following to the grave, But before one is in it, their minds are turned And making the best of their way back to life And living people, and things they understand. But the world’s evil. I won’t have grief so If I can change it. Oh, I won’t, I won’t!” The husband responds patronizingly that he knows she will feel better for having said these things. It’s time to end grief, he suggests. “[Your] heart’s gone out of it: Why keep it up?” The poem ends with the wife opening the door to leave. Her husband tries to block her: “Where do you mean to go? First tell me that. I’ll follow and bring you back by force. I will!—” Enthralled, I read the piece straight through, and at the end I had to remind myself of the reason I was reading it.

• From Momma and the Meaning of Life (1999)

  What I’m aware of is that we started with the issue of your not being able to complain, perhaps not feeling you had the right to complain. Your work today has been uncomfortable, but it’s the beginning of real progress. The point is that you have a lot of pain inside, and if you can learn to complain about it and deal with it directly as you’ve done today, you won’t have to express it in indirect ways—for example, through problems with your house, or your legs, perhaps even the feelings about insects on your skin.” Magnolia didn’t answer. She just looked straight at me, her eyes still brimming with tears. “Do you understand what I mean, Magnolia?” “Ah understan’, Doctah. Ah understan’ real good.” She wiped her eyes with a tiny handkerchief. “Ah’m sorry to be bawlin’ so much. Ah didn’t tell you before, maybe Ah should’ve, but tomorrah’s the day mah momma died. One yeah ago tomorrah.” “I know what that feels like, Magnolia, I lost my mother last month.” I surprised myself. Ordinarily I wouldn’t speak so personally to a patient I barely knew. I think I was trying to give her something. But Magnolia didn’t acknowledge my gift. The group began to disperse. The doors opened. Nurses entered to help the patients out. I watched Magnolia scratching away at herself as she was wheeled out. In the discussion following the group meeting, I enjoyed the harvest of my labors. The residents were full of praise. Above all, they were properly impressed by the spectacle of something emerging from what looked like nothing. Despite scant material and little patient motivation, the group had generated considerable interaction: by the meeting’s end, members who for the most part had been oblivious of the existence of other patients on the ward were engaged and concerned with one another. The residents were also impressed by the power of my closing interpretation to Magnolia: that if she were to request help explicitly, she would render obsolete her symptoms, which were symbolic, oblique cries for help . How did you do it? they marveled. At the beginning of the meeting Magnolia seemed so impenetrable. It wasn’t difficult, I told them. Find the right key and it’s possible to open a door to anyone’s suffering. For Magnolia that key had been the appeal to one of her deepest values—her wish to be of service to others. By persuading her that she could help others by allowing them to be helpful to her, I had quickly undermined her resistance. As we spoke, Sarah, the head nurse, poked her head in the door to thank me for coming. “You’ve worked your magic again, Irv. Wanna get your heart warmed? Before you leave, take a peek at the patients having lunch, at all those heads closer together. And what did you do to Dorothy?

• From Momma and the Meaning of Life (1999)

  And then, when she seemed to be making progress in therapy, her twenty-year-old godson—the only child of her cousin, a close lifelong friend—drowned in a boating accident. It was in the midst of her bitterness and despair over this last loss that she dreamed of the wall of bodies. “Keep going, Irene; I’m listening.” “What I mean is, how can you understand me? Your life’s unreal—warm, cozy, innocent. Like this office.” She pointed to my packed bookshelves behind her and to the scarlet Japanese maple blazing just outside the window. “The only thing missing are some chintz cushions, a fireplace, and a crackling wood fire. Your family surrounds you—all in the same town. An unbroken family circle. What can you really know of loss? Do you think you’d handle it any better? Suppose your wife or one of your children was to die right now? How would you do? Even that smug striped shirt of yours—I hate it. Every time you wear it, I wince. I hate what it says!” “What does it say?” “It says, ‘I’ve got all my problems solved. Tell me about yours.’” “You’ve talked about these feelings before. But they have such force today. Why now? And the dream, why do you dream this dream now? ” “I told you I was going to talk to Eric, and yesterday I had dinner with him.” “And?” I prompted her after another of those irritating pauses of hers that implied that I should be able to make the connection between Eric and the dream. She had mentioned this man only once, telling me that his wife had died ten years before and that she had met him at a lecture on bereavement . “And he confirmed everything I’ve been saying. He says you’re dead wrong about my getting through Jack’s death. You don’t get through it. You never get over it. Eric’s got a new wife and a five-year-old daughter, but the wound still bleeds. He talks to his dead wife every day. He understands me. And I’m convinced now that it’s only the people who have been there who can understand. There’s a silent underground society out there—” “Underground society?” I interrupted. “Of people who really know—all the survivors, the bereaved. All this time you’ve been urging me to detach from Jack, to turn toward life, to form a new love—it’s all been a mistake. It’s a mistake of smugness from those like you who have never lost.” “So only the bereaved can treat the bereaved?” “Somebody who’s been through it.” “I’ve been hearing that stuff ever since I entered this field!” I burst out at her. “Only alcoholics can treat alcoholics? Or addicts treat addicts? And do you have to have an eating disorder to treat anorexia, or be depressed or manic to treat affective disorders? How about being schizophrenic to treat schizophrenia?” Irene knew how to press my button.

• From This Boy's Life: A Memoir (1989)

  She got Geoffrey’s number from Princeton information, then calmed me when I panicked at her request for money. “We’ll just make it collect,” she said. I listened to the muffled signal ring through the static. I was quaking. And then I heard his voice. I had not heard it for six years, but I knew it right away. He accepted the call and said, “Hello, Toby.” I tried to say hello back but the word got stuck in my throat. Every time I tried to speak I seized up again. It wasn’t self-pity; it was hearing my brother’s voice and, for the first time in all these years, the sound of my own name. But I couldn’t explain any of this. Geoffrey kept asking me what was wrong, and when I found my voice I told him the first thing that came to mind—that Dwight had hit me. “He hit you! What do you mean, he hit you?” It took me a while to get the story out. The word mustard resists serious treatment, and as I described what had happened I began to fear that Geoffrey would find the episode ridiculous, so I made it sound worse than it had been. Geoffrey listened without interrupting me. Once I was finished he said, “Let me get this straight. He hit you because of a little mustard?” I said that he had. “Where was Mom?” “Working.” Geoffrey was quiet for a moment. When he spoke again he sounded discouraged. “Toby, I don’t know what to say.” “I just thought I’d call,” I said. “Wait a minute,” he said. “He had no right to hit you like that. Has he done it before?” I said he had—“all the time.” “That’s it, then,” Geoffrey said. “You’ve got to get out of there.” I asked if I could come live with him. “No,” he said. “That wouldn’t be possible.” “What about Dad?” “No, you don’t want to live with the old man right now, believe me.” Geoffrey said he had something else in mind, something he’d been planning to mention the next time he wrote. He asked me what the school was like in Chinook. When I told him I went forty miles downriver to the high school in Concrete, he said, “Where?” “Concrete.” “Concrete. Jesus. What are they teaching you?” I listed my courses. Band, shop, algebra, PE, English, civics, and driver’s ed. Geoffrey made unhappy sounds. When he asked about my grades I told him I was getting straight A’s. “That’s good,” he said. “That gives us something to go on. You’re obviously doing as well as you can, and that’s what they’ll be looking for.” Then he told me what he had in mind. He said that his old prep school, Choate, awarded a certain number of scholarships every year. Given the fact that I was earning top grades, he thought I might have a chance at one of these scholarships. It was a long shot, but why not try?

• From Momma and the Meaning of Life (1999)

  Irene told me of the blessed relationship she had enjoyed with her brother, Allen, two years her senior. Through her adolescence he had been the protector, the confidant, the mentor every young girl dreams of. But then, in one screeching moment on a street in Boston, Allen was dead. She told me how the police phoned the small house she shared with college roommates, how every detail of that day was frozen forever in her mind. “I remember everything: the ring of the phone downstairs, my chenille bathrobe with rows of small pink and white tufts, the flopping of my fleece slippers as I went down the steps to the alcove next to the kitchen where the telephone hung on the wall, the wooden banister so smooth to my hand. I remember thinking that the wood had been worn smooth by all the Harvard and Radcliffe undergraduates before me. And then that man’s voice, that stranger trying to be kind as he told me that Allen was dead. I sat for hours staring out the beveled glass of the alcove window. I can still see the rainbow-colored mounds of sooty snow in the side yard.” Countless times during therapy we were to return to the dream of the two texts and the meaning of The Death of Innocence. The loss of her brother marked her for life. Death exploded her innocence forever. Gone were the myths of childhood: justice, predictability, a benevolent deity, a natural order of things, protecting parents, the safety of home. Alone and unshielded against the capriciousness of existence, Irene struggled to attain safety. Allen might have survived, she believed, if he had had the right emergency medical treatment. Medicine beckoned—it offered the only hope of mastery over death, and at Allen’s funeral she suddenly decided to apply to medical school and become a surgeon. Another decision Irene made in the wake of Allen’s death was to have enormous implications for our work in therapy. “I figured out a way to avoid ever getting hurt again: I would never again have such a loss if I never let anyone matter to me.” “How did that decision play out in your life?” “For the next ten years I made no attachments, took no chances. I knew a lot of men, but I broke things off quickly—before they got serious and before I felt anything.” “But then something changed. You married. How did that come about?” “I’ve known Jack since the fourth grade and somehow had always thought he would be the one. Even when he disappeared from my life and married someone else, I knew he’d be back.

• From In an Unspoken Voice (2010)

  Rather it is purged and replaced with terms such as drives, motivations and needs. While instincts are still routinely drawn upon to explain animal behaviors, we have somehow lost sight of how many human behavior patterns (though modifiable) are primal, automatic, universal and predictable. For example, as the World Trade Center towers crashed to the ground, instinctually driven people ran until their feet were bleeding. They ran for their lives like their ancestors who were chased by the predatory cats on the ancient Serengeti. They then regrouped, seeking the safety of their dens and communities, as they walked in an orderly fashion, over bridges leading to each of the five boroughs. When we collapse in grief at the death of a loved one, we share this innate response to loss with the other highly developed mammals. Jane Goodall’s description of the matriarch Flo’s death and the subsequent self-starvation of her young male offspring in the tree above her corpse is one such example. ‡ Yet another comparable instance of a grief response comes to mind with the listless pets we frequently return to after what seemed to us a short weekend away from home. Road rage and sexual fixations are disturbing manifestations of other instincts —in these cases, instincts gone awry. Grief, anger, fear, disgust, lust, mating, nurturing of young and even love (as well as all the action patterns that go with them) are universals among humans. All bear a remarkable resemblance to similar behaviors in mammals. Charles Darwin, more than any other human being, clarified the essential connections between the human and other animal species. Aside from discovering the evolution of form and function, he further recognized the similarities of movements, action patterns, emotions and facial expressions shared by mankind and animals. Darwin’s masterworks addressed the continuity of emotional expressions among mammalian species. He was struck not only by the similarities in physiological and anatomical structures, but also by inborn, instinctive behaviors and emotions across species. In The Descent of Man Darwin writes, Man and the higher animals ... have ... instincts in common. All have the same senses, intuition, sensation, passions, affections and emotions, even the more complex ones such as jealously, suspicion, emulation, gratitude and magnanimity; they practice deceit and are revengeful; they are sometimes susceptible to ridicule, and even have a sense of humor; they feel wonder and curiosity; they possess the same faculties of imitation, attention, deliberation, choice, memory, imagination, the association of ideas, and reason ... though in very different degrees. 113 The omnipresence of instincts dazzles us in mating rituals such as the stunning display of feathers by the male peacock. This provocative announcement is as successful in attracting mates as it is beautiful. These two outcomes are, arguably, one and the same. Most mating rituals begin with an initial phase of “flirting,” followed by a sequence of strutting.

• From Cleanness (2020)

  He seemed pleased by this, he gave a quick bow, at which our toast turned more raucous, Nazdrave , we cried, the Bulgarian toast , Nazdrave . He hopped down from his perch, motioning us to be quiet, We are not drunk Romanians, he said. Then he held the quarter up, looking at it anew, and with a tone of real wonder asked What do I do with this money, which set us laughing again. Keep it, D. said, from the back of our circle where the priest stood too close to her, it means someone in America loves you. Ah, said N., beaming at her, pleased beyond words, and he slid the coin into his breast pocket and cupped his hands over it. I keep it forever, he said. Then the priest said something I didn’t catch, pointing with his bottle, and N. said Yes! The beach! I take you there, and we followed him across the square. I was eager to be festive with these people, to distract myself from the grief I had felt since receiving R.’s message, my own grief and grief at the thought of him alone in his room in Lisbon—though I didn’t know where he was, of course, he had sent his message hours before and might already have recovered from his spasm of regret, who could know. I hung back a bit, as we reached the other side of the square, to look at the structure we were passing through, something like a covered patio between two buildings, while the others were descending the wooden staircase to the sea. There was a set of wooden counters, what looked like a sizeable bar, but all of it was abandoned now, strewn with trash and empty bottles. It must come alive in the season, I thought, though there was a kind of finality to its disuse, it was difficult to imagine that in a few weeks it would be transformed, packed with young people. I felt uneasy, and suddenly I realized I wasn’t alone; a man, who must have been watching us as we passed, was leaning against the wall. He took a long drag from a cigarette, the tip flaring red in the dark, and met my eyes briefly before lowering his gaze. I almost thought he was there to cruise, that maybe this was a place men used, but he had an air of belonging, leaning against the wall, and I decided he must be something like a guard, keeping an eye on the place until it came to life again for the summer.

• From Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence (2006)

  As a therapist, I seek to make each partner more fluent in the language of the other. Laura’s experience has robbed her of the capacity to recognize the body’s vocabulary. Like many women, she battles the age-old repressions of female sexuality that have trapped women in passivity and made us dependent on men to seduce and initiate us into sexuality. Economic and professional independence notwithstanding, Laura remains sexually dependent. She leaves it to Mitch to figure out what she wants. Together, we explore the tortuous conflicts between desire and denial, wanting and not having, gratification and repression. I invite Laura to engage with her fantasies, to own her wanting, and to take responsibility for her sexual fulfillment. I steer her attention to her physical self, and challenge her to break through the vigilance, the guilt, and the disavowal that surround her sexuality. Can she look her mother straight in the eye and still maintain a sense of herself as a sensual being? Can she indulge in her own eroticism and declare the “nice girl” officially void? When I suggest to Mitch and Laura that they’re trapped in a language with too little imagination, an alphabet too limited to contain their erotic life, Mitch bursts into tears. “I’m not angry,” he says of all the times that his frustration has led to mean, hurtful words; “I’m heartbroken.” I ask Laura to just hold him and I leave the room for a few minutes to give them the chance to connect through the purity of physical touch. When I return, they’re practically falling off opposite ends of the couch, a yawning gulf between them. When I ask what happened, they immediately backslide to the tried and true mutual blame that got them here in the first place. “I tried, but he…” “I wouldn’t have if she hadn’t…” I realize that my intervention was more an expression of my own hope than any intention on their part. They weren’t ready. Realizing the futility of any more talk, in the months that followed I tried several different approaches, most of which relied on physical interactions rather than verbal ones. I had them lead each other around the room, trying out different arrangements of leaders and followers: cooperation, resistance, and passivity. I had them fall backward into each other’s waiting arms. I had them stand face-to-face and push against each other with their open hands. I had them mirror each other’s movements. The conversations that followed the games became gradually more revealing, less critical, and even more playful. By giving a physical but nonsexual representation to their emotional impasse, they were able to see their patterns of resistance. “I can let him get close,” Laura admits, “but not too close. I trust him, but only so much. I always hold back, don’t I?”

• From Momma and the Meaning of Life (1999)

  And it is I who tries to force himself between you and your grief? And certainly I who blocks you at the door and tries to force grief medicine down your throat?” Irene nodded as tears gathered in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. It was the first time in her three years of despair that she had wept openly in my presence. I handed her a tissue. And took one for myself. She reached out for my hand. We were back together again. How had we grown so far apart? Looking back, I see that we had a fundamental clash of sensibilities: I an existential rationalist; she a grief-stricken romantic. Perhaps the rift was unavoidable; perhaps our modes of coping with tragedy were intrinsically opposed. How does one best face the brutal existential facts of life? I believe that at bottom Irene felt that there were only two, equally unpalatable, strategies: to adopt some form of denial or to live in intolerably anxious awareness. Wasn’t Cervantes voicing this dilemma through his immortal Don’s question, “Which will you have: wise madness or foolish sanity?” I have a bias that powerfully affects my therapeutic approach: I have never believed that awareness leads to madness, or denial to sanity. I have long regarded denial as the enemy, and I challenge it whenever possible in my therapy and in my personal life. Not only have I attempted to shed all personal illusions that narrow my vision and foster smallness and dependency but I encourage my patients to do the same. I am persuaded that although honest confrontation with one’s existential situation may evoke fear and trembling, it is ultimately healing and enriching. My psychotherapeutic approach is thus epitomized by Thomas Hardy’s comment, “If a way to the Better there be, it exacts a full look at the Worst.” And so, from the very beginning of therapy, I spoke to Irene with the voice of reason. I encouraged her to rehearse with me the events surrounding and following her husband’s death: “How will you learn of his death? “Will you be with him when he dies? “What will you feel? “Whom will you call?” And in the same way, she and I rehearsed his funeral. I told her I would attend the funeral and that if her friends would not linger with her at the graveside, I would be sure to do so. If others were too frightened to hear her macabre thoughts, I would encourage her to speak them to me. I tried to take the terror out of her nightmares. Whenever she moved into irrational realms, I could be counted on to confront her. Consider, for example, her guilt for enjoying herself with another man. She considered any life enjoyment a betrayal of Jack.

• From In an Unspoken Voice (2010)

  Actually, I saw a picture of him walking toward me. He was killed a month after we were married … I think that I never got over it … I couldn’t believe it happened … In a way I still don’t … I dream about Evan a lot. It’s always the same dream. He comes to me; I’m despondent. I ask him why he left me. He doesn’t answer me, but turns his back and walks away. I wake up wanting to cry, my throat is all tight, but I don’t want Henry to know. I feel so terrible; like there’s something wrong with me … I don’t want to cause him any pain.” “Miriam, I’m going to ask you to say something and notice what happens inside when you say the words. But remember these are my words. They might not mean anything to you. I’m only asking you to try them out and then just to notice how your body responds. Try not to think too much about it; just do it. Does that feel OK to you?” I say this not because it is true (or false) but so that the person can observe the effect the sentence has on their body sensations and feelings. She nods. “Yes, that’s OK. I’d like to do something about these feelings, these dreams, if I can.” “Ok, here’s the sentence: ‘I don’t believe it happened; I don’t believe you’re really dead.’ ” The purpose of this is to bring into consciousness the direct body experience of denial so that it can be dealt with. Miriam holds her breath and turns pale; her heart rate drops sharply, from about 80 to 60, indicating that the vagal immobility/shutdown system may have kicked in. “Are you OK, Miriam?” I ask . “Yes … but my guts are queasy and tight … like a cold hard fist … I feel sick again … It’s worse this time … but I think that I can handle it. I’ll tell you if it’s too much.” Wanting to reinforce her developing capacity to assess her capability to handle difficult sensations, I ask her, “What gives you that sense, Miriam, that you can handle it?” “Well, mostly I feel it in my arms and legs again. They still feel strong now, even if they’re shaky.” With her eyes still closed, Miriam starts to tremble visibly. “That’s OK,” I encourage. “Just try and be with it. Know that if you need to, you can open your eyes. OK if I place my foot next to yours?” † “Yes, I would like that … Yes, that feels better.”

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  ORIGEN. Or, because God who had been with them in the cloud by day, and in the pillar of fire by night, (Exod. 13:21.) never after shewed Himself to them in like manner. In Isaiah (Is. 5:7.) the people of the Jews is called the vineyard, and the threats of the householder are against the vineyard; but in the Gospel not the vineyard but the husbandmen are blamed. For perchance in the Gospel the vineyard is the kingdom of God, that is, the doctrine which is contained in holy Scripture; and a man’s blameless life is the fruit of the vineyard. And the letter of Scripture is the hedge set round the vineyard, that the fruits which are hid in it should not be seen by those who are without. The depth of the oracles of God is the winepress of the vineyard, into which such as have profited in the oracles of God pour out their studies like fruit. The tower built therein is the word concerning God Himself, and concerning Christ’s dispensations. This vineyard He committed to husbandmen, that is, to the people that was before us, both priests and laity, and went into a far country, by His departure giving opportunity to the husbandmen. The time of the vintage drawing near may be taken of individuals, and of nations. The first season of life is in infancy, when the vineyard has nought to shew, but that it has in it the vital power. As soon as it comes to be able to speak, then is the time of putting forth buds. And as the child’s soul progresses, so also does the vineyard, that is, the word of God; and after such progress the vineyard brings forth the ripe fruit of love, joy, peace, and the like. Moreover to the nation who received the Law by Moses, the time of fruit draweth near. RABANUS. The season of fruit, He says, not of rent-paying, because this stiff-necked nation brings forth no fruit. CHRYSOSTOM. (non occ. ap. Chrys.) He calls the Prophets servants, who as the Lord’s Priests offer the fruits of the people, and the proofs of their obedience in their works. But they shewed their wickedness not only in refusing the fruits, but in having indignation against those that come to them, as it follows, And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat one, and killed another, and stoned another. JEROME. Beat them, as Jeremiah, killed them, as Isaiah, stoned them, as Naboth and Zacharias, whom they slew between the temple and the altar. PSEUDO-CHRYSOSTOM. At each step of their wickedness the mercy of God was increased, and at each step of the Divine mercy the wickedness of the Jews increased; thus there was a strife between human wickedness and Divine goodness. HILARY. These more than the first who were sent, denote that time, when, after the preaching of single Prophets, a great number was sent forth together.

• From In an Unspoken Voice (2010)

  The intentional use of a mental or physical health practitioner’s own intact heartfelt human expression can be profoundly therapeutic. In spite of the raw dominance of the vagal immobilization and sympathetic arousal systems in suppressing social engagement, the power of human contact to help change another’s internal physiological state (through face-to-face engagement and appropriate touch) should not be underestimated. Thus, as I discussed in Chapter 1, the pediatrician with the kindly face who sat by my side after my auto accident gave me the glimmer of hope I needed at that exact moment in order to go on. The gentle power of the human face to soothe the “savage beast” is portrayed in a film with the revealing title Cast Away. Tom Hanks plays the lead character, Chuck Noland, who is marooned on a remote, uninhabited island as the sole survivor of an airplane crash. Also washed ashore is some of the plane’s cargo, which includes a white volleyball printed with the Wilson brand name. He aptly names the ball “Wilson” and offhandedly adopts it as his mascot.g To his surprise, it begins to take on a life of its own, becoming the confidant for Noland’s innermost thoughts. One day, in a fit of impotent rage, Noland throws the ball into the sea, but then—realizing how deeply he has become attached to Wilson—he dives in to retrieve it. Back on the beach, he affectionately draws childlike facial features65 (eyes, mouth and nose) on the round volleyball.h Wilson now becomes his most intimate companion, sharing his troubled thoughts, deepest yearnings and anguished feelings of loneliness and despair, as well as his joyful triumphs. Noland’s bonding with Wilson is eerily reminiscent of the ethologist Konrad Lorenz’s orphan ducklings and their powerful attachment (imprinting) to a white ball after their mother was removed from their life shortly after their hatching.66 Once they were permanently bonded to the ball as their surrogate mother, they preferred it even to a live, soft, feathery mother duck. Finally, Hanks’s character realizes that the island is apparently outside of any shipping lanes and that he will never be rescued if he remains on it. In his ill-fated attempt to leave on a raft he has made, Wilson is swept away during a fierce storm, and Hanks is inconsolable in his grief. Face-to-face, soul-to-soul contact is a buffer against the raging seas of inner turmoil. It is what helps you calm any emotional turbulence. So, in spite of the vast primal power of the immobilizing and hyperarousal systems, therapists should recognize the power of facial recognition and social engagement in calming their clients, and in meeting people’s deepest emotional needs and motivating many behaviors, both conscious and unconscious. Lest I leave you in the lurch, Noland, at death’s door, is finally rescued. Upon returning home he takes all of the surviving packages and, traveling across the country, delivers them to their rightful owners. Yes, that’s right: face-to-face.

• From Saint Thomas Aquinas Collection (22 Books) (2016)

  Reply to Objection 3: Natural procreation is directed to the production of the species; wherefore anyone in whom the specific nature is not hindered is competent to be able to beget naturally. But adoption is directed to hereditary succession, wherefore those alone are competent to adopt who have the power to dispose of their estate. Consequently one who is not his own master, or who is less than twenty-five years of age, or a woman, cannot adopt anyone, except by special permission of the sovereign. Reply to Objection 4: An inheritance cannot pass to posterity through one who has a perpetual impediment from begetting: hence for this very reason it ought to pass to those who ought to succeed to him by right of relationship; and consequently he cannot adopt, as neither can he beget. Moreover greater is sorrow for children lost than for children one has never had. Wherefore those who are impeded from begetting need no solace for their lack of children as those who have had and have lost them, or could have had them but have them not by reason of some accidental impediment. Reply to Objection 5: Spiritual relationship is contracted through a sacrament whereby the faithful are born again in Christ, in Whom there is no difference between male and female, bondman and free, youth and old age (Gal. 3:28; Col. 3:11). Wherefore anyone can indifferently become another’s godfather. But adoption aims at hereditary succession and a certain subjection of the adopted to the adopter: and it is not fitting that older persons should be subjected to younger in the care of the household. Consequently a younger person cannot adopt an older; but according to law the adopted person must be so much younger than the adopter, that he might have been the child of his natural begetting. Reply to Objection 6: One may lose one’s grandchildren and so forth even as one may lose one’s children. Wherefore since adoption was introduced as a solace for children lost, just as someone may be adopted in place of a child, so may someone be adopted in place of a grandchild and so on. Reply to Objection 7: A relative ought to succeed by right of relationship; and therefore such a person is not competent to be chosen to succeed by adoption. And if a relative, who is not competent to inherit the estate, be adopted, he is adopted not as a relative, but as a stranger lacking the right of succeeding to the adopter’s goods.

• From This Boy's Life: A Memoir (1989)

  perhaps especially the last, made my father fascinating. He had the advantage always enjoyed by the inconstant parent, of not being there to be found imperfect. I could see him as I wanted to see him. I could give him sterling qualities and imagine good reasons, even romantic reasons, why he had taken no interest, why he had never written to me, why he seemed to have forgotten I existed. I made excuses for him long after I should have known better. Then, when I did know better, I resolved to put the fact of his desertion from my mind. I visited him on my way to Vietnam, and then again when I got back, and we became friends. He was no monster—he’d had troubles of his own. Anyway, only crybabies groused about their parents. This way of thinking worked pretty well until my first child was born. He came three weeks early, when I was away from home. The first time I saw him, in the hospital nursery, a nurse was trying to take a blood sample from him. She couldn’t find a vein. She kept jabbing him, and every time the needle went in I felt it myself. My impatience made her so clumsy that another nurse had to take over. When I finally got my hands on him I felt as if I had snatched him from a pack of wolves, and as I held him something hard broke in me, and I knew that I was more alive than I had been before. But at the same time I felt a shadow, a coldness at the edges. It made me uneasy, so I ignored it. I didn’t understand what it was until it came upon me again that night, so sharply I wanted to cry out. It was about my father, ten years dead by then. It was grief and rage, mostly rage, and for days I shook with it when I wasn’t shaking with joy for my son, and for the new life I had been given. But that was still to come. As a boy, I found no fault in my father. I made him out of dreams and memories. One of these memories was of sitting in the kitchen of my stepmother’s beautiful old house in Connecticut, where I had come for a visit, and watching him unload a box full of fireworks onto the table. It was all heavy ordnance, seriously life threatening and illegal. My stepmother was scolding him. She wanted to know what he planned to do with them. He pushed a bunch of cherry bombs over to me and said, “Blow ‘em up, dear, blow ’em up.” I BEGAN TO take a sharp, acquisitive interest in cars after Skipper customized the Ford. As I walked my paper route I took apart the cars I saw and put them back together in more interesting ways, lowered, louvered, dagoed, chopped-and- channeled. I read the used-car advertisements in the papers, comparing prices,