Mt 5:27-37
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell.
It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that anyone who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.
Again, you have heard it said that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but carry out the vows you have made to the Lord.’ But I say to you, Do not swear at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is his footstool, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black. Let your word be ‘Yes, Yes’ or ‘No, No’; anything more than this comes from the evil one.”
Read through a hermeneutic of…uh…relaxation, clearly what Jesus is saying is
If thou lookest at thy brother’s wife’s shoes and thou art beset by a grievous envy, in thy heart it is as though thou hast already procured them for yourself by immoral means.
Truly I say to thee, if thou hast possessions too numerous for thee, thou shouldest cast them aside; for it is better for thee to be wanting in possessions than to be thrown into the depths of bankruptcy because of thine excessive desire for them.
Truly I tell you, if thou hast disingenuous intimate relations, thou shouldest cast them away that lack in sincerity; for it is better for thee to lament the loss of thy beloved than to be flung into the abyss of scornfulness and vengeance.
If thou desirest to break up with thy partner, thou shouldest discuss it in the presence of their person, and not send such a missive in the manner of an electronic communication (excepting that thy relationship wast until this moment expressed solely in the manner of electronic communication and through no other means).
However, if thou desertest thy partner, thou art compelling them to alter their status of relationship on Facebook.
If thine ex-partner should engage in a novel relationship following directly from your desertion, thou didst compel them to alter their status of relationship on Facebook, which didst not pass unnoticed amongst thy common acquaintances and shall henceforth affect you also, and that thou didst this by compelling them reveal their status to potential suitors.
It was said of old that thou shalt not tell falsehoods nor make false promises in the name of the Lord. But truly I say to thee, that thou shouldest not embellish thy promises and thy word, nor shall thee secure thy promises by any thing except the value of thine own word; for all things belongeth to the Lord, even thine own self, and thou hast not the power to ransom them against your own word. Speak always only the truth, with clarity and without accessory, for to do otherwise is to succumb to the ways of the devil.
Verily, reader, thou art charged with the task of imparting this missive anon to all thine acquaintances, for it is verily a novel rendering of the words of our Lord.
Aroint with it then.
Also, I think this is a lovely occasion to reprint something you may have already seen:
Why I Hate Proof-texting
I hate proof-texting: that much has been established. Proof-texting is any time someone pulls from the Bible a passage which provides ready-made proof of the position with which they agree – or anytime proof is found that the contrary position is, indeed, incorrect.
I disagree with the practice of proof-texting because it does not acknowledge the Bible's textuality. A text is not simply a bunch of words on paper: it is a living thing, existing to be actively read. There can be no passive reader of a text, because a text is not actualized unless it has been fully engaged; a text cannot live unless it is constantly being read anew, vertically, through all its nuances as a being in relationship with the reader. There is a dynamic quality to a text, a flow, movement, and vibrancy. A text cannot breathe if it is not dynamic, is not vertically engaged, is not inhabited in a genuine quest for deep meaning. The text requires an always-returning, a re-reading, a new engagement which does not regard it as a static, lifeless thing.
When a person proof-texts, the Bible becomes a work, a purely horizontal thing which can be read linearly, a thing which does not admit of multiplicity, a static thing. You can search it for what you want, pull it out of the work – force it, if necessary – and take it home with you, never to return to the work again. You have abandoned the work but, worse yet, you have consumed it! The Bible becomes yet another object for our consumption, a one-dimensional thing without contradiction, tension, or life. The Bible becomes a commodity, bought and sold in the arena of understanding. But there is no real understanding, because the Bible, as text, has not been allowed to express itself, to speak, to be fully that which it is.
The Bible should never be made into a work. That would imply that it, as the word of G-d, is brought to us so that we can eat it, digest it, and throw it away without engaging fully in its complexity. That would imply that the word of G-d is one-dimensional, fundamentally lifeless. The Law, the Gospel, is written on our hearts, and our hearts are alive. A dead thing cannot be grafted onto a living; a static thing cannot bear the chances and changes of a heartbeat.
The word of G-d must be a text. Like an Icon, it is a window through which we enter into relationship with the Divine. In the context of right worship, it becomes alive through our engagement. It is written on our hearts because we do not simply look through it…we enter into being with it, vertically descending in its layers, allowing it to live and move and have its being. Always returning, always exploring, but never demanding, we come close to G-d in engaging the Bible as text. We cannot exploit it, or the richness falls away. We can never withdraw taking our goodies with us, or we lose the fullness to which we are called. G-d wants a relationship, a continual renewal, a continual engagement with His living Truth.
That is why I hate proof-texting: it denies the possibility that G-d speaks once but that I can hear Him twice, that that power belongs to G-d (Ps 62).
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Monday, September 21, 2009
What a beautiful sky with clouds in it
and light clinging to their underneath
like a woman’s frosted slip, or the inside of a dress.
The seasons are starting to creep up
on the warm air and afternoon sun,
autumn trees pretending to be a sunset in the day.
Sweet breeze like music,
like a bird swimming through the air
tossed on every wind in the beautiful sky
with clouds in it.
and light clinging to their underneath
like a woman’s frosted slip, or the inside of a dress.
The seasons are starting to creep up
on the warm air and afternoon sun,
autumn trees pretending to be a sunset in the day.
Sweet breeze like music,
like a bird swimming through the air
tossed on every wind in the beautiful sky
with clouds in it.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Consumption
Before I start, I’d like to say something: I am not a trend whore. By which I mean, I don’t buy things because they’re en vogue. In fact, as a general rule, I avoid wearing anything trendy until it’s been out at least 2 or 3 seasons, even if I already own it. Not that I attempt to purposefully look unfashionable, either – I usually aim for something in between cool/cute and mediocrity (unless I’m in a really bad mood…oh boy). The nicest compliment anyone’s ever given me clothes-wise is “You should be one of those people who dresses celebrities or something. You always look so original and fun, and you make things pretty without spending a lot.” At the time, I was wearing this sleeveless dress I got from Simons for, like, 5$, and converse boots coming to about mid-calf. Those were some great shoes. I had gotten a free shirt at some jeans store which I didn’t love, so I liberated its sleeves and fixed them up so I could cover my arms without putting on a cardigan. The dress had great lines so I didn’t want to break them up with an extra layer of clothing. I know I’m rambling, but that was a really great outfit, trust me. Suffice it to say, it’s clearly been a long time since I put any effort into being creative clothes-wise.
Anyway, I’m not a trend whore. But I’ve been walking by these amazing boots at Browns everyday…they’re those really tall boots that we’ve been seeing on the runway (anyway, I’ve been watching them on the runway, along with a lot of really structured pieces emphasizing the shoulders, shiny material, leather, plaid, some really interesting gathering, and stretch pants - again). Über trendy. But they’re also purple suede. Purple!!!! And they don’t have ridiculous heels on them either (like we’ve also seen on the runway and quite enough of that thankyou). I admit it: I’m infatuated with them. So, today I finally decided to ditch my trend-hating trend in favor of the boots. And besides, they’re eccentric enough to work for me. And although I might pay 5$ for a dress, I’ll spend ‘ridiculous’ amounts of money on shoes: I AM a shoe whore.
They didn’t exactly have my size, which is to be expected, so I didn’t get them. They did have another different-ish kind in this dark purple-blue color that are pretty awesome, but those are pressing my price limit close enough that I’d never think of getting them without active moral support and a second opinion.
While I was there, I decided to walk around to all the shoe stores in the vicinity to check out their boots. They were not super awesome…no purple anywhere *frowny face*. But what struck me the most was the complete lack of customer service anywhere except Browns. Did they think I couldn’t afford their shoes or something? And anyway, shouldn’t you try? I knew that I was willing to drop up to maybe 300$ on sufficiently amazing boots if they were made well and durable, and had a good balance (crucial: bad shoes are not made to naturally fall to the 'center' thereby taking some of the stress off your spine). I can justify the ridiculous price by being able to wear them for the rest of my life. I also knew there’s no way I’d buy anything at a store with crappy service.
It got me thinking: why were they so comfortable ignoring me, ignoring anyone? Is it that they think consumers are so indoctrinated that they’ll be desperate enough to buy their shoes without any convincing at all? What does it mean to turn the business of selling us stuff that we don’t need into a service so important that we have to go to it, rather than the other way around? It’s scary to think we’re a society that will gorge itself so much on consumption that anyone thinks it's okay to purchase something from just anyone – anyone with no investment in you or even in what they’re selling. We buy stuff all the time without ever being aware of why we want it, or where it comes from, or who it’s exploiting. They expect us to have no reflection…enough lack of concerted awareness that we’ll even be interested in things they don’t even bother to try and sell us. If we build it, they will come.
What does all of this mean theologically? It’s fairly self-evident to say that a perverse love for things and acquisition has replaced a love and desire for God in many people’s lives. But what about Christians? What does it say about us? The most dangerous thing about consumer culture is its insidiousness, its infiltration of every aspect of our lives. It runs alongside us, weaving through our lives, an unconscious incorporation of our things into our identities. We might not look at it or think about it, we might believe that things are utterly unimportant, but the truth is we’re all surrounded by this overwhelming cultural desire, we all live our lives in it, and we can’t escape our place in it just by telling ourselves that we’re different or that we’ve escaped it. Because even if we buy the 5$ dress that we think falls outside the clawing grasp of couture, that dress got there after a process in which high fashion gets transmuted down through ready-to-wear designers and retail stores into a variety of pieces incorporating ideas or patterns or materials from some designer’s collection…your original non-fashion dress that you thought nothing about when buying is actually just another element in a giant web of production that ultimately begins with some person telling us what it is they think we should want.
I don’t pretend to have a solution. I just think that we need to be aware that we play a part in a larger consumer reality and that, as Christians, and even as people who may reject the idea of things altogether, we do not stand outside this circle. If we want to see more clearly and perhaps attempt to refocus our society there needs to be some critical thinking about the ideas we live in. Because, frankly, no one group of people can change a social construct by merely shifting their behavior, because that rebellion already implicitly buys into the ideology it rejects; it is that reality that determines what constitutes rebellion. Just like how getting tattoos used to be a way of ‘rebelling’ against the dominant culture actually relied on the ideas of that culture in order to be meaningful, uncritical rejection that isn’t supported by a more sophisticated system of thought can never hope to survive or thrive or be meaningful outside the paradigm it pretends to be escape. Because it's only a juxtaposition, and not a re-thinking.
Having said that, I also found some really great colorful shoes in my long journey…maybe if I can’t find sufficiently amazing boots, I’ll consider those instead.
Anyway, I’m not a trend whore. But I’ve been walking by these amazing boots at Browns everyday…they’re those really tall boots that we’ve been seeing on the runway (anyway, I’ve been watching them on the runway, along with a lot of really structured pieces emphasizing the shoulders, shiny material, leather, plaid, some really interesting gathering, and stretch pants - again). Über trendy. But they’re also purple suede. Purple!!!! And they don’t have ridiculous heels on them either (like we’ve also seen on the runway and quite enough of that thankyou). I admit it: I’m infatuated with them. So, today I finally decided to ditch my trend-hating trend in favor of the boots. And besides, they’re eccentric enough to work for me. And although I might pay 5$ for a dress, I’ll spend ‘ridiculous’ amounts of money on shoes: I AM a shoe whore.
They didn’t exactly have my size, which is to be expected, so I didn’t get them. They did have another different-ish kind in this dark purple-blue color that are pretty awesome, but those are pressing my price limit close enough that I’d never think of getting them without active moral support and a second opinion.
While I was there, I decided to walk around to all the shoe stores in the vicinity to check out their boots. They were not super awesome…no purple anywhere *frowny face*. But what struck me the most was the complete lack of customer service anywhere except Browns. Did they think I couldn’t afford their shoes or something? And anyway, shouldn’t you try? I knew that I was willing to drop up to maybe 300$ on sufficiently amazing boots if they were made well and durable, and had a good balance (crucial: bad shoes are not made to naturally fall to the 'center' thereby taking some of the stress off your spine). I can justify the ridiculous price by being able to wear them for the rest of my life. I also knew there’s no way I’d buy anything at a store with crappy service.
It got me thinking: why were they so comfortable ignoring me, ignoring anyone? Is it that they think consumers are so indoctrinated that they’ll be desperate enough to buy their shoes without any convincing at all? What does it mean to turn the business of selling us stuff that we don’t need into a service so important that we have to go to it, rather than the other way around? It’s scary to think we’re a society that will gorge itself so much on consumption that anyone thinks it's okay to purchase something from just anyone – anyone with no investment in you or even in what they’re selling. We buy stuff all the time without ever being aware of why we want it, or where it comes from, or who it’s exploiting. They expect us to have no reflection…enough lack of concerted awareness that we’ll even be interested in things they don’t even bother to try and sell us. If we build it, they will come.
What does all of this mean theologically? It’s fairly self-evident to say that a perverse love for things and acquisition has replaced a love and desire for God in many people’s lives. But what about Christians? What does it say about us? The most dangerous thing about consumer culture is its insidiousness, its infiltration of every aspect of our lives. It runs alongside us, weaving through our lives, an unconscious incorporation of our things into our identities. We might not look at it or think about it, we might believe that things are utterly unimportant, but the truth is we’re all surrounded by this overwhelming cultural desire, we all live our lives in it, and we can’t escape our place in it just by telling ourselves that we’re different or that we’ve escaped it. Because even if we buy the 5$ dress that we think falls outside the clawing grasp of couture, that dress got there after a process in which high fashion gets transmuted down through ready-to-wear designers and retail stores into a variety of pieces incorporating ideas or patterns or materials from some designer’s collection…your original non-fashion dress that you thought nothing about when buying is actually just another element in a giant web of production that ultimately begins with some person telling us what it is they think we should want.
I don’t pretend to have a solution. I just think that we need to be aware that we play a part in a larger consumer reality and that, as Christians, and even as people who may reject the idea of things altogether, we do not stand outside this circle. If we want to see more clearly and perhaps attempt to refocus our society there needs to be some critical thinking about the ideas we live in. Because, frankly, no one group of people can change a social construct by merely shifting their behavior, because that rebellion already implicitly buys into the ideology it rejects; it is that reality that determines what constitutes rebellion. Just like how getting tattoos used to be a way of ‘rebelling’ against the dominant culture actually relied on the ideas of that culture in order to be meaningful, uncritical rejection that isn’t supported by a more sophisticated system of thought can never hope to survive or thrive or be meaningful outside the paradigm it pretends to be escape. Because it's only a juxtaposition, and not a re-thinking.
Having said that, I also found some really great colorful shoes in my long journey…maybe if I can’t find sufficiently amazing boots, I’ll consider those instead.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Tell It Slant
First, let me apologize for the depressing nature of my blog lately. But, in the absence of church-going, I’ve had to rely on talking about my ‘feelings.’ It’s going well, don’t you think? Except for the complaining all the while. I suppose it’s to be expected that there is a little bit of anguish for each ecstatic instant.
I got back one of my term essays today; I had (finally!) handed it in four months late. Since I’d passed the course, I figured I couldn’t have bombed the paper. Therefore, I was curious to see exactly which part of this thing I’d written was actually acceptable. I was expecting soooo much criticism…but actually my professor was very kind. It was simultaneously good – phew, I can relax – and disappointing – my certainty that the paper was crap was squashed, a ribbon at a time. Which I suppose is also good. I think. It yet remains to see.
Truthfully, I haven’t really liked anything I wrote last year. Well, originally I liked my paper on the Symbolic as a metaphysical reality grounding all possibility of meaning, but then I re-read it and had no idea what I was saying. Well, I mean, I knew what I was saying, but it felt like my knowing was so superficial. I guess that’s the problem with being a theory-whore: in the moment there’s a huge payoff and it feels great and important and intoxicating, but afterward I feel like I’ve woken up next to something I don’t recognize. You should see my Heidegger papers from during my Literature degree. Not my best moments, to be sure. I feel like…not myself, like myself sideways. I feel like…whatever I’ve managed to painfully create has been nothing more that a few disjointed moments of colour on an otherwise blank canvas, soundless as dots on a disc of snow.
Maybe it’s a palimpsest…like the stillness in the air between the heaves of storm.
I don’t know why I care so much about schoolwork; from an outsider’s point of view, and in the long run, it doesn’t really matter. I feel like I’m searching for something, trying to unlock some magical thing that’s going to make me feel better again; that I could not breathe without a key.
I wish I could be more myself again. Everything seems off somehow. It’s like being in a room where everything has been moved an inch out of place. You know something’s wrong, you feel disconcerted, but you can’t quite say why. Myself felt ill and odd…There’s something missing, something empty…I don’t hurt: not exactly. I guess I feel like I’m in the space where pain has an element of blank, where it’s the sense of something…like the ground has shifted where my life had stood. The feet, mechanical, go round…maybe if there is a way to stand still somehow, stop everything just for a little while, your breath has time to straighten.
In other news, I skipped church on Sunday. Again. Definitely not the will of the Inquisitor. I’ve got to find a way to get excited again, so that not everything feels like just one more thing I have to do. There are days when everything feels like a chore, when everything I do is a job set by some sort of boss – even happy things like praying feel like work, all sorts of things…whatever is driving this feeling and brushing my joy away, she sweeps with many-colored brooms. To let you in on a secret: given all my…ahem…medication-induced issues (see above), I should be kind of proud I’m somehow managing to walk around and do all these things while appearing normal. Well, no one’s spontaneously said anything, so I assume I look normal enough. I should be proud, but of course I’m not: that is not the way of me. Of course, after this beautifully incoherent post, I’m sure the mirage of normalcy is fading quickly.
Also, while I’m sitting here thinking about writing this blog, I think I see one of my teachers walk by the door. He’s pretty fuzzy-looking, so I’m not sure. I’m not sitting very far away, either. Yep, my vision is getting even blurrier – a side effect. This is not ideal. This situation is becoming untenable. I can almost see hope flying away into the distance. Hope is the thing with feathers. Not that I can make them out.
I guess I feel like time is running out in my little universe of maintaining my world while simultaneously getting this thing sorted out. It’s been suggested that I take medical leave…but if I break my inertia I’ll never get through this school thing…and, after all, a wounded deer leaps highest. And, since I didn’t fail out of the program, it would be a waste not to press on. I know that if I can just make it through this difficulty, this feeling of disconnection and distance, of confusion and unclarity, of alienation…I feel that darkness is about to pass.
I just really hope I’m doing the right thing. Aside from this marginal blog, I haven’t talked seriously about this whole disaster with anyone. That really wouldn’t be fair. I want to be a happykat, not a sourpuss always caterwauling away about my life…issues. I really hope that going forward as planned, according to schedule, isn’t going to be a bad idea leading to some sort of burnout or something. While I absolutely don’t want to give up, being the most stubborn person in the world, I don’t want to make it worse because I could not stop
I got back one of my term essays today; I had (finally!) handed it in four months late. Since I’d passed the course, I figured I couldn’t have bombed the paper. Therefore, I was curious to see exactly which part of this thing I’d written was actually acceptable. I was expecting soooo much criticism…but actually my professor was very kind. It was simultaneously good – phew, I can relax – and disappointing – my certainty that the paper was crap was squashed, a ribbon at a time. Which I suppose is also good. I think. It yet remains to see.
Truthfully, I haven’t really liked anything I wrote last year. Well, originally I liked my paper on the Symbolic as a metaphysical reality grounding all possibility of meaning, but then I re-read it and had no idea what I was saying. Well, I mean, I knew what I was saying, but it felt like my knowing was so superficial. I guess that’s the problem with being a theory-whore: in the moment there’s a huge payoff and it feels great and important and intoxicating, but afterward I feel like I’ve woken up next to something I don’t recognize. You should see my Heidegger papers from during my Literature degree. Not my best moments, to be sure. I feel like…not myself, like myself sideways. I feel like…whatever I’ve managed to painfully create has been nothing more that a few disjointed moments of colour on an otherwise blank canvas, soundless as dots on a disc of snow.
Maybe it’s a palimpsest…like the stillness in the air between the heaves of storm.
I don’t know why I care so much about schoolwork; from an outsider’s point of view, and in the long run, it doesn’t really matter. I feel like I’m searching for something, trying to unlock some magical thing that’s going to make me feel better again; that I could not breathe without a key.
I wish I could be more myself again. Everything seems off somehow. It’s like being in a room where everything has been moved an inch out of place. You know something’s wrong, you feel disconcerted, but you can’t quite say why. Myself felt ill and odd…There’s something missing, something empty…I don’t hurt: not exactly. I guess I feel like I’m in the space where pain has an element of blank, where it’s the sense of something…like the ground has shifted where my life had stood. The feet, mechanical, go round…maybe if there is a way to stand still somehow, stop everything just for a little while, your breath has time to straighten.
In other news, I skipped church on Sunday. Again. Definitely not the will of the Inquisitor. I’ve got to find a way to get excited again, so that not everything feels like just one more thing I have to do. There are days when everything feels like a chore, when everything I do is a job set by some sort of boss – even happy things like praying feel like work, all sorts of things…whatever is driving this feeling and brushing my joy away, she sweeps with many-colored brooms. To let you in on a secret: given all my…ahem…medication-induced issues (see above), I should be kind of proud I’m somehow managing to walk around and do all these things while appearing normal. Well, no one’s spontaneously said anything, so I assume I look normal enough. I should be proud, but of course I’m not: that is not the way of me. Of course, after this beautifully incoherent post, I’m sure the mirage of normalcy is fading quickly.
Also, while I’m sitting here thinking about writing this blog, I think I see one of my teachers walk by the door. He’s pretty fuzzy-looking, so I’m not sure. I’m not sitting very far away, either. Yep, my vision is getting even blurrier – a side effect. This is not ideal. This situation is becoming untenable. I can almost see hope flying away into the distance. Hope is the thing with feathers. Not that I can make them out.
I guess I feel like time is running out in my little universe of maintaining my world while simultaneously getting this thing sorted out. It’s been suggested that I take medical leave…but if I break my inertia I’ll never get through this school thing…and, after all, a wounded deer leaps highest. And, since I didn’t fail out of the program, it would be a waste not to press on. I know that if I can just make it through this difficulty, this feeling of disconnection and distance, of confusion and unclarity, of alienation…I feel that darkness is about to pass.
I just really hope I’m doing the right thing. Aside from this marginal blog, I haven’t talked seriously about this whole disaster with anyone. That really wouldn’t be fair. I want to be a happykat, not a sourpuss always caterwauling away about my life…issues. I really hope that going forward as planned, according to schedule, isn’t going to be a bad idea leading to some sort of burnout or something. While I absolutely don’t want to give up, being the most stubborn person in the world, I don’t want to make it worse because I could not stop
Friday, September 4, 2009
Am I Wearing Shoes?
As a wise person once said to me, “You know you’re tired when you have to check if you have shoes on.” This is totally true. One time a few years ago, I accidentally went downtown without any shoes on. It was summer. The train security people looked at me like I was crazy.
I like ‘crazy’ slogans. “It’s such a nice day. I think I’ll skip my medications.” “I smile because I have no idea what’s going on.” “Some days it’s not even worth chewing through the restraints.” “I do what the voices in my head tell me.”
Ah, slogans: where would we be without them?
I wish I could plan my entire day beginning in the afternoon – for some reason I always feel better as the day goes by. Right now, I’m almost chipper. So much so that I’m absolutely certain I’m not wearing shoes.
But, back to my ‘real’ subject. Which I haven’t introduced yet. This morning, the people I was hanging out with were talking about hearing voices. Someone was remarking that some schizophrenics speak slowly because they have trouble hearing you and gathering their thoughts because of all the voices.
That got me to thinking about how it is we as a culture perceive certain types of psychiatric disorder, even just the phenomenon of people hearing voices. A cacophony such that one has trouble making out individual voices, and such that it’s almost impossible to pay attention to anything else, is sometimes a symptom of schizophrenia, but it’s hardly the only manifestation voices can take. People can hear malevolent voices or helpful voices, voices that keep up a running commentary on your life, voices that tell you to do certain things, voices that only show up occasionally. Voices that tell you the winning number on a lottery ticket. Not everyone thinks their voices are pathological, and at the same time not everyone can cope with them. It’s so easy to believe we know what it means to hear voices, but really there are manifold ways of experiencing the phenomenon, and it’s so hard to get inside the feeling of another person’s inner world.
It reminds me of people thinking that “Beautiful Mind” is an accurate portrayal of schizophrenia, even though his hallucinations are so complex and enduring. In reality, it’s extremely rare to have multisensory hallucinations, and the only time visual hallucinations are common to psychotic experiences is when those experiences are triggered by drugs such as LSD and mescaline. Let me put it this way: if you see a vision of the Blessed Virgin and she speaks to you, you’re probably not hallucinating. Bonus points if she gives you a cloak with her image on it and that happens to be full of roses.
Part of the discussion turned on the remark that if you did hear a voice, you’d be terrified. And then to think about what Moses felt when God spoke to him. On the one hand, it’s natural to be fearful when confronted by God, and it’s natural to be scared of what you don’t understand. But, on the other hand, it can also be comforting and even thrilling to hear voices. We’ve forgotten, I think, that the phenomenon of hearing voices is deeply and fundamentally linked with what it means to be human, a phenomenon that has occurred throughout history and over the whole world. We pathologize so much of what we don’t understand…sometimes I wonder if it’s not a form of jealousy, of secret longing to have an experience that can be so transformative. I think we have to be more careful, more selective, and rely on people’s own sense of their experiences before we decide what’s normal. If a person likes their voices, who are we to call them a symptom of illness? After all, many of our Saints heard voices. But if a person is deeply disturbed by them, we are we to say they’re part of a metaphysical reality?
On this subject I have no personal experience to share, because I’ve never heard voices, so I can’t tell you what it’s like, and I don’t think anyone can ever really imagine a phenomenon so personal. But I do think it’s worth taking the time to realize that we don’t always know what we’re talking about, not really, even if we ‘know’ everything there is to know about it. It’s especially worth me taking the time, since I so often think I know everything.
I like ‘crazy’ slogans. “It’s such a nice day. I think I’ll skip my medications.” “I smile because I have no idea what’s going on.” “Some days it’s not even worth chewing through the restraints.” “I do what the voices in my head tell me.”
Ah, slogans: where would we be without them?
I wish I could plan my entire day beginning in the afternoon – for some reason I always feel better as the day goes by. Right now, I’m almost chipper. So much so that I’m absolutely certain I’m not wearing shoes.
But, back to my ‘real’ subject. Which I haven’t introduced yet. This morning, the people I was hanging out with were talking about hearing voices. Someone was remarking that some schizophrenics speak slowly because they have trouble hearing you and gathering their thoughts because of all the voices.
That got me to thinking about how it is we as a culture perceive certain types of psychiatric disorder, even just the phenomenon of people hearing voices. A cacophony such that one has trouble making out individual voices, and such that it’s almost impossible to pay attention to anything else, is sometimes a symptom of schizophrenia, but it’s hardly the only manifestation voices can take. People can hear malevolent voices or helpful voices, voices that keep up a running commentary on your life, voices that tell you to do certain things, voices that only show up occasionally. Voices that tell you the winning number on a lottery ticket. Not everyone thinks their voices are pathological, and at the same time not everyone can cope with them. It’s so easy to believe we know what it means to hear voices, but really there are manifold ways of experiencing the phenomenon, and it’s so hard to get inside the feeling of another person’s inner world.
It reminds me of people thinking that “Beautiful Mind” is an accurate portrayal of schizophrenia, even though his hallucinations are so complex and enduring. In reality, it’s extremely rare to have multisensory hallucinations, and the only time visual hallucinations are common to psychotic experiences is when those experiences are triggered by drugs such as LSD and mescaline. Let me put it this way: if you see a vision of the Blessed Virgin and she speaks to you, you’re probably not hallucinating. Bonus points if she gives you a cloak with her image on it and that happens to be full of roses.
Part of the discussion turned on the remark that if you did hear a voice, you’d be terrified. And then to think about what Moses felt when God spoke to him. On the one hand, it’s natural to be fearful when confronted by God, and it’s natural to be scared of what you don’t understand. But, on the other hand, it can also be comforting and even thrilling to hear voices. We’ve forgotten, I think, that the phenomenon of hearing voices is deeply and fundamentally linked with what it means to be human, a phenomenon that has occurred throughout history and over the whole world. We pathologize so much of what we don’t understand…sometimes I wonder if it’s not a form of jealousy, of secret longing to have an experience that can be so transformative. I think we have to be more careful, more selective, and rely on people’s own sense of their experiences before we decide what’s normal. If a person likes their voices, who are we to call them a symptom of illness? After all, many of our Saints heard voices. But if a person is deeply disturbed by them, we are we to say they’re part of a metaphysical reality?
On this subject I have no personal experience to share, because I’ve never heard voices, so I can’t tell you what it’s like, and I don’t think anyone can ever really imagine a phenomenon so personal. But I do think it’s worth taking the time to realize that we don’t always know what we’re talking about, not really, even if we ‘know’ everything there is to know about it. It’s especially worth me taking the time, since I so often think I know everything.
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Welcome Home Outcast
You can tell it’s not summer anymore when you go back to the school chapel for Wednesday Mass. What you can’t tell is why. It feels a bit odd actually, maybe because family members keep asking me when I’m going to stop going to that chapel. I admit that I do sometimes worry I’ve outstayed my welcome: after all, it’s not exactly normal to finish your theological program and keep coming back for such a long time. Especially since I was never affiliated with the college and so never actually contribute to it. It’s almost like I break into a seamless, uninterrupted rhythm. It feels a bit like I’m intruding, which for some reason I feel more strongly than usual. The weird thing is that, at the same time, I feel so happy to see my friends again.
The relief that follows a long absence…there’s nothing quite like that; for a moment when I entered the chapel and picked up those familiar books, I felt that same happiness, that same lightheartedness, that same joy. I dunno, it’s like…for an instant thinking ‘Oh, so that’s what it’s like being where I’m supposed to be.’ Then I felt like usual. But it was still pretty awesome!
It’s not summer anymore because something has changed. I’m hoping that something is me. Maybe chapel, like, gave me a little electroshock or something. Maybe now I’ll get off my butt and go back to church, which I’ve been skipping prodigiously.
I really, really hope that summer’s over, mostly because I’ve been, well, sick all summer. I really, really hope that coming back to this place and centering my life around communal worship will somehow put me right. I hope the lethargy and oppressive exhaustion are over, that I can start again. I admit it didn’t help this summer that one of my really close friends from my Arts degree decided to ditch me. I mean, I know that sometimes when you’re struggling, especially when it seems you’re not getting better, you can’t expect people to stick around, but it still sucks even though I understand it. And anyway, my best friends (excepting her) have always been there for me, and that’s what matters. And there’s always God. I think we’re all really blessed that God’s always there no matter how much we sometimes ignore Him and take Him for granted. This summer, at least, has helped me realize that God is not a friend but something greater. I also realize I need to struggle harder against the isolation I tend to retreat to when I’m having trouble. Because the people who care about you are tougher than you think; even when you’re not perfect, not happy, not well, even when you almost believe you won’t survive, they’ll believe for you. And sometimes they bring you flowers.
Final requests: if it looks like I’m trying to hide or otherwise withdraw, don’t let me get away with it; don’t ask me how I am because the answer might really suck; and kick me in the ass if I don’t go to the clinic to get those horribly elaborate blood tests that you need a transfusion to get over; and don’t let me skip on those meds they’re giving me to try and mitigate a ‘disease’ that no one really understands. Yay, mystery ailment! I’m pretty sure there’s a prize when I finally get to the bottom of this.
P.S. My hair is a fuzzball from hell.
Also, I really want a cigarette.
The relief that follows a long absence…there’s nothing quite like that; for a moment when I entered the chapel and picked up those familiar books, I felt that same happiness, that same lightheartedness, that same joy. I dunno, it’s like…for an instant thinking ‘Oh, so that’s what it’s like being where I’m supposed to be.’ Then I felt like usual. But it was still pretty awesome!
It’s not summer anymore because something has changed. I’m hoping that something is me. Maybe chapel, like, gave me a little electroshock or something. Maybe now I’ll get off my butt and go back to church, which I’ve been skipping prodigiously.
I really, really hope that summer’s over, mostly because I’ve been, well, sick all summer. I really, really hope that coming back to this place and centering my life around communal worship will somehow put me right. I hope the lethargy and oppressive exhaustion are over, that I can start again. I admit it didn’t help this summer that one of my really close friends from my Arts degree decided to ditch me. I mean, I know that sometimes when you’re struggling, especially when it seems you’re not getting better, you can’t expect people to stick around, but it still sucks even though I understand it. And anyway, my best friends (excepting her) have always been there for me, and that’s what matters. And there’s always God. I think we’re all really blessed that God’s always there no matter how much we sometimes ignore Him and take Him for granted. This summer, at least, has helped me realize that God is not a friend but something greater. I also realize I need to struggle harder against the isolation I tend to retreat to when I’m having trouble. Because the people who care about you are tougher than you think; even when you’re not perfect, not happy, not well, even when you almost believe you won’t survive, they’ll believe for you. And sometimes they bring you flowers.
Final requests: if it looks like I’m trying to hide or otherwise withdraw, don’t let me get away with it; don’t ask me how I am because the answer might really suck; and kick me in the ass if I don’t go to the clinic to get those horribly elaborate blood tests that you need a transfusion to get over; and don’t let me skip on those meds they’re giving me to try and mitigate a ‘disease’ that no one really understands. Yay, mystery ailment! I’m pretty sure there’s a prize when I finally get to the bottom of this.
P.S. My hair is a fuzzball from hell.
Also, I really want a cigarette.
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