Classroom Talk
Fall 2001 Archive
Facing up to my own part in this engagement. Posted by John on December 19, 2001 at 16:59:31:
Lou had recognized just what we needed at the moment, and spoke up about it . . . contrition. I followed up with a "Christmas manipulation" that I
wish all of you would hear—down the board aways in the posting "A little manipulation by the Coach. ;-)"—if you wouldn't mind reading that before
you go ahead and pick up with today's class here. Thanks.
........................................................................
One might easily suppose, with all the focus and emphasis on hearing the music in Bruce's e-mails in these recent classes, that I was forgetting the most
important point that I was telling you all about a week or two ago, the extreme importance of turning the pointing finger back around towards one's
own inner Self, and asking "How am I contributing to this engagement?"
From all these listenings I've been encouraging you to have to the stinging music of what I called "being hurried up and pressured" by Bruce, and
feeling I was "being judged" by him, it may seem that I have forgotten the cardinal awareness game observation that "stingers don't happen in a
vacuum, but as a back-and-forth continuum."
But that is not the case. I have been aware of my own part in it. I am actually "the Villain" in this engagement, as I hinted when we started out this
exercise. Things that I did coming out of my own ego-driven personality provoked strong reactions of Believer dependency and Judgly anger in
Bruce. As sure as God made little green apples, that's true! He was spring-loaded to sting me in his habitual ways. But I had been spring-loaded to
sting him before that.
I hope that some of you class-members here are in a position by now to be able to see that "the Coach is the one who is in the wrong about this whole
thing," and not Bruce. The Coach has impacted Bruce, and Bruce has reacted with anxiety, and anger.
I hope you can catch-on that I was the one, in the main, who brought this engagement about, and that there is even a valuable clue for me here to one
of the ways that I most get in my own way in this class, and I most defeat my own purposes in attempting to coach this class. I think there's a good
possibility that many of you can catch-on, simply by reflecting back over your own experiences with me as a coach around here. Because I've done this
very thing with nearly all of you. What has been my worst fault in coaching this class? — This may be a golden opportunity for me to fully grok a
valuable truth about my own unconscious conditioned patterns of behavior that would be wonderful ground for my doing transformative work with
it, in behalf of my own peace and harmony, as well as that of you class-members here.
In his next e-mail on Friday the 30th, Bruce's reasoning had become much more reasonable, all of a sudden, for me. And his honest expression of the
emotional feelings he was experiencing was as good as it gets, and helped me to be able to hear what he had to say.
One more thing first . . . I had been honestly interested in the definition of "hermeneutics." I'd asked several famous cognitive scientists at the annual
"Science of Human Consciousness" gatherings at the University of Arizona here in Tucson to explain that term in past years, when I heard them
"throwing it around," so to speak, as if "everybody knows what that means." And, in the *highly intellectual explanations* of "hermeneutics" that were
given to me at those times, I could never quite seem to get the foggiest notion of what the heck they were talking about. I was both baffled and
frustrated about this.
Remember, Bruce and I were being in the middle of a rather tense engagement. Intuition came to my service here. Realizing I was sincerely interested
in the meaning of the term, I woke up to the idea that a propitious opportunity lay at hand. Even in the middle of the engagement—it was a good
idea for me to intentionally "create a space for" some interaction between us that would be positive instead of negative, would be outside the sphere of
the issues we were being upset about . . . creating a space for *the possibility of* a cooperative and collaborative interaction between us . . . like a
deliberately declared "oasis" of peace and harmony, in the midst of the conflict going on all around.
I'm not sure I've explained this clearly enough. It was in short, deliberately creating an opportunity for two colleagues to do something together in
companionship in a friendly way, instead of in conflict, instead of being in "wall-to-wall" reaction to each other and in a situation where there was
nothing but estrangement. It was a bid for some moments of useful collaboration in a field that was otherwise disturbed.
I didn't know at the time if you might be so pissed-off at me, Bruce, that you might not feel like having anything to do with my request for a definition
here. But I appealed to you to be my teacher for a moment there, for a change—my hermeneutics teacher—as that struck me on the spot, intuitively,
as "a good move" to make, a useful gesture towards peace and harmony, in the spirit of the awareness game. And it seems to have worked.
>Hermeneutics is just a fancy word for the "technique/art" of interpreting texts (Game Tapes) to discover the phenomenology or lived experience to which the text or words refer.
>"The finger pointing at the moon (Words) is Not the Moon (lived experience)."
I get it! Thanks! In a context of mindfulness training, this is perfectly clear! What those cognitive scientists I mentioned had no frame of reference for,
as they attempted their intellectual definitions of the word—what they didn't understand *experientially* is the experience of *experiencing* life . . . . .
instead of being in ordinary cognitive consciousness, or "sleep," and just thinking about it intellectually.
We seem to be talkin' the same language, Bruce. We speak of a life in which there is *both* intellect and experience! From your experience of it, could
you say that the awareness game is a game of practicing hermeneutics in the awakened present, while relating with other people? Can you resonate
with that?
And remember please, Folks: "hermeneutics" in this sense—if it's correct to apply it to the awareness game—would be interpreting the lived experience
of other people from the obvious and apparent nature of the outward words they say and the acts they do, but ALSO—and as an even higher
priority—*being reminded to* turn the pointing finger inward and experience our own *actual lived experience* directly, being reminded ("woken up")
by interpreting the obvious and apparent nature of the outward words and acts that we, our own Selves, say and do.
>And this is what you are very good at. When you go line by line of someone's tape I learn and wake up and see! For example, I understand that when I said "Lifelessly, Bruce" that that was really bullshit. From your hermeneutical interpretation of my tape you saw correctly that lifelessly was a cognitive story that was merely an old personality tune--not the truth. That wakes me up!
Good. I do appreciate this feedback, for the practical information it provides me in being able to see that you are understanding what I'm trying to
illuminate of that. And thank you for the apple on my desk, too—the nice compliment that you see me as being good at that. I appreciate this
enthusiastic Student music. And it feels good to be appreciated. ;-) Thank you.
>This is the technique/art I wanted to learn from you
Oh-oh. All that mellowness is interrupted here for me. Now we come to "what you want." Heh-heh. That's in the province of the ego itself! The
single most characteristic music of the ego is . . . "I want . . ." Before this you were communicating your enthusiasm to me. Now, you have gotten into
"what you want from me." There is a slight pressure on me that begins here.
>[continuing the line] as you were going through my Game Tapes line by line. What a wonderful thing to see in line 6--doormat music...in line 18---blarney con artist stuff...line 22....approval seeking, etc.
This is more of the enthusiastic appreciation and appropriate feedback that is just as practical as the previous itemizations, I mentioned. It's good to
know you can see that stuff about you. But something has happened to me here. The harmony has been disturbed for me. I don't receive this
blessing of "wonderful" from you with the same peace and happiness as I received the previous communication. I have become a little "closed off," at
this point, a little bit leery. I have a whiff of the idea that I may be "being used." I am "distancing myself" from it, distancing me from you. The close
contact we had before has been broken. I am leaning back from you in my chair . . . because I see that this praise comes along with what you *want
from me*.
Now, mind you, I'm going to be getting around to the fact that I'm the Villain in "my starring role" in this play. In fact, you are soon to persuade me of
the logic of that in your reasoning about to follow. But, until we get to that, I'm just been moseying along here, practicing hermeneutics, with one
thing after another that I notice popping up along my trail, in keeping company with you. And here—with much reasonable justification!!!—you are
about to put the whole thing onto me in your judgment of the situation. At the same time as you are being "right" about your reasoning—yes, you
are!—I seem to be sensing faint music here of "What about me?!?!" . . . "Me first!" as well. And my body clutches up slightly at the sound of this.
>Again, that's what You began doing and you whetted my appetite by posting parts one and two and then dropped it to go down Stinger Circle (a cul DE sac)?
Now, just a dad-burned minute there, pod'ner! "Stinger Circle" may have been a cul de sac to you! Obviously it was. But I don't get a strong sense
that you have done any reflection about whether Stinger Circle may have had any different significance for me, or for other members of our class as a
whole.
I've tried several times to explain this to you, and it seems to have "gone in one ear and out the other," as they say, without my being able to have any
inkling whether you've heard a word I've had to say on this subject. I think it's fair to say that you've disparaged both my explanations that I work
by laying foundations upon foundations, and that I am attempting to work in such a way that I am bringing everybody in the class along,
appropriately, at the same time, all together, as we proceed along with my lesson plan. That's the blueprint of the work I am trying my best to do
here, in fact. (And yet, your complaint is *righteous*. I *wasn't* fair to you. I see that, and, I'll be getting to that.)
I understand that there are *a host of ways* that you do NOT think you can teach this class better than I can. But it has been these two ways above
(foundation-building, and teaching the whole class at once), specifically, that I have been referring to when I've been saying that you act as if you
know better than I do how to coach this class. I think I see what you mean, but do you also see what I mean?
For the facts, observations, and exercises that I have to share, you give me credit as your teacher for that. But in the way that I'm going about doing
this coaching week-in and week-out over the years, you haven't seemed to me to be giving me credit for that, heh-heh, since the day you walked in
the classroom door with the Enneagram in your hand, in fact, and your own idea about how this work should be done. — Now, don't get me
wrong. I'm delighted you *did* walk in our door! And I'm glad you're here. I'm only doing hermeneutics off it. (And I'm *not* putting down the
Enneagram, either, which may be better than the diagnostic tool that we have been using here, for all I know. I imagine that, in its own ways, the
Enneagram would do many of the same things as our Personality and Essence Wheel does, but I don't know.)
The classes during that whole "Stinger Circle" period that you refer to, Bruce, when back-and-forth stingers and being rubbed the wrong way was
going on among us, were *chock-full of foundations upon foundations* for getting a much more exciting appreciation of a person's main personality
types than . . . "So what?"
But that wasn't what you wanted from me! What you wanted from me, apparently, was, first, my idea of your personality types, and after that . . .
demonstrations of the practice of hermeneutics. But what I'm trying to get across as a coach of this class, is that hermeneutics, too, will turn out to be
another "So what?" for you in real life, bruddah, unless you absorb and understand these foundations that I've been trying to explain as we were
going along through that period of uptight class engagement . . . the era of "Stinger Circle," as you called it.
I think you miss the point here. The single most important thing to learn in this class is what "Stinger Circle" looks like, how it feels, what it is, what the
music of it sounds like, how it happens, and then, what can a mindful warrior for peace *do about it*, from within the sphere of his or her own side of
the issue, to move awarely to turn uptight engagements into harmonious companionship? That's the awareness game in a nutshell!
Take my posting the other week, called, "The point, in some detail," for example, which was a direct response to your own good question (yet every
bit of it applies to every student here!) In my own evaluation of the work that I've been doing here as I go along, that one posting was *the most
important foundational class* that I've taught around here all year. I think it may be the best single coaching job I've ever done with this class, in fact,
or with any class I've coached in the last thirty years before that!
And . . . . the only feedback I got from you about that class was your uptightness about it—having angry and anxious reactions to the fact that I
quoted Gurdjieff in the first few minutes of that class. (And, by the way, the things that I quoted of Gurdjieff there had nothing whatsoever to do
with "tricking and stinging people for their own good," which was the point you were objecting to, actually—i.e. what you were being *angry with me*
about, and distracted about at that time.)
Entirely to my surprise—how could I have guessed it?—my mere mention of the name Gurdjieff turned out to be a powerful stinger for you, and you
reacted to it. The sound of that name impacted your body, and anger and anxiety were the reactions within. It certainly seemed like your personality
was getting in your way that day, bruddah. And I was left feeling sort of despairing that everything that I'm teaching here would wind up being "So
what?" for you . . . . . if you wouldn't set that reactive stuff about Gurdjieff aside, and go back into that class on "The point, in some detail" with your
"Beginner's Mind" on, and digest, through and through, the foundations that are laid out so carefully there.
I'm still interested in examining what seems to be your "attitude" against that "Stinger Circle" period a little more, Bruce. Let me go back to your game-
tape in Classroom Talk of November 26th, called "Ouch!.....Hmmmmmmm ....Ouch!" You said:
>I did skimp on processing my impatience with you, too, as I was "patiently waiting" for your next Jigsaw Puzzle installment.
That's very good! You're being candid and outfront about the emotional feeling of impatience with me here (cf. anxiety), and it seems that by putting
"patiently waiting" in quotation marks that way you are making a tongue-in-cheek acknowledgement of the impatience that is going on for you in this
process.
>Being from the tribe of "Good Men in a Hurry" I was and still am eager for you to get on with that valuable exercise.
Again, that's very good. You are being Self-aware of the way it is with you here. This is reality. And it doesn't put a pressure on me for you to share
this truth with me. I can happily say: "Great! I am glad that you are being eager for this, when I can get to it." But it turns out that there is a problem
that goes along with this situation for you.
> What irritated me about the Sally Drama was that it distracted you from getting on with what for me is the most important part of the Awareness Game: using the wheel to become more effective, loving, and joy-creating with others.
"The Sally Drama?" Hmmmmm. The "most important part for me," you say. Again, it's that "What about me?!?!" music to me. When you speak like
this (when you come from a *fixed* attitude like this!), it may come across to others as if you are only interested in your own maybe-Selfish realm, and
don't even pause to consider if there may even *be realms* for the rest of us who surround you here in this class. It may sound as if you are ignoring
the rest of us and —sorry to put it so harshly—"whining" out loud here. For it was not "the Sally Drama," in reality. It was "the Bruce and Sally
Show!" You had a part to play in that, you know. This is what I am trying to get you to take a look at. Sally's (less than warrior, at the time) stingers
didn't come in a vacuum. They were pained reactions to things that had rubbed her the wrong way.
I don't mean to put you down. And I don't mean to blame you, either. I only mean to point out that it is the provocative sound of "What about
me?!?!?!" music like this from you that seems to have played right into that whole Bruce-Sally-Bruce-Douglas-Bruce-Suz-Bruce-Anonymous-Flamer
("Pussy!")-Stinger Circle that emerged on our classroom scene.
Every one of you had your respective stingers to chime in with in the whole melee of it all, of course. There was no obvious awareness and restraint
when all this was going on. Each of you had your part to play in this complex engagement. And the parts that all of you were playing then were
rather obviously "non-effective, absences of love, and unjoy-creating behaviors," to paraphrase what you were wishing so mightily for. But, Bruce,
you had a part to play in that engagement! Look at it this way: if you had been *entirely removed* from that scene, would that scene have happened
then that way?
Unwittingly, you played a provocative part—innocently, without realizing it. The purpose of this exercise is for you to catch-on to the part that you
played in it, and for the others to catch-on to the parts that they played in it. If *any of you* can catch on to the parts you played in it, then you know
what to work on transformatively, to mellow out your own lives and stop playing into the unconscious enmeshment in back-and-forth stingers that is
going on around you everywhere you go.
Now I ask you, how in the world am I going to coach you students how to become "more effective, loving, and joy-creating with others," Bruce, if we
just IGNORE the times that come up when the things that pop-up here, in our unconscious patterns of acting-out conditioned behavior, are *the
opposite* of those blessings that you are wishing for? The very way that we learn the awareness game in this class is by using the wheel to examine
and study those specific identifiable ways that humans in the ordinary human condition are NOT effective, NOT loving, and NOT joy-creating. Once
we understand this, then we are in a position to do something about it. And before we understand this . . . we just don't know what's going on
around us and within.
So . . . although these engagements that come up in class are distracting from whatever else we might happen to be doing at the time, it is not correct
to say that they are distracting from the central purpose of this class. They are at the heart of what we are studying here. And it is only by learning
to understand the nature and the causes of these engagements that we will EVER get beyond "So what?" about the goodies in the awaremess game
that are shared about in this school.
Your argument—and you have persuaded me—continued:
>I remind you that you were enthusiastic about doing an analysis and dialogue on the game tapes--it wasn't just me!
That's true. And I am enthusiastic! And it's even *been happening* here now in an alternative way that neither of us could have predicted at that
time.
>You asked me to participate. I answered the questions. You began the exercise. You heard a buzzer go off...and no more work on this Important Work has been accomplished.
That was true for awhile.
>So when you say that you are not able to teach a training designed to my personal wishes I wonder if it's more accurate to say that you have chosen Not to follow through on the Training that you began for the benefit of me, yourself, and the class.
I haven't chosen not to follow through on that training! I hadn't gotten to it yet at that point. I don't remember ever saying that I wasn't going to do
it. That was "your projection," that is, what you imagined, in Believer thinking (i.e. anxious thinking), that that was true about me. I didn't have that
idea. Apparently, that's your anxiety talking. Finishing this work was constantly my highest priority in this class, except for one thing . . . . . the
unexpected emergence of a brouhaha in the room, where people's feelings were getting hurt right and left. When that happened, that was a higher
priority for me, as a conscientious coach, in its time.
I understand how very important it has been to you for me to finish that exercise. And it *is* important to me not to let you, or others in this class,
down (although I sometimes do). But can you understand that something could come up in the life of our group that is more important than your
eagerness for me to finish that exercise? Can you understand that sometimes, in the interests of what you are wishing for, your * best move* is to just
pause, and wait?
Now . . . this whole event here in Classroom Talk has interesting over-tones—does it not?—of when Mommy and Daddy were fighting, and you were
left waiting, as a child, for the things that were important to you at that time (part of your memories of your most frustrating experiences of childhood
life). But, in this instance, in class, we notice that you were a part of the fight this time.
As frustrating and painful as it was for you in your childhood to endure such interruptions of your eagerness and impatience to go onward with the
things that you wanted, and as frustrating and painful as it has been for you again here now in the same way, there is something that can be learned
about real life in this scenario. Shit *does* happen. Whether the shit is with our parents only, or whether it is with our own Selves mixing with other
kids on the playground, there ARE interruptions in life.
When the shit is flying, other people ARE distracted from the things that each of us want to be happening. In others' points of view, the shit that is
flying takes priority over what *we* want. Either we can go on fighting against the reality of this until the day we die . . . or we can just catch on to
the reality of this. If we catch on that this is a reality that cycles into our lives again and again, we can better learn how to flow with it when it
happens, because it is part of all that is so. We can either flow with it, or it will blow down the mast and sails of our boat.
We can learn to accept a stark reality, that the world around us *is not centered on me*. Acting as if the world is centered around me, acting as if my
own agenda should take priority over the agendas of others around me when the shit is flying . . . doesn't work! That's the music of the Believer. It
can aggravate people at times. The *very sound of it* comes across as "whiney" to certain others. It stings some other people, and rubs them the
wrong way. And we have witnessed in the developments here where it goes from there. Even in a class of mindfulness students these personalities
can pop up and hold sway, giving stingers back for stingers, "evening the score," and keeping the uptight engagements going, and tension in the air.
So . . . what can a person do about it, when they are feeling anxious that what they are waiting for so eagerly isn't going to come true? Well . . . the
awareness game has a variety of answers for this—each of them a mindful warrior skill to be tried out, learned, and practiced. Know what's going on,
in the first place. Understand that it's normal for this to be going on. Catch on that "whining" about it gets in one's way (by alienating some others
and bringing reactions back). And realize there's another way to go about it than broadcasting Believer music. Communicate the basic truth of it.
How do you feel? What do you wish? Cut. The fewer words about it, the better the message gets through.
"Coach, I'm being anxious that with all my investment in that exercise, and all my interest in learning that information, that you are going to drop it
without finishing it. And it makes me angry to think you are doing that." That short declaration could have replaced *all of the other words* that
you've had to say about this."
And I'd have said something like: "I have no intention of dropping it. I'm doing the best that I can in the context of what's going on now, and I'll
finish it when I can." I'd have coached, "Try to process the sensations of anxiety and impatience that you are feeling there in the muscles along the
long-bones of your arms and legs as well as you can, to let some of that tension off your body. Try your best then to adjust to the situation. When
you can process those tensions on through, and adjust to the real circumstances of others around you, your own life will become more peaceful within.
That's the best thing that you can do in circumstances like that. Playing a lot of nervous Believer music over the matter runs a risk of prolonging your
wait.
Now, let me call special attention here to something we've talked about before, that Believers are people who have believed in others too easily and
too much. They have been led on in their lives, promised many things that never came true . . . . . isn't that exactly what you've been thinking has
been happening to you here, Bruce? It seems to fit like a glove! And your reasoning with me about it has all been quite logical, too. So I could never
blame you for thinking that, only hope that you could catch on to the nature of your doing it that way, and maybe seeing how that gets in your own
way.
In transformative work, the work of Believers consists in recognizing that they believe in others too much, recognizing that they *depend too much on
other people*. By all means, follow the things you are interested in (the things you are interested in are part of the true Being that you were born to
be!). Follow the things you are most interested in. Follow them *as far as they go*. But learn to avoid expecting that the things you are interested in
will always go as far as you want them to go. Take what you do get! And be free with it, "a total winner!" When your whole life is tied to getting
more than what you do get, you have set your Self up to be enslaved to being anxious about it.
Don't let your Self be fooled into depending on me. Then you can have everything I've got, and be free! Even if I promise you things, don't let your
Self be dependent on that. Lightning could strike me the next day. Or I might, indeed, be a mean guy who takes pleasure in treating you badly. I
might be a Con Artist, just fooling you for my own vanity. Or I might have over-estimated what I can actually get done in a certain period of time. Or
unexpected trials and tribulations might get in the way and slow things down for me. Even blessings might come along that distract me from my
intended daily path. Don't look for security through others in this world. That's a set-up. Find your security in you.
Communicate what you wish for! Yes! Express your emotional feelings! That will often be of great help. And try to catch on to it when most of your
focus is inward, thinking only of "me." Try to remember there is always another side of the equation in human relations—that there is a whole complex
of matters going on in my sphere over here when I'm relating with you—things that you may not know about, or understand. Try not to set your
Self up by thinking that my side of things is not going on over here in me. Don't slip into imagining that my priorities are the same as your own. They
may not be. And forgetting there is a "my side of it" may only set you up to be hurt. When you find your Self being hurt by what I am doing, ask
"What is going on in the coach's sphere?" "Where is the Coach coming from?" Try your best to empathize with that. If you can't figure it out, you can
ask me. The more clearly you can understand where I am being at, the more likely you will get the most and the best of what I've got. "Where are
you coming from, Coach?" "What did you mean when you said. . ." "What's going on on your side of this all?" "I'd like to get to know you."
>This work is very interesting to me--and I am in a hurry. I'm finishing my Ph.D. dissertation and hope to have it finished by spring. It's focus is Tolle and the Enneagram: mindfulness applied to waking up to personality bullshit on the move. . . . I have an urgent need to get this dissertation finished so I can move to the next phase of life. . .
This sounds like a wonderfully interesting dissertation to me! I couldn't approve of it more highly! I do hope I get to read it some day! (And, I
sincerely pray—without depending on it!—that you have professors who will understand what you are writing about, who will be open to the
arguments you will make in it.) Yet I didn't know you were doing that, of course. It is a good explanation of your being in a hurry (although we
apparently still had nearly four months left until your deadline when you communicated this to me). I do understand your hurry about it here, but *
that much of* a hurry? It wasn't as if we were down to the last weeks of this race. And, *in the form of* your expressions here, that is still
embellishing the "me of it" from your side of our relationship. Do you see what I mean? Worthy argument though it is, it still comes across as more of
the impatient Believer music of "me, me, me."
And even though I responded to you right away by e-mail that I'd be *glad to be* of help to you with your dissertation in any appropriate way that I
can . . . . . I was still left with a feeling that my own Being was not being acknowledged by you in this worthy "mutual effort." How can I explain what
I mean? It was for me, as if I, *as a living, breathing, feeling human fellow in here*, was only being used for your purposes, didn't somehow seem to
really exist for you in your view of the situation. It was as if I was, not a human person, but a "means to an end," for you, so to speak. Ow! That sort
of thing happens to me with people more than you might suppose in my life, Bruce, and it's painful to feel "depersonalized" that way. That kind of
thing can make me feel "personally rejected," if you see what I mean . . . . . which *could* bring my Rebel into the picture.
But your arguments swayed me anyway, as I said! I decided that, after all, you were right! Yes, you were right!!! I could understand where you
were coming from. At any rate, I wasn't going to let the emotional reaction that I felt about the way you seemed to be treating me stand in the way of
my willingness to be of whatever real world help I could be to you. (I can assure you that if my own ego-driven personality had been kick-started
and held sway over me in this situation—just my Rebel side alone!—it wouldn't have been that way. But I got off of my personality reactions, because
being of help to you anyway seemed like the right thing to do.)
>I expect that the Rebel in you may
Good! You were reflecting about my side of the matter here. That's a good hunch, and a plausible idea (if one knows my personality make-up). But I
didn't come up Rebel with you here. as it turned out. Yet, that's not to say I hadn't been rubbed the wrong way.
>I am frustrated and disappointed and angry that you drew me into this project (besides being enthusiastic and happy)
Ha! Good job of seeing there are two sides within you over this matter! There are negative feelings and parenthetical positive feelings in this bag. It
was a great move for you to express all that inner reality with me—those emotional feelings. I could relate with that. And your judgment—that I
"drew you into this project" was actually the very point where the tide turned, and you finally swayed me to the logic of your over-all argument.
I thought: "I have *got to pay attention to this,* and sit with this like a brick in my lap, because however it is that all this evolved, *this* is truly the way
that it has come across to Bruce. I thought: "From Bruce's perspective, I have "drawn him into" the jigsaw puzzle exercise. And I could *understand
right away* that you were feeling frustrated, disappointed, and angry about it—seeing it that way.
I had to confront my Self, and ask: "Is this what I do? Do I draw students into exercises, and then frustrate them, and anger them because I don't
follow through and finish what I've started?
And that was when the light of a thousand candles came on for me, and I had to face the truth of it, that, "Yes, this is what I do do, don't I? This is
what I have done to many of you in this class. I've set you Folks up by drawing you into a certain exercise, or a certain discussion, and then I've let
you down by not following through and finishing it up. I've done this very thing, again and again . . . . . and thus, it *has to be* a habit of mine,
obviously! It has to be ego-driven personality that I am conditioned to do.
I realized that I've tried to talk about this subject with all of you before—those times I've mentioned "the injustices" in this class, I was referring to this
habit of mine. And I've never followed through on that discussion either, never really brought that into the open, into the light. These have been
injustices. I've been doing that injustice over and over again. I realized that this was my fault, my mistake, my blame. And I felt deeply contrite about
it. I felt contrite about it with you, Bruce, and with all of the others of you in this group. I realized that this was probably my single worst fault in the
coaching of this class. I realized that every time I had done this, *I was getting in my own way*, and that every one of those times, without knowing
it, I was probably bringing emotional reactions of frustration or anger, or both, back upon me!
I do aplogize to all of you for this habit of mine, of course. I feel terrible about it, now that I finally really grok what it is! I don't have to list the names
of each one of you here that I've done this with here. Each of you must know who you are.
What is this mistake all about? Where am I coming from when it happens. Yes, my arguments about laying foundations, and about trying to share
things when the best time comes up for sharing them are true. But there is more to it than that. Let's go on with your complaint.
>You began it and I learned so much from your first two posts about my Game Tapes. Then you dropped it because you sensed a buzzer going off in the bleachers.
>Then you egged me on to reply to the wounding I received from others. NOTE: I waited two weeks while you dealt with Sally and other envious/jealous/bored old timers and frankly was cool about the whole thing and just gave you time to handle it and get back to the task that YOU regarded as being so beneficial to the class.
Well . . . . . there did seem to be some jealousy and some boredom going on during that episode. But here you seem to be forgetting to turn that
pointing finger back around to your own process and probe and search for ways that you were playing a part in that whole engagement. The others
need to do the same thing with that information. But, so do you . . . if you are here to learn to understand these episodes, too.
It wasn't just that you were in a hurry for the things you wanted here. It was also HOW you went about it, how you expressed it, how you did it. If
you become absorbed in blaming the others for what they did, you will never be able to catch on to what was your own part in the dynamics of that
painful fight. Being right in judging others is the booby prize in this class. The real prize is reaching a point where you catch on to the insights of how
you got in your own way, how you brought this pain into your own life, how you provoked others to sting you.
Being right about these matters is the booby prize. It's too easy for all of us to become locked-into how the other person did us wrong, and blinded
by the self-righteousness of judging that. What's difficult is getting beyond those judgments—even if they are right—and seeing the part that we, our
own Selves, have played. That's the prize. That's the hidden bonanza in studying situations like these. Because you can't change other people, if they
can't change their own Selves. The best you can do with other people's habits is to learn to recognize them for what they are, and let them pass right
on through without getting purchase on your pain body. But the best you can do with your own habits is to learn to recognize them for what they
are, and then . . . CHANGE, practice stopping doing them.
Everybody in this class has work to do in this area, including you. Everyone who has participated in this engagement might learn to feel contrite
about it, including you. And even if nobody else sees the consequences of the habits they are acting-out, if you manage to catch on to how *you are
getting in your own way*, realize how you are bringing stingers back upon you, then whatever anybody else may do, you do have a chance to be a
winner in the event. You cannot force others to change. The one thing that you can do that works in the real world, is learn to make adjustments in
your own ways of coming across to other people. The only thing that you can always do (if you wake up and have knowledge of what's happening) is
attempt to make positive changes in you.
So long as you would say, "Well, they made mistakes and did bad things, so I'm entitled to do that back to them, too," so long as you would regard
human relations in that way, there is no good that can come of it *on either side* of an issue! And everything that is taught in this class is . . . "So
what?"
>At your prodding I posted . . . I put the chill pill--all you need is love in at the end to satisfy your request to respond to the attacks. She attacked me. You asked me to say something. I said, Sally, chill out...focus on love
>I feel screwed over by You and the Class. I sat in the hotseat---confess my family origin wounds. Agree to be honest with you, dialogue with you...in front of a hostile audience..and whamo! Attacks from the bleachers! You drop the project. Then tell me I don't have the foundation
>Your . . . reply . . . didn't show . . . wisdom, care, coaching, essence that you usually express so skillfully. The phrase "smart guy" was evidence of that. Did you mean "smart ass?"
Ah yes, you're right about that, too. Notice, significantly, that the one time I *did* fall into stinging you in that whole rap seems to have made a
stronger impression on you than all of the rest of what I said. This is worth some notice and reflection. Even a single negligent stinger in an evening's
conversation can get in the way of everything else a person is trying to accomplish, and drown out everything else that is said. — And even what
might seem a relatively *mild* stinger, like "Smart guy," can have as much damaging impact as a much more aggressive-seeming equivalent, like "Smart
ass." It isn't in the content of what we are wishing to do, but in the context, that the damage happens. The wounding damage comes into it through
HOW we say and HOW we do the things we say and do! And whatever the opera may be about, the how we do it comes across in the music of the
personality we perform it in!
So look at the interesting overview here: I am the one who's "the Villain." You are the one that's "the Victim." Your arguments have convinced me of
that without a doubt. And yet it *doesn't really matter*! Does it? The fact that I am the heavy in this play is only incidental to the meaning of the play
for you. My wrongness doesn't change the outcome for you. You can take no real solace in putting it on me. My mistake is unimportant, on the
periphery of what it is that counts. Would you rather be right, or be loved? My ol' teacher Mits used to ask us that.
Yes, I will have to pay my price for the mistakes that I make in this life. But that has nothing to do with you. Whether you be at war or at peace,
whether you be in harmony or dissonance, has nothing to do with my sins, or the sins of others around you. Even though you may be completely in
the right about the argument, and I may be entirely wrong about it . . . whatever the process brings you is a function of how you do what you do.
Whatever another person has done to you that is wrong, the outcome of happiness or pain that you come out of it with is entirely in the hands of you.
But only if one can catch-on to what their own part in an engagement has been, and only if they can be contrite about that, is there any hope that *
intentional* change can be made, so that the same old stuff, the same old getting in their own way doesn't keep happening over and over again . . .
tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and the rest of the times that the very same situation cycles back again into their space.
Shit happens in life, and the same shit keeps happening again, until we catch-on finally—if we ever do!—that we keep on doing it to our Selves, that we
keep on getting in our own way.
The pushy music of the Dictator will do it to some of us, that of the aloof Con Artist to others. The sounds of the punishing Judge and the outrageous
Rebel can do us in, and the helpless Doormat songs and whining Believer songs of dependency can provoke other people to attack. The melodramatic
wails of the Martyr can estrange us from other people around. And so even the sounds of intended kindnesses by worrying Kind Helpers that go
too far.
It isn't what you wish for in this life that spoils things for us; it's *how* you go about it that gets in the way.
Coach
Bruce and I made up after this, and I asked him if I could use these e-mails for classroom practice. We both seemed excited and pleased about the
whole thing by then. One way or another, Bruce, you always had what you were wishing for coming *anyway*, without even one minute of all this
fuss.
In our last class of 2001—on this Friday, I hope—I'll review the basic characterstics of the essence, as well as the personality, of the Student/Believer,
the Hard Worker/Doormat, and the Player/Judge. And then we'll see if we can spot any clues in those childhood memories of Bruce's that
foreshadowed the Fate and the Destiny that has emerged for him on the stage of his life over the years since that time.
I love you All. See ya in a couple of days . . . . . (ahem, cough-cough—I think I can keep my promise on that!!!)
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Archived 01/08/2002