I Don't Have to Tell People I'm Setting a Boundary

I like to think that I know something about boundary setting, but I actually have only learned a few things, and highly imperfectly.  For that reason, I wrote a post about a year ago: the top 10 ways NOT to set boundaries. Since it was sarcastic and for that reason perhaps hard to understand, I am going to attempt a sincere approach this time.

First of all, the best books on boundaries that I've read are by Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend, both Christian ministers. A Bible passage alert is in effect for their books, which is great for those of us who love a spiritual thought well-grounded in Bible wisdom but for some it might be a deal-breaker. The original Boundaries book is really perfect for the person who has convinced themselves (or been convinced by the collective consciousness) that they are being loving by allowing themselves to have give and give and give without boundaries or limits. This book perfectly disabuses the notion that there is anything loving about allowing others to violate our boundaries. Cloud (and sometimes Townsend) also published Boundaries in Dating, Boundaries in Marriage, Boundaries with Kids, Boundaries for Leaders and Beyond Boundaries. All great. I have found Boundaries for Leaders particularly useful as a minister.

Most people who talk about boundaries, including Cloud and Townsend, will emphasize that boundaries are set and maintained by us, not by other people. This is so true. But today I'm going to focus on the single biggest piece of wisdom I've learned about boundary setting: there's no real advantage to telling the other person you're setting the boundary.
This is the thing I wish I had learned YEARS ago: One of the big obstacles that has kept me from setting boundaries (at least between my ears) is that I thought that in order to "set a boundary" I needed to talk to the person who had violated my boundaries; I needed to sit them down, tell them how they had hurt me or tell them what they were not going to be able to do anymore; or, at the very very least, tell them what I was or wasn't going to allow.

I would avoid, procrastinate, and delay "setting a boundary" because I couldn't possibly face that conversation and its terrifying emotional fallout.

What I wish I'd know years ago is that first of all setting a boundary (which might involve informing someone that I'm doing it) is not that important. What's important is holding a boundary. And if I am holding a boundary, then I don't need to inform anyone other than myself (and perhaps a trusted person that I hold myself accountable to), I just need to do it.

Example: I had a very close person in my life who was calling several times a day, and if they didn't reach me, leaving terrible voicemail messages about how I had ruined their life and how terrible I was and about all the things that I needed to do differently. Because this person was a very close relative who I was choosing to continue to have a relationship, I wasn't going to completely cut them off, but I also couldn't continue to abuse myself by speaking to them often and listening to their messages.

A trusted advisor suggested that I talk to that relative once a week only at a set time and stop picking up the phone or listening to their messages. At first, I misinterpreted the advice and procrastinated informing this relative of the new policy. Eventually I informed them. As I predicted, they were furious, hurt, and terrified. Their behavior and calls only escalated after I informed them. And when I called at the weekly time, they were especially abusive on the call.

I went back to the advisor and told them how it had played out. The advisor asked me, "why did you tell them you were doing this?" The answer: I never considered any other option! From then on out, I never informed anybody who I was holding a new boundary with that I was holding a boundary, I just did it.

If I could deal with a person coming over once a month for dinner but no more, I just invited them once a month, I didn't tell them it would be only once a month. Works like a charm.

The other plus is that if I don't inform someone of my new boundary, I'm the only one who knows if I can't do it.

Summer Junk Food for the Mind

Where do you stand on junk reading?  I go back and forth.  For years I have alternated "quality" literature--like deep spiritual inquiries, riveting memoirs, biographies and histories and prize-winning novels--with "beach" reading like science fiction, fantasy, mysteries, thrillers and the occasional better written romance (only the Highlander series comes to mind).  As I move from the former to the latter I tell myself that I need a break.  I need not to have to work so hard at my reading.  But do I (need a break, have to work hard)? Is that actually true?

After recently completing the awe-inspiring Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson, I realized that my relationship with junk reading is eerily similar to my relationship with junk food.  I have trained myself to think that there's something I deserve or need about junk food and junk reading, but it's a lie.  Our culture is full of stories of the person who is forcing themselves to eat kale, quinoa and tofu and then escapes into the true pleasures of a burger, fries and a milkshake.  

Believe me my brain is very much capable of enjoying a burger, fries and a milkshake, possibly several of them.  But is my body?  see my body reliably has strong negative health reactions (stomach trouble, headaches, sinus infections and uncontrollable cravings) to beef, wheat, dairy and sugar;  so is it really "enjoying" the burger and milkshake? or is just enjoying the idea of the burger and milkshake, the cultural concept of taking a break from what you should do, having a treat?  If the tofu is crunchy and salty, the kale is properly flavored and quinoa is marinated, I can eat a meal that my mind AND body fully enjoy.


It's the same, I realized, with literature.  There was NO way that I had to work to "get through" Just Mercy.  It was a treat from beginning to end.  It was a page turner.  It was inspiring.  Reading it changed my life and enlivened me.

Why on earth would I need a break from inspiration and being enlivened, I began to wonder?  Why on earth would I need to consume anything but brilliantly prepared, well-seasoned magnificent and also nutritional literature this summer?

Now don't misunderstand me.  I DO understand that there are brilliant, well-written science fiction, fantasy and other genres out there, and I intend to keep reading them.  Nor do I seem to be done experimenting with pulp fiction.  The last book I read (and thoroughly enjoyed) was The Hearing by John Lescroart (and then I ran out and bought 3 more books by him--well written legal mystery/thrillers set in San Francisco). 

Similarly, I don't judge anyone else for eating burgers, fries and milkshakes.  Although I really don't touch beef, I do still experiment with wheat, dairy and sugar--always to ill effect.  "What I can eat could kill you and what you can eat would kill me," say some friends of mine.
The challenge is that the downsides of choosing junk over nutritional lit are much more subtle for me than those of choosing junk food.  I don't feel sick. I don't gain weight.  Mostly I miss out on new ideas, new thoughts, an expanded horizon, that feeling you get when you read a perfect sentence that you could never ever have written but that you recognize as sheer genius (I'm talking to you, Jonathan Franzen).

And so I leave you, as I leave myself, strongly considering consuming a stronger ratio of nutritious to junk literature this summer and beyond.  And that's a start...

Feel the Slow Sweet Good Love of Mister Rogers (aka God)--5 Snouts up for Won't You Be My Neighbor?

(:)(:)(:)(:)(:) 5 enthusiastic Snouts up (Understand my Snout-Based Rating system) for Wont You Be My Neighbor? The movie about Fred aka "Mister" Rogers.  

A month ago I was in San Diego to see my mother and this movie was sold out on a Wednesday night.  I said "WTF?"  Last night, I bought tickets in advance--lots of empty seats but a solid 30 people, mostly under 40, saw this movie on a Tuesday night months after it opened.  What is happening here?

What's happening is that Fred Rogers is one of the comings of the Christ--I don't want to say "second" because I think there are many expressions of the living Christ consciousness amongst us.  And I think that when people see Mister Rogers in action in this movie, they recognize that on some level, whether they can articulate it or not, and they want others to feel what they felt while watching the movie.

Many friends recommended this movie to me.  One couple described a scene where, in an early episode from the late 60s when white people were violently reacting to swimming pool integration, (white) Mister Rogers invited (African-American police) Officer Clemmons to bathe his feet in the same wading pool.  Years later, in the eighties during AIDS scare, Mister Rogers invites Clemmons (who also happens to be gay) to share the pool again and Rogers dries off Clemmons' feet with a towel.  The imagery of shared communion and Christ's love is obvious when you think about it, but it is not explained.  It is just done.  So powerful.

The scene that actually caught me the most though, probably because of my years as a lobbyist, was Fred Rogers' 1969 testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on Communications chaired by Sen. John Pastore.  In the movie, right before this testimony, you can see Pastore's snarkiness about PBS and his strong inclination to cut $20 million (a lot in 1969) from its funding to give to President Richard Nixon to fund his growing "exercise" in Vietnam.  When Rogers testifies, everything changes.  Rogers tells Pastore in his simple sweet way how his goal is to let every child know that they are loved exactly as they are right now.  And you can (I almost wrote "literally" but that's a different post lol) watch Pastore's face and heart melt as he feels the importance of that ministry break through all his cynicism. 
Link to Fred Rogers Testimony

I had no idea that Fred Rogers was a Presbyterian minister and his life's work was this ministry with children.  Sure I watched 100s of hours of this show as a child.  I loved the land of make believe.  I hated Mister Rogers slow conversations with other adults and us.  As I hit puberty, I mocked this show and did my best to ruin it for my younger brothers.

I learned in this movie the real reason I intuitively hated Mister Rogers.  It turns out that Fred Rogers was a lonely sad fat kid like me.  My response to that childhood was to run like hell from that kid, to do anything I could possibly do to be popular, to be happy, and, if at all possible, to be thin (only moderate success with that).  Rogers healed his body -- every day he swam and maintained a curious weight of 143 pounds (you need to see the film to know the significance of that number).   Like me he became a minister.  But unlike me he turned himself TOWARDS that sad fat kid, not away from it.  He stopped.  He slowed himself down to the speed of love.  And he didn't leave one person behind.  He personified divine love throughout his life.  What can we do to emulate Fred Rogers?

Hurry to see the Hilarious Thanksgiving Play at Cap Stage

(:)(:)(:)(:)(:) Five enthusiastic snouts up (see Understanding the Snout-Based Rating System) for The Thanksgiving Play by Larissa FastHorse on the Capital Stage through July 22nd.  It's no small trick to create a play that is edgy, brilliant, thought-provoking (all hallmarks of the Capital Stage canon) and also hilariously funny and fun.  By grappling with the question of how to write a play examining Native American issues without any Native American actors,  playwright Larissa FastHorse has done it all.  

The play centers around 4 teachers/actors attempting to "devise" a new more culturally sensitive Thanksgiving play for elementary school children.  The two lead characters sound more like an episode of Portlandia than your average play--hilarious caricatures of well-meaning white progressives.   At the top of the show, the Yoga Guy/Street performer boyfriend (Cassidy Brown) gives his failed Actress/Elementary school teacher/Director girlfriend (Jennifer Le Blanc) the ultimate sensitive gift: a water bottle crafted from the recycled glass from broken public housing windows.  She is so touched.   It only gets better from there.

The two other actors, a sexy actress (Gabby Battista) whose heritage we begin to determine from L.A. and a nerdy teacher/would be playwright (Jouni Kirjola) in town, are wonderful too.  The teacher/director lady is the lead straight man around whom the other 3 land great jokes.

Director Michael Stevenson (also the Artistic Director of Capital Stage) has done it again with direction that enhances but does not detract from the work--funny funny physicality in this play brings laughs that surely not every production could manage.

Listen, I gotta run and this is only up for another week--see it and tell all your friends!

The Path not Taken--Some Version of me is a Fighting Death Penalty Cases Right Now

You ever have a strong sense of the road not taken in your life?  Not necessarily regret, but just a sense of what might have been if.  Sometimes I get this feeling that life is like a video game in which multiple versions of the same story exist side by side dependent on upon key choices.  In one version of my life, I am living in the southern United States representing people accused of capital (death penalty) crimes.

About 2 pages into attorney Bryan Stevenson's brilliant real life To Kill a Mockingbird story: Just Mercy: a story of Justice and Redemption, I had stopped reading to Google bar review courses and look for jobs defending people facing the death penalty.  

This was one of my alternate universe lives and I came pretty close to living it.  I went to a public interest law school (SUNY Buffalo School of Law) because I wanted to do this.  Ignoring the advice of my boyfriend (now husband)'s grandfather who said "the problem with going into criminal law is that most of your clients are criminals," I took all the classes most oriented to criminal law.  I even took a special class on federal law and a special class on the doctrine of habeas corpus (latin for "you shall have the body"  -- which is highly relevant to capital crimes--this is part of the legal doctrine that makes it illegal to detain someone without charges but also false charges).  I worked for the Federal Public Defender in Oregon one summer under the great Steve Wax (who retired a few years ago after 31 great years in that role).  And upon graduation, I applied for a public defender fellowship at Georgetown University Law School (and very nearly received it-- see Post on how I lost a prestigious Georgetown Fellowship due to sexism) .

All of this was with the goal of representing people accused of capital (death penalty) crimes.   As wrong as I believe the death penalty is, it is that much more wrong that it wildly disproportionately is applied to people without financial means and African-American men.   It is said that a "capital crime" is a crime where people who don't have the "capital" are sentenced to die.  And that is in large part true.  Almost no one with an extensive legal defense gets sentenced to death.

By the grace of God, I still stayed in public interest law (so many of my fellow law students did not find a way to do that) and got to have a career representing consumers and workers in Congress and the California legislature.  And although I have no regrets about that decision--it was a thrill to be of service in that way.  And although I have now left even that behind for ministry, I am nonetheless finding myself wistful about the path not taken.

Michael B. Jordan

I will continue to read Stevenson's marvelous engaging story of his crusade to represent Walter McMillian, an African-American man from Monroeville, Alabama (the same town in which the famous To Kill a Mockingbird story took place) sentenced to die for a crime he, and large portions of the town, insist he did not commit.   It's such a great story in fact that it's being made into a movie next year starring Michael B. Jordan (Black Panther) as Bryan Stevenson--you know its big time when a star like that has been hired.  

I can't wait to see how this story comes out, how the movie is and how my life comes out.  Will I take the Alabama bar next year and move to Montgomery?  Stay tuned...

Five Snouts Up for PBS' Little Women--an early feminist masterpiece

(:)(:)(:)(:)(:) (click here to understand my snout-based rating system) for Masterpiece's recent 2 part adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women.  Like most avid (white American) girl readers of my era, I adored Louisa May Alcott and read and re-read Little Women countless times (I was particularly obsessed with Eight Cousins, one of her lesser known works.  It was the book I read whenever I was sick and couldn't read anything else.)

However, it having been decades since I've read Little Women and having seen only 1 or 2 screen adaptations of it, I had failed to appreciate what a feminist masterpiece this story is and how perfect for our times.

In an era where women are simultaneously captivated by Pride and Prejudice and #metoo, enter Little Women.  This is a story where you get young women dressing up in gowns and courting, with the central figure Jo (not Josephine) March (the author's voice) turning down her suitor because she is focused on her writing--in late 19th century America.

Louisa May Alcott

I read that the American Library Association recently removed Laura Ingalls Wilder's name from a prestigious children's book award for her culturally insensitive portrayals in her popular Little House on the Prairie series (possibly a subject for a different post).  Perhaps they should consider renaming it after Louisa May Alcott.   While Jo does eventually marry an older professor in the story to run a boy's school with him, the real Jo March, Louisa May Alcott, remained single throughout her life and was an early feminist and abolitionist.  She and the book are a true inspiration for our times.

Bless Donald Trump for helping us remember who we are

All evil and harm that is done in the world is done because we forget who we are.  We forget that we are one.  We forget that when we harm someone else, we are harming ourselves.  The extreme harm of separating refugee children from their parents (the accurate term is refugees, not immigrants, these families are by and large running for their lives from Central America) and scattering them across the country, is heartbreaking and terrifying.  Yet, it is not particularly new.  

Tragedies like this took place while Barack Obama was president of the United States.  Tragedies like these take place all over the world.  They are all heartbreaking and terrifying but they don't all seem to call us to action like this one.  What is bringing us to remembrance of who we are is President Donald Trump.  Yesterday The Washington Post reported that Under Trump Americans are Becoming More Supportive of Immigration -- and this is based on a poll run before the latest outrage.  

In spiritual terms, President Trump is a projection of the dark shadow of Americans.  We say we are a law-abiding people, but we flout the law when we can.  We say we are a place where freedom flourishes, but we try to suppress the free press when we disagree with it.  We say all people are created equal, but then it turns out we really mean only the people who look like us and worship like us, and maybe only men.

Deficiencies of the electoral college notwithstanding, Donald Trump could not have been elected president and could not continue to inspire fierce loyalty in his base if he did not speak to our dark unexamined, unadmitted craven xenophobia.  

Get this: when I say "our" I do not mean Republicans or even that large subset of Republicans that are rabid supporters of the president.  I mean all of us.  

So while President Trump is, by his naked appeals to our shadow side, awakening our remembering of who we are, the call is also to remember ALL of whom we are.  If 30% of the American public wants to wall off the country, instigate stark consequences for those who try to enter our borders and deny women control of their bodies, then 30% of our collective consciousness wants the same.

A call to action these days is "Resist!" -- yet it is a spiritual law that what you resist persists.  Just as we need to remember that we are love and that we are one and that those refugees are us, and every person (and animal and tree) on the planet is us, we also need to love and cradle and whisper to those parts of us that we have rejected and shoved into the shadows.

In his various wonderful Youtube talks, the enlightened being Matt Kahn reminds us that when a toddler or young child has a tantrum our most loving action can be to wrap them in our arms, preventing them from hurting themselves or others, and just let them scream and scream until they are ready to behave.  And we can whisper to them/ourselves, says Matt, "I am forgiven, forgiven I am.  You are forgiven, forgiven you are.  I am love, love I am.  You are love, love you are" over and over and over until we know who we are.

And so I ask what energy, space and consciousness can I and my body be to let go of all I am holding against Donald Trump and his supporters and to embrace those parts of myself that have wanted to exclude or hurt others who are different than I am?  And anything that doesn't allow it, can I destroy and uncreate that all now in all parts of my consciousness, every lifetime, all directions, all layers, all times, no matter what?

And then I can remember who I am.  And I can go out and work and support and vote for a world that works for everyone. 

For Fathers Day: Return Immigrant Children to Their Parents Immediately

As a new thought minister, it is difficult to know what to add to what Stephen Colbert says above--where to begin with the daily heartbreaking news at the border.  Even evangelical ministers, who have largely been supportive of and even enthusiastic about the immigration policies of the President, are decrying the recent decision to separate children from their parents at the border.  Yesterday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions fell back on Romans 13 to insist on support for this policy, “I would cite you to the Apostle Paul and his clear and wise command in Romans 13, to obey the laws of the government because God has ordained the government for his purposes.”

The Washington Post Daily 202 (my favorite daily news source Link to subscribe to Daily 202) says that previous peak usage of this Bible passage was by leaders in the American south in the mid 1800s to justify slavery.  Mr. Sessions fails to mention the previous passage, Romans 12 “Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. ... Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.”

In the Centers for Spiritual Living, we do not believe it is possible to be separate from God.  We don't believe in a separate force in the world that is the Devil or a separate force of evil.  But we are clear that people ourselves create harm and evil, by separating ourselves from each other--which is a form of separation from God.  When we are advised to "love our neighbor as ourself" that means they are ourself--it is not pretend.  All evil is a form of forgetting this basic truth:  my neighbor is myself.  There is no other--we are all one.   

So let us not mince words:  separating children from their parents is evil.  Lying to mothers and children that the kids are being taken for their baths and moving them to a warehouse on their own is a scene out of Nazi Germany. Holding 1500 immigrant children at the border in a former Walmart without legal representation, without contact with their parents is wrong, heartbreaking, unjustifiable.

Just as this evil at the border is a result of forgetting, our current political crisis is a result of forgetting.  We must not forget who we are.  We must not forget that whether we voting for them or not, we elected our representatives.  They are us too.  That means that some part of our consciousness has accepted that it is okay to separate mothers from children.  We need to take responsibility for having participated in getting the country to the point where it could be this divided and this forgetful.

This is one of those moments where it is impossible to imagine that this can happen and we can return to our daily routines and our daily lives.  At a minimum, how about in honor of Father's Day, we take a moment to call our member of Congress at (202) 224-3121 (you enter your zip code and they tell you your member's name and connect you with them) and say "I urge my representative to visit the border and shut down the immoral detention of these families and separation of these children from their mothers." (I just did)

If Addiction is a spiritual problem, how is it also a disease? Part 3: Questions about Addiction and Treatment Raised by Unbroken Brain

Okay this seems to have turned into a series of articles on the questions raised by the book Unbroken Brain by Maia Szalavitz.  Today's question is: if addiction is a spiritual problem with a spiritual solution, how is it also a disease?

This is tricky: as we explored in the last article, Alcoholics Anonymous was founded by desperate men who had no other viable treatment options in their time.  Somehow, addicts, by admitting that we are powerless over our addictions and by cleaning up the wreckage of our past are able to draw on a higher power that restores us to sanity.  Millions of addicts have found this to be true.  

For every person that finds recovery in the spiritual solution offered by the 12 steps, there are people who leave 12-step recovery claiming that the reason is that can't deal with the spiritual solution.  Much of the early work of Alcoholics Anonymous was about how to help drunks find a higher power that worked for them that wasn't the punishing God of their childhood or perhaps even a God at all.  Some alcoholics simply make the other people in the group their Higher Power--they speak of G.O.D. ("Group of Drunks")-- the point is something other than yourself.  (For people who have a hard time with this, I always recommend Martha Cleveland's pithy The Alternative 12 Steps: A Secular Guide to Recovery)

So that's loosely how the spiritual part of it works--not in depth.  Which brings us back to the question, if addiction is a spiritual problem with a spiritual solution, how is it also a disease?

When I was the communications director for Physicians for a National Health Program, I used to joke "I'm not a doctor but I play one on TV" (later I made the same joke as I represented nurses in the legislature).  My degrees are in psychology, law and consciousness studies, so take this for what it is worth.  

As someone who works closely with addicts in recovery and as someone who has studied the nature of disease and spiritual recovery, this is what I can offer:

Addiction easily meets this dictionary definition of disease, a disorder of structure or function in a human, animal or plant, especially one that produces specific signs or symptoms or that affects a specific location and is not simply a direct result of physical injury.

Though the treatment and care for the disease may be partly spiritual, from a functional standpoint, it is very useful to treat addiction as a disease.  If my addiction is a disease, then I can release myself from shame and blame.  If my addiction is a disease, then I need treatment for that disease every day.  If I think of addiction as diabetes, then I can define my insulin.  Maybe my insulin is going to 12 step meetings, praying and meditating every day, being of service, caring about others.  If that keeps my disease in remission then that's something I do every day.  Not just on week days.  Not just when I'm in town.  Every day.  A diabetic who takes a break from insulin injections does so at their mortal peril.  It is the same for the addict to take a break from their spiritual insulin. 

That's enough for today, stay tuned for me to think about these questions as well:

• Since doctors and medicine virtually provided no hope for treatment of addiction prior to 12 step, why should we trust them now?
• Follow-up to that question, how has medicine evolved in its treatment of addiction?
• If psychological components of addiction treatment, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), use thought examination techniques popularized by 12-step groups, why should anyone pay a therapist when they can get it for free?
• How is it ethical for residential treatment centers to charge you or insurance companies a whole lot of money just to send you to free 12 step groups?
• Does it make sense for a medical model to refer you to a "spiritual solution" for what appears to be a disease?
• If addiction IS a disease AND has a spiritual solution, then why is there not a spiritual solution for other diseases?
• Follow up to that questions, and why aren't medical centers referring you to spiritual solutions for those?
• Are there some personality types that respond better to the radical responsibility model of 12 steps than others?
• How can it be that it is "not my fault" that I'm an addict and "only I can solve it" by doing "my work"?

Unbroken Brain Part 1: if you're addicted, is it your fault or? 
Unbroken Brain Part 2: Does shame and blame work in treatment and recovery from addiction?

Does Shame and Blame Work with Addiction?

In yesterday's post, I reviewed the book Unbroken Brain and listed the questions that it raised for me.  Today I'm going to explore the first question: If addiction is a disease, and not a moral failing, why does 12-step culture use so much shame and blame as a technique for getting people to stop using?

Back when Bill W. handed Dr. Bob his last drink on June 10, 1934 thereby founding Alcoholics Anonymous, there was no known cure for alcoholism.  It was considered hopeless.  Drunks died in prison, in hospitals, in drunk tanks or at best "sanitariums," or dove off bridges and buildings.  By the time they died, their families might have used plenty of shame and blame to get them to stop.  And it hadn't worked.

Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith, desperate alcoholics themselves, were also respectively potentially a successful high level salesman and a prominent surgeon.  They were white men who had high expectations of themselves.  They found, through research, intuition and desperation, that they only thing that allowed them to not take a drink was a spiritual solution.  As the "Big Book" of Alcoholics Anonymous puts it, "What we really have is a daily reprieve contingent on the maintenance of our spiritual condition." 

It would be wrong to imagine that shame or blame could ever help an addict.  Shame and blame are the addict's go to feelings.  No other person could ever inculcate more shame or blame for an addict or alcoholic than they do for themselves.  What 12 step programs (such as Alcoholics Anonymous, Overeater's Anonymous, Workaholics Anonymous, Debtor's Anonymous, Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous, Gambler's Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous and many many more) do is require rigorous honesty.

The single most important part of spiritual fitness is honesty.  When people can tell the truth about themselves, and get right-sized, the compulsion to use and drink is lifted.  That is what Bill W., Dr. Bob and millions of others since them have found.  But radical honesty is not a part of our normal culture, at least in the U.S.  Our culture rationalizes, tells white lies, justifies.  And we reward those behaviors.

So sometimes, when we come face to face with a culture like 12-step that requires rigorous honesty, it looks like it is shaming and blaming.  It is not.  It is owning up to the real devastation that we create when we are selfish, self-seeking, dishonest and fearful and we act out of those impulses.

If You're Addicted, Is it Your Fault, or Not? 5 Snouts Up for Unbroken Brain by Maia Szalavitz

(:)(:)(:)(:)(:) for Unbroken Brain by Maia Szalavitz (Understanding the snout-based rating system).  There are people who think 12-step programs are the only way to treat addiction and then there are people who hate 12-step programs and never the twain shall meet, except in this book.  Before she rehabilitated herself and became a journalist, Maia Szalavitz dropped out of Columbia University due to drug addiction, was convicted of drug dealing and remanded to crappy residential treatment.

The book is part memoir, part investigative journalism into the worst and best of 12 steps, residential treatment and the harm reduction model of treatment.  Maia is clear that 12-step programs saved her life.  And Maia is clear that abuse and harm is done in the name of treatment by almost exclusively relying on 12-step programs and "spiritual solutions" as well placing full responsibility on the addict for recovery from what is called a disease.  

My most important take away from the book is this:  while 12-step groups provide free, structured, self-led support and a spiritual solution  that can be a key component of recovery from addiction, they also have some cultural biases and downsides that don't help every addict hence may not be appropriate for a medical setting.

Honestly I could write a whole book about the questions this book raises (and only partially answers):

• If addiction is a disease, and not a moral failing, why does 12-step culture use so much shame and blame as a technique for getting people to stop?
• If addiction is a spiritual problem with a spiritual solution, how is it also a disease?
• Since doctors and medicine virtually provided no hope for treatment of addiction prior to 12 step, why should we trust them now?
• Follow-up to that question, how has medicine evolved in its treatment of addiction?
• If psychological components of addiction treatment, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), use thought examination techniques popularized by 12-step groups, why should anyone pay a therapist when they can get it for free?
• How is it ethical for residential treatment centers to charge you or insurance companies a whole lot of money just to send you to free 12 step groups?
• Does it make sense for a medical model to refer you to a "spiritual solution" for what appears to be a disease?
• If addiction IS a disease AND has a spiritual solution, then why is there not a spiritual solution for other diseases?
• Follow up to that questions, and why aren't medical centers referring you to spiritual solutions for those?
• Are there some personality types that respond better to the radical responsibility model of 12 steps than others?
• How can it be that it is "not my fault" that I'm an addict and "only I can solve it" by doing "my work"?

I think this is going to have to be a multi-part series because I have so many thoughts on every one of these questions.  Stay tuned...

What will it take for objectification of women to cease? How far have we moved?

Sold at Venice Beach, CA June 9, 2018

It strikes me that the #metoo movement is burgeoning; the Miss America beauty pageant is eliminating its swimsuit competition (so that we won't know its a beauty pageant).  Yet the products to the right and below publicly hawked in Venice Beach, are still somehow considered acceptable.  


Slavery is about the most basic evil we can agree on in this society yet it is okay for us to wear panties saying "John's Property" or "Mike's Bitch"?

What will it take for objectification and claims of ownership of women to not just be socially unacceptable but to disappear?



How does it get any better than this?  What else is possible?

My Thoughts on the Recent California Primary and a World that Works for Everyone

The results of Tuesday's California primary were underwhelming but could have been worse.  Turnout was low despite supposedly high activism and engagement.  What energy, space and consciousness do we have to be to notice primary elections are important and to really focus on them?  What else is possible?  How does it get better than this? 

Historically turnout is only high in Presidential election years.  This November we have a super important election to determine who will lead the US Congress.  Currently Congress is being controlled by a political party that is dismantling health care protections, lowering tax rates for the wealthiest, trying to weaken social security, programs that help the neediest amongst us.  It is also defaulting on its responsibility to oversee the Presidential branch and hold it accountable if it is engaging in illegal activity.   The people in control of Congress now do not share my values of a world that works for everyone.  

Many Congressional seats around the country will have to change hands in order for us to stop the bad policies being advanced and to have a chance to move forward on the economic and social issues that most Americans relate most to. 

What will it take for American voters to notice that their values and their future is at stake in every election?  What will it take for us to vote for a world that works for everyone and also encourage and help others to vote for a world that works for everyone?

Results in this election that move in the direction of a world that works for everyone:

• State Sen. Kevin de Leon (D) garnered just enough votes to make it into the general election runoff against US Senator Dianne Feinstein (D).  de Leon is a stronger champion than Feinstein for the rights of all people to have clean air, clean water, affordable health care, housing, and a living wage.  Although the odds are heavily stacked in Feinstein's favor, what would it take to mobilize a strong vote for de Leon to send a message to Sen. Feinstein that California's values are stronger than she thinks? 

• Voters sent candidates who are more likely to vote for a world that works for everyone to the top two of several congressional races in the state--so many Democrats were running in those seats that there had been a decent chance that they would only advance Republican candidates to the general election

• Voters strongly defeated Prop 70 a dirty deal to stop climate action.

All in all, it could have been worse.  There are some strong candidates on the ballot in the fall.  What can we do to educate ourselves and others about the importance of the fall general congressional election and to come out in force for a world that works for everyone?

Marie's Crisis Cafe, where have you been all my life?

(:)(:)(:)(:)(:) 5 Enthusiastic Snouts Up (Understanding My Snout-Based Rating System) for Marie's Crisis Cafe in NYC's West Village.  OMG, where has this been all my life?  This place is so great I can't even imagine how I didn't know about it before now.

Nowhere but New York City could this possibly occur.  Picture a typical below street level Greenwich Village tiny dive.  The focal point is this upright piano shown above (there's also a bar beyond it as you can see in the background).  The patrons on barstools surrounding the piano belt out every single lyric (mostly from memory) of show tune after show tune complete with harmonies, hamming it up, pairing up for duets, etc. The pianist queues lyrics with gestures and is often hilarious.

The friend who took me had tried to get in several times before and always encountered big lines (the fire marshall must limit capacity to 35 people max, maybe less--it's really small).  We waltzed right in at 9:30pm on a Tuesday night post Memorial Day--by 10:00pm it was packed.

Some of the singers pose as drunken barflies asleep on their stools and then come alive suddenly when their favorites are played--sitting partially upright and releasing these gorgeous tones--hilarious to watch.  Others seem like girlfriends with babysitters in from Jersey to request Mama Mia (a request that goes largely ignored by the piano player--why play Abba when you can play Rogers and Hammerstein, Sondheim, or Miranda and Diggs?)

Some you get the impression are there pretty much every night.  They know every song by heart.  They have gorgeous voices, certainly they performed in these shows, and wanted to do them on Broadway--maybe they even did.  Maybe they even still do.  

I got to chime in on songs from Gipsy, Chicago, and Oliver but felt most confident with My Fairy Lady and Guys and Dolls (because I've been in them).  Honorable mention goes to me for coming up with a missing harmony in Hair's "Aquarius"--i was unduly proud of myself for that.  My friend and I told ourselves that the regulars were wincing as we sang, but they probably paid us no notice (what could be worse, lol?)

We didn't try the food in the "café," but it is served.  We ate first at one of those great longstanding Indian restaurants in the East Village and then walked over through Washington Square--one of those rare summer spring nights where it was warm enough to languish in the park but not too hot.

Anyway, if you like singing or show tunes are just hearing live free music (did I mention, no cover charge?--although maybe on weekends)--this is the place to be.  You can bet I'm going back there!

The Iceman Cometh on Broadway -- Risky and Brilliant with Denzel Washingon

(:)(:)(:)(:) 4 snouts up out of 5 (Understanding My Snout-Based Rating System) for The Iceman Cometh on Broadway in NYC now starring Denzel Washington.  There's a few reasons that this brilliant play by perhaps the best American playwright, Eugene O'Neill, doesn't get staged often: it's got 4 acts; it takes just under 4 hours to run; it has a LARGE cast (which is fine for a musical but for a talky play, unusual); and it is set in 1912 and has a lot of obscure references from that time period.  

This production resolved a number of these difficulties simply by casting Denzel Washington as Hickey--the lead charismatic figure (although the part of Larry, played in this production by David Morse is very large--I think he's onstage the whole time).  By having Denzel as the lead (who doesn't enter until Act II), you spend the marvelous Act I on the edge of your seat as everyone on stage waits for "Hickey" to come, everyone in the audience waits for Denzel.  And even though that's a great first act (crazy to see all these drunks passed out on stage, who periodically come to and say something amazing), the play really starts when Hickey/Denzel character arrives so the 4 hours fly by.

Secondly, Denzel Washington's able easy performance somehow makes everything feel au courant even when it isn't--his character mocks the other characters' focus on "The (Communist Wobbly Workers) Movement," the "Boer (South African--British vs. Africaans) War " and, most of all, their drunken "pipe dreams." (My husband counted something like 41 uses of the phrase "pipe dreams" in the play).

But also Denzel being African American in a sea of white faces (there is one character, Joe,  who is written as black, more about that in a minute, the production chose to do "traditional" casting for all the other characters except Denzel's) somehow makes the play feel more current--AND in doing so, this casting choice (and Denzel's winning performance) paves the way for us to easily see O'Neill's central dramatic problem is as real as ever today.

The play takes place entirely in a bar on the lower west side of NYC in 1912.  The characters are a whole bunch of male drunks and 3 female prostitutes who basically live in the rooms above this dive.  Like most plays, it reflects more about the time in which it was written than it does the time in which it was set.  Written in 1940, the play's focus on alcoholism, and the possibility of recovering from it (not considered likely or discussed much in 1912), seems to have been heavily informed by the founding of Alcoholics Anonymous in 1934 and its subsequent literature.  Although some researchers think otherwise, believing that O'Neill as a severe alcoholic from an addicted family, recovered from alcoholism by writing his plays.  

Hickey, it turns out, has gotten sober and has come back to encourage the group of drunks to get honest about themselves and face the fact that their dreams are strictly pipe-induced (yes, originally the term comes from opium dens) so will never come to pass.

A word about O'Neill's black character, Joe.  I'd like to hear what others think.  I think it must have been somewhat groundbreaking for 1940 O'Neill to create a black male character who hangs out basically nonstop with white men as a peer drunk.  Granted he seems to have some work responsibilities, but so do at least 5 other white characters, and they are minimal.  The white characters display racism towards him and hurl awful epithets at him, but Joe stands up for himself and holds his own.  Joe has his own parallel story line and pipe dream--some really funny and interesting stories.  The greatest compliment he is given is that he is "white," much discussed, which is offensive to our ears and jarring to hear.  It strikes me that most other 20th century white playwrights simply avoided the issue of race altogether and wrote entirely white characters--or had poorly developed black characters in the background as a servants.   

The female characters in this play, in contrast, are all either prostitutes or discussed as "bitches," and slapped or physically threatened by their bartender pimps are more caricatures, not fully developed--although they do go on "on strike" at one point.

If you see the play, Bill and I recommend taking the steps we took:  read the play first, and take a nap in the afternoon prior.  It is a little difficult to make out the dialects of some of the characters without the background of having read it or being familiar.

In all though, the power of O'Neill's writing, the strength of Washington's performance and the unique vision of tons of drunks on stage shine through.  See this production if you can.

Design Flaw? Commercial Scale Dual Flush Toilet Handles Defy Human Habit

It's a small thing but it has bugged me for a while that the most common form of low flush toilet handle used in large scale bathroom facilities (Leed certified (highly environmentally friendly) type buildings) is designed to encourage more water use.

Let me explain: most toilet flushes are only going to flush away #1, not #2. And most of us (in the U.S.) are used to pushing a toilet handle down to flush.

Photo of handle in Brown University Building

Enter this model of toilet flush where if you squint at the graphics you can see that for a low flush (1 drop of water on graphic) you pull the handle up and for a heavy flush (3 drops of water on graphic) you push the handle down.

If you're not used to these toilets (most people don't have dual flush toilets in their home, and if they do, they're not this model), you will probably just push the handle down and it will be the heavy (#2) flush, which is likely to be unnecessary.

What am I missing?  The people who design these must have thought this through.  Am I right?  is it really a design flaw? Please educate me.

ALREADY? The Fast and Slow Pace of Childrearing

This weekend, Bill and I are in Providence, Rhode Island to see our baby girl graduate from Brown University (with a degree in Computer Science).  Every person I've told that we're going has said "already?!" and they don't know the half of it.

The day to day experience of raising children seems to go impossibly slow.  Some of those days with very young kids or mad, bored teens, were hecka long.   Yet, it all passes by in these bursts of "already?"

It would be too trite to trot out the parade of "alreadys" that march through one's mind.  I couldn't possibly bore you with memories of that baby laugh, those bright blonde curls, the first falling down steps, not to mention the carpools, the camping trips, the tears and fun of high school.  

When the kids were kids I used to muse that every single age I wished they wouldn't get any older.  That was really true.  And it was such a blessing.  Every single year of their childhood  (except for around 15) I thought they were fantastic and wished they wouldn't get any older.  They did and that was fantastic too.

I still feel that way.  And just like all those other times, I'm convinced that it won't keep up.  How could I enjoy my daughter of the future any better than this glorious 21 year old brilliant & charming beauty I have right here? 

Happy Birthday to Me (Mostly today only, not all month long anymore)

All Month All About Me Birthday Sara

It was not that long ago that I considered my birthday to be a virtually monthlong event.  Longer in some ways if you included the time I was talking about it.  During this period, I needed a big party.  I needed presents.  I needed attention.  I had expectations.  They were never met.  I would feel disappointed.  I would never somehow feel that I had been properly celebrated.  

Mostly just the day of Birthday Sara

Over the past few years, this need to be properly celebrated has diminished just a bit.  Don't get me wrong, I still talk about my birthday a bit.  I still want presents from my husband and children.  I even make a little google doc with suggestions to make it easier (but that also makes it less likely that I'll be disappointed).  

I still like there to be a family celebration and I still love a good excuse for a party.  What's different though is that I don't NEED it very much.  I don't need it other than right around the real day.  And I don't need it to be all about me.  For example, this year, we are taking some friends to the Women's Empowerment Gala Dinner which happens to be tonight, which happens to be my birthday.  We're going out in honor of my birthday but we're there to help raise money for this wonderful organization that has helped transitioned women out of homelessness.  They are the star attraction, very much not me.  

What makes this evolution possible, it strikes me, is that I now get my needs met year round.  I do not overdo for others as much.  I do not postpone my own down time or fun or play.  So I don't need to cram all sorts of things into a month anymore.   I also am not craving attention because a) I get a lot of attention in my job and my family life and b) I no longer really expect other people to make me feel okay.

These smaller, sweeter birthdays are really so much more fulfilling than the blowout birthday extravaganzas of yesteryear.  I am grateful for another year of life, another day of life.