Revelations on Day 2 of the Master Cleanse.
1/2/10
1:33pm
While sitting on the toilet (something one does often following the Saltwater Flush-portion of the Master Cleanse) a few minutes ago my mind began to wander, and that old fear of violence and repressed-anger started to manifest. These are recurring themes for me.
My thoughts had drifted to a destination that was rather common only a couple of years ago, but which I now visit with less frequency; an apocalyptic scenario in which I see myself wandering around a post-war (or post-peak-oil, or post-climate disaster, or post-economic collapse... pick a post-) world.
How would I deal with details like the erosion of my clothing? Surely when one is forced into a nomadic lifestyle one isn’t able to carry around a lot of extra clothes. What clothing would be necessary? One would probably start with jeans and a T-shirt, and carry extra layers for when it got cold. Maybe a sweater, a jacket, and hopefully a couple of extra pairs of socks and underwear. How would one keep them clean and from falling apart when they are worn every day? Would people go back to washing their clothes in streams? Would new clothing be found or scavenged from time to time?
On the heels of this type of anxious, detail-oriented speculation follows the fear-based fantasies of violence. Roving packs of gangs wander the wasteland, stealing resources from people wandering alone or in smaller groups. I picture my cats being killed for their meat by desperately hungry hunters. My body tenses and a familiar feeling of suppressed, impotent rage radiates from within this tension.
A distant memory bubbles up. My brother and I are walking our little black mutt, Cash, at the Little League baseball fields near the house where we grew up. We are Elementary school-age, and we run into a kid in his early teens who starts harassing us and throwing rocks and dirt clods at our dog. We yell at him to stop, but he just laughs and continues to throw things at Cash.
The memory of that impotent rage manifests and becomes real anger in the present moment. I start to visualize some kind of wish-fulfillment scenario in which my brother and I decide that, between the two of us, we can take on this older kid. We will chase him down and get ahold of him and beat him up; and while we do it we will let him know that this is what it feels like to be a helpless dog, pelted with rocks. He will feel the pain that he has caused and - although he will be angry at first - it will eventually sink in that he brought this upon himself. He will understand the error of his ways and change his perspective.
At certain moments while cleansing, I seem to gain a heightened ability to consciously observe phantoms that arise from the psyche; phantoms that usually remain just below the surface, leaving a residual discomfort like the feeling of "waking up on the wrong side of the bed" because of a troubling dream that you don't even realize you've had. Normally I forget about these daydreams as quickly as they bubble up and pop. Perhaps this forgetfulness is actually a habit forged from repeatedly choosing to turn away from the ugly face of fear and anger.
Sitting here upon my porcelain lay z boy, it occurs to me that there is a connection between the apocalyptic fantasies that began my daydreaming and the memory that it ended with, and that the connection goes beyond the theme of harm being inflicted upon pets. Rather, the harm being done to my pets stands for the feeling it evokes – impotence, or a lack of control. I don’t speak of sexual impotence, but rather powerlessness. And this seems to be a common theme in my dreams and daydreams of disaster-scenarios. There is always violence, or else the threat of violence. And it always seems beyond my ability to make it stop. Beyond my ability to control. And the inability to act creates a feeling of powerlessness, which gives way to an impotent rage. Impotent because it is a rage that, if acted upon, can only result in my demise.
After considering this, I think about what must be my most bizarre, and seemingly uncontrollable, neurosis: my inability to focus when brushing my teeth, which causes me to brush for at least 10 minutes and often up to 20 or even more. I have also gone through stretches of time where I’ll have regular dreams about my teeth rotting or falling out.
Over the years, I’ve read different interpretations of the significance of this theme in dreams, and the one that seems to be universal is that teeth that are rotting or falling out represent control-issues.
I guess I’ve long known that I have control issues; but just don’t know what to do about them.
The idea of a connection between the fear of violence that births impotent rage and issues of control is new to me, however. Now that it has occurred to me, it really seems to make sense, though: my fear of violence is a fear of situations in which my fate and the fate of those whom I love is beyond my control. In truth, much of what happens in life is beyond our control. One certainly can set one’s intentions and be prepared, to some extent, for certain situations; but like all other pairs of opposites in our dualistic perception of life, there is a balance between chaos and control. In order to resolve this issue, I will have to know the balance as an experience.
It seems incredible that I am only now beginning to notice and understand some of these issues, in my early 30s. One major reason: from my late teenage years and up through the present, marijuana has been an effective way for me to avoid such difficult reflection on a conscious level. Perhaps the fact that I haven’t smoked pot for two weeks now (a new job-opening may require a drug test), coupled with a weeklong raw-food diet leading up to my cleanse, has fostered some clarity, allowing me to look these issues in the face.
Marijuana is an issue unto itself. I definitely see value in The Pot and haven’t yet decided to cut it off from my life. In fact, another quote that I read recently from Joseph Campbell (I’ve been reading a book that compiles a bunch of his lectures and sayings) had somewhat changed the negative view I'd been taking towards weed since around the time that I turned 30. He writes:
Don’t quit your vices
Make them work for you.
Simply put; but it resonated. Campbell's words made me realize that for the last two or three years my vice has remained the same while my perspective regarding it has become more negative. Questioning the usefulness of a vice is one thing if the questioning leads to some change in action. If pot truly has no value in my life, I should just stop partaking in it. However, as long as I choose to continue smoking, why should I feel guilty or turn it into a negative experience?
This is a complicated thing, because – and this probably shouldn’t surprise me considering my control issues – my pot use is something that I rarely have under control. When there is weed in my home, I am smoking it. Oftentimes this is the case even on weekday mornings, before I go to work. Pot tends to shift perspectives and priorities and bring relaxation. When I'm high, I find that things that seemed to warrant urgent attention in sobriety - such as chores and exercise - become unimportant, or things that can be attended to later. So, if I am going to continue to have pot in my life, I must learn how to “make it work for me.” This means having the discipline to only do it when it is useful – namely, to gain access to the creative source.
Not that the creative source is inaccessible without it. But, as someone who is so self-conscious, marijuana certainly aids in things like playing the piano and accessing creativity rather than worrying about the fact that I don’t necessarily “know how to play.”
Anyway, this has been a useful “session” here, I think. I’m starting to see that perhaps if I can just confront this one issue, face it, and figure out how to transcend it, many things will fall into place for me.
2:43pm
Note (3/19/12): Two years, two months, and 17 days have passed since I originally posted this to a blog that was meant for my eyes only. Tonight - with just over a day left before I embark on 9 months of traveling that will serve as the material for the blog that this one has become - I edited the heck out of this post. Not sure if it was even worth including; but the control-issues that I was considering at the beginning of 2010 are interesting to revisit, because learning to "relinquish control" will be a key challenge in the travels ahead. In order to live a story that will serve as an example of how life can be a dream-led adventure rather than a series of conscious choices and decisive actions, I will have to become quite good at letting go and trusting the wisdom of intuition.
1/2/10
1:33pm
While sitting on the toilet (something one does often following the Saltwater Flush-portion of the Master Cleanse) a few minutes ago my mind began to wander, and that old fear of violence and repressed-anger started to manifest. These are recurring themes for me.
My thoughts had drifted to a destination that was rather common only a couple of years ago, but which I now visit with less frequency; an apocalyptic scenario in which I see myself wandering around a post-war (or post-peak-oil, or post-climate disaster, or post-economic collapse... pick a post-) world.
How would I deal with details like the erosion of my clothing? Surely when one is forced into a nomadic lifestyle one isn’t able to carry around a lot of extra clothes. What clothing would be necessary? One would probably start with jeans and a T-shirt, and carry extra layers for when it got cold. Maybe a sweater, a jacket, and hopefully a couple of extra pairs of socks and underwear. How would one keep them clean and from falling apart when they are worn every day? Would people go back to washing their clothes in streams? Would new clothing be found or scavenged from time to time?
On the heels of this type of anxious, detail-oriented speculation follows the fear-based fantasies of violence. Roving packs of gangs wander the wasteland, stealing resources from people wandering alone or in smaller groups. I picture my cats being killed for their meat by desperately hungry hunters. My body tenses and a familiar feeling of suppressed, impotent rage radiates from within this tension.
A distant memory bubbles up. My brother and I are walking our little black mutt, Cash, at the Little League baseball fields near the house where we grew up. We are Elementary school-age, and we run into a kid in his early teens who starts harassing us and throwing rocks and dirt clods at our dog. We yell at him to stop, but he just laughs and continues to throw things at Cash.
The memory of that impotent rage manifests and becomes real anger in the present moment. I start to visualize some kind of wish-fulfillment scenario in which my brother and I decide that, between the two of us, we can take on this older kid. We will chase him down and get ahold of him and beat him up; and while we do it we will let him know that this is what it feels like to be a helpless dog, pelted with rocks. He will feel the pain that he has caused and - although he will be angry at first - it will eventually sink in that he brought this upon himself. He will understand the error of his ways and change his perspective.
At certain moments while cleansing, I seem to gain a heightened ability to consciously observe phantoms that arise from the psyche; phantoms that usually remain just below the surface, leaving a residual discomfort like the feeling of "waking up on the wrong side of the bed" because of a troubling dream that you don't even realize you've had. Normally I forget about these daydreams as quickly as they bubble up and pop. Perhaps this forgetfulness is actually a habit forged from repeatedly choosing to turn away from the ugly face of fear and anger.
Sitting here upon my porcelain lay z boy, it occurs to me that there is a connection between the apocalyptic fantasies that began my daydreaming and the memory that it ended with, and that the connection goes beyond the theme of harm being inflicted upon pets. Rather, the harm being done to my pets stands for the feeling it evokes – impotence, or a lack of control. I don’t speak of sexual impotence, but rather powerlessness. And this seems to be a common theme in my dreams and daydreams of disaster-scenarios. There is always violence, or else the threat of violence. And it always seems beyond my ability to make it stop. Beyond my ability to control. And the inability to act creates a feeling of powerlessness, which gives way to an impotent rage. Impotent because it is a rage that, if acted upon, can only result in my demise.
After considering this, I think about what must be my most bizarre, and seemingly uncontrollable, neurosis: my inability to focus when brushing my teeth, which causes me to brush for at least 10 minutes and often up to 20 or even more. I have also gone through stretches of time where I’ll have regular dreams about my teeth rotting or falling out.
Over the years, I’ve read different interpretations of the significance of this theme in dreams, and the one that seems to be universal is that teeth that are rotting or falling out represent control-issues.
I guess I’ve long known that I have control issues; but just don’t know what to do about them.
The idea of a connection between the fear of violence that births impotent rage and issues of control is new to me, however. Now that it has occurred to me, it really seems to make sense, though: my fear of violence is a fear of situations in which my fate and the fate of those whom I love is beyond my control. In truth, much of what happens in life is beyond our control. One certainly can set one’s intentions and be prepared, to some extent, for certain situations; but like all other pairs of opposites in our dualistic perception of life, there is a balance between chaos and control. In order to resolve this issue, I will have to know the balance as an experience.
It seems incredible that I am only now beginning to notice and understand some of these issues, in my early 30s. One major reason: from my late teenage years and up through the present, marijuana has been an effective way for me to avoid such difficult reflection on a conscious level. Perhaps the fact that I haven’t smoked pot for two weeks now (a new job-opening may require a drug test), coupled with a weeklong raw-food diet leading up to my cleanse, has fostered some clarity, allowing me to look these issues in the face.
Marijuana is an issue unto itself. I definitely see value in The Pot and haven’t yet decided to cut it off from my life. In fact, another quote that I read recently from Joseph Campbell (I’ve been reading a book that compiles a bunch of his lectures and sayings) had somewhat changed the negative view I'd been taking towards weed since around the time that I turned 30. He writes:
Don’t quit your vices
Make them work for you.
Simply put; but it resonated. Campbell's words made me realize that for the last two or three years my vice has remained the same while my perspective regarding it has become more negative. Questioning the usefulness of a vice is one thing if the questioning leads to some change in action. If pot truly has no value in my life, I should just stop partaking in it. However, as long as I choose to continue smoking, why should I feel guilty or turn it into a negative experience?
This is a complicated thing, because – and this probably shouldn’t surprise me considering my control issues – my pot use is something that I rarely have under control. When there is weed in my home, I am smoking it. Oftentimes this is the case even on weekday mornings, before I go to work. Pot tends to shift perspectives and priorities and bring relaxation. When I'm high, I find that things that seemed to warrant urgent attention in sobriety - such as chores and exercise - become unimportant, or things that can be attended to later. So, if I am going to continue to have pot in my life, I must learn how to “make it work for me.” This means having the discipline to only do it when it is useful – namely, to gain access to the creative source.
Not that the creative source is inaccessible without it. But, as someone who is so self-conscious, marijuana certainly aids in things like playing the piano and accessing creativity rather than worrying about the fact that I don’t necessarily “know how to play.”
Anyway, this has been a useful “session” here, I think. I’m starting to see that perhaps if I can just confront this one issue, face it, and figure out how to transcend it, many things will fall into place for me.
2:43pm
Note (3/19/12): Two years, two months, and 17 days have passed since I originally posted this to a blog that was meant for my eyes only. Tonight - with just over a day left before I embark on 9 months of traveling that will serve as the material for the blog that this one has become - I edited the heck out of this post. Not sure if it was even worth including; but the control-issues that I was considering at the beginning of 2010 are interesting to revisit, because learning to "relinquish control" will be a key challenge in the travels ahead. In order to live a story that will serve as an example of how life can be a dream-led adventure rather than a series of conscious choices and decisive actions, I will have to become quite good at letting go and trusting the wisdom of intuition.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Welcome, and thank you for your visit. Please choose an alias for yourself. If you knew me before I became Barefoot Beirdo, please humor me and refrain from using my given name here. I'd like to strongly encourage posting your own dreams in the comment field. Also, any constructive criticism of this blogs' layout and readability are greatly appreciated. This here's a work in progress.