{"id":900,"date":"2017-07-20T18:03:18","date_gmt":"2017-07-20T22:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sallybsedgwick.com\/conversation\/?p=900"},"modified":"2017-07-20T18:14:47","modified_gmt":"2017-07-20T22:14:47","slug":"despairandunease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/despairandunease\/","title":{"rendered":"Despair and Unease"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"FishIncreasingly, I\u2019m confused. When friends get together, the main points of discussion seem to focus on illness, relationship break ups, horrible things that happen in the grocery store, lack of hope for world peace, political craziness, or the completely strange behavior of children or parents.<\/span><\/p>\n

I get tired when I scan Facebook, overhear conversations on the street, or read just about anything. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing we can do!\u201d is repeated as if it were obvious and reassuring. It\u2019s a terrible world! Let\u2019s live in it together. In other words, most talk seems to be about hopelessness that only we and our friends understand, ad nauseam.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/i>In fact, the other day, a friend shared this quotation: \u201cA fundamental sign of mental health is one’s realization that life is hard.\u201d\u2014 Scott Peck<\/a>. <\/span><\/p>\n

I answered this, being me, with, \u201cThat\u2019s a depressing quote.\u201d To which someone replied, \u201cBut life is<\/i> hard\u2026\u201d I left the conversation at this point, but have to ask isn\u2019t \u201chard\u201d a decision? An interpretation? If \u201clife is hard,\u201d what is the opposite? \u201cEasy?\u201d Then what is an \u201ceasy\u201d life? Does it mean never having to\/choosing to do anything? Most of Scott Peck\u2019s quotations<\/a> are simply challenging, such as \u201cWe cannot solve life\u2019s problems except by solving them.\u201d But I digress.<\/span><\/p>\n

From the stage, a speaker \u201cearns the right\u201d to share with their audience through telling them about the bankruptcy, accident, or divorce. In a group we scorn the word \u201cperfect,\u201d which, if you\u2019ve been following these conversations, you know I actually like (Perfect<\/i>)<\/a>. In fact, we would rather wallow in our imperfections. Maybe we also wallow in assuming things are hard because it precludes action. It implies that addressing issues is ultimately useless.\u00a0 <\/span>Family drama is the norm. Many (most?) churches focus on sin and the sinful rather than on joy and redemption. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"rustedOf course, when we meet each other, it\u2019s \u201cHow are you?\u201d \u201cFine. You?\u201d \u201cFine.\u201d Although \u201cfine\u201d isn\u2019t true most of the time. In the case of \u201cfine\u201d as a false response, in addition to our really not being fine (whatever that means), we\u2019re lying to our bodies, our minds, and those we meet, which is another post for another time.\u00a0<\/span>Did I say I was confused? It’s not that I’m doubting that any of the above is true. I don’t know anyone happy with our current politics. I’m sure your mother\u2019s behavior is incredibly frustrating.<\/p>\n

But what would happen if we just said \u201chi\u201d on the street and leave it at that \u2014unless we knew the person we met and really wanted to know how they were? Or answered the question of \u201chow are you?\u201d as a friend of mine does. \u201cHow are\u00a0 <\/span>you?\u201d \u201cPartly cloudy with a chance of showers.\u201d Or, as I\u00a0 <\/span>usually do, with silence and a smile. <\/span><\/p>\n

What would happen if, while admitting our \u201cnot being fine,\u201d instead of claiming it as our primary identity, we described the ways we\u2019ve made it to the other side of the negative or asked for help in seeing how the apparently negative could be a possibility? What if the problems were presented as a chance to share job opportunities or to explore new ways to deal with your \u201cdifficult\u201d mother?<\/span><\/p>\n

As another example maybe one can say \u201ccancer survivor\u201d when talking about someone. But what if that person\u2019s preferred identity is one who rejoices in flowers or who has discovered new cooking techniques, or who has set a new record in the javelin throw? And had also, by the way, survived cancer. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"brokenOne reason I\u2019m confused is that I know I dismiss some of this. \u201cYou really were life threateningly sick,\u201d my doctor scolded me. \u201cOh,\u201d I answered. And I think he\u2019s right. I need to claim that part of my life even though I\u2019d rather forget it. I joke, although I\u2019m actually serious, that when I \u201cearn the right\u201d to share onstage, my line is that people can choose what \u201cD\u201d they need for me to expand for them. Death, divorce, disease, debt, degrees, depression, decadence, debauchery, even, perhaps, desires\u2026, etc. But what I want to share and so \u201cclaim\u201d to “earn the right” is the excitement, joy, and achievement on the other side. No, not on the “other side,” but as part of every side.<\/span><\/p>\n

Because a major piece of our mandate to change the world involves daring to hope that it will change. Yes, I understand, that for some of you, that seems almost impossible. (You might want to reread our first conversation<\/a>\u00a0for a vision of why it\u2019s not impossible.) But take the risk. Hope involves daring to see that something not only will and can change, but is changing. And this gives it space and direction in which to continue to change for the better.<\/span><\/p>\n

The mandate is to dare to claim joy and excitement now<\/i>. <\/span><\/p>\n

So “How are you?” “Well, my knee hurts sometimes, but I’ve been swimming almost every day; I have a couple of new ideas on things to share with Spirit Moxie; I\u2019ve met some new friends; I\u2019ve started a new Facebook page; and I’ve had some chances to cook again.”<\/span><\/p>\n

You?<\/span><\/p>\n

_________________________
\nPhotos from the top:<\/p>\n

Fish \u2014 Spirit Moxie
\nRusted Cars \u2014 David A. Lynch<\/a>
\nAbandoned \u2014 David A. Lynch<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Increasingly, I\u2019m confused. When friends get together, the main points of discussion seem to focus on illness, relationship break ups, horrible things that happen in the grocery store, lack of hope for world peace, political craziness, or the completely strange … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asides"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6DJHl-ew","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=900"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":906,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions\/906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.spiritmoxie.com\/conversation\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}