Wow – it’s been such a wet IWD, wet week, wet month, wet summer … and I want to do a blog post for IWD. I was reading a few feminist blogs this morning, when I really should have been doing work for the back end of my psychology practice. It is one of those days when I have a long ‘to do’ list but I can’t get my act together to do a thing on it. And, I’ve had two cancellations … possibly due to this weather.

It is still being reported that 70% of ‘the poor’ are women, women own 10% of the wealth of the world and do two-thirds of the work. So, we can’t stop working for human rights and for women.

However, my mind has been racing about kyriarchy. A fabulous term that might really be helpful to understanding where the love and compassion has gone. My lay view of the word is that it means the the domination of one over another. Here’s a definition:

Kyriarchy – a neologism coined by Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza and derived from the Greek words for “lord” or “master” (kyrios) and “to rule or dominate” (archein) which seeks to redefine the analytic category of patriarchy in terms of multiplicative intersecting structures of domination…Kyriarchy is best theorized as a complex pyramidal system of intersecting multiplicative social structures of superordination and subordination, of ruling and oppression. 

Patriarchy – Literally means the rule of the father and is generally understood within feminist discourses in a dualistic sense as asserting the domination of all men over all women in equal terms.  The theoretical adequacy of patriarchy has been challenged because, for instance, black men to not have control over white wo/men and some women (slave/mistresses) have power over subaltern women and men (slaves).  - from, Wisdom Ways, Orbis Books   New York 2001

Kyriarchy is the word that comes to mind when I think about a male friend who is always ‘teasing’ me about how oppressed he is by feminism every time I open my mouth … just looking at him is like me being the bull and him the red fucking flag. Then, after we’ve have the exhausting debate, he describes the whole experience as something sexual! And I want to kill him all over again. His partner just rolls her eyes at me. Anyway, part of his argument will inevitably go something like this ‘you white feminists oppressing us male wogs’. Meaning, generally and personally – I’m oppressing him … and perhaps he is right as I am a white women of privilege and he is originally from a culturally and linguistically diverse place. So, he seems to be talking about kyriarchy in his argument, when one has domination over another. Thinking with this word moves me, as a feminist, from just thinking about patriarchy and unpacking the multiple complexities of our modern world and all of the oppression.

The ‘mommy wars’ are so painful too me. Where’s the compassion? Where’s the love? I have witnessed one of my friends say to another of my friends, ‘I didn’t have children to put them in day care in all week’. She was oblivious that the listening friend, does have her children in day care most of the week and I know her heart breaks because of this. She doesn’t have the financial privilege the speaker has. Never mind me, who works away from home, more than the average mother (and the speaker knows this) but I can honestly say I don’t have the guilt or the heartbreak – I’ve worked that shit out. Well it can creep up occasionally, I’m only human! Anyway – this is a kind of kyriarchy, when the women of privilege lord it over the rest of us … in subtle ways.  Those who are more mentally and emotionally resilient (usually the wealthiest) lord it over those of us struggling with our mental and emotional health (usually the poorest).

Okay … Happy International Womens Day – I didn’t complete this on the actual day, but go me!!

Bull fighting leaves me feeling sad and powerless  …..

 Read what the bull fighter said. Some one posted this on facebook …

MAKE THE CONNECTION.
“And suddenly, I looked at the bull. He had this innocence that all animals have in their eyes, and he looked at me with this pleading. It was like a cry for justice, deep down inside of me. I describe it as being like a prayer – because if one confesses, it is hoped, that one is forgiven. I felt like the worst shit on earth.”

This photo shows the collapse of Torrero Alvaro Munera, as he realized in the middle of the his last fight… the injustice to the animal. From that day forward he became an opponent of bullfights.

‘When I paint I feel that all the artists of the past are behind me’  Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

It’s been a while since I’ve posted on Compassionate Flow. I apologise to my dear followers. I’ve been busy each week since the beginning of this year writing creative fiction for Creative Writing Ink. Every week a photo is provided to prompt an idea for writing a creative piece. You can see some of my work over at Scaffold of Love. I’m over the moon because I won the writing competition for January and, not being greedy or anything, I want to win in February too! C is for creativity and E is for emerging writing. You know the letters of Compassionate Flow all stand for things we love.

So, Pablo Picasso –  A is for Art. Last weekend, myself and my four cherubs, ventured into the NSW Art Gallery to see the Picasso exhibition. We all had a fantastic day and were amazed at how prolific this man was. He was passionate and absolutely professional in his discipline to art. His work is so bold and so free. He seems like a man who didn’t care what people thought. Pablo’s style was not mainstream. Let’s face it, mainstream is usually boring. It was wonderful to see some of his early works. My understanding of this exhibition is that it was the collection left after he died, all the amazing  paintings just hanging around under the bed and behind the piano (like we have at our place). Sydney was lucky to have these works on loan from France. We just had to go, who knows when we’ll be in Paris next! Pablo also did some confronting sculptures.

It seems he was a bit of a womanizer as well as an artist. (Don’t get me started!) So moving along,  he lived across both world wars, hanging out in the South of France in World War I and painting the days away, and then in World War II painting under the watchful eye of the Germans. He was influenced by his travels to Spain, the Pacific and by artist – Cezanne. Masks dominate in his work as does the nude female figure, abstracted in his special way. Finn loved ‘green boob’, named by him and actually called ‘La lecture’ or ‘The Reader’ (1932). She’s the one above!

Here’s a few more pics

I often puzzle over what it means to belong. Many of us desire to belong somewhere, to something, to someone. When someone presents to therapy, often underlying ‘the problem’, is a need to belong. In society we are always forming communities - groups, cults, gangs, tribes, fan clubs, friendship groups, etc. A group tends to work best when there is a common theme, a cause, or belief system. Perhaps we like to group together because, basically, we are herd mammals.

I attended some Schema Therapy workshops last year and tested my schema’s. A schema is, very basically, one of a number of ’scripts’ one lives by. Schema therapy can be very helpful for some people and situations. Anyway, after answering many multiple choice questions, the schema I fitted with was something along the lines of: I don’t fit in or belong. This surprised me – I usually fit in everywhere and with anyone, sometimes I’m even the life of the party!

So I started thinking about this, (which is probably exactly why schema therapy is useful). I know I like to think along a continuum rather than having fixed ideas. For example, I love Queer Theory. I like to avoid the binaries and notions of an essential self. I attempt to hold my beliefs/thoughts loosely rather than tightly. I go along with the adage – ‘assumption is the mother of all fuck ups’.

So I came up with the following, as a kind of, manifesto (is manifesto the correct word?).

Perhaps a sense of belonging is not found in belonging to anyone or anything but in avoiding the binaries with their boundaries and limitations. Moving through fear, past discomfort and embracing life along the lines of continuum thinking. Becoming culturally literate so as to be able to connect with anyone, within the limitations of what we know. Moving gently and being creative and mindfully aware of the present moment we are in. Moment by moment seeking to notice the sensations in our bodies and considering what they may mean. Building a practice that steps aware from othering by nurturing compassion and seeking understanding through collaboration. Pausing with others but not constituting them as other, rather embracing intimacy, even if only fleetingly. Moving fluidly with people, for a time in history along the continuum somewhere beyond the binaries, beyond inclusion and exclusion. This may be a place where we find our sense of belonging.

I asked my friend in an email, as a semiotic expert, if the above paragraph made any sense to him ?

His response:

‘When “semiotically speaking” this would seem to be part of the fluid dynamic of interaction, that Peirce embraced in an ill named state/category of sign system/state, Seconds. Subjectivities expressed, inter-subjectivities materialised. Much more could be said here …. I think very much we need enriched communicative senses and models that identify the processes you mention in modern culture – both coming from, yet transformative, of biological and cultural bonds and traditions of family and culture, etc. Peirce identified two other states – Thirds, if more decision making, collective, politicised sense of shared organisation that allows one to belong to a locality, a nation, a region. The First state is phenomenological, that which is given – the earth as a given, provides another vaguer sense of belonging – also the vision of a common humanity. So briefly perhaps belonging can be mapped in several senses and directions. Tantalisingly, Peirce saw all states interdependent in various extents in any event – the planet finally is as seen on individuals also, and individual authenticity or expression is assumed  in any social conception. Much sense of continuum comes from Firsts – the quasi scientific sense of infinity, possibility that is transferable to some extent into social intimacy and indeed constitutes intimacy out of functionality (there also does seem something limited in those expressions linguistic or social functionalism). Peirce was also fairly anti dualistic – loved paradoxes – so is not a good source for the kind of structuralised oppositionalism of some semiotics (Saussure) that has so flavoured some cultural work – perhaps including the discourse of otherness to some extent’.

The Dalai Lama says:

“If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”

And … birds of a feather, flock together …

Swimming on Christmas Night!

As a psychologist I’ve never been one for self-help pop psychology books and I have an uneasy feeling growing about the gazillions of ‘self-help’ blogs out there. Do we really need all this help? Absent but implicit (if not explicit) in the self-help genre is the message that we’re not quite good enough and that we need to improve and change. It’s healthy to want to change for the better but it can be a vicious cycle if we are unwittingly being invited into feeling less because of this.

Making passive income is something we’d all like, being fitter is something more or less universal, reaching dreams and goals is something most of us aspire too. From an evolutionary biological psychological viewpoint it is part of what makes us human and what makes us the most creative and adaptable species on the planet.

Bloggers are busy trying to find their unique selling position, getting a niche market, finding out what people really want and giving it to them freely. Some will try and monetize this and we don’t mind paying a few bucks for some good ideas. This isn’t unlike all the self-help books that still sell well in bookshops.

Some authors and bloggers have had great experiences of personal growth that they just have to share with us. I’ve handed money over for some great courses and e-books, mindful that I’m fine just as I am and being careful not to be vulnerable to the subliminal messages between the lines that I need to be better. Don’t get me wrong, I have taken away some good stuff from these products.

It’s just I was working with someone the other day in the counselling room who told me she hadn’t had any peace for several years. We were on about session five and I asked her when she first noticed a lack of peace in her life? Eventually we uncovered that she has been engaged in the last few years in ‘self-improvement’ or ‘life improvement’ or ‘financial improvement’ courses and online activities. She has been involved in all the motivational movements out there. She spends a fair bit of time each day browsing around the internet and reading self-help books. She has affirmations posted around the place. (Another pet dislike of mine but a lot of people like them) We discovered this stuff always leaves her feeling ‘not good enough’. She was bit shocked to come to this realization. It was one of those light bulb, ah ha moments! For many years she has been working hard at change and really hasn’t got as far as she hoped. It seems she believed she would be some kind of millionaire living an amazing life or something by now. It seems she can never measure up because the measure keeps moving out of her reach. Constant striving had left her unwell and lacking confidence. When she wasn’t actively working on herself  she’d always be feeling a bit guilty.

Even coming along to a psychologist is an admission to yourself … ‘I need help, I’m not good enough, I’m  crazy.’ The collaborative work for the psychologist is to shift this world view, we have to deconstruct how this story developed in the first place. Childhood trauma, relationship breakdown, drug/alcohol culture may have played a part, but usually messages from our society, taken on board like osmosis, have contributed so much more to stealing confidence. The psychological work is to reclaim our lives from all these ‘you’re just not good enough’ messages. They soon turn into the nagging voice of criticism.

In therapy people sometimes sabotage their efforts to change. To me this is actually a good part of them that is saying ‘I don’t need to change I’m good enough as I am’ or ‘if I do change they were right and I’m not really good enough after all’. The voice of self-sabotage can actually be a voice of ‘you’re okay just how you are’ in a strange disguise. Once people unravel all these crossed wires they seem to be able to accept themselves while simultaneously working on change peacefully and effortlessly, without striving. I notice these thought patterns operating with eating disorders where people and therapists can get so tangled.

It’s controversial defining the word cult. In my psychology practice I consider three things to alert me if I think someone might be the caught up in cultish like stuff:

1. there’s a dogmatic charismatic leader of an organisation who has followers;

2. the leader takes money from the followers and doesn’t share any wealth with the followers ;

3. there’s some kind of psychological coercion that binds followers to keep following (the coercion may be very subtle and plays on vulnerabilities or causes vulnerability).

I don’t believe leaders of cults are intentionally doing harm. If self-improvement continues to support your view of yourself as needing more and more for fulfillment then I suggest you be wary. Take a break and embrace acceptance. If self-improvement gurus are always telling you to part with your money so you can feel and think better, be wary. If they have self-improvement course after self-improvement course that builds upon itself then be wary. If the leader is charismatic and someone you wish you could measure up to then be wary. If you find being involved with a self-improvement organisation takes more and more of your time, be wary. You need to notice early before you get in too deep.

Thanks for reading my blog  …. love ya

I’m on my way to making sanitary pads – re: previous post.

If you haven’t listened to Christina for a while stop now and give yourself some music therapy here. You are Beautiful in every single way. No Matter what they say, words can bring you day – don’t let them bring you down today. Words wont bring us down!