Risking ridicule, and leaning on love, we should crank up the volume and keep going
Posted: December 1, 2020
As I set up my internet portal to the world, I'm reminded of this quotation I scrawled on a piece of paper fifteen years ago and tacked to the refrigerator among my kids' stuff.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/04/20/rock-solid-2
It's from a review in the New Yorker by Anthony Lane of a documentary film about an enthusiastic but perpetually under-performing heavy metal band, and I commend the article to you rather than reading this post. I thought of the quotation because in setting up this website, I have had to confront my limits. As a therapist, I sit with people confronting their limits all the time and together we try to understand why they exist and if they can shift. And so, I want to be able to contemplate my own limits with the same compassionate enthusiasm Anthony Lane gave me to inspire my kids.
You Are Entitled to Your Experience
And this is a good introduction to my first guiding principle: "You are entitled to your experience." This is an idea I'll explore over and over in this blog, and though it seems simple, it's a revelation to people who have a hard time connecting with what they're feeling. Right now, my experience is that I am doing something very difficult. First, Wordpress is humbling, and second, there are a lot of other therapists out there and a lot of other therapist-bloggers. I'm tempted to talk myself out of a website and find some other outlet. This isn't required. I'm risking ridicule and indifference. The internal voices of doubt are familiar to many of us.
This is What It's Like Right Now
Those voices are trying to help: they want to get me back to a place of safety where I won't be frustrated or disappointed, experiences it's nicer to avoid. But they are also the very thoughts that can limit any kind of experience at all. Instead of pushing away the unpleasant, I can say: "Okay, this is what it's like right now. Frustrating. Disheartening. Frightening. This is what it's like to be me right now, and I'm entitled to the experience of being me."
Leaning on Love
And it will pass. When we listen to the voice of doubt with compassion, it opens up a little space to keep going. And it's not just self-compassion. I can think of the helpful people at Brighter Visions Websites who are ready to help, of Anthony Lane who sweated out that gift of a line I've been pointing to for eleven years now, and of my family who will (I hope) tolerate some griping while I figure this out. Because the leaning on love is the crucial part.