Last night, Emily called struggling over a promise she and I had made several months ago to our au pair, Alex that she had since rethought. I won't go into the minutiae, but her rethink was based initially on some concerns that once researched and considered, weren't so valid or important. Acting on those feelings would have been a betrayal to Alex and probably have changed the relationship between our family and him for the worse – so it would be critical that the feelings be right. There were few facts to back the feelings (and to clarify, it had nothing to do with Alex doing anything wrong). Nonetheless, her feelings of doubt and anxiety lingered.
She asked me what she should do about those lingering feelings. My answer was, "reframe". She was focused on one small aspect of a much larger picture – so zooming out and remembering all the reasons we made the decision in the first place and how holistically, it was a beneficial decision and promise might help resize or change the feelings.
Emily remained stuck on the issue because her feelings are her truth and so denying her feelings might mean scuttling an important truth or denying some vital aspect of herself.
Because of Emily's new philosophy – discussed at length in Shared Values – I've done a lot of thinking about feelings, including my own. While Emily sees feelings as her truth, I see feelings as vagrants or at best guests. They come, they go, they're transitory. This is very Buddhist, really. You are you and the feelings are just feelings. There's truth to it. I am not my feelings and I am not my thoughts. I have feelings and thoughts and it's very – and often – possible that neither of these speak any truth.
Like all guests, some are better than others. Some come with wisdom and enlightenment. Others are just annoying and problematic. Some are pleasant enough and you're happy to see them and happy when they go. Some are old, familiar friends who while comfortable to be around, may not be the best for you anymore. Even as I write it, it sounds like Dr Seuss' One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish:
Yes. Some are red, and some are blue.
Some are old and some are new.
Some are sad, and some are glad,
And some are very, very bad.
Why are they sad and glad and bad?
I do not know, go ask your dad.
There's a lot of wisdom in Dr. Seuss.
Of course, it's no easy trick to know when a feeling has significance and when it doesn't. I suppose that's when we cross over into intuition. This person gives me a creepy feeling and I think I'm safest to just keep moving – or not to do any business with them. This is not a good or safe person. Those are almost limbic responses that are part of our survival mechanisms – being able to identify a predator or a parasite.
But everyday feelings are a bit more challenging because our minds are tricky. We associate current events with older ones – often incorrectly. The person I just met is wearing perfume that reminds me of my great aunt – who was mean to me when she came over. Now my five-year-old memories and feelings come flooding in and subconsciously, I start to dislike this new person. Maybe whatever she says makes me feel like when my mean great-aunt was over (and for the record, I actually liked all my great-aunts and had a few that were very special). My feelings may have absolutely nothing to do with what's going on. Now, they may have some truth – that I felt really bullied by and fearful or resentful of my great aunt – but that has nothing to do with what's going on in front of me today. So I misjudge someone and let my five-year-old self run the show if I choose to follow those feelings.
I used to see this in my racist dog. I brought a semi-feral Balinese Kintamani puppy home with me from living overseas. In retrospect, I should have really expected it to be challenging - but I did it nonetheless and many adventures followed. He started out loving everyone (mostly) and he used to ride around with me in the backseat of my car a lot. One night, I came out of the gym and found some teenagers heckling him – getting him all wound up as he tried to defend his car from them. They happened to be black. From then on, he was unpleasant to black people. Later on, I lived in a ground-floor apartment with a patio. The gardeners would mow the lawn and trim the hedges just beyond the patio. My dog hated the sound and probably what he saw as their invasion of his territory. The gardeners happened to be Latino – so he began to dislike all Latinos. And there I was with a canine Archie Bunker.
Dogs were the first animal humans domesticated and part of the reason we love them is they share a certain emotional space with us – possibly because they were bred for it. In the way we feel and may act on those feelings – with or without reason – we're not terribly dissimilar from our pets.
Feelings can bring truth. If every time I see someone, they put me down and I feel sad – maybe that's not someone I want in my life. I feel happier, more energetic and more relaxed after yoga. Yoga might be a good thing to bring into my life. I have a friend I really enjoy and appreciate – maybe I should make more time for that relationship and tell the person I appreciate them. Being interrupted feels really disrespectful and off-putting to me – maybe I should let the person doing it know that I'm feeling really put-off and want to enjoy their company more, but am struggling because of their habit of interrupting.
Before I turn my feelings into conclusions, I probably need to ask myself the simple question, "Is it true?"
Is being interrupted disrespectful? Yes – I think this person is signaling either disregard for others or perhaps a specific disrespect for me - so my feeling is in line with what's happening. Or at least my perceptions, thoughts and feelings line up enough that I can reasonably decide to honor the feeling.
A Thai person I just met calls me fat. I become offended and immediately dislike this person, deciding not to give him the time of day again. Only in Thai culture, calling someone fat isn't an insult and can be playful. Also, 70% of foreigners including those we might consider slender rate "fat" on the Thai scale. Do my feelings and the situation align? Not so much. I may need to reframe.
I wake up tired and I had a bad night before going to bed. I'm in a bad mood. The barista at Starbucks makes a mistake on my order and I think she's an idiot. Maybe I say something rude and snippy because of how this idiot screwed up my drink which is screwing up my day. In fact, she's just another idiot in the chain of idiots I deal with daily and this validates my negative world view. In reality, the barista is a top student in UCLA's economics program and she misread the sticker with my very complicated drink order. She's not an idiot and she is human. My feelings and the truth of the situation are not aligned. I'm probably the asshole here.
Most of my colleagues at work don't like me. I feel a strange resistance of lack of belonging around them. Some of them seem snippy and mean – and no one wants to include me in their socializing or even to have me on their project teams. I could have chosen a job at a culture I don't fit into. These could be mean people. Or perhaps it's the fact that I'm deeply depressed that keeps me from seeing anything clearly. Moreover, if I am deeply depressed, I may be an actual turn-off to my colleagues and so some of my perception is fact. But my feelings and the realities may only partially align and worse, I may not see the big picture and can't take in useful facts.
I told my best friend I would help him move today and be there early in the morning. But it was a hard week and I physically and emotionally could use some downtime today. My feelings may be real – and my reasons for them true – but so are my feelings for my friend and I made a promise which is a contract that I will do something regardless of how I feel. I would feel worse breaking my promise to my friend in need – so perhaps the new feelings are something I can push past. They don't have to define me. They may be my experience, and it's possible my experience sucks and is worthy of empathy, but they aren't the Truth.
Right here is the real point – one that affects Emily and increasingly our society – my experience has started to be framed as "my truth" which gets people confused between "their truth" and the Truth.
Instantly the voices of five of my smartest friends pop into my head all contesting "the Truth" – telling me there are objective truths like the laws of physics and that mammals give birth to live babies but that even the Truth can be deconstructed and isn't always singular or clear. Fair point, projected voices of friends in my head. Still, come with me on this….
In the move to not flatten people's experiences and blatantly dismiss their feelings, someone has come up with the idea of the inner truth. It's an interesting concept that serves some good purposes. A woman exploring her experience of feeling sexism and harassment in the workplace – that a current of chauvinism runs through a company culture and that her experience is dismissed can strengthen her voice using the phrase "inner truth" which helps us to see that not everyone in the room sees and perceives things the same way and this person's experience is important. Perhaps it even speaks to a greater Truth that others have been willing to ignore – or prefer not to see or acknowledge.
Speaking "my truth" or "our truth" helps marginalized voices to be heard. Black communities usually do have different relationships and associations with police than other communities. Workplace cultures can be biased and unfair even when good people work within them. Bill Cosby was a predator whose victims' experiences were squelched by the people around him and his image as this man we all loved. People speaking "their truth" can help create new perceptions and understandings.
However, all tools can be used wrongly or for purposes both good and bad that weren't intended. I can kill someone with a hammer, screwdriver or a kitchen knife. I can use a clothes hanger or a hair pin to pick a lock. And so can the unmarginalized and even empowered or privileged usurp and appropriate the language of victimhood.
What's sad is that when fully empowered and privileged upper-middle-class white people adopt the language designed to strengthen victims and the marginalized, it dilutes and erodes the language itself – making it less credible and therefore less useful to the people who need it.
Sure, we all have moments when we're not taken seriously – maybe even gaslighted. We feel ignored or treated unjustly. Those things can be completely true. It can really suck or even be enraging when we're not heard or understood. Bottom line is most everyone just wants to be seen and understood.
Yet, deciding easily and readily that our feelings and experiences are Truth is a dangerous game. Most of us only ever know experiences. We can learn some objective scientific Truth. We might even be lucky enough to discover some meaningful universal Truths. But by and large, our days are composed of experiences which is why when you talk about an event that had ten other people in the room, you'll get 12 other perceptions and stories about what happened.
The primary purpose of these ten weeks here on Patmos is for me to get clear on my situation and what I want to happen in my life. People sometimes ask me if I've come to anything yet? I think that would undercut the experience. I'm about four weeks in. I have had a lot of thoughts and feelings and am going to have a lot more. Some of them might be what I act on, but most of them will be vagrants that pass through – some staying a little longer than others. I'm bound to have some that feel like empowerment and "taking back my life", others that make me feel trapped, some that are depressing and others enlightening. None are right or wrong – they are all part of the experience. In the end, I'm going to have to sort through them and decide which best fit the reality of my situation – which will lead me and my family to the best possible place. Which can I live with, which can I thrive with and which are just a distraction or disservice? At the end of ten weeks, there could be room to continue the process – but that's my deadline. I think it's sufficient time for an honest process and to begin to square my experiences with the realities of the people and world around me.
Nothing I'm experiencing is a real Truth. There is no "my truth". There is Me. I'm not entitled to have anyone see or understand me. I am entitled to my decisions and I think owed the respect of Emily working with me to find how we reconcile the gaps in our perspectives to find a workable path that accounts for all our needs.
Because in the end, all of our lives are a series of thoughts, feelings and experiences – sometimes overwhelming. Often, I think Ned gets it best:
Hello there, Ned. How do you do?
Tell me, tell me what is new?
How are things in your little bed?
What is new? Please tell me Ned.
I do not like this bed at all.
a lot of things have come to call.
A cow, a dog, a cat, a mouse.
Oh! What a bed! Oh! What a house!
