In the day or two after referencing old results of personality tests which suggest that I’m a mediator of sorts who both seeks and brings calm and balance, my web stats reminded me of posts I’ve written that might suggest otherwise. Posts about my various anxieties (generally needing to be early and my discomfort over being in other people’s way) and posts about my various attempts to smile while cutting carrots (in which I mentally/jokingly tell a guy to get fucked because he pulled down the same parking aisle I was going to pull down). It was as if the internet bots were trying to take me down a peg and remind me that I’m not at all like the person described in the personality test results… as if to say that despite appearances, there are very few rainbows or tranquil seas inside.
I’ve been playing with the “two wolves inside me” idea for years. It’s right there in my nod to Whitman on my about me page: “This site, or blog, is my barbaric yawp and my refined whimper… it is, among other things, an exploration of my multitudes.” When I write or explore, it’s almost always about the inner world – the two sides of the same coin: peace and turmoil. Sometimes, I worry that by focusing on the turmoil side, a stranger reading this might get the “wrong impression” about me. I begin to wonder that if most of my writing depicts strife, one might reasonably believe I am a man in constant strife if not sorrow (o’ brother). I also worry that frequently dancing with that devil of exploring the negative might have a negative influence or consequences in a “we are what we focus on” sort of way. The truth is, while I am absolutely a walking bag of contradictions (like I believe most people to be), I write as a way of recognizing those contradictions, accepting them, and sometimes as an attempt to close the gap (when appropriate) between my hypocrisies.
It’s not always easy to reconcile the contradictions or feed the wolves. And maybe reconcile is the wrong word here. Again, I’m remind of Whitman: “Do I contradict myself? / Very well then I contradict myself. / (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” If, as many psychologists suggest, self-awareness and self-compassion and self-knowledge are important aspects of healthy relationships then getting comfortable with the contradictions seems like an important, and ongoing, process. Furthermore, I suspect trying to understand the contradictions within may lead to compassion for others and their multitudes. So often, our disappointments are built on expectations framed by a fixed mindset. If we can accept that we’re complicated, we might be able to extend that acceptance outward towards other people and their complications.
But I think this notion of getting comfortable with contradictions (or ambiguity or multiplicity) goes beyond just building healthy and interesting relationships. I think it gets to some key aspects of living a purposeful, intentional, and (maybe) happy life. Yesterday morning, I woke up thinking about that ol’ paradox/dichotomy of seeking vs. staying put… of how we outwardly seek fulfillment or beauty or love or inspiration, because it’s sometimes easier than seeing all of those things internally or in our present moment. Oddly, the podcast I listened to that morning began with the adage “wherever you go, there you are.”
The podcast (Hidden Brain) was an interview research psychologist Iris Mauss about her understanding of happiness. She spoke about the nature of expectations and disappointments. She spoke about sitting in the present moment: happiness can’t be chased and unhappiness can’t be avoided. She talked about re-framing our context and language, replacing words like “needs” with words like “preferences.” Much of what she said echoed what I’ve read and heard in Buddhism and other psychology texts and podcasts. At one point, she suggested that we are social creatures who tend to find great happiness in connecting with others. Her studies suggest that an individualistic approach to happiness (solely focusing on individual needs) is not as well-correlated to a person’s well-being as more social pursuits of happiness are (focusing on the needs of others). Both the host and guest quoted John Stuart Mill:
Those only are happy (I thought) who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness; on the happiness of others, on the improvement of mankind, even on some art or pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an ideal end. Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness by the way. The enjoyments of life (such was now my theory) are sufficient to make it a pleasant thing, when they are taken en passant, without being made a principal object. Once make them so, and they are immediately felt to be insufficient. They will not bear a scrutinizing examination. Ask yourself whether you are happy, and you cease to be so.
The two also talked about openness as a component to happiness. Sometimes, I think I write and pursue an open/transparent life because it means keeping fewer things inside, having fewer secrets and places where shame might hide. On this subject, Mauss referenced one study in which they had couples argue, but also share things they liked about each other. They found that couples who shared deeply and/or more freely (about positive or negative emotions, even during fights) felt better about their conversations and their relationships than those who withheld. When I think back on most of my relationships, I’m sometimes surprised by how little I knew about the other person, how little they shared of their childhood or extended family or traumas and healing. I’m not sure I’ve encountered anyone who was, or sought to be, fearless in their vulnerability.
Because self-awareness, honesty, and authenticity are so important to me, I have a tendency to overemphasize (here on this blog) my internal imbalances as a form of acceptance and correction. Because I’m fascinated by paradox, I spend a lot of time wrestling with my own inconsistencies and trying to embrace and thinking. Turn inward and turn outward. Sit and seek. Balance and imbalance. Regardless of the outcome or geography, wherever I go, there I will be.