You Promised Not To Do This

I was just thinking about how fucking powerful writing has been to me improving as a human. My boy journals too. He’s 7. His journal says things like, “I see the TV. I have been writing for one minute. Dad has a Norwegian flag. Now I’ve been writing for two minutes.”

It’s very literal. Very observational. This is what is happening. This is what I see. But, as he grows up, he’s starting to see things that he couldn’t see before. And that’s what writing has done for me. It’s helped me grow up in an “I was blind but now I see” kind of way.

When I started writing my morning pages (3 stream of consciousness pages about whatever is on my mind) I’m sure to some extent I sounded like Blake. Here’s what I did today. I saved $5.73 with my Chopper Shopper card.

And when I started going to therapy, I’m sure I was so much fucking crazier than I thought I was. But, I didn’t need someone telling me I was as crazy as I felt. That kind of “help” pushes you deeper into the fog. I just needed someone to listen and feel like they actually got me.

Looking back, I’m amazed by how little my therapist has ordered me to do things and instead let me figure things out for myself. It’s the difference between intellectually being told something makes sense and having that ahhh, now I get it moment.

I spent a lifetime in churches being told about grace. And it took a few minutes in my first session with my therapist to actually get grace…to understand it and feel it. Okay…THAT’s what it’s supposed to feel like. Oh my God does that feel good. You can’t teach grace like you would a graduate level biology class. You can’t have someone else tell you about it. You have to feel it for your own self.

And being able to give myself grace and realize I don’t have to get uncrazy instantly has been so important to me slowly improving. My marriage therapist would basically tell me do this don’t do this. My current therapist tells me keep writing. And the results have been night and day.

I saw an example of this tonight as the kids and I watched an episode of the X Factor from last week. A contestant was extremely upset that she got rejected by the judges. She threw a fit back stage and her mom said, “You promised you wouldn’t do this.”

There’s a lot in that little sentence. The girl must have a history with anger problems. Her mom must have made her think that there was a good possibility that she would fail. And in the midst of the girl’s anger, the mom only added fuel to the fire by telling her she promised not to get angry.

Telling an angry person not to get upset is a good way to get punched in the throat. Mom got lucky, but the cameraman got water thrown at him and it wasn’t clear if the chair the girl picked up over her head ended up hurting anyone. The scene closed with the mom saying “I don’t know what happened. I’m so sorry.”

She was embarrassed by her daughter. But, how fucked up do you think the mom is in real life? I don’t know what happened. She promised not to. I don’t know what’s wrong with her. Well, bitch, maybe you’re part of what’s wrong with her. Ha…that was kind of harsh.

But the point is, if you have an anger problem the solution isn’t to make a promise that you won’t get angry. I’m going to try soooo hard not to get angry anymore. Of course you’re going to get angry again and when you do you’re going to feel like you let down yourself and your mom who is pointing a finger at you saying “but you promised…what the fuck is wrong with you.” That only adds to the anger.

What needs to happen is to get down to the root of what caused the anger. Actually not getting angry by sheer will power is so unhealthy. And promising not to get angry is a short term solution. You feel good for a second. The people that your anger hurt feel good temporarily. But, then you get angry again and what is your promise going to mean the next time?

I was thinking back to a time when a friend and I used to talk about how many times a day we took the palm of our hand and struck our forehead. It was nice to have company in our misery. We felt like fuck ups. We hit ourselves in the head as if to say, “I’m such an idiot. Why did I do that one thing that one time?” We remembered and focused on our fuck ups to the point where we really couldn’t enjoy our lives.

We both used humor and Christianity like that girl used her promise not to get angry. We coped with our feelings of inferiority and our abysmal self-worth by being funny. Hmm…people are laughing. I’m valuable after all. That feels way better than that bruise on my forehead. Hmm…if I show up at church and go through the religious motions I can feel like I’m not quite as big of a failure.

We felt awful all the time, but never took the time to get to the bottom of what was really going on. But, that’s what real therapy does. It doesn’t say take this pill and read this book it says, “It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.” (like Robin Williams says to Will Hunting) There are reasons for why that girl is angry. There are reasons why I felt like a piece of shit.

We think our lack of self-worth is our fault. What if it’s not? What if it’s the girl’s mom who came across as having it all together who is to blame for the girl ending up so angry? What if my forehead damage has everything to do with my childhood shit and what if how I’ve always felt about myself isn’t how I really am?

Because I started writing I can see things like that. I’ve worked my way up to this point slowly. Christianity closed my mind. Writing and this absolute godsend of a therapist do the opposite. They open my mind so I can see other things. I get the shit out that clogs my mind so that my mind can get to what really matters. Writing is like Liquid Plummer for the fucked up mind.

And everyone’s mind is fucked on some level. But, being willing to start the process of unfucking is the only way to progress. No one is past the point of hope. I’m not mad that it’s taken me 40 years to realize that I’m so fucked up I have to write every day. In fact, it probably tastes so much sweeter now because of all those years I spent in mental misery.

And part of that process has been really bumpy. When I wasn’t handling my grown up problems like I should have, my kids were deeply affected. I’d drink too much and need to nap off my hangover during my limited time with them. That’s so fucked up and so unfair to them. My undealt with shit was not their fault…not their fault…not their fault.

Kids need parents whose minds aren’t distracted…who notice what’s really going on with them. And as I’ve written more, I’ve been distracted less. So when Blake got angry at his friend and threw a ball at him the other day I didn’t make him promise to never do it again. I made him think about it. And we talked it through together. Blake is writing today about seeing a tv. But, tomorrow maybe he’ll write about how much it sucks that he lives with daddy a few days a week and mommy the rest and eventually maybe that that issue deeply affects his anger. It’s unfair. And that’s the feeling he had on the football field.

And it’s unfair that I haven’t been the dad that he and his sister have needed. So, I’m putting in the time to change that via writing and therapy. I realized tonight that I used to be relieved when I dropped them off with their mom or dropped them off at school. Like, whew…I did it, now on to the rest of my life. That fucking sucks. It’s embarrassing.

But, it’s so cool now to crave time with them…to love making them feel safe and at home. And to know that my job after I drop them off is to work on my grown up shit in healthy ways so that when they return, they’re not getting a distracted dad. They know I fuck up. But, they know I’m trying and that I adore them and want to give them a head start.

And it fucking thrills me that they both get out their journals and want to be like dad. I’m lucky that the finger pointing/“stop being a bad dad” marriage therapist has been replaced by Grace. She gets me. And listened when ears were shutting on my story right and left. It’s not perfection and following the rules that’s the thing. It’s grace letting you actually believe that you’re not such a fucking idiot after all.