Humor and Poignancy

On the day of the fire I begged for silvadene ointment for my burns.
"Don't you have some in the ambulance?" I asked the driver of the ambulance that had accompanied the fire trucks, the man who had screamed at me to get away from the fire.
"We aren't allowed to carry medications." He replied.
"Then what the hell good are you?" I inquired. (Forgive my bad language - it was a rough day.)
The same ambulance driver finally over-rode my comments and wishes and called for another ambulance. He was not allowed to leave the scene in the event a fire fighter was injured.
Another ambulance arrived; there was a man and a woman. They took a look at me and brought in the gurney.
"I'm not leaving here until I pee."
"You cannot get up. Your blood pressure is over the top."
"I'm not leaving here until I pee - period! Do you have a bedpan?"
"Yes."
"Get it, please."
"You mustn't sit up."
The bedpan arrived. I looked at the female, "You stay." I looked at the three watching male ambulance attendants, "OUT!"
I relieved myself and settled back.
The female drove. The ambulance attendant announced that he was an ER nurse.
"That's nice. It's nice to be in good hands."
"I'm going to put an IV in your hand."
"No you aren't." He stared at me in disbelief as I continued. "I know a bit about medicine and the only reason for you to put in an IV is to knock me out and I'm not going under."
"They may have to scale your forehead, it's pretty bad."
"We'll deal with that problem if it arises.'
"Then you are denying the IV?"
"Yes - would you like me to sign something?"
I watched as he wrote, "denied." Looking up he said, "What if you stoke out on me? Do you have an end-of-life form signed?"
"If I stroke on you do everything you can for me, but if I'm brain dead you'd better damn well trip over the cord."
I was worse - or better - in the ER. When the ER doc finally arrived we had a similar banter. The doctor gave instructions and left. A pretty blonde nurse lathered the ointment I'd been begging for over my many burn areas and bandaged me up.

About that time my good friend Ellen Lederman arrived. The Driggs hospital is a small country hospital. It was Saturday. Business was slow. As Ellen breezed by the reception area and headed into the ER, two women said in unison, "You can't go in there!"
True to form, Ellen glanced over her shoulder and said, as only Ellen can, "You've got to be kidding me!" She had me out of there in five minutes.

Later, flat out on her couch, while friend Betty Ann dashed to town to replace my blood pressure pills that had been lost in the fire, I looked at Ellen and said, "Hell of a way to get rid of Yellow Jackets." ...then the mind fell back into the horror of the situation.

On the morning of the fire, after the grandchildren had driven down the road, arms waving from windows, I checked something in the barn then went and sat on the front porch. Lexi, a two year-old black lab with the prettiest face you've ever seen and the silkiest of coats that shed continuously, got up from her outside napping bed, came over and sat down next to me.

I must interrupt myself and tell you a few things about Lexi. Lexi was Queen Elizabeth the First one minute and an errant, wild kid the next. She loved attention but she would not tolerate anyone putting an arm over and around her shoulders. She'd been that way from the day we got her at the age of eight weeks. Her usual was to flop on her back, spread her back legs and beg for a full tummy rub. As for kisses, she knew her Daddy loved them but that I shy away from doggy kisses.

Now back to that fateful (?) morning.
Lexi approached me quietly and sat by my side. I put my right arm over and around her shoulders. She nestled in close to me. Both of us looked out to the road and ranch buildings, the mountains in the distance, the front walk.
"You know Lexi, you were a wild kid and sometimes a problem when you were little but look at you now - you are one of the most beautiful dogs I've ever known and Daddy says you're the best hunting dog he's ever had."

The two of us continued to look straight ahead at the vista before us.
"I just wanted you to know that you've grown to be a wonderful dog and that I love you very, very much."

With the word "much" we both turned our heads to look at each other. A long pink tongue did a one-lick kiss that ran from the bottom right side of my mandible up to my right eyebrow. Then we both turned our heads forward and continued our visual study.

After a bit I said, "Well, there's a lot of work to be done and I'd best get at it."
Three hours later Lexi would to dead of carbon monoxide poisoning prior to the fire becoming her funeral pyre.

Of psychological interest: For two weeks I remembered every bit of sitting with Lexi on the porch, but my mind kept telling me that it had happened some days prior to the fire. One day my mind was re-playing the scene when I realized that it had occurred on the morning of the fire and that it was impossible for it to have happened on any other day as it was the first time in weeks that the dogs and I had been alone at the ranch. For some reason my mind couldn't accept the weight of this poignant scene occurring on the morning of the fire.

The quest for true happiness is perceived by many to ultimate goal of human existence. When asked what they wish for themselves, most people say that they would like to be happy. Everything else they wish for themselves is just means to an end. While happiness has always been a topic of interest and aspiration, its study, understanding, and the means to accomplish it recently has become a focal point of Western civilization. The reason is simple: we've done all that we can, and we are still not happy.

Think about America in the late 60s: pink Cadillacs, suburban houses with lush lawns, abundance of food, clothing, gadgets... All of the economic indicators said that we cracked the code. Yet the rate of depression is in constant rise since that golden time, and the average onset age of clinical depression is now in the early teen years as opposed to midlife back then.

What went wrong?

Developed countries became "developed" because they work to optimize economic indications of success like: economic growth, more jobs, and increasing purchasing power and average income. The very basic underlying assumption of the science of economy is that having more makes a person happier. It turns out though, that once one's basic needs are met, that is no longer true.

Researchers like Martin Seligman, Sonja Lyubomirsky, and Daniel Nettle found a few things that start to explain the happiness paradox:

(A) We don't know what will make us happy
(B) Some stuff gives us a quick kick but it does not last (so we go for more and still are not happy)
(C) Our circumstances determine only about 10% of our happiness

The combination of these findings results in a typical rat race scenario where we constantly struggle for the next job, food, vacation, house, car, etc, only to find out time and again that we are back where we started at the happiness game.

The solution? Well, LOVE.

When one tries to take the findings of positive psychology and make some overarching conclusions, it looks like a lot of it boils down to love, compassion, generosity, giving, and empathy: focusing less on the self and more on the collective, a principle that many different traditions and religions preach.

Deepak Chopra's new book The Ultimate Happiness Prescription takes a holistic approach to Happiness, and shows the common threads between what positive psychologists have found, values of different spiritual traditions, and the new thought movement:
- Letting go of your ego (equals - gratitude, forgiveness, compassion)
- Listening to your heart rather than your mind
- Challenging negative thoughts
- Being a part of a supportive, close, honest, and loving community

So here's to humility, compassion, and of course: gratitude. The stuff that true happiness is made of. Happy Thanksgiving! :)

What do we actually know about effective leadership? One hundred years of research on the topic has led to some clear answers.

First, are leaders born or made? The answer is both, but more made than born. Leadership is a complex and sophisticated social role. Although certain qualities do predispose some people to attain leadership positions and be better at leading, effective leaders actually hone their skills through experience, conscious self-development, education, and training.

Second, does leadership training work? Relatively recent analyses of over 100 years of leadership training and development efforts suggests that most programs do indeed lead to some positive change. Is the change dramatic? Sometimes. Certain crucible, or trigger, events can lead to substantial improvement in leadership ability. For the most part, however, leadership development is a long-term and incremental process.

Third, are there certain elements that all (or most) great leaders share? We are quite sure that the theory of transformational leadership represents the very best elements of leadership. Effective leaders tend to be inspirational, visionary, and serve as positive role models for their followers. But the very best leaders also care sincerely about their followers, their well-being and their personal development. Great leaders also empower followers and encourage them to be creative and to take initiative.

Fourth, is leadership situation specific? In other words, if you are a successful leader in one area, such as at work, will you also be a successful leader in the community, or in a different company? Although this question has not been thoroughly researched, it is likely that the same transformational qualities and skills will transfer to other settings. The limitation, of course, is that knowledge of the particular setting, and understanding of its “culture” is required. So, a period of adjustment and learning is needed to allow the leader to use transformational abilities in the new environment.

Finally, how early in life does leadership begin to develop? This is a fascinating question, and one that our current research program is exploring. There has been little longitudinal research on the early “roots” of leadership, but our initial results suggest that the foundation of leadership begins at a very early age. Encouragement from parents and teachers likely plays a very important part, as well as early exposure to a variety of social situations, and novel experiences.

What are the implications for personal leadership development? Leadership is complex, but it can be developed. We know the building blocks of leadership success, and it is clear that devoting time and energy to your personal development pays off.

When I was growing up there was a couple on my block. She was heavy and he was thin.

My mother who never failed to notice anything, particularly weight, would comment: She is heavy, but he is thin. Periodically, we would run into them and my mother would repeat "she is heavy and he is thin." Appearances had great meaning to my mother, but she would never permit herself to say anything beyond that.

As I got older I began to wonder about that couple. Did she want him to be thin and smaller than her? Did he want her to be heavy? If she died and he married someone else, would the next woman also be heavy? If he died, would she again choose a man smaller in frame than she?

Apparently, neither of them minded and they have as far as I know, lived out their lives with the normal happinesses and miseries known to people who live in this part of the country. And yet the question still intrigues: was he thin because she was fat? Was she fat because he was thin?

Recently, an obese man I know confided in me that part of his obesity is his identification with his mother. We were eating at a social function and he said with a degree of shame that when he gets overweight as he is, he begins to have breasts.

Naturally, the thought made me very sad. There must be better, less hazardous ways of identifying with his mother. Why was he stuck in that way? That was a question that would have to wait for another day, but apparently, in order to deal with his dangerous weight issue, one would probably have to explore his relationship to his mother.

The funny thing is that we tend to think of our bodies as belonging to ourselves and they do of course, but they seem to develop in relation to somebody or something. For example, in past decades pediatric studies have revealed that the onset of puberty in young girls is getting earlier. Some studies have shown that in households where the father is absent, the girls tend to mature earlier.

Our bodies seem to react to people and to things. We know that people age under stress, they shrink, expand with sadness and happiness. Many people I know are trying to lose the same 10-15 lbs for years. Freud noted that people tend to play with objects, they might throw them or damage them or maintain them because they are representatives of people, usually important people in their lives. People they have strong feelings about.

When we overeat, or under-eat, exercise, work out or not work out, lose weight or gain weight, in addition to strong environmental factors, we might also consider that we are sending messages to people. The idea that we are always in profound communication to somebody might help some of us make progress.

My last column was mostly about two emotions, grief and fear. This column will concern two other emotions, shame and anger, and also another kind of stress, bodily tension such as illness and fatigue. Emotions and feelings are at core physical, rather than only mental. Sadness is the feeling we get when bodily preparations to cry are not carried out. In this view, crying is the orgasm of a state of bodily arousal: grief. The habit of controlling emotions by ignoring them turns out to be a huge problem. Over the long haul, unresolved emotional arousals can build up to the point of continuous painful feelings and/or tension.

Last time I proposed that all emotions, both positive and negative, can be enjoyed. The challenge is to be able to experience them in a third way: neither 1. ignoring them, on the one hand, nor 2. getting lost in them, on the other. In drama theory this third state is called aesthetic distance. The audience is to identify with the characters to point of feeling their emotions, but at the same time remembering that they are NOT the characters.

Strong emotions can be enjoyed in a safe environment: theatre, film, books, songs, or telling one's experience to an empathic person, or even to one's self. Peter Levine (1997) described this state as pendulation, moving very quickly back and forth between painful feelings and the safe present. I once had an extraordinary fear experience in this mode: after an excruciatingly dangerous experience, my body took over, shaking and sweating til my clothes were drenched. It was not painful, and I felt completely relaxed when it was over. Shaking and sweating seems to be the orgasm of fear arousal.

Like many people, when angry I may get loud and mean. But I have had several anger experiences of a quite different kind. I told the culprit "I am angry at you because....." in an ordinary voice. Since this approach is so undramatic, I have had to repeat my complaint several times. Then two things happened: the other person started apologizing, and I felt hot. I realized that it was not the room that had gotten warm, but my body. Apparently catharsis doesn't involve yelling and fighting. It is rather an internal process: heat metabolizes the adrenaline of bodily preparation to fight. Could body heat signal the orgasm of anger?

Shame, embarrassment and humiliation: When I tell students to describe to the class their most embarrassing moment, many of them are convulsed with laughter telling the story. Laughter seems to be the orgasm of shame. However, it's often difficult to get to laughter, especially if one was deeply humiliated. What is often required are many repetitions of just talk about the incident, before one can find humor in it.

It also needs to be said that just as there is a good cry and a bad one, there is also a good laugh and a bad one. A good laugh turns out to be when one is laughing at one's self ("Silly me") or the universe, but not at other people. Laughing at others usually is ridicule, driven by anger: no help to either party.

One final comment on yawning. Even though most people think that yawing increases one's oxygen supply, there is no evidence. In my experience, I yawn when I am tired, not when I am sleepy, and when under intense physical pain. A trip to the dentist often results in a fit of yawning afterwards. In my most painful illness, I think that extraordinary fits of yawning made the pain bearable.

As you may have guessed by now, I am not saying that it's easy to enjoy your emotions, only that it is possible. With enough time and practice, I think that anyone can learn the art of distancing (pendulation) of one's emotions to make them less painful and to begin the long process of resolution. It may be that the future for human beings depends on everyone learning this lesson.

These comments on catharsis were brief. For further discussion, see #57 on my home page (http://www.soc.ucsb.edu/faculty/scheff), my 1979 book, or an edu-tainment backed up by two rock stars: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DM_MxBizcQk