Dr. Bob's Blog

The very active mind is common, and in today’s overactive world perhaps triggered all the more. Meditation practices assist in calming such a mind and gaining insight into one’s life. Out of an old Taoist tradition, and later painted by a Chinese Buddhist master, the Oxherding pictures offer some symbolic and ultimately practical advice. What follows are some thoughts on this classic story.

We are oxherders, all of us. Seekers, with or without knowing it. We have lost our mind. Lost the ox. We must track it and catch it. Old habits (poisons) of greed, ill-will and ignorance disrupt our efforts. We must find and tame the ox nevertheless. Once found, whips ands ropes are brought to the cause. Over time, the old fears and frustrations fade and as if by magic, the ox is forgotten. Serenity. Transcendence and returning to our roots. There is no separation. The two are one. The ordinary life and enlightenment.

The focus here lands midway in this story: Whips and ropes. The meditation challenge of taming the ox. Many fine teachers, well known and obscure have shed light on those whips and ropes, the taming, in the path toward serenity and transcendence. If the serene state is represented as open, precise and gentle awareness, then taming might begin with a simple and relentless counting of breaths. Just to ten (or even 5) and back to one. Maybe we rope in the effort with a kind of labeling or noting of concurrent sensations: buttocks on bench; chest rise and fall; ticking clock. All of this quieting the mind and its many, many thoughts.

In especially difficult times, lightly touching thumbs could be parted as one thumb is gripped tight by the other hand. Squeeze for a few momewnts. Whips and ropes.

And taming reveals the pauses and gaps between breaths. And between thoughts. Dichotomies disappear. Two become one. Serenity.

Robert Fettgather is an instructor of Psychology at Mission College in Santa Clara, CA. He is interested in human behavior and observing people.

People watching, the art of observing others in public spaces, can be both entertaining and enlightening. It allows us to gain insights into human behavior, emotions, and interactions. Whether you’re an aspiring writer, psychologist, or simply enjoy the curious observation of others, these tips will help you make the most of your people watching experiences.

Always respect the privacy of others by maintaining a discreet distance and avoiding invasive stares. People watching should never feel like an intrusion into someone’s personal space. Aim to be inconspicuous and blend into the surroundings

Location, location, location! Select a spot that offers a vantage point without being too conspicuous. Ideal locations include parks, cafes, public transport, airports or bustling city squares. Places with diverse crowds will provide a broader range of behaviors to observe

While people watching can be intriguing, remember that you are only observing a snippet of someone’s life. Avoid making sweeping judgments or assumptions based on limited observations. Empathy is crucial in people watching. Try to put yourself in the shoes of the individuals you are observing, understanding their emotions, and motivations behind their actions. And remember, the purpose of people watching is to learn and appreciate the diversity of human behavior, not to confirm preconceived notions.

So, next time you find yourself in a public space, take a moment to sit back, observe, and appreciate the fascinating world of people watching.

This video is an introduction to my college course:

Sometimes hopelessness interfaces with depression to produce states of extreme despair and can signal a potential for suicide. On the other hand, to be without hope can create the space for a fresh start– as failed attempted life solutions based on false hope are released, some wake up to new and promising alternatives.

How might we think about such an apparent contradiction?

One might begin by examining the deceptions of false hope which are too often replete with failed logic and avoidance of hard truths. After all, hoping to gain entrance into a college, internship or job without possessing the required qualifications will likely not bring that hope to reality. Difficult emotions may arise in the form of deep disappointment and resentment. When this approach repeats, the pattern is the essence of self-defeat.

Let’s next consider hopelessness not as a problem but as a kind of solution. Tibetan Buddhist tradition advances the practice of mind training or Lojong. Usually attributed to Atisha, it includes 59 “slogans”- some easy to understand, others not so much. One in particular is germane to this discussion: “abandon all hope of fruition”. Generally, this saying is interpreted as giving up hope for a certain result. It has been suggested, from the Buddhist view, that we are better off letting go of all attachment to the (self-serving) results of our efforts.

Making the effort without getting caught up in over-thinking the results can open us up. Those false hopes for impossible outcomes could drift away- a more honest approach.

So we might contrast false hope with honest hope: truthful hopes; authentic hopes. Hopes informed by rationality and even wisdom are sometimes smaller than their grandiose and false counterparts. But what a wonderful place to start.

Growing up, a frightened child is met by an empathic adult who provides comfort- or not. Likewise, the sad child seems to engender a caring response-or not. Growing up, the mad or rebellious child might evoke an angry adult response in even the best of parents- or not. These patterns repeat inside as we tend to do ourselves what was done to us- for better or worse.

Let’s focus on what’s needed. The scared child within needs a calm adult compassion to hold them and their real or imagined fears. The despondent inner child needs empathy and love. Trickier, the mad or rebellious child inside might at first evoke an angry response (as when our parents responded to our anger with their own). Bringing patience and love to the angry child within is a worthwhile practice. With unconditional acceptance and love we meet that child inside in whatever state of mind and heart they present. From there we reassure and guide in a process sometimes called re-parenting. With re-parenting, the ego adaptations of the adapted child become less necessary and habitual. They are artifacts of a past that no longer exists. The natural child is experienced more fully and remains our closest connection to the divine and the eternal.

But what if we meet inner fears and frustrations, not with acceptance, but with more of the same? What if we beat ourselves up (adult beating up inner child)? Then the adapted child within is at risk for solidifying through our adult years into a kind of false self far from our divine origins. Adult and rational sensibilities fade and we are age-regressed- children in the adult body. Disagreements become playground fights. Genuine hopes become unrealistic fantasies and bitter disappointments. The rigid egocentricity of “me” seems fixed and we struggle with life, and with the inevitability of death.

And what dies? Surely not the divine. Our spiritual reality is that the universe and earth that birthed us is naturally and divinely alive within our whole lives. Perhaps the natural child was born with this knowledge of eternity- specifically, that a part of each of us existed before birth and will exist after our deaths. The natural child and wise adult identify with the divine and engage dying and death with a tender acceptance. But for the adult with a lifelong identification with the adapted child, those habitual defenses and ruminations are misunderstood as the one and only “me”-separate from all else. And that self dreads death and rightly so because “me” will certainly end as the body passes.

What to make of these ramblings?

Maybe that the “adapted” part of us that struggles with death is to be accepted and comforted-for that part will indeed die and deserves our compassion. And, to remember everyday that the “natural” part of us, the divine, existed before we were born, exists within us now, and exists for all eternity after our death.

We all come from this 4.5 billion year old home called earth. And we are, as the astronomers say, star stuff…and as the singers chant, stardust! The possibility of our existence relies on atoms formed forever ago in colossal stars. We floated our first nine months in amniotic fluid that bears a salinity resemblance to the oceans (2% and 3%, respectively). There is divinity in an infant’s eyes!

We are matter become conscious.

This brief two-part essay will focus on what happens next invoking principles of Transactional Analysis and a little Buddhism (I claim no special expertise in either and these interpretations are my own).

So from floating, we go to birthing into families and societies that demand a certain degree of conformity and therein resides our challenge. After that physical birth comes a kind of psychological gestation and birth of the ego or “me”. Under ideal conditions, the child develops qualities of spontaneity, curiosity and self-appreciation. Alternatively and under less auspicious circumstances, the child may become overly conforming, rebellious or suppressive, and lacking in self-confidence. In Transactional Analysis terms, these represent the natural and the adapted child ego states, respectively.

Auspicious or not, upbringing matters. We may tend to do to ourselves what was done to us, a karmic repetition of the past. We parent ourselves much like we were parented. Intra-psychically, we may nurture and guide those childlike energies within. Or we may reject, abandon or abuse that child inside as our parents/caregivers once did.

This binary model does not quite capture the nature of the natural/adapted dynamic. Circumstance blends these qualities with a fluidity that sometimes shifts from day to day from more natural to more adapted and back. Still, those shifts veer mostly one way or the other. With adolescence these characteristics inform identity development and the transition to adulthood. But within, the child remains.

The concept of the “inner child” is well known in popular culture and makes for some pretty humorous comedic skits. Long before that, Carl Jung identified a divine child archetype. And in the latter decades of the twentieth century, some psychologists began to use this concept in psychotherapy and hypnotherapy- premised on the existence of an inner child that is quite alive in the adult psyche. And, some Buddhist teachers have embraced a meditation practice for showing loving kindness toward the child within.

So how does all this fit together?

Just past the Solstice, we approach the season of resolve. Self-help programs proliferate and the parking lot at the gym will overflow. For some, holiday excess propels resolutions in thirty-one flavors of fancy, but like the ice cream they will just seem to melt away.

Digging deeper, we might un-package the concept of “resolution” with the intention of developing intention. That is to consciously and specifically choose a path, practice or behavior. Intentional living invites a ducks-in-a-row congruence between mind and emotion across decisions large and small. Clarifying values is no small part of the process, discovering to what degree our value system is not merely held but expressed everyday.

Values comprise our essential beliefs. They underscore commitment in “acceptance and commitment” therapies. Adhering to our personal values leads to committed action and the concrete steps necessary for resolve.

Religious traditions insert the sacred into resolve. Vows of marriage or upon entrance to a religious order are examples. Adherents to various religious traditions undertake vows too. Interestingly, the construct of these vows may wisely anticipate failure and, in some ways, the impossibility of attainment. After all, one might expect at least some blundering a long the way to transformation.

A word of caution: Resolve with the expectation of perfection without failure promotes discouragement, self-recrimination and a year of too many jelly doughnuts. Or whatever!

So what is the alternative? Aspirations small or grand are wonderful but insufficient. Our wisdom starts with understanding the impossibility of perfect achievement. It starts with the humility of accepting our human frailties and follies. But it must not end there, lest we lapse into self-pity and an endless succession of half-hearted and failed attempts.

Instead, with humility, we could vow toward dedication to a worthwhile goal like kindness with a loved one (or even a “difficult person”). Of course we will mess up and our shortcomings will throw us off track. But we must return again and again to the vow. It is because our imperfection is accepted that failure is understood as part of the way forward-and that only strengthens our resolution to stay the course.

To paraphrase one of Buddhism’s four vows, our path of resolve is unattainable. And we vow to attain it.

A proper history of the the field of psychology would take several volumes. Presented here are some interesting antecedents to current studies that define psychology as the scientific study of behavior and mental processes. Mental processes are basically internal and covert. Examples of mental processes include both thoughts and emotions.

In considering the antecedents to psychology, some scholars go back to the time of the Buddha, near Nepal from about 450 BC to 370 BC. In one famous passage from the Heart Sutra the Buddha identified the importance of the body, feelings, perceptions, mental formations and consciousness. While translations/definitions are not exacting to modern psychology, Buddhist philosophy was concerned with these topics which are fundamental to any contemporary course in general psychology.

Meditation is a practice that bridges the teachings of the historical Buddha to contemporary research in psychology. In fact, meditation has been found to change and influence both mental and physical processes. There have been many research projects investigating the benefits of meditation including studies of stress and anxiety, smoking cessation, pain reduction and improving overall physical health.

Today there are many types of meditation and approaches to meditation practice. Mindfulness meditation is quite popular and generally involves the cultivation of simple attention a long with an accepting attitude: observe and let go.

“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me.’’ E.S. in A Christmas Carol

For many years, I have been using Dickens’ classic tale and the character of Scrooge as a means of illustrating concepts of later-life integrity and despair in a course on human development. Erik Erikson termed the last of his eight life crises, ego integrity versus despair. He thought that the task of achieving ego integrity, the sense that one has lived a successful life that mattered, began in middle adulthood but was most central in late adulthood. Despair occupied the ruminative opposite of integrity, and was characterized by regret, guilt and the hopelessness. There is no hope, after all, to reverse time and give it all another and wiser try.

But maybe for a lucky few deep, deep reflection (and a visitation from three spirits) could illuminate toward acceptance and a second chance.

The despairing Ebenezer Scrooge’s existential confrontation with a troubled past, present and potential future illuminates our Holiday season and depicts a question central to aging and death: “was mine a meaningful life?” Scrooge’s reconciliation with the past allows for an affirmation of Christmas and the values of charity and kindness.

But perhaps none of us ought to count on the chance visit of three spirits in our later years to make things good. Instead, as we hear Dickens’ story at holidays to come, may we all be reminded of Erikson’s profound theory of integrity vs. despair, and come again and again to our own sense of the meaningful life.

A long and extreme hiatus from my last entry here. Time passes. My first inspiration for these writings was sharing my experiences as a therapist and teacher and spiritual aspirant and dad.  Passing on the wisdom of the many teachers who stood with and by me patiently, as I learned a bit, here and there.  That inspiration is a little fainter now. To back fill:

I first read psychologist and hero Burton Blatt’s Souls in Extremis 30 years ago-on the radical data and poetry driven tragedy of institutionalized people with intellectual impairment: “once the good man has seen the institution, he can never pity himself”

Well I saw it over decades of working at a California State Hospital. There was caregiving, but to often abuse and neglect ruled. The Rulers made proclamations of reform, took many bows to unknowing applause-but nothing seemed to change.  There were we few who made our best effort for those souls in extremis, we were a small tribe. Some including myself were human rights advocates and part of the deinstitutionalization movement. We bothered the Rulers.

Time passes. I have two sons, Aaron and David, who on this Fathers Day remain my greatest teachers. David, my son with Down Syndrome has taught me as Blatt’s writings once did about victims and victimizers (the sub title of that book). First hand. For David became a kind of victim and taught me the deepest meaning of the Institution and its Rulers.

He has lived for seven long years in programs and placements. I have written about it elsewhere, The New Institutions. And I finally understand that the State ownership of our most vulnerable is and always has been about power, career and greed. Once Wardens lived in grand homes as their sometimes ruthless employees made careers off the owned and objectified. And the public closed collective eyes.

Time passes.

I have long worked for David’s (and others) rights and freedoms. I have met the Rulers. I have tried to challenge them.  They are well paid bureaucrats, faux advocates and guardians, hypocritical politicians. And, unsurprisingly, their lawyers. Like long ago, their power and greed make them invulnerable as they continue to use the vulnerable for their own profit.

And now in the spirit of the times, they are masters of propaganda; of crafty speeches and photo ops.  Victimizers posing as helpers. It is not as hard as you may think.

For many of these vulnerable do not speak. And we who give them Voice are hit. And hard.

At first I thought David’s circumstances were unique. And my own too. But the tragedy is that they are not.

Finding myself powerless,  I am stunned and hurt. Yet there is an abiding Gift I celebrate this Fathers Day.  For now that I have been pushed down by the Rulers that rule David and many other vulnerables, I join them. Not literally, for I will never experience David’s fate or that of his peers. But I approach it; I am at its edge and feel an ache and vulnerability that I have never known before.

On the margins now.  Marginalized. And shaken.

But I love the company.