which, in turn, caused further neglect and, for many, made him an
object of mockery. Yet, despite his anxiety and loneliness,
Schopenhauer survived and continued to exhibit all the outward
signs of personal self–sufficiency. And he persevered in his work,
remaining a productive scholar until the end of his life. He never
lost faith in himself. He compared himself to a young oak tree who
looked as ordinary and unimportant as other plants. «But let him
alone: he will not die. Time will come and bring those who know
how to value him.» He predicted his genius would ultimately have
a great influence upon future generations of thinkers. And he was
right; all that he predicted has come to pass.
34
_________________________
Seen from the
standpoint of
youth, life is
an endlessly
long future;
from that of
old age it
resembles a
very brief
past. When we
sail away,
objects on the
shore become
ever smaller
and more
difficult to
recognize and
distinguish;
so, too, is it
with our past
years with all
their events
and activities.
_________________________
As time raced by, Julius looked forward with increasing
anticipation to the weekly group meeting. Perhaps his experiences
in the group were more poignant because the weeks of his «one
good year» were running out. But it was not just the events of the
group; everything in his life, large and small, appeared more tender
and vivid. Of course, his weeks hadalways been numbered, but the
numbers had seemed so large, so stretched into a forever future,
that he had never confronted the end of weeks.
Visible endings always cause us to brake. Readers zip
through the thousand pages ofThe Brothers Karamazov until there
are only a dozen remaining pages, and then they suddenly
decelerate, savoring each paragraph slowly, sucking the nectar
from each phrase, each word. Scarcity of days caused Julius to
treasure time; more and more he fell into astonished contemplation
of the miraculous flow of everyday events.
Recently, he had read a piece by an entomologist who
explored the cosmos existing in a roped–off, two–by–two piece of
turf. Digging deeply, he described his sense of awe at the dynamic,
teeming world of predators and prey, nematodes, millipedes,
springtails, armor–plated beetles, and spiderlings. If perspective is
attuned, attention rapt, and knowledge vast, then one enters
everydayness in a perpetual state of wonderment.
So it was for Julius in the group. His fears about the
recurrence of his melanoma had receded, and his panics grew less
frequent. Perhaps his greater comfort stemmed from taking his
doctor`s estimate of «one good year» too literally, almost as a
guarantee. More likely, though, his mode of life was the active
emollient. Following Zarathustra`s path, he had shared his
ripeness, transcended himself by reaching out to others, and lived
in a manner that he would be willing to repeat perpetually
throughout eternity.
He had always remained curious about the direction the
therapy groups would take the following week. Now, with his last
good year visibly shrinking, all feelings were intensified: his
curiosity had evolved into an eager childlike anticipation of the
next meeting. He remembered how, years ago, when he taught
group therapy the beginning students complained of boredom as
they observed ninety minutes of talking heads. Later, when they
learned how to listen to the drama of each patient`s life and to
appreciate the exquisitely complex interaction between members,
boredom dissolved and every student was in place early awaiting
the next installment.
The looming end of the group propelled members to address
their core issues with increased ardor. A visible end to therapy
always has that result; for that reason pioneer practitioners like
Otto Rank and Carl Rogers often set a termination date at the very
onset of therapy.
Stuart did more work in those months than in three previous
years of therapy. Perhaps Philip had jump–started Stuart by serving
as a mirror. He saw parts of himself in Philip`s misanthropy and
realized that every member of the group, except the two of them,
took pleasure in the meetings and considered the group a refuge, a
place of support and caring. Only he and Philip attended under
duress—Philip in order to obtain supervision from Julius, and he
because of his wife`s ultimatum.
At one meeting Pam commented that the group never
formed a true circle because Stuart`s chair was invariably set back
a bit, sometimes only a couple of inches, but big inches. Others
agreed; they had all felt the seating asymmetry but never connected
it to Stuart`s avoidance of closeness.
In another meeting Stuart launched into a familiar grievance
as he described his wife`s attachment to her father, a physician
who rose from chairman of a surgery department, to medical
school dean, to president of a university. When Stuart continued,
as he had in previous meetings, to discuss the impossibility of ever
winning his wife`s regard because she continually compared him
to her father, Julius interrupted to inquire whether he was aware
that he had often told this story before.
After Stuart responded, «But surely we should be bringing
up issues that continue to be bothersome. Shouldn`t we?» Julius
then asked a powerful question: «How did you think we would feel
about your repetition?»
«I imagine you`d find it tedious or boring.»
«Think about that, Stuart. What`s the payoff for you in being
tedious or boring? And then think about why you`ve never
developed empathy for your listeners.»
Stuart did think about that a great deal during the following
week and reported feeling astonished to realize how little he ever
considered that question. «I know my wife often finds me tedious;
her favorite term for me isabsent, and I guess the group is telling
me the same thing. You know, I think I`ve put my empathy into
deep storage.»
A short time later Stuart opened up a central problem: his
ongoing inexplicable anger toward his twelve–year–old son. Tony
opened a Pandora`s box by asking, «What were you like when you
were your son`s age?»
Stuart described growing up in poverty; his father had died
when he was eight, and his mother, who worked two jobs, was
never home when he returned from school. Hence, he had been a
latch–key child, preparing his own dinner, wearing the same soiled
clothes to school day after day. For the most part, he had
succeeded in suppressing the memory of his childhood, but his
son`s presence propelled him back to horrors long forgotten.
«Blaming my son is crazy,” he said, «but I just keep feeling
envy and resentment when I see his privileged life.» It was Tony
who helped crack Stuart`s anger with an effective reframing
intervention: «What about spending some time feeling proud at
providing that better life for your son?»
Almost everyone made progress. Julius had seen this before;
when groups reach a state of ripeness, all the members seem to get
better at once. Bonnie struggled to come to terms with a central
paradox: her rage toward her ex–husband for having left her and
her relief that she was out of a relationship with a man she so
thoroughly disliked.
Gill attended daily AA meetings—seventy meetings in
seventy days—but his marital difficulties increased, rather than
decreased, with his sobriety. That, of course, was no mystery to