A Marsha Summers Blog

From Marsha

I often find myself reacting to disapproval or even to words that I interpret as disapproval.  In the workshops, Dr. Bob often talked about “personal taste”.  Some things we like–some people we like.  It has nothing to do with whether the thing or the person is “bad” or “good”.

It is simply my “personal taste” which is actually of value.  Can you imagine what would happen if every man liked only one kind of woman?

But aside from that, I often wondered what I could say when someone disapproves.  The urge to defend and explain seems to elevate into who’s “right” and who’s “wrong” and possibly a big argument and hurt feelings.  If I see myself as having done what I did as right or proper or as the only thing I could at the moment with what light I have, there’s no need to defend or explain.  We each are doing our best with what light we have.

But my next question was—well, where can I go from there?  Below are several statements that John found on the website that one can experiment with.  I found it hard to use these statements in the beginning as vanity said I “wasn’t being true to myself”.  Ha, so much for that.  I can be peaceful inside anyway.  John explored the website and found more about the situation of experiencing wanting approval and escaping disapproval.

From John

I’ve been looking at the teaching about “taste” and particularly like the experiment you suggest when confronted with someone’s disapproval by saying:

“Thanks for reminding me.”

“Thanks for pointing that out to me.”

“You may be right about that.”

“Oh, you could say that.”

“I’ll consider it.”

“Let me look at that—I’ll spend some time with that—thank you.”

I’m a sucker for approval.  I think it says something about me!  What might one say when receiving approval? My conditioning would be to deny or play down the approval with false modesty which seems anti-agape.  So it would seem that accepting approval would be in order; not because it says anything about me, but because the other person is expressing their taste which they think is right, proper and justified at that moment.  So just a simple, “Thanks” would seem in order. The next moment they might just as easily express disapproval of me.

Interesting….  Thanks for the experiment.  As Bob said, “Nobody can tell you one thing in the world about you because there’s nobody in that skin but you.”

From Marsha

Our teacher talked about each of us believing we’ve made mistakes.  He often asked if we ever thought we made a mistake. Of course we all can look back and be totally convinced that we made mistakes in our past.

He was talking about those decisions where everything seemed to go awry—things that didn’t turn out like we thought they should.   He mentioned that if we had done ANYTHING different, we couldn’t know what the outcome would have been—we might have found a million dollars or we could have become a basket case.  That certainly made it easier for me to not make it important when I turned on a wrong street and was late.  Now I just look at it as though if I had been on the right street, I might have been in an accident—and there have been times when I was late and came upon an accident that I might very well have been involved in.  Below is another way to look at what we call “mistakes” from John.

This morning following my usual routine I worked on the newspaper crossword as I sipped my morning coffee. Saturday morning’s puzzle is the most difficult of the weekday puzzles. I do the puzzles in pen and have an aim to complete them without any “mistakes.” The aim is really a goal when I discover I’ve made an incorrect entry. The crossword puzzle is a game and like all games is given by Life that we might learn. When I think I’ve seen something from the teaching doing the crossword I write it in the margin of the paper. This morning I wrote “mistakes=human.”

Like I do with most things I see regarding my conditioning, I do a search of your site. The key word I used this morning was “mistake.” From the “Place of Language” I found,

“Mistake – An act which one thinks was not to one’s advantage but which can never be proven as such; an illusion.”

I was reminded of an incident yesterday of forgetting how to respond to my bridge partner’s bid (we use a very complicated bidding system) which resulted in us not getting to game which everyone else in the room bid but they all failed to make and with my “mistaken” bid we had a top board! My mistake wasn’t a mistake at all!

I had taken out the ball peen hammer and was beating myself over the head about my mistake. Even when my mistake turned out to have a silver lining, a number 5 Not-I was still whacking my head with the hammer. The self-improver Not-I was watching and reacting. It feeds on “mistakes” and is not easily ignored.

The upshot of all this inquiry is that my “mistake” was playing the crossword and bridge games to gain and escape the 4dbu’s. Shall I give up the crossword and bridge? That would be a reaction. A response might be to contribute to a pleasant harmonious mood whether doing the crossword in solitude or playing bridge in a room full of people. That’ll be a challenge!! I’m playing bridge again today.

From Marsha:

Competition is one of the ideas of the man-made world that is fine when agreed upon that we’ll play a game, and one of us will “win”; however the urge to competition is often carried unconsciously into many other areas of life such as “I am right” and “you are wrong” and the argument is over an “opinion” rather than fact.  Below is a contribution from John.  He found conflict within and “checked it out” with the teachings.  Below are his discoveries.

From John:

Competition

Man likes competition because he thinks he’s going to win (vanity).  He’s going to be proven better than others (at least momentarily).  Competition is a form of violence based on the belief, “If you have it, I won’t have it.”  It is a form of greed in that one is trying to keep another from getting what one wants for oneself. That’s his expectation….an ideal which eventually leads to disappointment and the necessity for adaptation (vicious cycle). Once Man is no longer in competition within, he will eschew competition without.   The absence of violence is peace.  Cease competition and begin to do what you want for the joy of doing it!  “Culture” is a state where there is no competition, where people do what interests them, where they are cooperative and independent.

For years I have heard the statement that I “shouldn’t take things personally”.   I’ve often wondered what that meant and asked myself how I could get out of it so I was immune to the effects on my inner state.  In former years, I thought what they said about me must be true and I must do a lot of changing to gain their approval.  This excerpt gives me another way of looking at what people say to and about me that puts a wedge between what they say and how I can see it differently—making it impersonal .

From workshop Albion 1972

Then, obviously you’re going to have sensation—all this approval is is that I sense somebody who says, “I like you” or “That’s a pretty suit” or “I like your weird tie” or “I like your hair” or “I like your behavior.”

That’s all it is – a matter of them expressing their taste.  It expresses absolutely nothing about me.  Did you ever realize that?  Somebody says, “I like you.”  They’re only telling you something about their taste; they’re not describing one iota about you.  Don’t get the big head over it because all they’re telling you about their taste, not a thing about you.

They walk up and say, “I can’t stand you.”  They’re not saying one derogatory thing about you; they’re only expressing their taste.  They haven’t said a thing about you, and I take it as though it was something serious—accurate–true.  No, it isn’t, they haven’t said one iota about you—they have only expressed their taste’ and I give everybody perfect freedom to express their taste—it has no effect on what I am.

So if somebody walked up to you and said:  “I love you.”  All they’re doing is telling you they have a taste — that they approve of you at the moment.  It’s a statement of their state of being at that moment, not a thing about you.

And if I say, “You are the loveliest creature in the world.”  I haven’t told you a thing about you, I’ve only told you about me.  You see we’re always talking about ourselves and other people talk about themselves; and we have a form of insanity called “ideas of reference”.  Did you ever hear that everything that is said, I think that it’s about me and I get all pushed out of shape over it—So that’s my particular brand of insanity.

So you have “ideas of reference”.  You immediately jump to the conclusion because somebody has a personal taste that it somehow relates to you.  Nobody can tell you one thing in the world about you because there’s nobody in that skin but you.  The rest of them can only talk about their taste, and everybody’s got different taste.

From workshop Maryland 1978

(Bob, yesterday when you were talking about an occupation is what I have and making a contribution is what I do.  If I’m alone in a field and walking and enjoying the experience, am I doing or am I having?)

You’re doing at that moment–and you are having.  Usually they go together.  You are doing what you wanted to do at that moment—just take a walk out to the beautiful sunny field with flowers and trees.

(But I’m not making a contribution.)

Oh yes you are.  You’re enjoying yourself and that radiates hundreds of miles, ok?  And you also have a very desirable state of being.  You have a natural state of your being.  You see, basically, always when we are “doing”, the “having” is a byproduct.

Now, had you gone out to be sure you’d “have” a good feeling; you’d be so busy watching to see if you were that you wouldn’t see the flowers.

(Right.)

So we always start with “doing”, but automatically or as a byproduct, we “have”.  So if you went out just to take a walk, we’ll say, and enjoy getting out of the house and being out in the open; the byproduct is you have a wonderful feeling, ok?  That radiates far away, so it does many things for many people and you are contributing to “Life”–especially you.

An experience:

Today I went to play piano at a nursing home.  Since my sight is limited, I only see the shapes of people.  I was unable to find anyone in charge to ask them to bring people to me; and everyone was wandering around carrying out their duties.

My PA was set up for me, and so I sat at the piano and started playing happy rags, boogies and classics.  I threw in a couple of sing-a-longs; but there was no response, so I didn’t know “what was going on”.  I felt ignored and the inner complaining began.

I observed the inner turmoil and complaints, but ignored them and thought “so what!”  The not I’s told me to quit that job, it wasn’t any fun, why waste my time, and on and on.

I still remembered that my partner, X,  is always with me no matter what.  Then I remembered “the walk”.  So I continued to enjoy what I was playing and singing and kept radiating.

After about half an hour had elapsed, the activities director came by and told me that everyone was enjoying it.  Whew!  That made me feel a little better and I told her that since I couldn’t see the audience I had become discouraged.  With no feedback, I was beginning to wonder if anyone even knew I was there.

Pretty soon two sweet ladies in their wheelchairs came close and said they were enjoying it.  I was getting somewhat stiff from sitting so I stood up and did an action song and walked around the room.  Two daughters were there, each visiting a parent; and they were very enthusiastic about how my performance and the music  was affecting their loved ones.

Then as I was leaving and walking down the corridor, a man in a wheel chair said he had been in his room, but he had listened to  the music and loved it.  And to my amazement, even one of the aids walked by me with enthusiasm and energy and told me how much she had enjoyed it.

So the radiating out a good mood IS a very powerful thing to “do”; and has far reaching effects that perhaps we’ll never even know of–but I’m reminded that the effort is well worth it.

From School Talk #50 Chaos to Order

When I first read this part of the school talk, I did experiment with it.  It was a challenge not only to remember but also to think of things in a different way.   It wasn’t easy to come up with descriptive words.  But as is the way of man, in a few days I forgot.  So it is nice to pick up the experiment again and see what happens.  Here begins the excerpt:

So it would be fairly simple if one took it upon one’s self to say, “I’m going to drop the whole four dual basic urges as my purpose.” I’m going to find something else to do. I’m going to start communicating with other people with descriptive words rather than judgment words–that is to say, other than saying that my taste is the epitome of correctness for the world—and if it doesn’t fit my taste, it’s a royal mess, ok?

So we could leave the judgment words off. You might be surprised how many people that you had a tendency to “lock horns with” seem to change when you use descriptive terms. In other words, when you use descriptive terms, there’s very little for people to contend about. Huh?

Now if I said you have on a beautiful dress, somebody may say “No way.” Huh? But if I said you have on a purple dress made out of crinkle cloth and it looks like you’re enjoying wearing it, not very many people argue about it. It kind of fits that.

Another person says your hair is long. That really doesn’t mean anything, but if I said “Your hair hangs three inches below the nape of your neck.” You can kind of get a glimpse of it, ok?

We could say that a painting is beautiful, but I can look at it and ask what does it mean? I say it’s a ballerina painted on gold leaves putting on a shoe and evidently her toe was hurting. Nobody will contend with you very much there.

They contend if I say this is a pretty desk–somebody says, “Yuk!” but if I said it was a chipboard desk with a fine little film of violet over the chipboard then there it is-that’s description.

Now if we could all talk in descriptions instead of judgments, they really would have very little to be upset or contend over, and it’s surprising how few people will go on the defensive around you.