the black and white of our feelings

“fear is bad and love is good!” – why taking our feeling out of the boxes could improve our understanding of life.

Go to a forest. Pick up a random piece of wood and look at it carefully. You will observe a unique texture, shaped by nature which is the result of a complex process in growing and adapting to a specific environment. This individual piece of wood does not exist a second time. Once you zoom out your micro perspective, you will be able to see an entire forest, composed by millions of individual pieces of woods and plants. This observation always taught me to understand how complex the world we live in actually is and how much energy it requires us to understand and listen to our environment.

In order to organize all the information in our brains, humans developed a strategy to simplify everything around us. We put our perception in categories. Therefore: a tree remains a tree, but seldom a tree which grows towards the sun, hiding smaller trees in his shadow or hosting a bird.

Putting things into categories helps us to simplify our lives, but it also makes us loose our focus and our awareness to allow individualism. A tree is a tree, but many of us would not take their time to carefully identify the uniqueness of a certain tree. Nowadays this is what we call ‘mindfulness’.

Beside nature there is something else most people would describe as “fuzzy” or sometimes hard to understand: feelings and emotions. All of us sometimes struggle with the outcomes of our inner processes and therefore book shops are packed with books teaching us on certain emotions and people go therapists in order to approach the unknown inside of their souls. The complexity of our emotions brings us to the point also to sort our feelings into categories. We usually use two different ones: good feelings and bad feelings.   

I learned about good and bad feelings in my early childhood. Education consisted concept of “you should not be angry” or “always be happy, otherwise no one will like you”. This kind of education is also gender based – men are supposed to hide sadness while girls should not deal with aggression. Our way of conceptualizing emotion provides the foundation for generations of humans who are taught to ignore one of their key instincts: basic emotion, such as sadness, anger or aggression. 

I observed the dissolving of the “bad feelings” becoming a trending movement in the past years. 

People attend classes in order to leave anger or sadness behind and there is a huge industry growing in order to promote infinite happiness and the distance from anger and grief. Many times I am confronted with people who try to tell me: “Look, I joined this course and then I lost all my aggression and my hate. And yes, I do love everybody.” Listening to these kinds of thoughts, I have the impression of talking to a robotic version of a human prototype, but not to a real person.

But imagine a world, in which no one would have any impact on someone else. You might be telling your best friend how someone fooled you and she would respond with a friendly smile. Are these the moments which create boundaries? Instead, I remember evenings after break-ups and failures, in which we sat together, drinking wine and gossiped endlessly about every boyfriend we ever had and will have. I remember situations in which I allowed my emotions of jealousy, aggression or sadness to take part of my actions – and my surrounding responded with compassion and openness towards my weaknesses. It is an amazing experience to be loved for your ‘bad parts’. If I would live in a world in which I could never have an impact on anyone with my feelings – I would feel useless. Feelings and emotion is a tool to communicate the insights of our heart, which is more honest than expressing our ratio.

We also have the tendency to work against feelings we judge as “bad”. These could be aggression or anger. I met people who take this challenge very serious which leads them to a point to ignore all the bad feelings someone ever experienced. I have one friend who truly says that he never practiced failure. According to him, his life was filled with happiness, loving parents, friends, health and a good education. All of this sounds lovely and should be everyone’s dream. Nevertheless – if I ask this person if he is happy about his life, he always mentions that there is something missing. This helped me to understand, that the ‘bad’ is a caring pathway towards reflection and learning.

I love to compare the feeling of my friend to the illusion of a life-long holiday. Imagine your life would only consist of free days, in which you always decide what to do. Sounds like a dream? Yes, but most of us would conclude, that we typically enjoy our free time, if we have worked before. That shows us – we need the bad in order to understand about the good and vice versa. Sometimes love needs to be taken away to show us how important it is. Sometimes we need to fail in order to change our perspective. Everything we judge as “bad feelings” can actually have a very positive impact on us. Our saddest moment allows us to learn about vulnerability. Moments of anger can guide us towards our wishes.

However we need to distinguish between actually having the feeling and about how much we allow them to take over our decisions. Dealing with controversial emotions in a compassionate way doesn’t mean that we are open and allowed to express them. Our fear of communicating ‘bad’ emotions also results from our bad experiences we have observing others expressing them in an inappropriate way. 

Most of us witnessed someone getting very aggressive and expressing himself by shouting or using any kind of violence. And these examples are always mentioned to teach us to delete aggression from our list of emotions. Still, most of the people who express aggression belong to those with the biggest troubles of accepting it. Aggression is a tool for many people to hide the current feeling of sadness or loneliness and therefore is not used correctly. Compared to that, someone who really feels angry and still is able to communicate his perception straight but not hurting, allows his environment to understand and correlate to him. 

In the end we all belong to the same species, able to express anger and love, grief and harmony. All of these are part of us and tools to orientate ourselves in this world. What would help us is to open up towards our so called bad sides and treat them with compassion and kindness. Maybe this is the pathway towards real happiness.

compassion! it's about humanity!

how the world leading psychologist in compassion and mindfulness research would teach me about being human. a personal summary of the congress “attachement and trauma”

I love listening. And I am more than intrigued by the concepts behind compassion and mindfulness as interventional methods in psychotherapy. Therefore I ended up, lowering the age limit and seeking for responses in the middle of 1200 people, attending a conference exactly asking this question: how does attachment work and how can we use mindfulness and compassion in therapeutically contexts with humans who have been affected by life so hard, that feeling love and joy is one of the most challenging tasks they’d find for their lives.

Many people are asking me now, what I've learned. Conferences are confined spaces, collecting masses of potential but hiding it behind scientific borders. As we were talking about humans, we should also share these thoughts to humans. I’d love that each of the 1200 attendees would spread his/her ideas and thoughts somewhere. It might happen in many ways - and here is mine.

  
It's not possible to sum up this massive inspiration and motivation, the complexity of thoughts and dedication to research I would be able to observe, but here are some of my most recent thoughts and feelings. I want to adjust, very seldom in my life I felt so much connected and supported in my way of thinking like in these days.

me, myself and a mainstream called mindfulness

We live in a culture which prays the individualistic, yet, the egoistic. People associate 'mindfulness' to a status of acting superior. But, mindfulness has nothing to do with yoga retreats in India and hipster vegan food. It has nothing to do with fleeing from this world and hiding in rooms covered by the smell of incense sticks.

“It’s mindfulness, mindfulness, mindfulness everywhere. And then: compassion, compassion, compassion. People are talking so much about it, that they can’t live it” (Jon Kabat-Zinn)

Mindfulness is mainstream. It became popular due to neuroscience studies, which showed how the brain transforms once people start to meditate. And who – in our society of high-achievers – is not looking for a perfect method to rewire the brain towards a supercomputer. But mindfulness is more than that and life itself should become the actual meditation practice.

“Mindfulness is not an invitation to become more and more egocentric, it is actually the other way around: do not act self-centered, but feel the correlational towards this planet and all its beings.” (Jon Kabat-Zinn)

Daniel Siegel used an even better word for it: MWe, a combination of “me” and “we” to describe us individuals as a part of a large system we call: humanity. Yes, we might be separated by our skins, but we are interconnected by our breathing and sharing the same rhythm of heartbeat. Research is supporting his model of defining happiness as a result of feeling related to a group of people, and being a part of them.

we are all together in this

‘If everyone cares for himself then nobody is alone.’ I’ve heard this sentence in a group of dancers – means: a group in which people are associated with sharing moments of touch to each other. When this person said this sentence, everyone around would applause and appreciate the saying. I sat in the middle of this group and were about to cry. I don’t want to be the only one to care about myself – I want to be cared and protected by others. In addition to that: so many times we experience, that it is much easier to care about others than for you. Why not use this potential?

Yes, responsibility is risky. We can feel absolute responsible and meaning the best and we might achieve the worst we can imagine. Yes, responsibility is connected to failure, guilt, shame and all that ugly stuff modern society tries to prevent us from. But think about it: how poor would your life be, if you could never say or feel sorry? Shame is, according to Kathy Steele, a support for social structures in society which teaches us the borders and limitations we have to keep up in order to guarantee safety. Those who do not feel shame are sociopaths. Yes, responsibility sometimes forces us to cross the borders of what we consider to be accurate.

During her speech, Pat Ogden would show a therapy video in which she is holding the hand of a client who is traumatized from war and uses his right hand, seeking for touch. She asks him what he would like to do with the hand and he is responding that he would need her to hold it. So she did. Watching this, someone in the audience stands up and asks: "How could you touch the client? We are not supposed to do that in therapy." Ogden: "How could I not? Sometimes therapy comes to the point where it starts to be about humanity."

the most basic human instinct called compassion

No one ever has to learn compassion. We are all born with the intuition to care and feel for and with other humans. Using it in therapy is just a friendly reminder for our patients how care and listening can work, as these people are often so traumatized from the fact of not having experienced enough of it. Compassion is correlated to another aspect: courage! In order to be compassionate, we must dedicate ourselves to the fact that “our species is able to create good things and embrace love and care, but also works in a destructive way, starting wars, torturing people, coming crimes.” (Paul Gilbert) The acceptance of this suffering requires a high amount of courage and dedication. It expects us to decrease illusion, leave the hippie status of believing everything is covered in flowers. Yes, this world is good, and sometimes it is really bad. Both are part of our existence and need to be seen.

We are all wired to connect, shaped for love and build to take over the responsibility about ourselves, but also about everyone and everything surrounding us. Care and protection are infinity human instincts and the key towards happiness and love.

This is what I really have to share in these lines: Dedicate yourself, love, fail and fall, love even harder.

Mindfulness is everywhere, such as compassion. If there is something I really want to achieve now, it’s encouraging people to act responsible, feel interconnected and throw themselves into this adventure of falling and flying we call ‘life’. 

“People are aiming so much towards a higher and greater status of so called mindfulness. But this concept teaches us to live the present moment. Now. You could die after each breath. Focus on what is now and enjoy it.” (Jon Kabat-Zinn)

how two people with autism would teach me about love

Autism and Love have nothing to do with each other? Here are 5 things I learned from an autistic couple. 

I never thought I would do this: write an article on love and relationships. And I never thought I would use “autism” as a positive example of how relationships should be conducted. But as life is not always about planning and thinking – I am thankful to share my experience on how two people, diagnosed with autism, taught me about loving. 

She loves clothes. Skirts and shirts we would not associate with society-appropriate styles, but she absolutely shows she likes wearing them. Her parents had migrated from another country, and even though she speaks both languages perfectly, she sometimes has troubles in writing. I met her as a caring and friendly person, sometimes confused by rules and structures. She is interested in everyone surrounding her and asks many questions.

He loves eating, even though he is allergic against many things. When he talks, his fingers start trembling, which does not correspond to his attitude of speaking very slow. He always uses full sentences and every word he’s sharing seems to be well selected. When he is starting an action, he prepares every step on it. He knows when the busses are running and is informed about opening times in supermarkets. I am impressed about the details in life, he is caring about.

Both have autism. In our society ‘autism’ is associated with a lack of empathy and less emotional understanding. People having autism are not able to love – that’s what we think. 

I work with autistic people for seven years now. She and he both joined my intervention groups for more than one year in order to meet people who are supposed to be alike. We’ve spent nights cooking, playing games and just talking about life. Sometimes I did not feel any difference between people having autism and myself. The only impression I had is that their lives included more obstacles than my own one. Love could be one of them.

I remember when they first met, it took them two hours until they’d ask for each other’s name – and two more meetings to exchange numbers. In the meanwhile, I observed small tryouts of interaction, such as choosing a sitting place next to each other and shy looks trying to start a conversation. I also observed caring and attention, small gestures and thankful moments when the other person replied as hoped.

For half a year they would attend our group meetings, but not date each other outside that context. The first time they actually spent time together, happened when she was sick. He offered to accompany her to the doctors. That was the first attempt towards a caring relationship. 

swiping your love life

Different situation - I attended a supervision course in physical therapy, in which I didn’t know any of the other attendees before. Our trainer asked us to start our session by talking. Everyone should share his biography, current questions in life and thoughts. One woman talked about being overwhelmed with two small children. Another one was searching for love. A third person mentioned troubles in job, while another one reflected on her marriage. Three hours later I felt impressed by the density life just caused on these square meters our sitting circle comprised.

Swipe left, swipe right. The first one has blond hair; the next one is wearing sunglasses, one has black hair, another one is photographed with an alpine landscape in the background. Biographies are passing by as clouds or water. Later that evening: I was having a beer with some friends, chatting and joking until one of them starts ‘tindering’ on his phone. As I have never used the application before, he passes me his phone: “You can pick for me!” I start scrolling and deciding. Soon I was swiping by biographies. Biographies that where likely to be just as intense as in my training course. This is how love in my surroundings is conducted. Fast. Way to fast. If you saw one drop, you still don’t know about the ocean. 

time

What my couple with autism taught me the most was the value of time. And that love needs time. I remember small moments of interactions, which got closer and closer but not too close to overwhelm them. In my generation I often observe a fast lane towards love which usually ends with a hard crash. We jump onto emotional territories, we do not know, even though we consider ourselves as experts. Yes, we all might have been in relationships or affairs before – but every new person consists of completely individually shaped and complex formed memories and thoughts. We need time to sense and understand who we are meeting. One of my biggest wishes still is, to have time for a detailed observation. I am curious how someone walks, start talking, and breathes. One swipe on Tinder won’t do this job.

focus

What I admire about my autistic couple was the focus and precision they included in their meetings. There was only one person – the other one. I believe that, if we are facing someone new our emotional capacity can only last for one person, which also demands a lot of patience and courage.

curiosity

“Do you first want to go to the supermarket and then to the bakery, or the other way around?” During our meet-ups I would count many questions for each other from both sides. Questions on daily routines or on preferences. I know so many couples not asking questions anymore, because they think they know everything. They rely on their intuition, their own life experience and from what they consider having learned about other people. But people change concepts, goals and needs – and asking is a friendly way of meeting them. My observations towards my autistic couple always were subtitled with the words ‘respect’ and ‘compassion’, when questions filled the space.

attention

From my working background, I can say, that physical interaction in our society happens in a very confusing way. We shake hands with close friends or we have sex with strangers we don’t know their name.  We all consider ourselves to “know” how sexuality and touch work out – even though every’body’ consists of completely different needs and feelings. I often met people – men and women alike -, who proudly presented me their counting list of sexual contacts which would award them as heroes in bed. What I often miss about these explanations were terms of ‘listening’ and ‘empathy’, which I personally consider as the most important traits for love and sexuality. I learned that empathic touch in relationships demands a lot of asking. For my autistic friends, touch was a completely new territory, they never walked on before. Observing their physical interaction often reminded me on walking on Martian surface – packed with curiosity and attention.

acceptance

“Yes, my boyfriend has this absolutely weird behavior. I need to make him stop it.” I hear these kinds of sentences so many times. People with autism are often judged showing atypical behaviors, such as counting things or following very strict routines. What I would observe following the autistic couple in my group was that they would absolutely value the other one’s weird behavior. When I asked them about it, they would answer: “Because it is important!”

All in all, my autistic friends introduced me to soft qualities I sometimes would love to see increase in our daily life. I believe we should appreciate and respect love (or even friendship) as a great gift and not as a constant way of consuming things.

If one would ask me, how people with autism love, I would sum it up like this: No Tinder. No Fast-Food-Love. No fake expertise. But listening to each other.

Tango statt Tränen

warum Therapie mehr sein sollte, als ein abstrakter Raum für trübe Gefühlswelten
 

Meine erste therapeutische Erfahrung habe ich mit circa 15 Jahren gemacht. Sie fand zwar nicht beim Therapeuten, sondern in einer abgerockten Hinterhoffabrikhalle statt  - aber ihre Auswirkungen auf mein weiteres Leben, würde ich als therapeutisch bezeichnen. Ich war das, was mit 15 viele Menschen sind: latent aggressiv, emotional unkoordiniert und trotzdem träumerisch. Unsere Theaterchoreographin war eine junge Brasilianerin mit sehr großem Herz und nonverbalem Gespür für Menschen. Eines Tages bat sie mich, früher als die anderen zur Probe zu kommen. Sie drückte mir einen großen, alten Bühnenvorhang in die Hand und forderte mich auf ihn zu zerschlagen. Ich griff nach dem Vorhang und schleuderte ihn minutenlang immer wieder auf den Boden, bis der Schweiß von meiner Haut perlte. Obwohl ich mich verausgabte, veränderte ich die Struktur des Vorhangs nicht. Erschöpft brach ich über dem Boden zusammen, spürte, wie sich die Arme unserer Choreographin um mich legten. Ich glaube, wir saßen eine Stunde so da. Danach war das mit der Aggression vorbei. 

Heute weiß ich: das was damals in diesem Raum geschehen war, beinhaltete eine Wirkung, die mein ganzes Leben prägen würde. In diesem tatsächlichen Moment allerdings, verstand ich gar nichts.

So geht es wohl vielen Menschen, die eine Therapie machen.

Wenn ich mich an meine selbstrelevanten Ziele als 15jährige erinnere, sahen sie folgendermaßen aus: ich wollte cool aussehen und dabei einer Gruppe angehören. Das Theater bot mir genau diese Möglichkeiten: ich lernte Bewegungen, die im gesellschaftlichen Kontext als „cool“ bewertet wurden, und war dabei auch noch Teil einer Gruppe. Interesse an persönlicher Entwicklung oder Selbsterfahrung? Das konnte ich damals bei mir absolut nicht entdecken.

wie Therapie manchmal sein kann

Heute, rund 10 Jahre später, bin ich Körpertherapeutin. Ich tue das, was unsere Choreographin mit mir gemacht hat, mit vielen anderen Menschen. Die Erfahrungen haben sich in meinen Körper eingebrannt, mit den Jahren habe ich sie reflektieren gelernt. Ich weiß, warum es sinnvoll ist Theatervorhänge auf dem Boden zu zerdeppern. Aber aus meiner eigenen Erfahrung weiß ich auch, dass das nicht alle Leute verstehen. Menschen, die sich nie umgehend mit Therapie beschäftigt haben, verstehen Therapie vielleicht nicht. Einfach, weil sie es nie gebraucht haben. Trotzdem kann es passieren, dass sie an einem Punkt im Leben stehen, an dem sie Therapie benötigen.

In meiner heutigen Arbeit bieten sich mir oft Bilder, die ich als ironisch bezeichnen würde: Topmanager, die Körbe flechten sollen. Mütter von vielen Kindern, die ihr Leben in drei Farben auf A1 Bögen bringen. Aggressive Schwerverbrecher, die mit bunten Tüchern spielen. Oft habe ich mich gefragt, ob der jeweilige Mensch mit der jeweiligen Biographie dahinter versteht, was er da eigentlich tut. Ganz oft habe ich eine Antwort erfahren: Nein!

Wir sind Therapeuten. Wir sind dorthin gekommen, weil uns irgendwann die Idee für dieses Konzept so sehr überzeugt hat, dass wir uns dem gewidmet haben. Und ganz oft automatisch allem, was dahinter steckt: leise gesprochenen Sätzen, andächtigem Nicken und tiefsinnigen Gedanken. Oft habe ich mich gefragt, wie sehr das mit der Lebenswirklichkeit vieler Menschen da draußen überhaupt korrespondiert. Ist Therapie vielleicht ein surrealer Raum, geprägt von Weichspüler und virtuellen Milchschaumwelten?

Ich erinnere mich an Momente aus meiner Therapieausbildung, die ich wirklich langweilig empfand. Ich sollte in Übungen minimale Bewegungen andeuten – etwas, was ich in meiner Freizeit niemals tun würde. Wenn ich Bewegungen ausführe, dann soll das auch richtig sein, nicht nur pro forma. Es soll „Klettern“ oder „Tanzen“ oder „Schwimmen“ heißen. Und nicht „Therapie“. Wenn ich tanze, dann entsteht durch das Erlernen der Bewegung, durch das Schwitzen zur Musik und das absolute Versinken in der Tätigkeit ein Flow. Ich vergesse dann alles um mich herum, und lebe den Moment. Das passiert nicht, wenn ich meinen Arm in die Luft halte und ein bisschen wedele. Natürlich haben auch kleine, segmentierte Bewegungen ihren Sinn – aber den muss man erstmal verstehen lernen. Heute bin ich dankbar dafür, die Erfahrung des Nichtverstehens erlebt zu haben.

Mit der Therapie ist es wie mit der Kunst: man muss lernen, sie zu verstehen. Für jemanden, der sich mit Kunst auseinandersetzt ist es einfach sich vor ein komplexes Gemälde zu stellen und es zu begreifen. Für mich ist es: ich stehe davor. Schön oder nicht schön. Mehr habe ich nicht gelernt. Bei Musik ist es das Gleiche: komplexe Klassik motiviert mich nicht zur Reflexion, sondern erzeugt Dissonanz, die mich eher abschreckt. In solchen Momenten, in denen ich in Bereiche eintauche, die zu komplex für mich funktionieren, denke ich dann an meinen Patienten, den Topmanager. Er soll Körbe flechten, ohne die tiefere Bedeutung davon intrinsisch begriffen zu haben. Ja, ich habe vielleicht durch jahrelange Ausbildung und Erfahrung das Konzept von Achtsamkeit und von Momentaufnahmen des Lebens erlernt. Sollte man die Menschen nicht deshalb dort abholen, wo sie gerade stehen? Und ist das bei dem Manager nicht eher am Börsenkurs anstatt beim Korbflechtmaterial?

Warum suchen wir unseren Menschen also nicht Bewegungsformen, die ihnen wirkliche Freude bereiten? Dazu müssen wir keine neuen, therapeutisch angelehnten Pseudobewegungen etablieren, sondern dürfen ruhig auf das vertrauen, was seit Jahrhunderten Menschen glücklich macht – Tanz, Spiel, Laufen, Springen, Schwimmen oder Klettern.Therapie kann deshalb in der Kletterhalle stattfinden, im Café, auf der Straße oder in der Kneipe.

Ich glaube an die intrinsische Motivation des Lernens. Menschen lernen gerne – und die beste Therapie kann genau daraus bestehen in einen Prozess aus Lernen einzutauchen, in dem Erfahrungen gemacht werden, die der Realität des Menschen entsprechen. Der idealen Realität eines Menschen entspricht nicht, in einem Therapieraum zu sitzen und dort im Stuhlkreis hockend Gefühle zu benennen. Der Realität des Menschen entspricht in diese Welt eingegliedert zu sein – auf seine individuelle Weise. Manche gehen dafür in Vereine, andere bleiben eher für sich – und sind damit trotzdem Teil dieser Gesellschaft.

wie Therapie sein sollte

Ich habe das Gefühl, dass wir in der Therapie oft vor Mitgefühl zerfließen. Therapie kann cool sein, sollte manchmal sogar cool sein, Spaß machen und Menschen zum Lachen bringen. Therapie ist der erste Raum, in dem neue Erfahrungen stattfinden können – also auch positive. Ein therapeutischer Raum sollte die Vielfalt des Lebens und seine Ironie erlauben können. Und das Leben zeigt uns oft, wie dicht Leid neben Liebe steht, welche Rolle Nähe, Verbundenheit, Wut oder Spontaneität bedeuten können. Dazu gehört auch, dass Therapie mal laut, ruppig und plump erscheint. Und, dass diese Fülle sein darf und auch schön so ist. 

Ich habe die Erfahrung gemacht, dass Menschen nicht das Bedürfnis nach Heilung bei mir suchen, sondern den Wunsch nach Entfaltung verspüren. Einen ruhigen, sicheren Raum zum Entdecken, zum Ausprobieren. Am meisten lernen die Menschen, wenn wir sie nicht therapieren, sondern sie einladen ihr Wissen über sich selbst zu erweitern. Wir, therapeutisch arbeitende Menschen sollten die ersten sein, die zu dieser Reise einladen, und mit einem Lächeln sagen: Komm einfach mit!