Easily Amazed

what happens to your style of communication when you are under stress?

virginia satir outlined five different stances that individuals adopt when they are under stress. (source: Goldenberg & Goldenberg)

placater – acts weak, tentative, self-effacing; always agrees, apologizes, tries to please. body posture is grateful, begging, self-flagellating

blamer – dominates, invariably finds fault with others, and self-righteously accuses. body posture is finger pointing, loud, tyrannical, enraged.

super-reasonable – adopts a rigid stance, remains detached, robot-like, calm, cool, maintaining intellectual control while making certain not to become emotionally involved. body posture is monotone voice, stiff, machine-like, computer-like.

irrelevant – distracts others and seems unable to relate to anything going on, afraid to offend or hurt others by taking a position on an issue. body posture is in constant movement, constant chatter, distracting.

congruent communicator – seems real, genuinely expressive, responsible for sending straight (not double-binding or other confusing) messages in their appropriate context. maintains self-esteem under stress, making certain that his or her inner feelings are matched by clear and direct outer communication and behavior.

do you fit into any of these categories? can you think of other categories? which category might those that you love, those that you work with fit into? how do your habits of communcicating when under stress interact with the communication habits of those around you? just some food for thought!

commments:

depending on what’s underlying the stress, i can and fit in to any of those categories. also depends on the situation – do i feel incompetent, inadequate, overwhelmed, “all-over-the-place”, not heard, or even amongst all that is there a calm center in the storm? definitely..i’ve been all of the above and more.

how ’bout you?

ryan | Email | Homepage | 06.15.04 – 10:09 pm | #

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I second what Ryan has to say and then some since I have the whole female/hormonal thing that adds a whole ‘nother dimension to how/when I react. Today while dealing with irrational angry lady at work who yelled at me for 30 minutes straight I think I tried out all of those communication styles but none worked effectively. So then what do you do? She’s wasn’t worth trying any more beyond that so I just gave up!

cyn | Email | 06.16.04 – 3:33 pm | #

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i think i am a super-reasonable, congruent, irrelevant, placater.

if i lose my cool, i am a super-reasonable, blamer.

it also depends on who i’m interacting with.

how about a super-reasonable that adopts a flexible stance, retains an outward calm while allowing himself to internally feel, and can intuit the other’s emotions, and seeks a compromise or balance, & sends straight messages in their appropriate context, matching inner feelings with clear and direct robotic words. call it partially congruent reasonable communicator.

ats | 06.30.04 – 10:58 am | #

are you interested in psychology, counseling, social work, psychiatry, the general realm of mental health? if so, stick with me while i tell a bit of my story and then share a new idea in the mixing.

as you may or may not know, i am currently working towards my masters degree in counseling with an emphasis on play therapy and transpersonal/integral counseling. as both a therapist and an individual, i strive to co-create spaces that invite exploration of the life that is within us and around us. encouraging one another to be open and present, actively engaging in our lives, appears to be powerful medicine. i have found therapy to be a phenomenal resource for offering people an opportunity, environment and relationship through which to explore one’s inner territory and make contact with emotional, physical, and spiritual health.

i moved to texas a year and a half ago because of the strong play therapy program that the university of north texas offers. 2 months after i arrived i volunteered at a conference at the university on near death experiences. at the conference i was in disbelief, here i was in an academic setting with a couple hundred (i’m bad with numbers, it looked like lots of people!) people (IN TEXAS) talking openly about near-death and other mystical experiences. i was moved at a core level, in amazement that there were academic and intellectual circles that had similar conversations to the ones i had with my friends in our living rooms. after the conference i was at p.m.h. atwater’s website and i saw reference to UNT in a list of alternative universities offering excellent degree/certificate programs. it became clear to me why i had so emphatically decided that texas was where i HAD to go to graduate school.

Dr. Jan Holden, a counseling professor, president of IANDS, and a practicing counselor whose guiding theory is integral psychology, has been an incredibly valuable asset to my education and a wonderful professor to learn from and with. through her, the world of transpersonal and integral psychology and counseling opened up to me. it’s been extremely confirming for me to learn this intellectual language that coincides with much of my experience of and intuition regarding some of the ways of humans and the universe!

my participation in the integral naked forum has connected me with many remarkable people. ryan is one of those people and at his blog, integral awakening, the idea came up to create a counseling/psychology blog. i am extremely passionate about the field of therapy and would love to be a part of a community that is working to propagate a holistic, integral perspective of what a therapist and therapy is. there are so many stereotypes about counselors and psychologists that simply are not true and there is a wide population of people who have been let down and disregarded in traditional therapeutic processes. we hope to use this blog to explore and focus on anything and everything that is related to counseling and psychology.

does this sound interesting to you? do you want to participate?

i agree with ryan , the master mind behind this idea, that “it would be a collective/joint effort that I think would be very exciting because I have yet to come across such an active resource – plus I know it would benefit my development as an individual and a counselor.”

post a comment if you’re moved to participate and i’ll keep you all informed as this project comes to life.

comments:

delicious sharing

Ashley, Ryan what I fantastic idea!

I am definitely in and will do all I can to help you guys make the (integral?) counseling/ psychology blog a great resource and experience

It will be exciting to have an outlet to share with like-minded budding counselors.

My outlook, research, and modality is rooted in the prophetic words of Jung- “The counselors role is to objectively validate the subjective reality of the client”

From Quantum physics to post-modern thought, it is becoming more and more evident that reality is a fluid construct- we need an integrally informed, client centered dialog rooted in the moment where principles of mindfulness and awareness reveal layers of the self.

This enables a progressive development of the inner person towards greater freedom, self expression, and in particular toward a natural harmonious way of being in the cosmos.

Jeff | Email | Homepage | 06.15.04 – 4:01 pm | #

Evenin’ Ashley,

We met briefly at the Practice of Peace conference last November through

Christy Lee-Engel of Bastyr University. I’m the President of LIOS

(Leadership Institute of Seattle) and Dean of the LIOS/Bastyr University

School of Applied Behavioral Science. We offer a degree track in Systems

Counseling so when Christy forwarded your message about the blog I

stopped by for a “visit”. I’m familiar with list serves, but new to

blogs, so we’ll see how this goes.

Your vision (“integral counseling”) is as intriguing as it is ambitious.

It would be helpful to me to have a sense about what integral means to

you and how you see it being embodied in the counseling context. Is it

a systems approach with a Ken Wilber slant? Is it a mind/body/spirit

approach, something that incorporates current therapy modalities with

things like body work, 5 Element Chinese Model, mindfulness practices,

etc…? Or something altogether different?

Having been a family therapist for 20+ years before being called to my

current work I have an interest in what I think you are inviting. I also

have an intuition that it is a path that in some ways may be “dangerous”

for the profession, in that it has the potential of getting therapy out

of it’s “special” field of practice, it’s niche, it’s “ministry” if you

will, and into a more collaborative, integrative field, where it is but

one dimension of a much larger expression/exploration of what it means

to be alive and sustainable on this planet.”

Your “invitation” conjures up questions like “What is the relationship

between therapist and physician; therapist and lawyer; therapist and

school system; therapist and employer (their own and their client’s)?

So I applaud your curiosity and have added some of my own. Hope this

helps. I’m not sure when I’ll return to this site, given the work on my

plate, but I’m pretty good about responding to emails (the web has

trained me well). I can be reached at: dleahy@lios.org

Be Well,

Dan Leahy

in co-creating our ideal communities,

We need to stop having timid dreams, pale passions, and hesitant intentions. We need to embrace life with both arms, breathe in fully the universe’s abundance of grace. We need to stop apologizing for wanting more.

~ gassho

i often wonder why so many of us keep our dreams small. i am always filled with awe and admiration for those that dream large, for those that aren’t afraid to want more, and especially when they believe that they can have it.

on the plane home from israel (the new york to atlanta leg), i sat next to mike cumberbatch. recently he shared his dreams of returning gladness to the human heart. i received this email back in april and was so moved by his words. i want to share them with you because i value his perspective of nurturing LOVE and giving it at opportunity to grow. i want more of that in the world! in order to share this however, i have to confront a fear that i have of being egotistical. sometimes i’m hesitant about sharing stories of amazing experiences i have or meaningfully intimate words shared with me because i don’t want others to think that i am full of my self, egotistical… you know the lot. well, i’m trying to get over this nasty little habit:

Hi Ashley,

Recently there are so many things happening worldwide that’s upsetting and sad.

If there is any chance for gladness to return to the human heart I believe it must begin with a constant striving to be united with LOVE. Perhaps even in the light of all the evidence to the contrary wherever we find a beach-head of Love in ourselves or another we should be about nurturing it and giving it an opportunity to grow.

I am not suggesting denial of evil in the world, it’s there. Instead I’m favoring putting our energies to doing those things that make for the upliftment of the human spirit.

You are one of those people like an oasis of goodness in a desert of pain.

All the best to you in your efforts to be all you can be

May God who is Love continue to richly bless you

Mike

honored and thrilled that i can be an oasis of goodness in a desert of pain, i also acknowledge the many reflections of goodness that are present in my virtual and physical communities (more recently mike wrote, “You fill me with hope for the future! There seems to be so many young people living their lives without reflection on the possibility of nobility. Then there’s you and your friends! Thank you for intorducing me to your insights and those of your colleagues.”). i extend this recognition to the collective YOU that are reading this and encourage us all to continue investing energy in the upliftment of the human spirit, being all that we can be, embracing life with both arms, breathing in fully the universe’s abundance of grace, and dreaming grand dreams.

ryan, new to the blog world, posted this at integral awakening:

wonder: v. desire or to be curious to know something.

we discussed co-creating and establishing a sense of wonder with a group, which I believe applies to any group, community, or relationship, for that matter…When we are part of a group or community, a key component is “having awareness of others”, and more importantly, “others having the awareness of that awareness.” …When we have an awareness of others, we wonder about them – what is happening in their life, what are they thinking, feeling, seeing, believing, being, doing? And in turn, others are aware we are wondering about them, and vice versa. And it is through this mutual awareness, wondering, that fosters and fuels the blossoming of meaningful relationships, groups, communities, and dialogues – it is the lifeblood of groups.

and more wonder from a torah portion on learning to listen

Abraham Joshua Heschel would begin his lectures with a startling announcement: “Ladies and Gentlemen, a great miracle has just happened.” People would immediately sit forward, eager to know what happened. “The sun just went down,” he’d say. They would stare at him, wondering if he’d lost his mind. Some would laugh, others would shake their heads. Then he would begin to describe the inner life of the religious person. What does it mean to be religious? How does a religious person see the world? He’d challenge the audience: What have you lost when you lose the capacity to wonder at a sunset? What sort of person are you when you’re no longer surprised or impressed, no longer compelled to stop and notice the sun setting? What do you lose when life becomes so dull?

“Wonder, or radical amazement,” Heschel wrote, “is the chief characteristic of the religious man’s attitude toward history and nature. One attitude is alien to his spirit: taking things for granted, regarding events as a natural course of things. As civilization advances, the sense of wonder declines. Such decline is an alarming symptom of our state of mind. Mankind will not perish for want of information, but only for want of appreciation. The beginning of our happiness lies in the understanding that life without wonder is not worth living.”

i value the presence of wonder in my community

comments:

thanks, Ashley, for continuing this conversation. I think your posts help others to wonder more about life. Your quotes really hit home for me, particularly how devistating it is for us to lose our sense of awe about life. Have you studied logotherapy? The concept of existential vacuum I believes ties into this.

ryan | Email | Homepage | 06.10.04 – 4:17 pm | #

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i love the suddenness of wonder, how an object reaches out a grabs every ounce of my being, leaving me breathless and bewildered, filled with reverence and the eros of love, silent before this new revelation dissolving my certainties, shifting ego from its grooves.

cool cool water running down my back

thomas | 06.10.04 – 11:30 pm | #

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http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap040610.html

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap040531.html

thomas | 06.10.04 – 11:43 pm | #

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Ah! Ashley, you are the dazzling and modest embodiment of the Goddess of Wonder and Radical Amazement!

love, Christy

Christy Lee-Engel | Email | Homepage | 06.12.04 – 2:25 am | #

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ryan and christy,

thanks for letting me know that my sourcery (hee hee!!) is working and evoking the juices of wonder and amazement. i’d say it’s a passion of mine!

i did a quick search on logotherapy… it does seem to tie right in. i look forward to learning more, i’d never heard of it before.

thomas,

you point out a rich piece… wonder with reverence vs. wonder with skepticism… wonder with reverence invites the object into one’s being, encouraging breathless bewilderment and the dissolving of certainties. i’m thinking that wonder (or more accurately curiosity) with skepticism is driven by control and one’s need for/dependency upon certainties. instead of the eros of love filling the wonderer, the one with skeptical curiosity wanders into the object… analyzing, picking, piecing, trying to find some ground of certainty.

anyone agree or disagree?

ashley | Email | Homepage | 06.12.04 – 6:39 pm | #

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agree! on uncertainty…this from john ralston saul who says that our ability to live with uncertainty is where the ‘genius in humanity is released…periodially, we seem to stare at this uncertainty in amazement, as if overwhelmed by such an unsatisfactory requirement. and then we turn back to the utilitarian manifestations of our thousands of talents and characteristics…organizing and measuring and executing…as if these talents were more real and we more mediocre…as if we were incapable of embracing what we are.’

penny | Email | 06.13.04 – 7:14 pm | #

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it’s a good thing that we know (or are learning) that we’re fully capable of embracing who we are!!

ashley | Email | Homepage | 06.15.04 – 10:55 pm | #

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…she says with a bit of genius…

penny | Email | 06.17.04 – 6:56 pm | #

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only a bit? hee hee!

ashley | Email | Homepage | 06.18.04 – 1:13 am | #

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rumi on ‘a bit’…

let the drop of water that is you become a hundred mighty seas.

but do not think the drop alone becomes the ocean.

the ocean too, becomes the drop.

the ocean easily becomes a bit of ashley genius !

penny | Email | 06.18.04 – 7:20 pm | #

i recently wrote to brandylee, telling her that cohesion of community and community in general are passions close to my heart. i asked her how she see’s cohesion encouraged in a virtual forum… i’m going to make the leap and say that the attributes she responded with encourage cohesion in any type of community. i’ve toyed with her words a bit… i have such a habit of doing that!

extend yourself to others,

help ensure that noone is overlooked,

lend integrity to a superficial exchange with authenticity,

liven up a dull thread/area with infectious enthusiasm,

revive a dead one with passion and persistence.

listen to people carefully and respond to them reflectively,

don’t limit your contributions to certain “strains” of threads/ (certain places in the community)

be exactly where you need to be at any given time!

other thoughts about community have been stirring from some work corrigan has been sharing at parking lot and this wiki. he’s working with a small community which is having a serious problem with drugs among their youth. the information and discussions at those two links are extremely valuable. a suggestion for an open space theme for that community was:

how can i contribute to a safe community that gives hope to ourselves and our children?

my current dreaming about community leaves these questions:

what does your ideal community look like?

what do you value in your community?

what do you yearn for in your community?

what are you doing to support those aspects of your community?

how can you contribute to your community, helping to co-create your ideal community?

with these dreams tumbling in my head i received a poignant email from jake:

I think if America sleeps through another election it may just be heading for a coma. I feel like I know how the “minority opinion” must have felt as the Third Reight began to capture the majority of German public opinion and eventually of that nation through media and ideology. It must have been like trying to speak reason to folks in a hurricane.

whatever communities you are involved in, be an active participant. invest energy into creating your ideal community.

comments:

Hi Ashley,

You’ve opened up a very valuable conversation deserving the widest participation.

I’ve come to the position that we’ve spent enormous energy of thought and other resources on developing individuals and family while neglecting the bed in which they are set – community! We’re reacting to a deep growing sense of alienation and insignificance at the personal level.

I believe the Community is Primary, and if conditions are not put right at source no matter how well we attend to the Secondary, individual and family, their ill-health and or deterioration will continue.

Can a turnaround begin by re-emphasizing thoughtfulness on some of the following – our neighbors, our neighborhood, our children, our values, our responsibility, our commitment to the common good!

It is when these are healthy, I believe, we have the best opportunity to feel safe enough to permit the emergence of our deeper, more beautiful, tender and powerful selves.

All the best

Mike C.

Mike Cumberbatch | Email | 06.08.04 – 2:30 pm | #

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Yeah Mike! That’s the kind of thing I’m looking at too!

Chris Corrigan | Email | Homepage | 06.08.04 – 10:43 pm | #

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smile

me too

right now our camp community has about 35 adults, and we’re holding space for 40 youth, who will return to us next week for eleven days.

questions we are asking in our community right now:

what practices (both individual and collective) ESTABLISH and RESTORE: trust, boundaries, responsibility, respect, freedom, flow…

we also have generated a new wheel – experimenting with a medicine wheel pattern as a symbol & guide for being together has been rich. at the center, the place of purpose (or mystery), this one has “passages” – the name of our 11-day camp. becoming. in the east: belonging (& the “village code” that details this- truthfulness, boundaries, connect/respect…). south: freedom. west: power (as in martha graham: keep the channel open). north: fun! (flow)

just a glimpse of tools & touchstones of one emerging community.

love.

chris weaver | Email | 06.09.04 – 5:22 am | #

photo from starkitten