Deep

I remember what is was like when I first broke from my family and was totally on my own financially and emotionally. I was 20, very naive and broke. I soon found I was living in an overwhelming stream of change and new information. My young brain thrived on this, as young brains do. 

My first contact with formal psychotherapy occurred twelve years later, following a difficult separation. I suddenly realized, with the help of that therapist, that my mental-emotional life was embarrassingly superficial. It came as quite a shock, since I was by then working in the field of psychiatric care. It was the most useful shock of my emotional life. I think fondly of that therapist and the seeming torture of those sessions to this day.

Going deep is an important part of self-discovery, in my opinion. Some people do this easily. They are raised with permission to be emotive and expressive. They are in touch with their inner process somewhat naturally. This is very rare in my fairly wide experience with human beings at various life stages, as a professional caregiver and as a person in relationships. Most of us need to make an intentional effort to go deep, to stay there for any length of time and to learn from it. 

While going deep may sometimes feel like having a root canal in an oral surgery, it doesn't necessarily have to be so traumatic. A new friendship may trigger reminiscences in the getting-to-know-you phase, for instance. In a moment, you may be confronted with a sealed-over volcano of feeling. Caught by surprise, you may choose to skip deftly over it. However, a great deal can be gained by excavating it, venting it and sharing it. 

Many people are in the defensive habit of skipping over these opportunities every single time to maintain a certain posture or level of internal calm. Unfortunately, these superficial states can be slowly undermined by anxiety, fueled by unexplored and unspoken feelings. Suddenly, with just the right amount of external stress, all these sealed volcanoes can erupt simultaneously, causing a meltdown or a state of frozen fear.

The Facebook Age is one of superficial friendship and virtual personalities for many. Crafting the right postings to your profile may feed a sense of control that has no foundation in reality. There may be a hollow or hurting person behind a wall of impressive news feeds. The people who have worked at self-discovery and have wrestled with their inner identities stand out clearly to someone who has made similar choices. 

I contend that mindfulness and compassion are fed by ongoing self-discovery, which in turn is continually fed by attempts at mindfulness and compassion. This is the engine of humanist practice, as I see it. Its manifestation is consistent action for the greater good in the here and now. It's that simple and also that difficult.