Poetry as Pregnancy: When “The Shrink Rap ™ on Mental Illness” Gives Birth

For the past month, I’ve been on a poetry journey, as it were.  This voyage of verse began with my writing “The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness” for a non-profit, Passion for Change.  PfC educates the media and advocates for a more informed and balanced public portrayal of mental illness.  Along the way, realizing the need for clearer explanation for the Rap’s importance, I recently added this stanza:

Same sex marriage, legal marijuana
Are we all going California?
There’s a case both pro and contra.  Still…
Go west young mind – time-honored mantra.
But one big issue lies undercover
A source of disgrace for nameless “others”
Yet sleepless nights for mothers and brothers…
Hard to wo/man-up in a shame-breeding culture
Must Mental Illness still be the “closeted vulture?”

Simultaneously, I was generating lines about how our multi-hyper, “all-consuming digitocracy” might compromise one’s mental health.  And the ideas and images, sounds and rhythms kept coming:

Still…there’s a “new normal” equality
Of this you must agree:
With “off the grid” anxiety
Patience is now a luxury
And OMG…Everyone is ADD!
So forget “To be or not to be?”
You’re likely viral if not a byte crazy!

This passage proved a conduit to a Brave New World “Trinity” – Time-Numbers andTechnology – along with a Stress Doc ™ neologism – “Social Mediacracy.”  And while trying to capture the different facets of “Getting or Going MA&DD,” the Shrink Rap kept expanding.

Finally, I saw the obvious:  the original Mental Illness Rap had to give birth to a separate poetic progeny.  Initially, seeing the obvious was not so easy; you get wedded to your “baby” until realizing this “brainchild” has grown and is now a potential “mother of invention” or, at least, of procreation.  Now I understood that less (placing limits, streamlining, and sharpening the focus and scope of the original Rap) can be more (producing a better defined and related yet stand-alone second generation Rap).  And isn’t that the essence of gestation and giving birth, no matter the creative arena?

So here is the spanking new rap, (with some of her mother’s genes), “Getting or Going MA&DD:  Media Addiction & Digital Distraction – Four Slices”; consider this the equivalent of baby pictures.  The Rap is followed by the proud smiling mother:  “The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness.”  I can’t think of a more fitting and graceful way to celebrate this holiday season than bringing new life into the world.  Please feel free to provide me feedback and to share with others.  Peace and (en)joy!

Mark
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Getting or Going MA&DD:  Media Addiction & Digital Distraction – Four Slices

Can We Survive Social Mediacracy?

Today’s new web of complexity
A Siren song to one’s sanity –
Our all-consuming digitocracy
A hyper Facebook Fraternity.
Whether vanity or virtuality
United in distractibility
From a junk food surfing mentality
To tracking texts like it’s the lottery.

The “Dynamic” Duo:  Today’s “Trinity” & Toxicity

Dreading “off the grid” anxiety
We make Google eyes endlessly
At the high and mighty “TNT”
Our Brave New World “Trinity” –
Time-Numbers andTechnology!
Has dopamine toxicity
Numbed you into captivity?

A Not So Brave New World?

In insta-mode most miss the irony:
We’ve become so sedentary
No time for nature, no space for serenity
Tied to a station indefinitely
Being interrupted constantly
Fueled by undercover anonymity
And can’t see your eyes lack of empathy
Triggers “hide & seek” hostility, i.e.
The “e” in e-mail means “escape”-ability
Also, “I seek revenge” animosity
With heat-seeking “e”-missile strategy
Of a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde identity:
A person of seeming civility
Morphs all too mysteriously…
And now stalking your community
A reach out and crush someone cyber-bully!

ROI:  Return on Investment or Ruining Our Intelligence

The new ROI reality:
24/7 availability
Plus cost-cutting “efficiencies”, e.g.
Distant learning laboratories
(Yielding mostly distant memories
And frequent trips to lavatories).
Oh yes, the phone-conference pep rally
A monopoly on monotony
That only boosts consistently
Emotional IQ vacuity
As we send f-2-f to purgatory
Muting real give and take sensibility:
Who needs human intimacy
When there’s interconnectivity.
“Are you kidding me!”…
This is the stuff of absurdity
If not for all the zombie social anomie.
The future question, in all sincerity:
What’s the breakthrough-breakdown boundary
Besides gaming for eternity?


© Mark Gorkin  2014
Shrink Rap ™ Productions
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness:  Preamble

Same sex marriage, legal marijuana
Are we all going California?
There’s a case both pro and contra.  Still…
Go west young mind – time-honored mantra.
But one big issue lies undercover
A source of disgrace for nameless “others”
Yet sleepless nights for mothers and brothers…
Hard to wo/man-up in a shame-breeding culture
Must Mental Illness still be the “closeted vulture?”

There is but one reason why
For this fiery hue and cry…
Mental Illness, my friend, this is no lie
Is American as apple pie!
-------------

The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness

When it comes to knowing inner demons
Life’s seasons yield all too human reasons:
Childhood trauma, chronic OCD
Addiction, abuse, brain anomaly
SAD, bipolar, or PTSD…
Finally, rounding out our litany
Baring fall color intensity
And spice of soul variety
DSM disorders of personality.
Oh biochem-branch of our fallen family tree
Will you genome more labels or bloom creativity?

Passion, oh passion
Not just mindless action
Passion, my passion
Sowing seeds of compassion

Can mental illness be a deviancy?
When one out of two, says the CDC
One day’ll show symptoms, predictably.
Now think about that…it might be you or me!

With mental illness most play a blame game
“Get it together, stop being so lame.”
Or we shake our heads: “It’s such a shame”
Now you’re only a diagnostic name.

Passion, oh passion
"Touched with Fire" ** interaction
Passion, our passion
The blazing pain of compassion

MI – Myocardial Infarction
A disease worthy of all our attention.
But MI – the Mental Illness version
It’s only an “in your head” perversion.

With a heart attack, you don’t get no flack
We rally troops and fight the no good plaque.
With a mind setback; wrong side of the tracks.
For the mentally ill there is no slack!

Passion, oh passion
Drives human exploration
Passion, my passion
Moral compass of compassion

This mental health rap is not meant to scare
But we still need to play “Truth AND Dare”
Especially when a family affair
That touches all whether distant or near
And it touches all for whom we care.

Mental illness breeds when slighting human needs!
With meds and counseling we can stop the bleed
With jobs and housing – a chance to succeed.
To change heads and hearts takes both word and deed…
When one breaks out another soul is freed!

Passion, oh passion
Past time for indignation
On beyond compassion
It's time for a decision!

Passion, my passion
A mind’s sacred mission
Passion, our passion
Will YOU commit to action?
---------------

** Touched with Fire" – The title of Kay Redfield Jamison's book, Touched with Fire:  Manic Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament; Jamison, a psychologist at Johns Hopkins University Dept. of Psychiatry, also authored the best-selling autobiography, An Unquiet Mind.

© Mark Gorkin  2014
Shrink Rap ™ Productions


Mark Gorkin, MSW, LICSW, "The Stress Doc" ™, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, is a national keynote and webinar speaker and "Motivational Humorist & Team Communication Catalyst" known for his interactive, inspiring and FUN programs for both government agencies and major corporations.  The Doc is a training and Stress Resilience Consultant for The Hays Companies, an international corporate insurance and wellness brokerage.  He has also led “Resilience, Team Building and Humor” programs for various branches of the Armed Services.  Mark, a former Stress and Violence Prevention Consultant for the US Postal Service, is the author of Resiliency Rap, Practice Safe Stress, and of The Four Faces of Anger.  See his award-winning, USA Today Online "HotSite" – www.stressdoc.com – called a "workplace resource" by National Public Radio (NPR).  For more info on the Doc's "Practice Safe Stress" programs or to receive his free e-newsletter, email stressdoc@aol.com or call 301-875-2567.

Upgrading the (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness: The Challenge of Criticality…The Criticality of Being Challenged

Once again I’m reminded that when writing something "really good," it’s vital to get feedback from an objective-critical source.  And this time, I even managed to take full bore feedback from my toughest critic:  my 91 y.o. mother (who still manages to do the Sunday NY Times Magazine Crossword.  Living with my brother and his wife, I typically make a monthly family visit.)  I showed her my most recent rap:  A “Passion for Change”:  The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness.  This Resiliency Rap ™ was written for “Passion for Change.”  PfC is a non-profit, 501c organization that educates and encourages the media to provide a more balanced/objective depiction of mental health and mental illness.

During the feedback session, perhaps the clearest sign of “comfortable in my own skin” evolution was being able to consider her heated protest (she was “getting sick” of all the “Passion, oh Passion” choruses) without losing my cool.  In the past, I would likely have channeled my anger and defensiveness by affirming within myself, or attempting to “show her,” the value of my position.  Hey, she could be a daunting adversary.  As a procrastinating teen and young adult, she would pointedly pull from her brainy quiver words of the ancient Roman poet Horace:  To begin is to be half done; dare to know…start!  (And you wonder why I’m such an expert on stress, guilt, and neurosis.)

Today, I could accept her being “convinced” of her rightness without losing my own conviction, trusting my gut as to what “felt right” without the need for justifying, defending, and winning (or winning her over).

She did like most of the creative wordplay sandwiched in between the choruses.  I reduced the number of “Passion” refrains; however I consolidated but did not eliminate them, keeping the best and tossing the rest.  (Actually, I did have to “let go” of a pearl:  The passion in compassion.)

In addition, she enjoyed hearing a tangential musing often shared with speaking audiences, my uncommon take on the “s”-word for “passion."  (It’s neither “sex,” nor “soap opera,” nor the Washington DC-related favorite…”Senator.”  Alas the latter is a bit passé after Mr. Clinton’s memorable performance.  Actually, with a good dictionary, the “s”-word for “passion” is “suffering,” as in “The Passion Play”:  specifically, the sufferings of Jesus or, more generically, the sufferings of a martyr.  Mom even laughed when I couldn’t resist my punchline:  “Imagine all this time I never knew my Jewish mother was such a passionate woman!”  Definitely a groundbreaking and loving, trust-building moment for the two of us.

Letting Go and Designing Flow (with the help of family and friends)

Let’s get back to the theme of the essay.  Mom’s challenging feedback not only shook up the puzzle, it made me mentally restless.  This “constructive discontent” freed a basic recognition:  I had not sufficiently set the stage for the purpose of the poem within the Shrink Rap itself.  (And, yes, I had given more presence to the “passion” choruses than was warranted.)  Suddenly, there was a window for adding more subject matter content, now in machine-gun rhythmic, Tom Lehrer-like fashion.  (Here’s a gift:  google a video clip of this ‘60s Harvard mathematician and satirical-political writer-piano player-singer extraordinaire.)  The second, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth stanzas make a case for why we all should be more knowledgeable and passionate about the subject.

Also, noteworthy, I’m definitely dancing on the creative edge in these stanzas: inventing new terms, slipping in a mythical-biblical reference, using genome as a verb and byte for bit.  The rap is substantively, not cosmetically, enriched; no trivial feat these upgrading at the push of a button daze!

I also received on point feedback from CJ, a friend and creative colleague (a talented visual artist).  Her critique motivated a search and design mode for several more descriptive or evocative terms and phrases.  For me, the challenge of creative writing, especially poetry, is weaving meaningful conceptual content into thought-provokingly memorable and, when possible, en-light-ening images, sounds, and rhythms.  The realm of Shrink Rap allows me to truly sew and spread “word artist” wings.  Hope you too will take flight.  Naturally, would love any and all feedback.  Enjoy!

Mark
stressdoc@aol.com 

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A “Passion for Change”:  The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness

 

You say you're ready to "change for passion."

Sure, you’re hip to the latest fashion.
But will you really rearrange your brain...
Ready to work with a "Passion for Change"?

There is but one reason why
For all this “Passion” hue and cry
Mental Illness, my friend, this is no lie
Is American as apple pie!
-------------

The (Shrink) Rap ™ on Mental Illness

When it comes to knowing inner demons
Life’s seasons yield all too human reasons:
Childhood trauma, chronic OCD
Addiction, abuse, brain anomaly
SAD, bipolar, or PTSD...
Finally, rounding out our litany
With fall color intensity
And spice of life variety
DSM disorders of personality.
Oh biochem-branch of our fallen family tree
Will you genome more labels or bloom creativity?

And now a new web of complexity
A Siren song to one’s sanity
Our all-consuming digitocracy
A multi-hyper Facebook Fraternity.
Whether vanity or solidarity
United in distractibility
Making Google eyes at the “TNT Trinity”
As we deify Time-Numbers-Technology!

Passion, oh passion
A cyber celebration
Passion, our passion
What’s real, what’s illusion?

In insta-mode most miss the irony:
We’ve become so sedentary
No time for nature, no space for serenity
Bowing to 24/7 availability
Sacrificing work-life integrity
Tracking texts as one-armed banditry
Saving face as a cyberbully
Gaming for eternity.
The question for the future…
What’s the breakthrough-breakdown boundary?

Still…there’s a “new normal” equality
Of this you must agree:
Patience is now a luxury
And OMG…Everyone is ADD!
So forget “To be or not to be?”
You’re likely viral if not a byte crazy!

Passion, oh passion
Not just mindless action
Passion, our passion
Sowing seeds of compassion

Can mental illness be a deviancy?

When one out of two, says the CDC
One day’ll show symptoms, predictably.
Now think about that…it might be you or me!

With mental illness most play a blame game

“Get it together, stop being so lame.”
Or we shake our heads: “It’s such a shame”
Now you’re only a diagnostic name.

Passion, oh passion

"Touched with Fire" ** interaction
Passion, my passion
The blazing pain of compassion

MI – Myocardial Infarction

A disease worthy of all our attention.
But MI – the Mental Illness version
It’s only an “in your head” perversion.

 

With a heart attack, you don’t get no flack

We rally troops and fight the no good plaque.

With a mind setback; wrong side of the tracks.

For the mentally ill there is no slack!

 

Passion, oh passion

Drives human exploration

Passion, our passion
Moral compass of compassion

 

This mental health rap is not meant to scare

But we still need to play “Truth AND Dare”

Especially when a family affair

That touches all whether distant or near

And it touches all for whom we care.

 

Mental illness breeds when slighting human needs!

With meds and counseling we can stop the bleed
With jobs and housing – a mind-body is freed.
To change heads and hearts takes both word and deed…
Join Passion for Change; now help take the lead!

 

Passion, oh passion

Past time for indignation
On beyond compassion
It's time for a decision!

 

Passion, my passion

A mind’s sacred mission
Passion, our passion
Will YOU commit to action?

---------------

 

** Touched with Fire" – The title of Kay Redfield Jamison's book, Touched with Fire:  Manic Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament; Jamison, a psychologist at Johns Hopkins University Dept. of Psychiatry, also authored the best-selling autobiography, An Unquiet Mind.

 

© Mark Gorkin  2014

Shrink Rap ™ Productions

 

 

Mark Gorkin, the Stress Doc ™, www.stressdoc.com, acclaimed Keynote and Kickoff Speaker, Webinar Presenter, Retreat Leader and Motivational Humorist, is the author of Practice Safe Stress and The Four Faces of Anger. A former Stress & Violence Prevention consultant for the US Postal Service, the Stress Doc leads one-day "Stress Resiliency" workshops for "METRO" Managers and Supervisors of the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority (WMATA).  "The Doc" is also a Team Building and Organizational Development Consultant as well as a Stress Resilience/Wellness Consultant for international consulting firm The Hays Companies.  Mark leads highly interactive, innovative, and inspiring programs for corporations and government agencies, including the US Military, on stress and brain resiliency/burnout prevention through humor, change and conflict management, generational communication, and 3 "R" -- Responsible, Resilient & Risk-Taking -- leadership-partnership team building.

Email stressdoc@aol.com for his popular free newsletter; info on speaking programs and phone coaching sessions.  And click https://vimeo.com/69053828 for the Stress Doc's wildly pioneering "Shrink Rap" video.

Stress Doc Mantra: "Think out of the box, perform outside the curve (the Bell Curve) and be out-rage-ous!"

Discovering Your Best Personal-Professional Energy: In the Context of Health, Aging, and Time – Part I

Whether it’s a personal survival strategy, a dynamic impacting the quality of meaningful relationships, or a critical component of vitality, focus, and productivity at school, work, or play activities, interest in ENERGY – as a concept and on a practical applied level – appears to be intense and omnipresent.  As a Baby Boomer, why has this dynamic become paramount for the Stress Doc; what makes the subject of “energy” so personally compelling and professionally transformative?  Perhaps it's time to demonstrate my HAT Trick:  examining "energy" from the perspective of Health, Aging & Time.


Discovering Your Best Personal-Professional Energy:
In the Context of Health, Aging, and Time – Part I

As a Baby Boomer I’m aware of changing energy levels over the course of a lifetime.  Hey, just the other day my girlfriend’s three year-old granddaughter ran rings around me as we held hands, pulling each other while running and whirling in circles.  She’s the Energizer Bunny; I was the one who needed to take a break from the dizziness and exhaustion.  (And I’m not a slouch or couch potato; nearly every day, I get in at least a mile power walk, trekking with computer backpack to the coffeehouse.  FYI, I’m a tea drinker.)

Then there’s little Charlotte’s mom, working full-time in NYC (“the city that never sleeps”); she’s grappling with the time and energy to be a loving spouse and devoted parent (and step-parent).   M is also developing a life coaching business, every week or two sharing ideas in her “Loving Your Life” blog…her yoga classes are hardly a mind-body luxury.  Perhaps it’s time for the Stress Doc ™ to write a cross-generational tract:  A Boomers’ Guide to the Joys of Power Napping!  (Btw, Charlotte still takes a restorative nap; didn’t someone say, “And the children shall lead them”?)

Alas, it seems like a lot of folks are jolting their alertness levels by mainlining coffee, sodas, and energy drinks; many go for that quick “sugar high,” while others use and abuse amphetamines and other highly questionable stimulants.  And it’s pretty easy to become dependent if not outright addicted.  Maybe folks are mostly trying to keep up with if not survive these “always on,” “TNT – Time-Numbers-Technology – Driven- and Distracted, Everything Happens NOW Times.”

When the Energy Crisis Hits Close to Health and Home

So why is this Boomer giving undivided attention to the subject of “energy?”  As a 60 +, perhaps my generational energy sample is skewed by the number of Baby Boomers I know personally grappling with (or trying to postpone) the aging-energy process.  Then there are the TV ads.  You think all those Viagra and Cialis commercials, including 60 somethings taking up surfing speak to this point?  Let’s call this pursuit “the fountain of sexual energy and the fixation of youth.”  (Of course, healthy sensuality and sexuality need not be constrained by age.  Hey, with my partner/girlfriend, I’m ready to co-star in a hit series – “Sex and the Sixties” – that has nothing to do with 20^th c. culture or lifestyle.)

However, closer to home and to reality,
a) I myself had a recent “out of the blue” health scare:  One morning I woke with double vision.  After a series of tests at the ER and a neurologist waving his pencil in my field of vision, (talk about low-tech assessment), the diagnosis was clear:  blockage caused by plaque in a cervical (neck area) nerve led to palsy-induced “diplopia” or double vision.  The condition lasted three months; recovery was mostly gradual, sometimes sporadic.  At times, objects looked like fragmented glass or a Cubistic-style painting.  Finally, one morning the ceiling fan above my bed no longer had eight blades.  Hallelujah!

Day-to-day, the attack was more frustrating than disorienting or dizzying; I even managed to do a couple of speaking programs during this purgatory.  As a speaker, I get pretty focused mentally, even when not sharp visually.  (Regarding the purgatory label, the scary part was that no one was quite sure of the recovery timeline or final outcome.)  Fortunately, there was no damage done to brain or heart; vision has completely cleared; mostly a sobering wake-up call.  Message sent was received:  have increased dosage on daily Lipitor and aspirin and am exercising “disciplined moderation” in food consumption, especially salt and sugar intake; oh yes, no more nightly pastry  ;-(.  I’m now eating avocado regularly and cooking with canola oil.  P.S.  In a discussion with my cousin, I learned my uncle, at a similar age, had the same condition (more than once, alas), and

b) a friend and training partner, a high energy nurse who just last year got her doctorate at 61, also had to face some hard truths:  her mind-body recently told her loud and clear that she no longer can get up at four in the morning and drive 1.5 hours to the clinic and job to which she’s been devoted; while not quite working the graveyard shift (which statistically does affect longevity), it’s close enough.

Health issues definitely sharpen your focus and perspective, sorting wheat from chaff regarding life’s priorities and plans!

Boomer or Bust:  The Interplay of Choice, Cluelessness, and Constitution

As mentioned, aging frequently has surprises in store:  like the seemingly “sudden” appearance of significant or serious medical problems.  These “unforeseen” health issues typically have external and internal roots in such realms as:  a) repetitive motion injury or slow erosion lifestyle and nutritional choices, b) exposure to environmental toxins and social-psychological-family-organizational dysfunction and, as noted, c) genetic predisposition and family history.  Lifestyle choices, including lack of exercise as well as exercise-related injury or repetitive trauma, along with food or substance use and abuse, invariably catch up with us.  Our choices and how we handle life’s stressors contribute to “organic” – mind-body – erosion as well as dangerous inflammation or clogged artery build-up.  (And sometimes you have no clue, especially when engaging in supposedly health-promoting exercise.  For example, a few years back, a bone spur in my inner ear fostered the growth of a mass – finally diagnosed as non-tumorous – that had to be surgically removed. PAINFUL!!!  According to my ENT surgeon, the culprit was years of swimming in cold water at the YMCA pool!  And it had been years since my lap swimming days.  P.S.  I love Dr. M, but this time his “ear-side manner” left something to be desired.  Don’t let your doctor do this procedure without giving you some serious pain killer.  GRR!  In fact, if you’re ever dealing with a terrorist, and feel morally queasy about waterboarding, try sticking a sharpened scalpel inside the individual’s non-anesthetized ear.)

However, ongoing stress and strain (from the psychic to the ergonomic; hey, being seated all day can be dangerous) are not merely contributors to present day maladies.  Akin to the impact of erosive weathering on an archeological site, eventually, human wear and tear invites diagnostic assessment.  Closer scrutiny may reveal the physical and physiological effects of genealogy as well as long-ago illness or childhood trauma, no longer masked by the protective or defensive cover of youth.

Finally, if one removes those rose-colored glasses or in-your-own-world headphones and periodically casts a sober future gaze or listens for a deep inner echo, intimations of setting-sun mortality loom upon the horizon.  (Of course, even death doesn’t end the ongoing spiritual energy argument.)

The Benefit of Seeing the “End” Zone

However, not wanting to be labeled Moody Mark, a “glass is always half-empty” kind of guy, (actually, I believe it’s usually half-empty and half-full), let me highlight one potential benefit of the aging process:  for the stretch run, sometimes we push ourselves just because time is running out.  When time and energy is a finite resource, and we truly recognize the yin-yang interconnection between vitality-vulnerability, we’re often more selective about the mental spaces we inhabit.  Will one focus or meander; are you “on,” or do you need restorative downtime?   At a certain point in a life journey, we are more discriminating about our pace and the races we choose to run.  For example, my 60 + girlfriend just fulfilled a lifelong dream – going on an African Safari.  While it was a fairly upscale adventure, scaling parts of Mt. Kilimanjaro definitely took stamina.  (Of course, it helps being a daily jogger.)  D. knows she can’t be a lion tracking, mountain climbing grandma forever.  However, this retired teacher is determined to add check marks to her “bucket list” sooner rather never, that is, before her mind and muscles say it’s too late.

Returning to one’s Spiritual Homeland

I can relate, especially in the cognitive-performance arena.  Having been the Stress Doc ™ lo these many years, I am beginning to expand my speaking and workshop focus to once formative areas.  While it infuses all I do, until recently I have not led programs on “Passion Power” or “Creativity,” per se.  A subject in hibernation is now radiating a sultry, Siren-like call from just over the proverbial horizon.  To paraphrase a quote by T.S. Elliot, the current journey appears to be taking me back spiritually to my “coming out of the creative closet” birthplace; a return to my N’Awlins/“Big Easy” – American in Cajun Paris – creative roots and tentative-formative years.  Perhaps I may now truly understand and subsequently share this long-hidden “creative energy” wellspring and “rite of passage” for the first time.

One stimulus for the arena shift has been the response to recent “Passion Power” speaking/workshop programs.  People have been captivated and definitely want more.  Perhaps the other spur has been my recent health scare, especially in the context of entering the Golden Years as a speaker.  Putting further touches on a legacy (hey, don’t worry, I’m still “a legend in my own mind”) as well as capturing and conveying your essence and fiery spirit becomes the driver.

Can a Phoenix Keep Rising from the Ashes?

Let me begin by providing some historical background.  Exploring the subject of creativity and cosmic revelations had been part of my daily doctoral studies many moons ago.  (The “out of body” and cosmic revelations were triggered while lying on the psychoanalytic couch.)  However, trying to tackle a mystical dissertation topic in a traditional doctoral program mostly achieved, when academic flashdancing whirled to a burnout tango.  I had to give up my doctoral studies; though, in fact, this humbling loss and ego blow spurred the quest to become a multi-media Stress Doc and Psychohumorist ™.  While building a private clinical practice, within a two-year period, I had broken into local radio and Cable TV, and was even exploring the edges of stand-up comedy.  (Presently, the economy and webinar technology have definitely reduced the number of Stress Doc speaking gigs.  Perhaps it’s time to emerge from the Stand-up Psychohumorist ™” closet!)  As Nobel-Prize-winning author and philosopher, Albert Camus, observed:  Once we have accepted the fact of loss we understand that the loved one (or loved dissertation topic/stress expert identity) obstructed a whole corner of the possible, pure now as a sky washed by rain.

Letting Go/Letting Flow:  Danger and Opportunity of Crisis

Whether the loss and subsequent pain is razor sharp or chronically corrosive, it often severs a connection with the once irreplaceable or with the “comfortable” status quo; conversely, it may sow or trigger the unpredictable or unimaginable.  Here’s what’s no longer optional:  psycho-babble or business as usual.  Many significant letting go experiences are shaped by numerous “no exit challenges” and converging if not chaotic emotional streams – shock, rage, fear, sadness, guilt, helplessness, even relief – of grief.   Being “outside your comfort zone” can be exciting and dopamine-enticing; in reality, it’s often fraught with uncertainty if not danger.  Such a dynamic, double-edged process only takes place when one is genuinely in the arena; you are caught up in a space-time ecosystem that compels grappling with heart- and soulful loss and change.  And as many luminaries have noted, it takes “first-rate intelligence” (to quote famed 20^th c. author, F. Scott Fitzgerald) to hold contradictory ideas in the mind simultaneously.  Wrestling with this Yin/Yang interplay between vulnerability and courage assists in the conscious and intuitive carving out of a “path less traveled.”  You are now forging a passage of novel yet meaningful possibility and engagement.  And remember, this eventuality is often enhanced by an unprecedented, gripping need to reach out for a critical lifeline when “in over your head.”  (Of course, some folks will cling to their comfort zone.  If a person can’t see what’s right in front of their face, the issue is likely inside their head.  Using repetitive logic to get the person to “let go” is often an example itself of not letting go.  The issue, alas, tends not to be logical, but more psycho-logical!  See if the person is amenable to talk with a helping professional.)

Fortunately, the regenerative grief pathway is “long and winding.”  We may need to ebb and flow, to experience more than one painful “let go,” to periodically grasp a consoling arm, to crawl along more than one humbling yet hard-earned wisdom path…before discovering that grief and future transition are potentially magical in their own mysterious ways.  As I once penned:  Whether the loss is a key person, a desired position, or a powerful illusion each deserves the respect of a mourning.  The pit in the stomach, the clenched fists and quivering jaw, the anguished cries and streaming tears prove catalytic in time.  In mystical fashion, like spring upon winter, the seeds of dissolution bear fruitful renewal.  Amen and women to that!

Stay tuned for Part II:  Defining and Generating Individual and Organizational Energy


Mark Gorkin, the Stress Doc ™, www.stressdoc.com, acclaimed Keynote and Kickoff Speaker, Webinar Presenter, Retreat Leader and Motivational Humorist, is the author of Practice Safe Stress and The Four Faces of Anger. A former Stress & Violence Prevention consultant for the US Postal Service, the Stress Doc leads one-day "Stress Resiliency" workshops for "METRO" Managers and Supervisors of the Washington Metro Area Transit Authority (WMATA).  "The Doc" is also a Team Building and Organizational Development Consultant as well as a Stress Resilience/Wellness Consultant for international consulting firm The Hays Companies.  Mark leads highly interactive, innovative, and inspiring programs for corporations and government agencies, including the US Military, on stress and brain resiliency/burnout prevention through humor, change and conflict management, generational communication, and 3 "R" -- Responsible, Resilient & Risk-Taking -- leadership-partnership team building.

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