the golden west volume 5 part 3 - 1996 may

work & days: a lifetime journal project

1st May Being happy on credit is plain lying and I do it a lot, mostly only in relation to Tom. The little boy is like the will to live. The little girl is like the will to be wise. 2nd These have been days of fantastic cloud I've hardly seen. Upper pane of the window blue, blue and white and white and dark grey. Running fast. Small shreddy beings faster against the cumulous. How such air things can keep their shape and move. They have just the degree of shape I like. Neurologically minimal I'll say. The sun is being blown about. The eaves are full of twitter. The hemlock is stirring. What is a swallow seen for one beat - a blur that drops into points. It's Thursday morning. There's the way I never sleep on the left side of the bed because it's your space. Now I'm seeing that this paper is not about imagined sound, it is about imagining sound. The way we imagine sound is a way of talking about the brain - I see this in composer's descriptions - my sense of Orpheus going into the brain - any transparent landscape is that. - I was in the tub after speaking to Tom. The house was jarred as if a car had run into the porch hard downstairs. I heard water in the cooking pot sizzle as it splashed against the sides. The mirror flapped against the wall. 3rd Louie frightened of her position. I say, Louie you have to understand that there is no way you are going to get what you want in this. The best that can happen is that you can be true to yourself this time in ways you were not true to yourself the first time you did this. You have to notice how you are tempted to betray yourself now, because those are the ways you betrayed yourself then and since. Hearing myself say that I think I am wise though I am daily proving that I'm foolish. How am I betraying myself? What does being true to myself require? Here is a clue: I don't write here without imagining reading it to Tom. What's my fantasy. That he's interested in my spirit and wants to accompany me. And then there's a backup fantasy when that one fails: that he wants to learn and I can teach him. That he wants to learn in a way that can take effect. He does want it but the wanting to hide is stronger. I want a companion and I have one but he is very weak. He is weaker than I have wanted to know. I have been weak in relation to him. I have betrayed myself by imagining him stronger than he is, again and again. What weakness is that? Ask first what his weakness is. He keeps himself in a haze. He derails his own intelligence by separating emotion from circumstance. He gives himself again and again emotion he hasn't earned. That way he can't work with himself. He can't go through the stages of a real enterprize and then be rewarded by real confidence and real joy. How is it that I mis-estimate his weakness? I have described him accurately many times in just this dry way: I saw the cockroaches, I read the meaning of the shadow drunks, I heard what he said when I asked whether booze was worth more than everything he has lost on its account. How is it that I both see and don't see? It says it's because I see without feeling and feel without seeing. When I see his wreckage I should feel it achingly. I shouldn't be callous about souls. My very pitilessness is what sets me up to be fooled. Track it. In what ways is he my weakness of action? He's broke. He's underemployed. He's in debt and improvident. He gets stoned instead of taking care of business. He risks his health. He isn't married. He has lost his child. He doesn't do what I ask him for. He doesn't pay attention to what I need. He takes minimal responsibility. How does he aggress against me, hurt me? He hurts me sexually by being rough and false. He hurts me by false promises, by lying, by denying my intuition when it's right. He sets me up to wait for something that isn't coming. He ignores my gifts. He hurts me by not feeling me, by having no care for my spirit. He seduces me by false promises and lies. He draws me into vulnerability by false pretences. What kind of man inner and outer would I like to be with? A man who has skill and discipline and loves his work, goes far with his work. A man of scrupulous courageous honesty. A man of deep responsibility and spirit care. A man who loves touch and can go far into it. A man who can learn, is curious, who sacrifices his illusions, who studies. A man who is manly in a confident way and not a bluffed way. A man who easily and naturally provides and takes care of himself and others. A funny man. A passionate warm-blooded man. A lucid man. A man who loves intimacy. A man who loves talent and intelligence and fosters them in others. An intuitive man who feels what is there in people and circumstances. A man who works physically too. A man with faith and clarity. A well-organized man. A radical man - a man who sees for himself. A man with respect and authority in the world. A man who wants to marry me utterly and thoroughly and truly. A man who wants my entire love and trust and passion and will do what is necessary to earn them. A man who wants my genius to succeed and be fulfilled to its furthest, and knows how to help. Is there anything else I am supposed to ask? Ask what you are evading with this figuring-out. You mean grief. Yes. I feel myself turning valiant: that's the way it is, it can't be helped, I am alone, I don't have what I need. What should I do with that? Be generous. Say no, I will get you what you need. I will change so you can have what you need. I will die so you can have what you need - I'm supposed to say that? Yes. But isn't it ego who needs it? No. I'm wanting Tom to say this to his spirit? Yes. And I should say it to my own. Yes. Do you want to say more? It's the sacrifice of a structure. Why am I doing this work with a drunk     to graduate Because I'm a drunk     no because you are weak in relation to drunks Do I have an enemy     Is she right about the devil     I want to know this predator     A derisive and murderous antagonist     Who is inborn     What is your name for this structure     stupidity. Deadened in feeling, frail and drained in initiative The dark man?     not a man Wipes out instinctual powers     A failed magician     Desire superiority and power     It's lonely     Hateful and envious     We are taught to submit to it     Do we marry it     YES Is there a sign by which I can know that has happened     fantasy Is a sign of destroyed instinct     YES   Not seeing that desire and action are counteractive Wanting relation and sabotaging it Setting goals and not even beginning Procrastination, shame, failure to begin or end, loss of energy to create in daily life, kills new growth, prevents consciousness.   Is my enemy resignation     no repression Is it my father     Who forbade energy       Who was envious malicious seductive self absorbed pompous nasty snide withholding terrorizing brutal lustful a bully a spoiler I have an unconscious structure who does that to me?!     My father is in me still killing me     Sex is my weakness in relation to it     and mind Tom isn't most of it but he evokes it     So I'm repressed with him in ways that aren't his fault     What is my best relation to the oppressor     see how it is behind fantasy Because it cuts off action     YES Does Tom have an oppressor of a similar kind     YES Does Louie     but not similar Should I pay attention to it     What must I do to it     find it behind exclusion/unconsciousness Write about my family     YES Use obsessive energy for that     YES Does it matter whether I go on with Tom     NO it matters that you do this work   5th This is a dryness I don't know what to think of. I am saying he has lost too much of his coherence, he is already too destroyed. It isn't moral. It isn't that he can make an effort and choose to come through. He is not going to be able. There was a weakness already when he was sixteen. He is not failing because of what happened then. He failed then because of what he was. What I'm saying is true, he's too destroyed     He was beautiful at times     YES I didn't want to see how destroyed     YES He can't be saved     Can anyone be saved     no Is he more wrecked than other people     hm? Than me     Why have I connected with a series of wrecks     you're looking for betrayal You have allowed me to do this     you have insisted on doing it And what has been your relation     helping you come through   What should I do about feeling     see its illusions I'm supposed to feel     you do feel But I feel mistakenly     I worked around it by suppressing feeling     It says: Tom is your fourth wrecked man in four years. You are looking for betrayal - that bleat of feeling released. I am discouraged. What would courage feel like? One way would be that I would say what I have said, he and I are in a process of true struggle and true value. Something is coming true. Love is true, though it has to win through much falseness. But what I am saying today is, love is false, in me and in him, though there are people in whom it is true. It is as if what is at stake is whether my life energy is good. The way it breaks out into hope and joy - whether that is wrong in me. I am saying to my love self: I feel you worrying that I will cut you off. You are foolish and drunken and you lead me to betrayal. I love you, I am not going to abandon you. You are my dearest life surge. I am married to you for as long as I am alive. We are having a hard time together because I am ambitious and impatient and you are impulsive and gullible. But you are beautiful, beautiful to me, so beautiful and touching. Will you give me your whole love and affection, will you work with me, will you grow with me, will you live with me under one roof? She says, write this: You have been fucking me over. I'll hang up if you phone. - I wrote it. I took it to Money Mart. The fax wouldn't go through. Clamped at the cunt. I lay down and passed out. What happened was vibration at the heart instead of clamping. That's all. Vibration at the heart - what is that     a loss undoing Leave the phone off the hook     no What will he want to know     what do you want to know? Whether I'm going on alone now - is that what he wants to know     YES Do you know the answer to that     YES What is it     you'll go on alone if you don't fight I am completely fed up with this     Demand he stops booze, demand he stops weed, those are my conditions     YES Tell him he has to choose     YES 6th Hello     shatter the structure Speak to him tonight and tell him     YES Can I be prepared and clear     Instruction?     come through to the intelligence of love's energy That was the energy I had when I broke last time     YES He has to feel real love in it     YES Why he is enslaved And something about energy My real energy of love makes a difference to him     something about secrecy It reaches through his habit of secrecy     YES I must give him an ultimatum     But I must do it without cutting off     Does that mean I must go on in agony     NO It's love woman who wants to cut off     YES She's my addiction     no she is addicted Is that my vulnerability     no your defense Being addicted and being cut off belong to the same structure     So I am not ready yet to talk to him     no But I am not in a state of love     you are Do you mean my willingness to learn     YES Should I offer to be his friend     YES Say I will not be his mate and his lover until he is clean     YES This is a very great sacrifice     Because I lose my freedom     He does not really want me as a mate     YES What does being his friend involve     having good judgment I should let him still phone me     YES And do what     when he does, fight with him Go to Al-Anon meetings     no read their stuff Is this unconditional love     YES What will it do for me     save you from withdrawing This is what I should have done from the beginning     YES Lust derailed me     no, need Need of what     temperance   Did I do that well     He said he was angry - he wasn't angry     What was he     in pain What will be the short-term consequence     he'll be more honest What will be the long-term consequence     for love woman What?     she'll be smarter But what about him     he will have to decide Am I doing the right thing     YES I will lose him     no you are not excluded He will be gone but I won't be excluded     YES Please say     temperance Is loss going to hit me     NO 7th I am amazingly better. It's as if I am really on his side now, wholly on his side, and that is where I am supposed to be. It's as if I couldn't be on his side until I could give up on him romantically, because his madness could enlist my madness. I feel a kind of joy and excitement that battle is joined. I'm thanking my book. I said to it yesterday that I wasn't loving him and it said, no, you are, because you are willing to learn. I said to him - among many other things - sometimes when I have said loving things to you I have seen something in your eyes that was saying, No, that isn't the right answer. I think it was wanting me to say what I am saying now. I don't know about that, he said. I do. I know it. I said and sighed. He poured out rationalizations. From 16 to 40 it was a 12-pack every night. Now it is just a coupla beers. He drinks like a gentleman. He loves weed, aesthetically. Bars are a metaphor. He needs them for that. His life is under control. He's no dummy. I said, You think it's better to burn out than to fade away, but I think there's a third option. 8th Oh I've done a lot of work these three days. 9th Lay down and got very sick - chills and fever - diarrhea. This morning there is sun on the carpet. It is nearly the middle of May and still very cold. Cold clouds. I'm standing at an end looking ahead into a time that doesn't have what I want in it. I saw that as if standing at the edge of a plateau where the land drops away. What doesn't it have in it - Tom's arms, Tom's hands - his kiss, his loveliness of feeling, his surprisingness - his barenaked hunger - his simplicity - his pleasure beside me when we visit the world - his largeness - his eagerness - his heat - the body I kissed - his manness, the eager ways of it - his graphic talk. I didn't dare feel him because I thought I would lose my clarity but this morning I am remembering what good company we were. We were a match of liveliness. We kept going out and meeting the world together. That was heaven. Please comment     something about sex He has a reservation about sex with me     YES Wants to hold out for a different kind of woman     YES What is it about     meditation In what sense     death This is very scary to me     YES Please explain     duality Do you mean he wants a man     YES Is this really why he's ditching me     YES Could he merge better with a man     YES Because of his fear     no because of his unconscious His unconscious is his mother     YES She wants a man     YES When he's drugged are they together     YES Is that what you mean meditation     no, the work Do you mean wanting to get away from the work     YES He wants his sexuality to escape the work     YES Why     because he wants to be integrated And he wouldn't be integrated with me     YES His sexuality wouldn't be integrated     Are we going in circles     no What is it about me     persistent I'm too persistent     not enough I don't get through to him     don't come Why don't I come     need to be more relaxed This is a confusing section     intelligent I'm ready to give up     you're withdrawn I'm sad     the future is unknown I feel now I'll stay incomplete     decision I felt complete when I was with him     except when you felt incomplete Then I check out his watch. It's a fake they say at the pawnshop. That's making me cry. This time I have been burned worse than ever     And by you too     no Why didn't you protect me from this man     you wanted to have fun Is that wrong     it's wrong to have fun with sex I was willing to give him good heart     But that wasn't good enough     it wasn't You think I got what I deserved     Did he get what he deserved     no Why not     he will before it's over From other sources?     he's going through it now What should I learn from this     that you survive That I survive betrayal     no that you survive true heart exposure With a man at all    Did I do good in a way     YES Should I have done better     stabilized as love woman Suffered more     YES You mean the feeling and understanding thing     YES You're right     it was your exclusion Would that have been better for him     YES But mainly better for me     YES 10 Still shitting cream soup, little dribs. I'm imagining this sickness is body transition. Okay that time is over, let's clear out. Wanting to stamp my foot and say, I gave you seven months and a lot of rope and you hanged yourself. Here are your promises and their dates. How can you live with yourself being such a sleaze. Don't you want to get to the bottom of yourself and start really living? That you don't seems evidence of deep stupidlity. Is his lying cynical     no compulsive It isn't the fault of drugs, drugs are the fault of it     He has to lie to women so he'll never be really vulnerable     The important thing to get across to him is that there is a right kind of burning     YES The adventure of liberation     YES Love as action not sensation     Love as willingness to suffer so you won't harm     Zonking is spirit derelection. It's death of his real self. To want to be out of pain, and a looser consciousness, is right. The means are ineffective. There are effective means. This is the central thing to get across.     YES Replacing habits one by one     NO adjusting structures Acknowledge creative death     Intellectual death     Crippling of relation to Mathew     Demolition of relation to women     Impotence and fear of impotence     Financial stress     Health stress     Finds it hard to do anything     YES So then I go through and list what seem to be lies. They are embedded in so much realness they seem not lies but child heart I would grieve not to have been given. The only one that hurt me was the one about seeing me in April on his honor as a man. That one was a lie my body knew to be a lie. It shocked me horribly. Up to my leaving it was a series of unfoldings, we got deeper every time. By the time I left we were white hearts. We were both there. That it was a lie meant he knew he wouldn't come. "I'm afraid I'll lose my nerve." He told me that. But at the last moment. What does that mean? There's still something missing in my understanding. After I got back it was as if he was lying all the time. It was as if he couldn't bear to tell me he wasn't coming and so he had nothing real to say. I've broken into a rank sweat saying this. There's a piece missing. He has it but will he ever give it. Love woman will you talk to me     no I miss you please talk to me     yes How are you doing     illusions are good for health You like illusions     yes I miss you a lot     no I think I miss him but really I miss you     yes Will you be with me even if he isn't     yes Is there something you'd like to do with me     have a turn, evade processing to integrate young heart Get out of this psychological work     yes Are you afraid of it     yes Do you think it will do away with you     yes Larger one is she right     If she is integrated what will be her role     imagining In everything I do     Is that a good role     not withdrawn Do you have questions you want to ask     will I be excluded If you were integrated what would you like     energy The way it was with Tom     yes, going places, being there Will you say more     imagining You like to escape     yes From pain     yes, from dullness, oppression I want you more than ever     YES What would you like from me     persistence in imagining Is there something you'd like to imagine     childish sharing The way it was with Tom     yes Play     yes   Did he string me a line to turn himself on     no for control Control his dependence     no control so he could be dependent Will you teach me how to play     YES Larger one is this good     no explain to her about the work Listen there is wonderful work for you to do, would you like to learn it     yes You are the beginning of a beautiful skill     yes To get to it we need to do some of this hard psychological work     yes Does that scare you     YES If you help me with this work we can be together all the time     YES You can live in the world with me     yes Will you help me     no LO now what     talk to her about death I don't know what to say     (Qp) The death the work is aiming for     The death that will result from reconnecting with her mother     YES Please help me here     a change of judgment Death is such a scary word     persist Do you want her to offer to die     YES Why would she do that     because of losses Because of losing Tom     no her mother You want her to offer to die because her mother ditched her     YES Are you listening to this     YES What do you think     it's honest LO is this reliving a death     no really dying I don't want her to die     it's for completion She is my beauty     no She's my liveliness     no She's my sexiness     YES She's my ability to attract men     She's my fun     YES My youthfulness     She's my heart     NO So her death is the death of those things    I hate that you're addicted to her She's my energy     What would be left     true relation to losses Big deal     you'd be honest This is what I've been telling Tom to do     thinking he should do Would he lose all that     YES What is true relation to loss     good for adventure I'd feel I'd be giving up everything that makes life worth living     YES Would I be giving up everything that ...     YES Do you mean give it up absolutely     NO Case by case as I work     You want me to lie down and be crushed     no to get better judgment Are you listening my beautiful one     no You are afraid I want you to die absolutely     yes What I want is for you to let me get reconnected honestly to my origins. I'll be able to take better care of you if you do     yes LO can you help     happiness can't be based on a lie Love woman is a lie     YES How do you feel hearing that     I want to be fixed Can she be made true     YES Do you want to be made true     it depends Can you talk to her directly     NO Would she want it if she understood it     YES Can you explain it to her     it means she'll be married To whom     temperance is her marriage Feeling and judgment     YES She'd be married to understanding     Would you like to be married to understanding     YES This is the process by which you marry him     So will you do it     YES My liveiness sexiness fun will marry understanding     I'd like that too     no you'll be the listener If liking is the wrong word, what's the right one     alliance Okay to stop?     Love woman do you want to say anything before I leave     ask a question Okay     it's about wisdom - does the undeluded judgment complete childhood Why do you ask     it's about marriage Do you want childhood to be completed     YES Do you know why she's asking this     the mother Does she want to know whether the marriage gives her her mother     That's what she's been looking for     Tom doesn't give her the mother back     This is a sweet question     What's the answer     anger, slow growth, conflict, honesty give her the mother back That's the right thing for her to work for     YES Is that what you wanted to know     yes Are you okay with that     yes 11th Fighting my mum for Mother's Day. I fought her the way I fought Tom - I herded her, first about religion and then when she was ending the call with guilt pressure, I got relentless. What did she try: 1) "You remind me of your father, nothing but cold logic." I said it was emotion but not the emotion she wanted. 2) "I thought my mum didn't have a clue who I was and I probably didn't know what was going on for her either, but we cared about each other." I said I talk this way to people I care about. 3) "I do want to know what you think." I said maybe nobody else tells her but we all think of her as wanting not to know. 4) "Why is it so much now we just get blamed for what we did wrong." I said, Why don't you take it that your children are trying to give you something they have learned? 5) "Why can't there be some bond from the things I did right." I said, You had years of that. "Why can't I still have it." There you are, wanting us to be what we used to be. Mainly I kept saying, You have no idea what you are being given at this moment. You're frightened of what I just said, you're trying to get away from it. I said there was a time that broke the bond. I saw her not getting it. I said imagine a two year old. She said she was in agony the whole time I was away. I said the two year old had no way to know that. I can't believe you have never imagined this. She said when I came back I called them you guys. I said that sounded contemptuous to me. She said, "Oh, no..." I said, "What do you think that little girl was feeling?" "Bewildered?" "What else?" "Angry?" "Yes." I can see she has never thought of that. "She didn't seem angry" she says. I say she was so angry she wouldn't give her anger. As I say it I am noticing that I have carried myself onto dangerous ground. "But when she grew up she realized," Mary said. Oh wow! I'm thinking. "No. She never grew up. The person who realized was a caretaker person. There's a way I have never been a real person since then." Then Mary puts it together. "Would she like to be angry now?" That feels very risky to her, I say, having been noticing how angry I have been all along. I'm feeling for whether to do it right then or whether to wait. I say will she come with me to Joyce, will she think about whether she can do that? I'll let her know the date. We leave it at that. Thank you, she says. You did good! I say suddenly. You did good, do you know that? Thank you, she says again in a real voice. She's got it. "I'm mad at your culture for not teaching you more about what a person is." "We were ignorant" she says. "They tried to keep you ignorant so they could control you," I say. "Oh, no..." she says. But you're there, she says. Yes, I'm her champion, I say, you want me to be your champion but I'm her champion. I didn't hold back. I fought clean. I took responsibility and focused. I didn't hedge when I got into fear. I didn't expect her to look after me. I didn't feel sorry for her. I spoke to her best. I was fearless about religion. I didn't feel sorry for myself. Have been wanting to say this about the work both in philosophy and this other: it is always a work of sorting, discerning, at a scale finer than the concepts we start with. It's discerning within concepts. (I gesture toward Wittgenstein when I think that.) Examples: 'representation' or 'imagination' in different people's systems. It isn't a matter of accepting one version, it is being able to read any of them accurately in site, and at the same time keep some of the other systems up - that is how it feels - up in the air, up in suspension - how it fields - to be able to sense the relative location. In emotional work, there's the way anyone becomes visible as many and you can learn who you are addressing or could address at different times. The active separate presences in I, for instance the one who as I write keeps wanting to ask how Tom is. Principle one is discernment. Principle two is tracking. Tracking is used in discerning. It means pushing with questions, persisting, not letting it go, dogging it, not being led away. Principle three is something like working a knot. In emotional work it means don't instruct yourself, clear the structure. Don't tell yourself not to wonder about Tom; go to the place creating the wonder and work it. Maybe find out who it is and get an understanding. It's neurological. In philosophy can I think of an example - something like that happened when I fell through from digital into analog, but I don't remember how it happened. I'm thinking of it now in relation to all the snag places where I'm supposed to recover love and action by working through the moment. One of the people I read on alcoholics got people to rework the moment they consented to drink again. I'm asking something about how or when I've been learning these ways of working. Persistence took years. I used to be satisfied with one question. I didn't think I could find anything. Jam taught me there could be persistence. Discernment has come this past year - last summer. I think of it as the net resolving. That's book training along with the reading. I have had a new sense of working knots just in the past week. The book taught me. The book and Joyce work similarly in the way they turn me loose and then correct me at points. Thinking of the Time, space and knowledge book saying knowledge is always available. What's new in the book work is asking that's more mutual - is there anything you want to talk about, I say. And learning to talk to the younger and less knowing parts. With Joyce it has been that it takes me years to understand what she means. I marvel at the patience she has to have in her work. She doesn't know whether she'll ever see acknowledgment or comprehension. I'm only beginning to know that when she speaks she isn't always addressing [the conscious or present] me. Writing these two pages has taken nearly two hours. 12 Waking at 3 and dialling through the songs [radio] - then I'm in your world - dialling through emotion - emotional line and texture and mix - a relevant lab. Heaven knows she can't go with him / And she rolls / On by herself / Heaven knows / He can't go with her / And he rolls / On by himself / Fare thee well. I'm tending to forgive you, I wonder is that alright. Don't mean I take it back, my challenge stands, I said I'd go for broke, I'm going, you're not, it's you who're hanging back. A woman singing This old man with such subtlety and passion it stands as a demonstration I don't know of what. [Tori Amos] Thank you for music back, California boy. Thank you for your flowing way. You don't have to go on livin' / With your back against the wall / Let me put my arms around you / I won't let you fall This worries me some: I think my challenge is right but it will seem to come at him from the side of the forces of oppression that have come at him all his life. He won't understand that I defend his wildness. Mother will they drop the bomb / Mother will they like my song / Mother should I run for president / Mother should I trust the government / Mother do you think she's good enough / Mother do you think she's dangerous Then the lonely supple defiant riding forth of the male voice of choice, electric, steel, escaped from the body that was in the woman, making it alone. I have sympathy for that - my friend - but there is a next move. You're hung up. I am / A wo - / man in / Love / And I'll do / Any / Thing / To get you / Into / My life / And hold you / Inside of / Me. She sings that wailing, wailing, very gloriously. It was the man who couldn't look me in the eye who knocked on my eyelid to say stay with me while we do this. Honey I'm not waiting for you / At the bottom of your glass Here I am / Here I am / Still carrying a flag for you / Burning me just like a brand [book material on addiction] There's a deluded personality and a clear one     Do they alternate     no, conflict Denial/deluded personality very fragmented     YES Sober personality damaged     Denial to protect social interface     But I'm supposed to challenge it     Large effort to appear competent     The impaired judgment can't judge itself impaired     Grandiosity is lying about capability     He believes it and at other times its opposite     Needs to learn truth is between     Susceptible to inner pressure, doesn't know how to release it         Con wants to expand     Does the uncon want to go on drinking     no The little voice - that eventually sounds like it isn't yours     The subtlety, resourcefulness and power of the addictive structure'     no There is an addicted structure     And it uses auditory imagining     The subtlety resourcefulness and power of the uncon     It is the con that is the addictive structure     Con needs to feel itself creative     Provide sober emotionality     Get into alliance with uncon, work cooperatively toward creative solution       It's like a lucidity behind him     It communicates with me     no, expresses itself If I am square with it he feels it as reliability         Does the con create the uncon     no they are both creations of the body Uncon is powerful creative attentive     These things are facts but it doesn't do them     Uncon seems to humor and protect the con from having its feelings hurt, is that right     no it has to do with material success, being able to survive socially Keeps facts and emotions uncon     Does what con asks even when it's trouble     no Con is a social construct     Created in language     Uncon is a religious construct in the sense of total relation     Assume a structure of self-loathing in Tom     Uncon shame, self-devaluation     no mostly con That's what he had to deal with when he was sober     YES Family and church       So there was surrender     and no It's a linguistic structure     YES It's not surrender it's conditioning     If you don't actively resist it gets in     The oppressor and hated self correlates     One has to go back and meet it     YES Can one meet it in one's friends     Combat       Confusion-restructuring is deep change of structure     You create confusion to allow it: going sane     When the oppressor is being undone there is confusion     Joyce has done that     YES It's detailed     work can be Can it be restructured in a flash     but doesn't stay   Am I going to have a chance to work with him     YES Only if I stay out of romance     YES So what should I do about romance     find your losses in it Name the dodges before they happen     YES Cut off his habit     He shd stop telling me he loves me     no but act it more When he tells me he loves me ask for action     YES The action of responsibility     YES   Do you want to say more about the oppressor in him     ask him Would meditation be useful to him     Loosening con     Ordeals - is that useful     I should set them?     no he should, make himself act The goal of getting here was good for that     YES Is there some other goal he should have now     happiness   Is he dissociated     not exactly Sexually abused by his mother That's why he's sensitive to being told he's gorgeous     It has an abusive feel to him     He didn't dissociate but he didn't understand     YES Was he angry with her     YES He didn't know for what     YES And still doesn't     That's a sort of dissociation     Of intelligence     YES   Drugs are means of dissociation     Dissociation two ways 1. reality registers but the structure is still to be experience, and 2. the caretaker gets a life history and starts to feel real     Those apply to him     It happens originally in trauma and then zonking allows you to do it again     YES The escaped realities are wells     YES My reading personality is a caretaker     YES Love woman is a caretaker     YES They don't act to protect, they REPLACE but are ungrounded     Dry drunk, states like drunk     His rages are       Dissociated reactivation     Reactivation can come apart into: behavior, affect, sensation, knowledge     Mind does come apart these ways     Basic     no there are hundreds of ways What's important is just to realize it can be partial     Trauma before his mother's death     something about his father Some alternative personalities can't tell the difference between memory and present     When memories reactivate they are there     Those are the remnants     YES It happens to him     YES Then he ejects     YES Other persons work to protect the helpless ones from pain and terror, look for methods     This is too anthropomorphically stated       My duality of consc in drunkenness was exceptional     Is that dissociation     YES The con is drunk     The same dissociation when I do emotion reactivation     If I did it more, con wd believe itself       Strategies to ward reactivation: revictimization (activates opioids), victimizing, zonking   Drugs augment dissociation     Drugs and unwanted feeling, that is the simplicity of it     Look at what the feeling was     Every time you're tempted, look for the feeling     YES A disorder of needing fantasy, ie needing to be fantasy     YES Euphoria as a vulnerable state     You feel powerful and free     Success when you're weak     Boredom = emotional shutdown, you're blocking something       Take a risk for the thrill of growth instead of the thrill of escape.   Would that work for him     YES Quitting, the frustration of having long-term goals is a habit that has been useful     YES A moral presence of felt truth, is this one true of him     The inside man, is there always someone in him who recognizes the truth     Recognition is a relation of con and uncon     Can you tell me the reason     shared structure Can you explain this more another time       Denial is a natural shock absorber     Bargaining, 'I can handle it' is denial     Watch for addict personality and recovery personality but don't be simply judgmental     He's bargaining     YES   He wants 2 things that are legitimate, to be out of pain, and a looser consciousness     His means are ineffective     Child gives up power in exchange for recgnition attention and care by adult self     YES Fantasy tells what they want     Grandiosity says what he wants to be       Is the idea of surrender correct     depends There can be surrender to the wrong thing     People surrender to their drunk personality     Did I surrender to love woman     That was the wrong thing     YES Should I surrender to you     NO Work with you     Will you explain surrender     it's a patriarchal concept He rightly resists it     no Will you give me a sentence     people try to make children surrender Breaking the spirit?     no, subordinating it Do I need to name what is correct in his resistence     Letting go of conscious control shouldn't be thought of as surrender     How should it be thought of     quest A search       Do you like the idea of relation to a higher power     YES As if a question is a prayer     YES Tom can't do it alone?     his conscious personality can't So the conscious personality must ask and listen     YES Must it trust what it hears     YES It learns to     YES Because there is real help     YES The way I learned to trust Joyce     no The way I learned to trust you     silence Do you want me to trust you more     no Is there something else you want me to ask about     patriarchy Patriarchy and trust?     YES Patriarchy destroys trust     but how How?     something about imagining Destroys self-trust     YES   Will you give me a sentence in working against compulsion     you have to integrate agony Is this about the relation of con and uncon     YES   Is there more you want to tell me about this     he has lost his honesty And what     be brilliant and courageous Face it?     YES And what     fight him And what     control his dishonesty You mean in me     Codependency is you are addicted to them, am I addicted to him       Enabling = bearing pain, taking consequences Detachment is the opposite, detach with love, take responsibility for oneself. Let them have the dignity of it, they are responsible for their own recovery.   And what     realize it's a crisis In me     YES, crucial   Drugs force the uncon     NO they force the con Con is terrified of that     YES Patriarchy spoils that relation     YES It trains con     YES The trained con is too tight     YES Part of its tightness is that it doesn't trust     That's what its tightness is     YES So looseness is always available in theory The longing for looseness is what makes us susceptible     YES Is that the patriarchal plot     YES So we trust the wrong things     And are thus controlled     So Tom was seeing the possibility of a correct trust     YES   Patriarchy is about making sure men are in control     certain men, rational men Mental men?     guess Men who deny the mother     Tom is not one of those     YES But patriarchy has destroyed him     YES Patriarchy limits imagination     YES Imagination is looseness     ACCESS to looseness Fantasy that knows itself fantasy     Dips its wings in the orange sky light     The brain has a physical need for looseness     YES Trained con untrain     Meditation     depends   Is drug dependency generally about relation of con and uncon     NO pain avoidance 1.get through pain, 2.loosen con - those two things are separate     Tom needs both     YES AA is a tight con     YES So he needs to do it some other way     YES Therapy     YES So surrender is about loosening     But patriarchy has made it about tightening     The question is surrendering what     YES It's correct to surrender tightness     Incorrect to surrender liveness     Training is surrendering liveness     YES Tom hasn't surrendered liveness     but has lost some       volume 6 the golden west volume 5: 1996 january-april work & days: a lifetime journal project