My dad is a man of his generation. At 96, he embodies an era in which women served while men took up all the space without apology. They were the unquestioned main characters.
As the youngest of six and a daughter, I learned to lovingly, kindly, and sometimes firmly confront him. I worked from the inside of our relationship. Sometimes I got sick of it and decided I was done for good. I even imagined burying him in my garden.
But then, somehow, forgiveness came. Another chance followed.
Working with my dad was good training for Creative Journey. Without knowing it, I was learning how to stay present with someone while challenging the hierarchies they carried. I was learning when to push, when to use humor, and when to let it become revealed. Most of all, I was learning that people usually need to experience another way of being in order to change.
Some people hold the line against injustice by rejecting those who perpetuate it. This is an important role. It makes the cost of harmful behavior real. Sometimes distance is the only safe or honest response.
My role has often been different. When I have the capacity and the relationship can handle challenge, I roll up my sleeves and work from the inside. I try to show someone, not tell them, that supporting and empowering others is actually more fun and fulfilling.
This is part of my Creative Journey work. I welcome people in without pretending that the habits they carry are harmless. In collaboration with the Golden Teacher1, I see if I can help them find balance and liberation again through an encounter with another way of being.
The same training shows up in my Capacitor work. Occasionally, I collaborate with people who do not initially recognize the power and value of my mind. This means I have to do the work twice: once to demonstrate my abilities and once to get the job done.
That recognition does not always come in time. I have been disappointed by short-term results and lost opportunities.
Still, I believe that giving someone a deep, embodied experience of another way matters. Change may not happen in front of me. The experience may lie dormant and, to borrow Arlo Guthrie’s phrase, come around again on the guitar later.
Love is a discipline. Can you love someone even though they are being oppressive—even though they are causing pain?
Sometimes a push away is the loving act. Sometimes drawing near is the loving act.
Golden Teacher is a strain of psychedelic mushroom