The Radical Quill

A Journal by Irene Lynch, CEO, ALEPPOS Foundation

ilynch@monmouth.com | http://www.aleppos.org

Important effective aspects of personality that might possibly change the world: 

courage

humility

persistence

Most of the convictions about my own history, and about what society calls “mental illness” are clearly articulated in a book by David Smail, a consultant clinical psychologist and former Special Professor in Clinical Psychology at the University of Nottingham UK, The Origins of Unhappiness: A New Understanding of Personal Distress.

It is David Smail’s theory that “the subjective experience of distress is much more an accurate reflection of the state of the person’s world, than an indication of some kind of ‘intrapsychic’ pathology….  This is not to say that we are not psychologically and emotionally damaged by our experiences of life, but that neither the causes nor the ‘cures’ of such damage can usefully be treated as ‘internal’ matters.”

“Our predicament is the world – the social environment – in which we live, and our suffering arises from our relations with it.  It has always been in the interests of power to obscure this simple truth, for it has (almost?) always been in the interest of the powerful to run that world to their own advantage while persuading the rest of us that their sole interest is the public good.”

………………

And his final words from this book:

“We shall, therefore, not be able to change the world purely through an act of will, however clearly we might see the desirability of doing so.  Even less shall we be able to make our lives any more comfortable through the cultivation of therapeutic make-believe.

What confronts us is a political programme in which an ethics built on reason and a knowledge of the world inspired by faith in its reality enable us to reconstruct ‘forms’ which can earn the assent of people secure enough to appreciate their worth.  Even though our present social organizations give rise to enough distress to underline the desirability of such a programme, it may well be the case that the causes of such distress still appear too abstract and ideologically obscured to provide the necessary impetus for change.

When enough people hurt badly enough to be moved to act together against the roots of our troubles, one can only hope that they may be in a better position than has often been the case before to know what to do.”

…………….

He has written other books of note, there are two that I recommend:  Illusion & Reality: The Meaning of Anxiety and How to Survive Without Psychotherapy.  His web site is:  http://www.nottm.freeserve.co.uk/

Another writer, to whom I’ve recently returned, is Harriet Goldor-Lerner, a senior staff psychologist and psychotherapist at the Menninger Clinic. She travels nationally to lecture, consult and present workshops.  Her first book, The Dance of Anger, changed my life, and led me to create a workshop on Anger which I presented at one of our state conferences.  It was a great success.  Her web site is: http://www.harrietlerner.com.   It is the first of a trilogy; The Dance of Intimacy and The Dance of Deception complete the triology.

In response to an interviewer’s question, Writing is so difficult that I sometimes wonder what motivates writers to write?, Dr. Lerner gave several suggestions, but this is my favorite:

Many of us write with modest goals, like to change the world.

And in the same interview:

Isn't that very brave - passing your diaries around?

When you reach fifty, your life is no longer embarrassing, because you realize that everyone's life is embarrassing.

Harriet is a very humble person.  From The Dance of Intimacy:

“The ideas and suggestions that lie ahead will be most useful to you if you can greet them with an open, courageous, and experimental attitude.  But also keep in mind that no one else can tell you what changes you should  make, at what speed, and at what cost.  No expert, not even your therapist, can know for certain when it is the right time for you to change, how much change is tolerable and in what doses, and how various moves forward and backward will affect your emotional well-being, your relationships, your sense of self, your moorings in this world, and your (or someone else’s) immune system.

Fortunately, the unconscious is very wise.  What you read in this book will always be there for you – long after you think you have forgotten it – until the time is right for you to make use of it.  Respect the fact that all you do and are now, has evolved for a good reason and serves an important purpose.  Trust you own way more than the experts who promote change, myself included, because ultimately you are the best expert on your own self.”

This summer is a very busy time for me.

I am thrilled to be a part of the Freehold Self-Help Center, and hope to share some of my work/ideas/dreams with such a caring, supportive group.

July 11-15, I will be attending the NAMI convention in DC, where I will have a Poster Session.

July 27 I fly to Cleveland to participate in a week-long seminar at the Hershey Montessori Farm School.  This first Erdkinder is a sane approach to education for adolescents.  I hope to pick up pointers for self-helpers to use.

August 8-11 is a Peace and Wellness retreat, another Montessori event.

 

And as a finale to this first issue, a little of my artwork and a photograph, ‘Man and Model T Ford in Flight From Grasshooper- and Drought-Ridden Area of South Dakota Highway 10', Missoula Montana, 1936 by Arthur Rothstein: