Doing yourself violence

An interesting comment from a therapist who works with families shattered with domestic violence has got me pensive. Apparently, my blog and the comments therein contain all the familiar verbiage. I'm not sure what this means, but I've noted the assessment is not a favorable one.

Came across your blog recently. Not LDS here. I'm a therapist that works with families affected by domestic violence, (broadly defined to include not only physical but psychological and emotional abuse.) I found myself drawn in recognizing posting after posting echoed the voices I hear daily in my practice. The voices of the abused trying to make sense of abusive relationships. Why do we stay in relationships that love us back so poorly? Beliefs. About self, about relationships, about God and the nature of Divine Love. Eerily, I have heard echoes of the comments I find in your blog coming from the victims with swollen lips and eyes nearly blinded by the abuser. "I know he loves me, I just need to be a better person." Yikes!! I could parallel any number of these comments similarly to the sad, sad mental contortions people make to live in abusive relationships. What is it but abuse to call someone an abomination?

And, as you may know, if you know me at all, I'm prone to apologetics when I'm not given a favorable assessment. ;-)

Truth is, I've had my share of swollen lips and eyes nearly blinded by an abuser. But the abuser has never been my faith or my family. The abuser has been pornography. Why do I go back, I wonder? Happily, I haven't gone back for quite some time. Maybe those 12 steps are paying off. Maybe my new found accountability system is working. Maybe I've parted ways with my abuser after all this time of dependence and humiliation.

As for the comments on this blog, many of them reflect places I've been on my journey. I see their views as views to defend as my own. I don't agree with them, necessarily, but I sympathize with the value of struggling through the issues; I know the importance of fighting the good fight, keeping the faith.

On the other hand, larger parts of my fight seem to be winding down, and it's odd to me that the commenter seems not to see it. I've felt more and more like blogging is a chore. It's not that I don't have anything to say; I still get ideas all the time for interesting ways to discuss relevant topics. But it has become so progressively less of an issue in my life that it feels at times distracting to revisit it. That's not to say that I've passed some wondrous benchmark of progress, because I cycle through these issues all the time, and it's too early to say how the long-term prospects look. But it is to say that I can understand how many people who have "overcome" SSA don't spend a lot of time debating the issue... because more than ever before I can believe that I may soon be one of them.

However, now that I've said that I feel dramatic and manipulative. It's not that I'm trying to get lots of comments telling me that I'm important and have important things to say. I believe there ought to be folks speaking up whose lives defy conventional wisdom, and I'm fairly certain I'll be trying to be one of them for a good while yet. And in so doing, I'll try to comfort those who stand in need of comfort, those who have been done violence by evils in the world (whether sophistry, pornography, intolerance, actual abuse, or whatever), and defend the source of truth and peace from being mischaracterized as an abuser.

Content

Not so cranky anymore.

As I've experienced a million times, a few hours of sleep puts an amazing distance between me and my crankiness. And, as I suspected, I felt more embarrassment about airing my pity party than anything else. Just thought I'd let you know in case anyone's been praying for me. You have, right? Right? ;-)

I love sitting in sacrament meeting and getting that peaceful feeling that everything will be okay. Even though the world is filled with injustices and hypocrisy and bigotry, it's worth having hope and optimism. The hymn in my ward today made me cry. You've probably never heard it before:

Come, come, ye saints, no toil nor labor fear;
But with joy, wend your way.
Though hard to you this journey may appear,
Grace shall be as your day.
’Tis better far for us to strive
Our useless cares from us to drive;
Do this, and joy your hearts will swell
All is well! All is well!

It really is, you know. All is well.

A beautiful day

After a hefty amount of snow, a near death experience on the freeway, and a run of sub-zero temperatures... today is gorgeous.

It reminds me that life cycles. Things don't stay the same for very long. I'd like my moody oscillations to trend up overall, though, and luckily, I think I'm being successful in that. I've still had my requisite ups and downs for the last several weeks and months, but overall there's a placid background of contentment... something I never really had a few years back.

It's likely that I'll hit some pretty low lows in the not so distant future. That's just life's way. So, I try to remind myself to be prepared for when they come. I try to ground myself with a constant awareness of what is most important to me in my life and where I want to find myself and my family next year, in five years, in thirty years...

And thirty years from now it's unlikely I'll remember this day at all. But it will have made me (in part) into whatever I will have become. And for that I'm very grateful for the beauty and the serenity of today.

Fruits

I got an e-mail a while back from a gay guy who’s pretty happy with his life being gay, but had an odd dream in which he saw himself as married to a woman. And having children. And LDS. And extremely happy. He described it like this:

…last June something came over me that I haven't been able to shake -a vision of myself in the future, eternally married as a Mormon with two children. It was the most incredible, wonderful feeling I have ever experienced. In the vision, my world was completely different - nothing was about myself anymore, and instead, everything was about my wife, children, and God. Our children were so beautiful - we would have done anything for them. I was still gay (and we all knew it), but that didn't matter. Just as I had sacrificed certain career aspirations, my time, money, and the planned direction of my life, I had sacrificed being with men. It wasn't something that I questioned because I had evidence of the blessings in front of me at all times.

So, he hooked up with the missionaries and started taking the discussions. I don’t know where he is or isn’t in the process of investigating the church right now, but at one point they were teaching him about the fruits of the spirit and he e-mailed to ask me about the “fruits” of my choices.

I’m pretty stupid about most things, but particularly about my own life and happiness. I have huge mood swings, moments of manic happiness, frenzied stress, bitter frustration… you know, the spectrum of life. Does that make the “fruit” something worth setting out there as an example?

There have also been occasional comments and e-mails from people who, in one way or another, suggest that I’m trying to persuade people to do things like I’ve done it… or to convert them somehow to my way of thinking. I can’t deny trying to be persuasive on some topic when I think I’m right and some other point of view is stupid (notice: no instances offered), but overall I really thought I had made it abundantly clear that this is a journey for me, I don’t pretend to know where it will end or what all the answers are.

I can speak to the happiness I have in my life right now, and it’s genuine. But I can also speak to the difficulties we’ve had (and still have), as well as the many examples of couples that haven’t succeeded in making their marriages a perpetual bliss.

As far as comparing my situation to those who have taken a different path, things get muddy fast. And super subjective. I can only look at the choices people make, and the way I perceive their happiness and the quality of their lives. I don’t necessarily go by whether people say they’re happy, because I’ve seen some pretty nasty, bitter people snarl out how great their life is and that if anyone disputes their happiness they’ll snap their neck like a !@#$ matchstick!!!

It turns out my subjective conclusions don’t really support the “fruit” theory at all. I see the full spectrum ranging all the way from wonderful, exemplary people to cranky jerks both inside the church and out. Of course, the traits that qualify the wonderful, exemplary people as such are qualities consistent with following LDS church teachings, whether they’ve been achieved by trying to follow Christ’s teachings deliberately or not. And vice versa.

I think Galatians isn’t really talking about knowing anything by its fruits (although it’s a great analogy), but specifically the gifts of the spirit. But if I’m making decisions about what to believe and do based on who I want to exemplify and become, I feel pretty good about things anyway.

Idolatry

There is a philosophy of moralism that consists of timeless moral principles. Most of the Judeo-Christian world holds the ancient injunction "Thou shalt not kill" to be a transcendent and absolute principle. To seek timeless principles of value to live by is a noble venture; to be moral is good; to be good is good--but if that is the only end we are seeking, then even goodness and morality can become idolatrous.... When the quest for principles and morals becomes our sole focus--and even our god--we encounter problems when a commandment is given that doesn't seem to have a foundational principle or moral we can immediately understand.... Lacking the understanding that "man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend" (Mosiah 4:9), individuals may cast aside a commandment in the belief that they can still be "good" without it. For the sake of goodness, they may be able to; but for the sake of Christ, discipleship, and holiness, they cannot. Those who try to find salvation simply in goodness are trying to build a latter-day tower of Babel. They rationalize that if there is a heaven, surely a "good" God wouldn't cast out His "good" children.

Ty Mansfield in
In Quiet Desperation

This was my favorite part of Ty's book. I saved this post up from back when I was reviewing the book, and now seems to be a good time to bust it out. The idea that morality itself could be idolatry (and therefore, somehow immoral) is really interesting. I find I believe it. Same goes for love as idolatry, happiness as idolatry, and all the other good and wonderful things I've seen people use to justify their behavior when it conflicts with God's expectation. Take your favorite virtue and use it to trump God, and voila: idolatry.

Benjamin has been explaining to me here how following prophets can be a form of idolatry, and I'm inclined to agree in some particular instance. When we follow prophets for their own sakes, when we are enamored with the men themselves, when the office is secondary to the person and therefore God is secondary to the person, it's idolatry. On the other hand, justifying not following God's prophet because it doesn't fit with our own personal feelings of what is right for us seems to be a very dangerous place to go. I'm all for personal responsibility in making choices and having integrity, etc., etc., but that doesn't equate with accepting one's own opinions as the last word on what must be right.

There are many aces to be played in the issues of life. They trump the suit, after all. "If men are that they might have joy, then I really have to do what I know makes me the happiest." "If God is love, I just can't believe that God doesn't want me to accept the beautiful love I naturally feel." "God wants me to get away from my self-hate, and now I'm sure he approves of the better place I'm in."

If only there were some way God could clarify the issues when things got confusing... if he had some sort of specific method of communicating with those who are trying to follow him that was less subjectively influenced by the natural man... if only someone on Earth could explain His will and speak with His authority... then I could accept the communication as from God and know that I'm avoiding the idolatry of morality, avoiding trusting the arm of the flesh, avoiding making God in my own image rather than the other way around.

If only.

Romance...

Romantic love is not only a part of life, but literally a dominating influence of it. It is deeply and significantly religious. There is no abundant life without it. Indeed, the highest degree of the celestial kingdom is unattainable in the absence of it.

I got this from Kim Mack quoting Bruce Hafen quoting Boyd K. Packer. (If you ever use it elsewhere, be sure to add me on the list of acknowledgments.) I've always had a favorable opinion of romantic love, but never considered it to be deeply and significantly religious. How 'bout that?

I want an abundant life, so I guess I'd better go buy some jewelry.

Cognitive therapy

Don't let the post title scare you away. This is not a post about gay therapy at all. Rather, it's a post about thinking your way through a challenge. When I was rotating through psychiatry, lots of patients were prescribed cognitive behavioral therapy--fixing problems by changing the way you think about things and the way you react. Phobias, depression, delusions, and anxiety can all be helped by thinking carefully and rationally about the issue.

Here's my problem: I see the passionate experiences of folks like John Galt and Enduring Eric and I want those experiences for myself. Here are married men who had extended affairs that were by all accounts highly enjoyable and now are in the process of returning to the church and receiving full forgiveness and all the blessings of the gospel. Their own blogs explain the details and all the obstacles and heart-wrenching repentance they have and are experiencing, but at the end of it all I keep thinking they've managed to have their cake and eat it too.

I want to love and be loved in the powerful way John describes. Gay or straight, I think few people find a soul mate as attractive and perfectly suited as John has. I wonder if the forbidden nature of an affair makes it that much more passionate. Actually, I'm sure of it. Regardless, that's the kind of passionate sexual connection I've never experienced. And I should be thankful, all things considered, but I find myself feeling cheated. Why shouldn't I experience it just like John did and then repent and go on with my family life?

Commence cognitive therapy.

The problem with my thought process on this subject is that, like many church members, I've tried to distill the atonement into some kind of spiritual arithmetic--the kind that always ends with dividing by zero and being forgiven of all debts. But the gospel of Jesus Christ isn't only about the tally of sins and the ability of the atonement to "cover" them like a credit limit, it's about becoming like God. And you don't become like God by milking the system. You can't become holy by planning your sins and delaying your repentance to get the maximum experience. Every sin contributes to Jesus' suffering. Every one. What kind of person has his sexual fling knowing that the cost is another person being hung from nails through his wrists? Not a divine person, to say the least.

When Elder Eyring says:

This is my warning to you today. It is a bad estimate of your personal costs to believe that a choice to commit sin is made so free by the power of the Atonement that we can have painless forgiveness... how much better to choose to be good and to do it early, a long way upstream from the terrible effects of sin.

I revert to my self-defeating mental exercise of rationalizing that I would be willing to endure a large amount of pain to have the intense experiences John describes. But, then I remind myself that it's not primarily about the happiness or pain involved. It's about becoming a divine person.

Elder Eyring also says:

If we stay at it long enough, perhaps for a lifetime, we will have for so long felt what the Savior feels, wanted what he wants, and done what he would have us do that we will have, through the Atonement, a new heart filled with charity. And we will have become like him. That promise also is in the Book of Mormon: "Charity is the pure love of Christ, and it endureth forever; and whoso is found possessed of it at the last day, it shall be well with him. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart, that ye may be filled with this love, which he hath bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ; that ye may become the sons of God; that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is; that we may have this hope; that we may be purified even as he is pure. Amen." (Moroni 7:47-48.)

I don't have to experience what seems like the most passionate and intense feelings in life. I don't need to "experiment" with my gay feelings to see what it's like... to know that, yes, I really am gay, and yes, I really will be missing out on that amazing sort of passion I desire in order to become who God wants me to become.

Happy and reconciled

As I plug along on my blog journey, various people have jumped on and off the ride. I forget sometimes that not everyone has been around for the duration and assume everyone's past the exposition. But, here's a rest stop before continuing the journey to reassess who I am, where I'm at, and where I'm going.

I'm gay. Not bisexual. If you want to dispute this, you have to give me your own definitions of these words since there are plenty to choose from. I'm using, I believe, the most common definitions (based on sexual attraction).

I'm conflicted, troubled, and struggling. There are so many things that I don't understand about the world, about human nature, about what is important and why. I think (aspiring to a Socratic wisdom) that recognizing my ignorance on these matters is a virtue in itself. Having cognitive dissonance over conflicting desires is unpleasant. It's also powerful and interesting. I'm trying to learn enough that I can overcome my struggles in sexuality, but I anticipate struggling to some degree on this issue for my entire life.

I'm happy and reconciled. Merely recognizing the struggle in which I'm engaged, recognizing that it may not end in this life, recognizing that such struggles make life beautifully rich, I've found inexplicable happiness. It's neither through nor despite my struggles, it's just off to the side. It's bound up in my family and my career, in my dreams and my optimism. I've learned that cognitive dissonance need not make me unhappy, but that managing it is an art. I've determined I have experiences sufficient to know the veracity of the LDS church, and puzzling sexual mysteries are insufficient to call the overwhelming evidence and life-long confirmation I've received into question. I'm reconciled not because I have all the answers, but because I'm okay with not having all the answers. I have some. And they are beautiful and hopeful and right.

I have great appreciation for those who share their insights and help me understand. It's a leg-up on the steep crags I sometimes face. I blog because it helps me. I hope it also may help someone else who is looking for a good path, albeit a road less traveled. I do worry sometimes that spending so much time thinking about and writing about this one issue could influence me negatively, so I'm wary as I journey on. For now, I think it's productive and helpful, so I keep moving like those pioneer children. ;-)

Labor day

There was a ward picnic this morning and we all had a pretty good time. As I was playing with my son on the playground, I got a little bit frustrated because he is so petrified of the slide. Many months ago he had no fear whatsoever and people always commented on a what a crazy kid he was for it. But, for whatever reason in a toddler's maturation, he now is terrified of coming anywhere near a slide. And as I try to talk him into it (knowing he will love it if he can just relax), he looks at me as if I'm the enemy. He knows I want him to go down the slide and he knows that's not his own goal. What he doesn't realize and I can't convey to him is that I only want him to go because I know he will enjoy it. I don't give a flying flip whether or not he goes for any other reason. But that reason alone is enough to make him distrust me whenever we're near each other by the slide.

Then I realized an odd comparison when the ward starting playing football. My brother-in-law said before the game started that it was the ward's common practice to have a football game after breakfast on Labor Day. I told him it was my common practice to never play football under any circumstances. But what the hell am I so afraid of? Dropping the ball or looking like a fool? Big deal! I stood there next to the slide watching the football game and realized that I'm the same as my son. I have irrational fears and place limitations on myself because I don't trust.

Pearson, 2

"What would have happened if—if you had just made yourself stay where you were with us? If you had just forced yourself to put your other needs away?"

Gerald thought a moment and then replied. "I would have become increasingly bitter and empty—just like Frank." Frank was an old friend whom Gerald had recently run into. He was a homosexual who married and stayed married and had gained eighty pounds in the last two years and hadn’t touched anyone during those two years, not even his wife. "I had to do what I’ve done. I haven’t done it perfectly. I would change a lot if I could, but I had to do it." Had to? All that we had, all that we lost… Could not other choices have brought us to some better destination?

Carol Lynn Pearson,
in Good-bye, I Love You

All I know about Gerald is what Carol Lynn Pearson has told me. I wonder what his blog would look like. What would he say when asked, "Could not other choices have brought us to some better destination?" There were several other quotes I considered discussing from the book, but (besides being a little sick of it) it all comes down to Gerald and his family as a single case example. A true story of a man and his choices. Of how it affected his family. Of where his choices led him.

Choices and destinations are the basis for life--finding the right ones, the best ones,... finding that a particular choice led to an unexpected destination and then making new choices in hopes of evading that destination. Look at the cast of characters I've met in my corner of the blogosphere. Look at their choices and their hopes and dreams and their common humanity. It's spectacular in a way I can't compare to anything else I've experienced.

I don't care that I'm being dramatic and sappy (call it an ode to Pearson). I can't believe the immeasurable humanity I've read in blogs lately. Sure, the literary quality is variable, the syntax occasionally with something left to be desired (ha ha), but just look at the raw intensity of so many people sorting things out. Look at them looking at the situation with clever eyes, critical eyes, frightened eyes, brave eyes because it matters. Look at the serious tenor that underlines even the casual comments. After all, it is the one thing our human chemistry tells us matters more than anything else in life (even if such a message is disguised).

In a way that social stigma and geographic boundaries have long prohibited, blogs seem to let me see choices and destinations with alarming clarity. And yet, there are so many variables that I can't really feel confidence in all the conclusions I'm inclined to draw. But I'm thankful for the things I can learn.

And so I continue the journey.

Index of Pearson posts
Pearson, 1
Detestable
Buried Life
Alone
Sacrifice
Pearson, 2

Sacrifice

“Gerald talked nonstop about how happy he is and how much he’s learning.”

“ Did you believe him?”

“Not entirely. He’s chosen a position now that he has to defend.”

“Chosen? Okay, Mario, just how much of all this did Gerald choose?”

“Not his homosexuality. I don’t believe he chose that. That part just came. Homosexuality is not a sin. But unchastity is. I know people who are as homosexual as Gerald is who have made other choices and are working out very satisfactory family lives.”

“Have they changed? Really changed?”

“Changed. Adapted. Made deliberate choices. I don’t know. But there is more than one way to deal with all of this. I love Gerald. You know that. I’ve always considered him a very great man. He taught me some of the most important things I’ve ever learned. I have thought about him—about both of you—at least once a day for the last ten years. But everything he was telling me about having to follow the ‘real’ him… I don’t know, I just can’t buy that. Listen. I have watched someone close to me go with the ‘the real him’ all his life. And in order to be ‘true to himself’ he destroyed lots of other people along the way. Sacrifice is sometimes not a bad principle. Sometimes it leads not to death but to life. When you don’t ‘follow the music that’s in you,’ if there’s a noble reason for putting it away, maybe you will find an even richer music. I will always love Gerald, but his light is not as clear as it once was. He’s dealing with a lot of sadness and guilt and confusion. I’m sorry.”

Carol Lynn Pearson,
in Good-bye, I Love You

So, which is it then? Be true to yourself, or forget yourself? I'm certain there are times when both are appropriate goals. Which is appropriate in the case of sexuality?

I was alarmed at the phrase "waste and wear out your life in service" when I was young, but it has grown on me like a fondness for ever darker chocolate. But there's also something hugely comforting in the words a friend of mine offered today: "you have to allow yourself the experience of being human."

I think the "real me" took a backseat when I got married. I signed up to give myself away. And I think the promise that, "He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it," rings true in this instance. I'm very happy even when I suck. Even when life sucks. My wife and my son make me so.

But I still wonder about the conflict between Emerson's, "See how the masses of men worry themselves into nameless graves, while here and there a great unselfish soul forgets himself into immortality," and Holmes', "Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out."

True to yourself, or forget yourself?

I really think God wants me to sacrifice certain things, and I'm game. Game to keep trying.

Buried Life

"No one’s spirit is gay or straight, but right now, in this life, as Gerald Pearson, I am a homosexual. I have got to follow that. You’re right. I could be celibate. If I didn’t >need to know and feel and experience, if I were content to just live on the surface of things, I could give it all up. I could squash myself down and bind myself up and tell life to go around and not through me. But, Blossom, I’m a person who needs to live! I am not an empty person. I’ve got to plunge into a life and find out what’s there for me! If I don’t, I’ll gradually die, piece by piece by piece. And I’ll be of no value to anybody, not you or the children or myself!"

Carol Lynn Pearson,
in Good-bye, I Love You

I found this highly offensive. I tried not to. But, Gerald, am I then an "empty person"? Is life merely going around and not through me? Am I not truly living? [Makes obscene gesture at Gerald.]

Gerald isn't the first I've heard make this charge, and he's no doubt not the last. I can imagine if I were him I would quickly add that what I say applies to nobody but myself... that I mean only that I could not live such a life, but that others might (although secretly to myself I would doubt it).

Actually, I have said something very much like that. When people ask me if I think every gay Mormon man should get married I say that my path is only for me. And it's a constant theme in the gay Mormon blogs that each one must reach down deep inside one's self and decide how to deal with this difficult situation.

But then there's that nagging absolutist deep down inside of me trying to claw out. Trying to say, "No, the answer for EVERYBODY is to trust that God knows more about our happiness than we do ourselves. What we can feel is so limited. We're like young children screaming to get away from the needle coming at us, the needle that will save our life."

And then the pragmatic L steps in and sasses back, "People know what makes them happy. They know it more than they know that something unseen and unsure can improve on the here and now." And then the absolutist L violently assaults the pragmatic L with an anvil and the spectator L grabs the popcorn.

The two L's invariably come to a compromise. The absolutist L, being much older and stronger, lays down the law that I internally acknowledge that everyone will be better off following God, but the spry and resilient pragmatic L won't back down until the concession is made that everyone should be allowed to figure that out for themselves, even if it's a tragedy. Gerald, for example, got a lot less life than he expected. And that's not just because he died of AIDS. He was unhappy as a gay man (although I'll save the quote on that for a later post).

But, pragmatic L insists, plenty of gay guys are plenty happy. It's not all tragedies. Absolutist L mutters under his breath, "Yeah, in this life." And spectator L throws his popcorn at the two and says, "Shut up, the poem is coming up."

...Alas! is even love too weak
To unlock the heart, and let it speak?
Are even lovers powerless to reveal
To one another what indeed they feel?
I knew the mass of men conceal'd
Their thoughts, for fear that if reveal'd
They would by other men be met
With blank indifference, or with blame reproved;
I knew they lived and moved
Trick'd in disguises, alien to the rest
Of men, and alien to themselves--and yet
The same heart beats in every human breast!
...
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life;
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to inquire
Into the mystery of this heart which beats
So wild, so deep in us--to know
Whence our lives come and where they go.
...

-Matthew Arnold

When Gerald heard this poem on Music and the Spoken Word, it was the first moment he knew absolutely that he was gay. Spectator L munches on a handful of junior mints and chuckles at the irony of why the poem was probably included in that religious program vs. how Gerald interpreted it.

Pearson, 1

"I was not being dishonest with you when we married. I loved you. You were wonderful and I really did love you. I thought that the problem would be taken care of. They told me it would be. I did everything they said to do. And I thought for a few months that everything was changed."

"But, Gerald," I interrupted, "we were--I was--happy."

"And I was too, in many, many ways. Blossom, this is not your fault. Maybe you think it is, but it has nothing to do with you, only with me. Yes, we were happy. I liked being with you. I even liked being with you physically. But to me it was like...like we were such good friends that we shared everything with each other, even sex. It was never quite like... like lovers. There is this other thing in me, Blossom, and it has never gone away and I know now that it never will. There is this thing in me that needs, that insists that my strongest feelings be for a man. It is a need that seems to be as deep in me as my need for food and breath. I tried to beat it to death, to strangle it, to smother it. And it has not died. Blossom, I know the anguish you've been through this last week. Can you understand that I have been in anguish too? And for more than a week."

"Gerald," I said, "it's wrong!"

"Wrong!" Gerald put his face into his hands and then looked up. "I have taken that word and used it like a whip on myself. I have flagellated myself with that word until I'm bloody. But it does not change things. I have fasted, I have prayed. How many thousands of prayers I have prayed! And it does not change things. If my homosexuality is wrong, then I am wrong, the fact of my being is wrong. Because that's what I am!"

Carol Lynn Pearson,
in Good-bye, I love you

I read Pearson's book about her gay husband dying of AIDS a few weeks ago. It was before I read the article about her daughter, Emily, having also married a gay man and thinking she could make it work. The book was strange to me. I kept reading it trying to assess Pearson's view of homosexuality. I tried to read it for the underlying message. It wasn't until I abandoned that approach and just appreciated that she was telling a story--a story with all the ups, downs, questions, and ambivalence left intact--that I really started enjoying it.

There were places she made me angry. There were many places she made me cry. I was in a public place and kept feeling self conscious. I recommend it to anyone interested in homosexuality and Mormonism.

As for the quote above, I have a few comments. I can agree that my wife and I are not lovers in a burning infatuation and lust sort of sense--something I miss greatly. But we are lovers in the most literal sense of the word. We "make" love of the true kind. We produce it from thin air by being what we are and what we want and what we can be for each other. Love is something I've been meaning to blog on but haven't gotten around to it (yes, I say this all the time!).

This passage brings out so many other issues--the hope for change, the futility of forcing the issue, the very real and unjustified self-hatred we experience, the confusion, the logical quandaries inherent in identity. Happiness without happiness. It makes me feel strangely close to Pearson.

Index of Pearson posts
Pearson, 1
Detestable
Buried Life
Alone
Sacrifice
Pearson, 2

Thinking things

For the last couple years I've had a recurring nightmare. It isn't always the same, but the theme is consistent: I find myself in a high-stakes situation in which I am unprepared. It's often academic. For example, I'm waiting to start a final and I realize (somehow suddenly) that I never bothered to read the textbook. Or I never once showed up for class, forgetting that I had even enrolled. I scramble through my backpack trying to find the text to flip through for a few moments as the proctor says to put away your materials. Panic ensues. Terror.

Life foists that same uneasy feeling on me once in a while. But, being awake, I experience it differently. I feel defensive. I rationalize. I justify. Thankfully, I don't feel nearly as out of control. My mind starts going into overdrive to lay some cognitive path that will protect and defend my... I dunno... happiness?

Yes, I'm still on the happiness kick. Essentially, I'm trying to convey that our brains drive our behaviors, and our personal needs drive our brains in some significant ways without our ever necessarily even realizing it. There's some brand of happiness that our mind vigilantly attempts to get and defend. And when our world view is threatened... when things go wrong, our mind has as its primary task making things better. Unhappiness of this variety gets things going. It makes me move. It protects me as a creature. Can it be viewed as merely another means to a biological end? What about a psychological end? I think it certainly could explain why people (myself included, of course) have such a hard time having a civil conversation about sensitive topics. Happiness is at stake. Sacred personal psychological comfort.

I suppose this explains why I had dread in the pit of my stomach when I attended the scientific presentation about reparative therapy given by Jack Drescher. I suppose it also explains why Dr. Drescher during the lecture was willing to categorically condemn anyone involved with reparative therapy (offering or receiving) as guided by poor motives. Our respective world views seemed to be at stake during that lecture. Consequently, I would have been reluctant to change my opinions had he said something compelling but particularly at odds with my hopes (which he didn't, scientifically), and he offered no concessions of good faith to conservatives or religious folks I believe because to do so would have opened the door to middle ground (unacceptable in terms of his political goals). Anyway, I digress. The point is, people need happiness and they're willing to do mental gymnastics to get it. And it's all quite unnecessary. Truth doesn't give a damn about your mental gymnastics, or your happiness. Things just are what they are. And being aware of that and okay with it seems to be a step toward a more robust and genuine happiness.

Unfortunately, everyone thinks they're already rooted in truth. Their happiness is already genuine. And when the shadows are cast across the quaking soil... panic. Defend the happiness.

Pain problems

Bill Clinton's biography includes his acknowledgment that he began to question his religious roots because he couldn't understand how a loving God could allow so much suffering and pain in the world. I don't remember exactly how he put it, but it was another iteration of the problem of pain discussed in theology and philosophy classes around the globe. It's a problem I appreciate.

If God wants us to be happy, and he most assuredly does, then why does he "make" us in a manner that we desire something forbidden to be happy? For some, the reductio ad absurdum argument ends there and the conclusion is not that happiness doesn't lie with the forbidden thing after all, but that he in fact doesn't forbid it. It's the more pleasant way to resolve the issue. Is it a fallacy? I hope you won't be offended by my offering my opinion that it is.

God doesn't take suffering lightly. He makes it clear throughout scripture that whatever else we do, if we fail to help the suffering, we are in big trouble. But, at the same time, he doesn't keep even the best from suffering. Christ, of course, suffered more than anyone. Job suffered immensely, and the list of martyrs is long. People suffer all the time, and God not only puts up with it, but seems to let it happen to the best. And, it even seems to me that God Himself suffers because of His children's poor choices. This makes me think that presence or absence of suffering isn't a big component in the happiness I'm looking for in life. Maybe it's only the presence or absence of suffering in those around me that counts. I dunno. Maybe there's something distinctive about different kinds of suffering.

Long ago I was told that the key to success is the endurance of pain. I've thought on that quite a bit and realized that subjecting oneself to certain kinds of "suffering" does indeed foster success, discipline, sacrifice, self-control and many other virtues. It's the purported antithesis to happiness that brings the most success and consequently more happiness. Where in all this does embracing gay love or gay sex lie? Does abstaining count as virtuous suffering that will make me stronger? Or does it count as frank unhappiness on the surface?

Not happiness

I'm not entirely sure how to verbalize what happiness is. But I'll tell you what I think it isn't.

I don't care for the aphorism, "ignorance is bliss." I think curiosity is a virtue and knowledge is nearly always a good thing. Perhaps a more apt saying would be "blissful ignorance is just unhappiness saved for later."

One day in clinic I was discussing smoking with a middle-aged lady. She was convinced that because her aunt who had been smoking like a chimney for decades had never had any problem with her lungs and was healthy into her 90's, the warnings about smoking were overblown and inaccurate. Her personal experience and perceptions of what was true and what made her happy led her to continue behaving in a manner that was likely to result in debilitating disease, suffering, and eventual death. Like many people, she couldn't quite understand the idea of relative risk--the idea that there's no black and white correlation between risky behaviors and bad health outcomes. She's like the compulsive gambler who fails to see the high probability of financial ruin because he's so focused on the real possibility, however infinitesimal, that he'll strike it rich. She's a sweet, ignorant fool playing the odds. Nice lady, don't get me wrong. But blissfully ignorant. Stubbornly so.

And this is not happiness. Pleasant, most likely, but not the kind of happiness anyone should be shooting for.

I was told as a child that you can't buy happiness. And I think I've had enough experiences now as an adult to demonstrate to myself the truth of that sentiment. I've had meals that cost over $100, I've traveled, I've spent a fair amount of time with friends taking in the nightlife. And it's all a lot of fun, but ultimately a bit disappointing. Or rather, ultimately a bit pointless. It's the version of happiness that prompts skepticism at the metaphor of heaven as a cherub sitting on a cloud playing a harp and eating grapes. Sure, you can paint the scenario as beautifully as you want, but what the hell is the point?

I can imagine a life for myself in which I find ultimate sexual fulfillment for many years. I can imagine a life in which I am remarkably wealthy and powerful. I can imagine that this life is achievable for a person of my personal qualities. But, again, what the hell is the point? When the libido wanes, the mind is less sharp, and arthritis sets in, that brand of "happiness" will be over. I don't think such a life could necessarily be described as happy regardless of how genuinely great it would be. And that's why I'm trying my best to choose a principled life instead. I'll live off of an average salary and find worthy uses for anything we earn over that. I'll raise a family and give them everything I can. I'll try to heal people and ease their suffering. And, to the extent I do these things not to find happiness, but because they are what's right, I think I'll be happy.

Happiness

Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Over my time blogging, there have a been a few topics that have become central to my journey--a few things about which I hope to always increase my depth of understanding... topics on which I see confusion and misunderstanding. One is certainly love. One is freedom. One is truth. And one is happiness.

My thoughts on the subject of happiness are disjointed enough (and perhaps complex enough) that I can't think of how to write a readable blog entry that captures it. So, I'll just acknowledge that up front and then take a stab at it.

Happiness, according variously to Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, is the purpose of our existence. Men are that they might have joy. How we define happiness and how we believe we will reach it is where the disagreement starts. I don't think the conventional happiness I hear some pursuing is what Joseph was talking about, and I don't think that getting to real happiness is a "choose your own adventure."

So, what is happiness? I'm interested in hearing what everyone has to say. I've wondered if it is a sense of peace and fulfillment, a pleasant sense that one's life is in fulfillment of one's potential and in accordance with God's expectations. Is it loving and being loved? Is it having low enough expectations that you can never be disappointed... embracing each small blessing with gratitude and bliss, no matter how small? Is it paradoxical, as Hawthorne suggests, in that you can never achieve it when you pursue it? This makes sense to me based on my impression of what happiness is.

My experience so far is simply that when I give up my pursuit of what I think will make me happy and attempt to focus on other more principled goals, happiness inexplicably sets in. Faced with the impossible situation my sexuality and my moral views place me in, there was no conceivable way for me to achieve what I know I want more than anything. It just wasn't going to work. And I assumed that happiness was going to be impossible for me. Having relented the conflict of how to force it all to work and rather having determined to do what I believe is right rather than what will make me happy, things worked out for me. It's like facing an impenetrable wall and having stopped pushing against it with my shoulder to busy myself with helping someone else, I find myself suddenly on the other side.

Joseph Nicolosi, 2

Motivation to change has repeatedly been found to be a primary predictor of success in treatment. Motivation means the client is unambivalent in rejecting a homosexual identity and is striving toward heterosexuality. Other indicators of favorable prognosis are lack of indulgence in self-pity, a positive sense of self, and the ego-strength to tolerate stress and frustration. Heterosexual fantasies and dreams are also strongly favorable. Also the stronger family relationships the client has, the better his prognosis.

Joseph Nicolosi, Ph.D.
in Reparative Therapy of Male Homosexuality

Is change something I really want? Not always, to be honest, but it's something I want to want. Premish recently got me thinking about desire to change. I've thought about it before in a more broad sense: when I'm hungry, would I rather be fed or just have the hunger eliminated altogether. Logically, they result in the same thing, satiety. But when I'm hungry, I don't WANT to have the hunger simply removed, I want it to be gratified. I suppose there's something psychological about that, but I'm far from insightful enough to realize what it is and if someone were to try to tell me I would most likely laugh them off.

Well, maybe I'll give it a try. Maybe there's something deep down that recognizes that a hunger has its basis in a real need--that just removing the hunger doesn't fill the need for sustenance. And my sexual hunger is reflective of a real need that will never be satisfied by castrating myself emotionally or physically, figuratively or literally. Further, in the case of sexual desire, the physical itch can be gratified without ever touching the underlying need for companionship and intimacy. That, I believe, is why I believe sexual and emotional needs cry to be met and it's hard for me sometimes to even WANT to change.

And I suppose that's why I find Nicolosi's theories so compelling. I'm as prone as the next person to label a person or his work as categorically good or bad, right or wrong, treasure or trash, but that's a lazy generalization. When I give him a charitable read, I realize that despite a number of flaws, I have much to learn from this man and his research. The etiology he suggest fits with my concept of neither sufficient nor necessary causes for homosexual orientation, and matches surprisingly well with events and conditions in my own past. My sexual, emotional, and intimacy needs can be met without behaving in a way contrary to what I know God expects of me. How to manage it is the game currently afoot. A game I think I'm winning, I might add.

A line at the beginning of the treatment section of the book made me stop in my tracks. He said, "I do not believe that any man can ever be truly at peace in living out a homosexual orientation." I found it to be repulsive on the surface. After a moment I realized that he means merely to conclude from his psychological work that homosexuality is a symptom of other identity and developmental problems that prevent complete well-being. From a secular point of view, I don't think he has sufficient data to conclude that, nor does his theory seem to require it. But, do I really believe that is true? I surprise myself by resisting the idea pretty strongly. Why should I resist, when that is exactly the core reason for church doctrine on the subject? If I believe the Proclamation on the Family (and I do), then I can't avoid drawing the conclusion that homosexuality is an obstacle to true peace. I feel almost like I need to apologize to my gay friends for believing this, but I suppose that's my strong-willed personality traits coming through (stumbling all over myself trying not to offend, to get everyone on the same page... well you can see that I've managed to survive a number of failures on that front in the past!).

Other than my fantasies and dreams, I think I've got some pretty good prognostic indicators in my favor. I look forward to loving more, believing in myself more, and struggling for lofty goals.

Index of Joseph Nicolosi posts:
Joseph Nicolosi, 1
Sensitivity
Limitations of gay love
Causes
Affirmative therapy
Self-acceptance
Joseph Nicolosi, 2