Wednesday, February 08, 2012

The End of Self Help Part 1

I started reading self-help books at thirteen years old, with appetite and fervor. But the true gateway was Women’s Day magazine quizzes at my grandmother’s house, age nine. Sitting on the couch which smelled like tongue, leafing through smoky pages quickly to the quiz section. My grandmother was endlessly patient with me as I quizzed her: Did she like A) bright colors and tango lessons, B) muted colors and waltzing or C) slow dancing and florals?

After tallying the answers into a final and definitive category of mostly As, mostly B’s or mostly C’s, I found out answers that were alternately intuitive and frightening. I learned that I was an introvert, I was naturally disorganized and my grandmother and grandfather were ill-matched and should seek marital counseling quickly. When I read aloud the results of their marital fate, they both laughed heartily with a bitterness and rawness that unnerved me.

As a blemished, tragic romantic of fifteen years old, self-help books held the key to salvation for me. All my awkward intense feelings of difference and aloneness could be changed by absorbing key principles of empowered living and authentic relationships. I could be unafraid or at least love my fear, be a model of self acceptance, financially secure (perhaps a millionaire), multiply orgasmic, ayurvedically balanced, gluten free and 100% creative and alive. I read the books in hopes of finding an antidote to the intimate and messy universe.

So, I accrued a lot of books, hundreds across the spectrum of self-help. I read them under the auspices that I wanted to be a therapist, that I needed to know how to help the socially anxious, ADD symptomatic, traumatized individuals of the world. But really, I read them all for myself. I filled bookshelves with Potatoes not Prozac, Codependent No More, Earn what You Deserve, If The Buddha Dated, also If the Buddha got Stuck and If the Buddha Married. Passionate Marriage and the Inner Child Workbook. Oh, and the magical wisdom of Spiritual Astrology, The Highly Sensitive Person and don’t forget the many tomes of Sark.

If I was bored, I would thumb through Radical Honesty, The Wisdom of the Enneagram or A Path with Heart. I stopped reading fiction altogether. Periodically through our years together, my writer-husband Ben suggested thoughtfully that I read some “real literature.” Let him read intellectual experimental fiction and prose poems, I thought defensively. That wasn’t me. I accused him of not accepting my true self. I had fought hard to feel okay about my self help library. I couldn’t read my books at the cafe without shame but at home, self help piled next to the bed. Eckhart Tolle, Parenting from the Inside Out and Healing Through the Dark Emotions were just my speed. On the bus, it was fine to read a Buddhist-type self book but totally inappropriate and shameful to read a book which genre straddled the self help/new age categories.I knew the rules.

Then one day while I chatted with a friend, she described me as a “distilled self help book.” Her tone was more admiring than judgmental but something inside me vomited, flinched and wilted as she said it. It’s true that I could describe in detail the process of “opening to a feeling” or explain the necessity of safety for trauma survivors. But inside I dreamt of being a wild woman, a self-trusting mystic who wrote poetry and manifestos by open water, did socially engaged art and followed inner promptings to adventures all around the world. Vanessa, the beekeeper, well maybe not beekeeper, but maybe Vanessa, the dancer, the artist and writer. Vanessa the Inner Child therapist, the mother, the herbalist, the wild one.

But I had become obsessed with other people’s wisdom. Other people’s visions of what the world was. My vocabulary was domesticated by self help and I turned away from my own inner-expert. I quizzed myself: Was I enmeshed with my mother? Was I practicing extreme self care? Did I need more mindfulness or to do a body scan? Was I differentiating enough from my husband? What the fuck was wrong and why wasn’t I happy?

I needed a big intervention, a massive change in direction. So I proclaimed AN END TO SELF HELP. Or rather an end to reading self help books. I got some boxes, packed them with all my self help books and got Ben to lug them to the basement. Then I sat on the floor of the echoing chamber that was my bedroom, gazing absently at the empty space on my bookshelves. What to do now? And this is when the shit hit the fan.



Vanessa Brackett
Feb. 2012

Vanessa blogs at increase the levels of radiance

Thursday, February 02, 2012

Seth's Pond

An excerpt from "Bella and Bea," a novel for preteens

Bea got on her bike and went down the hill to the pond.  She put the bike down by the wooden railing and made her way onto the shady path; the coolness of the air inviting like a cloud moving across the hot sun. As she came nearer to the water’s edge she heard whistling.   She began to whistle back. Suddenly the whistling stopped and Bea stood still.
“Hey,” yelled Bea and then she let out a whistle. She looked down the shoreline but it was empty except for some big rocks and  course sand on the shore.
Suddenly, a shrill whistle screeched in the silence. It was so close that Bea jumped.
She turned around and saw Jono
“Hey, what are you doing? That hurt my ears,” said Bea a bit irritated.
Jono just shrugged his shoulders and scampered down the path towards a rock that was half in the water.
Without an invite, Bea followed him thinking that if he didn’t want her there, he would say so.  Near a tree on the shore, Jono had stashed a fishing rod and tackle box.  He took out a fishhook from his tackle box and attached it to his rod. He then held up some bait; a slimy, squirmy worm.
 Bea held out her hand, a gesture that made Jono raise his eyebrow with surprise and curiosity.
“Do you fish?” he asked.
“I have,” said Bea not offering more information.
“Okay, let’s see you hook the worm and set out the line.”
Bea smiled and took the wiggly worm out of Jono’s hand.   She hooked the worm and swung the rod overhead. Jono watched the arc of the line and the spot where the hook landed in the water.
“Nice,” he said.
Bea smiled again and handed the rod to Jono.
For a while all they heard was the soft rustling of leaves and bird songs. Bea broke the silence. “Where’s Lucky?”
“Dad took him to the vet’s,” said Jono looking out into the water.
“Is he okay?” Bea asked with concern.
“Yeah, needs his yearly shots.”
“You must love having him.  He’s such a good dog. So, why the name Lucky?”
Jono’s face darkened as if a stormy cloud covered it.   “Just because,”  he said more quietly.
“Because he gives you luck?” Bea asked
“Not really ...”
“Well, is it because he’s lucky, I mean like being a cat that has nine lives?” Bea persisted.
“Yeah, I guess you could say that.  He was brought to the animal shelter when he was a pup. There was a fire and well his mother and another pup from the litter didn’t get out in time. But Lucky did and we got him. We didn’t name him; the people at the shelter did.” 
“Wow that is so sad and happy at the same time.  Lucky was sure lucky,” said Bea as she stole a glance at Jono.
“Yeah he is,” Jono said glancing back at her.
This time, Bea looked straight at him and said, “I hope he brings you luck, Jono,”
Jono did not say anything but looked out into the pond.  It was a beautiful summer day. The water was smooth, soft and still. Every now and then bullfrogs croaked and dragonflies skimmed the surface of the pond.  The blue sky and clouds reflected in the water. Bea looked out to the other side of the pond.
“Jono, what’s the pond like in winter. Can you skate on it?”
“Winter, yeah, you can,” he mumbled.
Before she could stop herself, Bea asked, “What’s it like here in winter?”
The dark cloud came across Jono’s face again. “Cold, icy. I hate it.”
“Oh,” she said softly and remembered  what Dad had told her about the accident  a few winters ago.  She was ready to change the subject when the fishing rod began to bend.  “Jono,” a fish, she whispered, “Reel it in.”
He stood there on the rock and held onto the fishing rod tightly with his left hand as he reeled in the fishing line with his right. He cranked and cranked as the rod kept bending.  Just as he was pulling back on the rod, Bea yelled, “Faster, Jono, faster. It must be a huge fish!”
And out of the water came a good sized bass flopping on the line. With a wide grin, Jono held the fish up high.  The dark cloud on his face was gone.


Marilyn London-Ewing
December 2011