For years I struggled to decipher their language, see beneath their glowing, often stifled tales of childhood, their pallid honeymoon narratives, or their strained portrayals of obligatory family rituals. I tried hard to interpret their put-downs and insults:
“You could never afford to live this way if you hadn’t married me.”
“I could scream when you go stone face on me.”
“The bitch in you is always guaranteed to come out when we visit your family.”
“You’re as screwed up as your mother.”
“You’re even worse than your father.”
“You’ve turned into the most uncaring, self-centered narcissist I’ve ever known.”
Smart bombs delivered in prosaic, everyday language.
It took me a long time to realize their words were mostly scrambled in Enigma code and I had to stop impersonating a brilliant cryptographer.
Today they come to me making small talk and courteous conversation, as their bodies tell me they feel like a mess. Some are clingy and scared, cut off from the parts I know are yearning for joy. Others arrive weighed down in a shit feeling that doesn’t quite blur their fascinating quirks and idiosyncrasies. Some bring in their painful stories and plop them down on my coffee table, leaving me to glimpse a parched, neglected garden hidden deep in the small of their back. At least three-quarters of them say they’re fine when their faces tell me they feel screwed up inside.
I want the ones who feel like dumb shits to believe they’re just smart enough. The guys who believe they’re sexless nerds to feel like magnets for babes turned on by wit and intelligence. The babes at the gym in sports bras and skin-tight leotards to raise their eyes just once to a guy who wants to see what they look like inside. I want all the nerds and babes in the world who feel hopelessly flawed to know they’re just perfectly imperfect.
Whenever they’re feeling numb and drained of all hope for themselves, I want them to imagine something better than being a fixed commodity or medically diagnosed personality disorder. I want them to see they’ve been brainwashed, force-fed a great big lie by a lot of well-meaning people: analytic psychotherapists and psychiatrists, parents, teachers, coaches, boyfriends, girlfriends, ex-wives, and husbands; many of them with the best of intentions but sincerely ignorant and conscientiously stupid.
I want them to see their unconscious as a great treasure chest laden with rich, unstoried stuff, hidden resources, strengths and powers they’ve never used because they’ve been brainwashed into believing they’re powerless.
I want them to realize their story is only one of other possible stories, as in a screenplay, an inspiring memoir, or a poignant, unfinished symphony. That after a traumatic loss, betrayal, divorce, or break up, they can go on to create new, more hopeful narratives and landscapes of consciousness for their lives.
I want them to understand that the antidote to brainwashing is to expect their lovers to be patient, compassionate, and willing to cope with their unreasonable demands for affection, their insecurities, and eccentricities. More than anything, I want them to defy the experts, be audacious, and embrace their wonderfully human, occasionally disastrous personalities.
