I talked about the way in which I have been handling grieving during this current potential change in my life. First, I shared that I will be grieving the times in my current job that are truly challenging and stimulating my creative juices. My old love of theater and art is reestablished as I prepare a script with my colleagues that portrays satisfaction with a newfound product or that leads to the resolution of a difficult problem. I also love to assist in identifying or creating the visuals that accompany this script. It is as if my work in the gallery and work with the theater company are coming together. Though what I am producing is a promotion of something trivial (such as the use of a deodorant) rather than something profound (like the enactment of a scene of reconciliation in a play I am helping to promote).
I also mention that I am grieving the potential loss of strong relationships with other members of the ad agency with which I am working. They are often frustrated, former players in the fields of art or theater. I will miss our extended conversations after work regarding Bertold Brecht or Wassily Kandinsky. Finally, and most importantly, I am grieving the potential loss of the centering relationship in my life. This being with my wife. I am very fearful about what could happen if she and I parted ways. My Guts are gnarled up as I speak about my wife. Would the gnarling of my Gut remain forever in place if I were to be alone in my life. The tears well up again. I don’t push them away.
We closed the session by Dr. Freud pointing to a motivating factor that is even stronger than the fear of loss. This is the fear of regret. We will do almost anything to avoid regretting what we didn’t do, the decisions we didn’t make, the path we didn’t take. While we would like to achieve something in our life, we are much more concerned about regretting not attempting to achieve something. Dr. Freud gave me a homework assignment. He asked me to identify several things I have regretted in my life. He would like me to bring these regrets to our next session.
Session Six
When I entered Dr. Freud’s office, I was drawn to a specific artifact he has on his bookshelf. He explains that this is an ancient representation of Hope. This crude statue comes from an African tribe where the sense of an impending future is big in their collective consciousness. In essence, they live in the future and worship the figure represented in this statute because it evokes a hopeful image of the future.
I talked a bit about my own hopes for the near future. Dr. Freud then asks me to talk a bit about the regrets I had identified after our last session. He noted that our regrets often relate closely to our hopes. We either regret not hoping for something—playing it too safe—or we regret hoping for something that was never realistic. Even worse, we may have spent time not just engaged in fanciful hoping but also wasting time and energy trying to act on this fanciful hope. I identified one of my regrets that fits this category of fanciful hopes. I mentioned that I had hoped, as a young, creative member of my ad agency, to be rewarded for my efforts and would receive multiple promotions that would enable me to lead large-scale, paradigm-shattering projects. Furthermore, these projects would relate to matters of social and environmental importance. I would be doing good, while also being creative and making a good living in terms of both finances and security. While I do have a fair amount of financial security in my job, the rest of the dream has been pretty much shattered. Not much hope on the horizon.
