Tag Archives: depression

Creativity and internal conflict…

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There was an article on Bruce Springsteen in the Guardian today. I am not a huge fan- but there is one of his albums, Nebraska, that I have played a lot. It is a spare, bleak collection of songs recorded on a basement 4 track cassette recorder. Some of it makes the hairs on your kneck stand out.

It was both shocking, and yet not a surprise to read this;

While he was working on his 1982 album Nebraska, he felt “suicidal”, according to friend and biographer Dave Marsh. “The depression wasn’t shocking, per se,” Marsh explained to Remnick. “He was on a rocket ride, from nothing to something, and now you are getting your ass kissed day and night. You might start to have some inner conflicts about your real self-worth.”…

The Boss was driven, he admitted, “by pure fear and self-loathing and self-hatred”.

“I’m 30 years in analysis!” Springsteen said. “You think, I don’t like anything I’m seeing, I don’t like anything I’m doing, but I need to change myself, I need to transform myself.

“I do not know a single artist who does not run on that fuel,”

I was reminded on an old post I wrote, reflecting on some words by David Bailey– he said that he had never known a good artist who did not have absolute confidence in their work. This seemed nonsense to me, as those I had met seemed full of doubts and fears about everything they created, and quite a lot about themselves too.

This may reflect my own skewed perspective of course. Success perhaps belongs to the bombastic.

But then again, creativity does appear to relate to introspection, and no one instrospects like those of us who carry damage. We have been hiding deep inside ourselves, and built all sorts of defences to keep it quiet down there. One of the ways of communication left to us is through art. There is no better example than Peter Howson.

Or Bruce of course.

Churchill’s faithful black dog, and why we might be grateful…

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I wonder if anyone heard this last Sunday morning-

(The programme blurb-)

“For a couple of days in May 1940, the fate of the world turned on the fall of a leaf” says John Gray. He outlines the strange conjunction of events – and the work of chance – that led to Churchill becoming Prime Minister.

He muses on how Churchill was found by one of his advisers around one o’clock on the morning of May 9th “brooding alone in one of his clubs”. He was given a crucial bit of advice which may have secured him the job. What would have happened Gray wonders if he hadn’t been found and that advice – to say nothing! – not been passed on?

He also ponders whether it was it Churchill’s recurring melancholy which made for his greatness? “It’s hard to resist the thought that the dark view of the world that came on Churchill in his moods of desolation enabled him to see what others could not”.

“Churchill had not one life but several” says Gray. Without them all, “history would have been very different, and the world darker than anything we can easily imagine”.

Interesting for several reasons- the obvious historical one- the other leading candidate for Prime Ministership (who most MPs wanted) probably would have sued for peace rather than fought on against Hitler. As a pacifist, I would have supported him in this- but the end result of Churchill’s influence on British politics at this time was war- and history has rather sided with him on this one…

The other reason however is related to how we understand depression.

Churchill was stalked by what he called his ‘black dog’ all his life. He was prone to black moods and fits of despair- it separated him from those around him, and made him different.

Depression is a terrible thing- it destroys lives. But Depression is not only a terrible thing- and those who journey with the black dog often achieve a level of insight and depth of understanding that others do not.

Depression in this sense may actually be a means of equipping us for life.

Some time ago I wrote a post on why I found all the obsession with positivity rather difficult. All those shiny happy invocations to will ourselves to ever greater heights. Here it is- entitled ‘In which I find myself reacting against positive thinking’. This is really not because I believe that to be miserable is good, and that we are all doomed (although perhaps we might be when I come to think about it.) Rather I believe that we start from where we are- and I am sick of people telling us to be someone else.

Human life is made up of light and shade- and as well as pure white there are many shades of grey. My experience is that most art emerges from the shadows- most creativity is achieved through adversity- and perhaps great statesmen also need a hinterland…

Blackpool rock…

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The glass is half empty again.

Strange that I should feel so ‘down’ after being part of such good things recently- but it is part of a familiar pattern, and this too will pass.

Because I set myself to some kind of honesty here (or at least a nod in its direction) I will practice the old vulnerability of poetry.

Forgive the mawkish self pity- and worry not- all the best people are broken. And I am more broken than most.

Oh- and forgive the bad language. Not something I would normally resort to, but in this instance, it seemed apposite.

Blackpool rock

.

There are words that run through me

Like a stick of Blackpool rock

Revealed again at each teeth jarring splinter

Slickened in scornful accusation

They say;

.

Failure

Fool

Fat

All f****d up

.

Better not to let you bite

At this broken edged circle

Lest you read me clearly

.

And God is gone

Even if the space he left behind

Still resonates

Becoming the beloved…

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We watched a DVD in housegroup this evening, borrowed from Michaela Kast (Thanks Michaela!) of Henri Nouwen, great catholic writer, friend and companion of Jean Vanier and standing a great tradition of writers and Spiritual thinkers who are influenced by liberation theology.

Here is a clip from the DVD I discovered on you tube-

There were two more talks on the DVD, and we watched them all.

The second one talked about communion- how the breaking of the bread was an image for how we were to live our lives.

TAKEN- Chosen so that we might see the chosen-ness in others.

BLESSED- but blessed most through our encounter with the other- in learning how to give blessing, not through seeking to receive for our own sake. Speaking well of one another- not looking for evidence for the prosecution…

BROKEN- being aware of our own brokenness, but not living in fear of it- rather placing it under the blessing.

GIVING- our life finds real purpose when we practice active loving of others

The third one focussed on the discipline of becoming the beloved- and had three elements-

LISTENING to God- time aside to be alone.

COMMUNITY- not the dependent, mutually needy but friction related community, but rather a community of people who are aware of being the Beloved…

And finally- MINISTRY- which is the practical out pouring of the two above.

I will post some more about this some time later, as it is a central theme for me at the moment…

I first discovered Nouwen through our friend and former pastor Judith Warren, who was helping me through some counselling at the time. I was struggling to ever believe that I could be the Beloved of anyone- let along God. It is a struggle that continues in me at times still.

And it was not until I listened to Nouwen again this evening that I realised how much these teachings have become central to the way I understand God, and the life of faith. Not because I think these things are now sorted and OK in me- but rather because contained within the hope love and joy of these words is something ineffably GOOD and right.

It is a return again to simple things, running deep.

The beloved who are free to love.

Nouwen died in 2006, of a sudden heart attack.

It is perhaps worth noting that he struggled with clinical depression. His book ‘Wounded Healer‘ written in 1969, speaks of a way of reaching out to others through connecting with our own brokenness and pain.

His life and ministry is another reason that I am grateful for the Catholic tradition.

Holy Spirit mojo…

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So what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, love mercy and walk humbly with your God.

Micah 6:8

I have been struggling a bit recently. Nothing dramatic- I am well used to low level angst. But I had this feeling of being shadowed and somehow beyond reach.

If I dig into what this was about, then some of it seemed to begin in the aftermath of a few difficult exchanges- some of them on-line discussions.

Like I said, I have learned to live with these shadows. I know myself well enough to see them as part of who I am and to have become aware that Grace is more powerful- and also that the ongoing transformational encounter with God that I have had is a process– not a magical event.

I can even believe that this process can be seen as the turning of negative things to positive-

So intense sensitivity can become a way to be sensitive to others.

Introspection and introversion can become creativity and contemplation.

Damage and depression can become empathy and openness to others who had emotional pain, and passion for social justice.

Isolation and social awkwardness can be mediated through an increasing awareness love and the value of friendship and community.

Doubt and insecurity can be turned to become instead the holy, restless longing for the ‘thing just beyond’- just outside the known. They can drive us to seek after God, and to reach out a little further beyond the safe places.

And like all of us, once I identified the things I was good at- once I had found my areas of expansion- I found a platform of security to build confidence and direction.

When the things that we define ourselves by are challenged- when we fall flat on our faces, or when others take a look at what we stand on and find it wanting- this can be hard.

So when confronted with others whose confidence and self assuredness exceeds my own, and they take a swipe at the things I stand on, I tend to shrink a little. Not nearly as much as I used to, but still, I struggle.

The issues that have laid on me heavily have been these-

• How an attempt to network can lead to a perception of empire building. And how unsatisfied I am with my response to such a challenge- which has been simply to withdraw.

• A suggestion that the life I found in ‘emerging church’ conversation is just male dominated argumentative posturing.

• And that unless I moved to live in the inner city and sought to do church with people in poor estates then my faith, and my chosen social work career, and by implication my whole life, has no value.

• A need to look beyond- to ask ‘what next Lord?’, well aware that I will never be fully satisfied with my own efforts towards life and love.

In the face of these challenges, I found myself shrinking inwards- still active and functioning, but lacking vitality. But God has this way of pouring in hope again, despite my capacity to let it leak out.

This is what I think he has had to say to me.

Put down those things you carry
Sit with me a while
Stop making things so complicated
It is much simpler than that

Start from where you are
Not where you would like to be
Not where others say you should be
There may come a time when I will warm your heart towards a new thing
But right now
I just want to warm your heart

All around you is beauty
See it

All around you are people I love
And I rejoice as you learn to love them too

Look for softness in your heart
There I am

Look for tenderness
And it will be my Spirit
Calling you to community

It is not for you to cut a way into the undergrowth
Or make a road into the rocky places
Rather let us just walk
And see were this path will lead us
You and I

For my yolk rests easy
If you will wear it
And my burdens lie soft on the shoulders
If you will take them up

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Dressing up light for the dancing…

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Snow above Loch Eck, Argyll

Snow above Loch Eck, Argyll

The snow fell very early this year.

Last year, it was after Christmas when the first snow appeared on the mountains around us. We are close to the sea, so mostly it rains.

But last week we had a spell of cold clear weather, and snow kissed the mountain tops.

Winter can be cruel here. Not in the Good-King-Wenceslas kind of way- but nevertheless it can sap at the soul. The dark nights, the constant wind and rain, the wet cold that seems to soak into your bones.

The hillsides become unstable sources of land slips, the whole landscape goes dead-bracken brown and lifeless, the trees skeletal against grey skies and the pine forests become one huge dark moss sponge.

For those of melancholic disposition, such as myself, there is a beauty to these winters. The shafts of cold sunlight that periodically turn the dull browns to shining bronze. The empty wildness of the landscape. But I know I will come to long for the springtime.

I have friends who experience depression. For them, winter is a dangerous time, containing the possibility of the end of hope. The days deny the reality of the coming of soft days and renewal, and just leave a dark tunnel with no distant exit point.

For us all, there is a pressing need for to transcend the darkness. To find light. To put it on like a coat and walk in it.

To dwell in warmth and companionship, to see beauty and to celebrate it.

Some things make this more possible- and for me, one of these things is snow…

First snows

The first snows of winter bring blessing
To the hills and the mountains.
Yesterday bottle-brown
Now blue white crystal and pure

Soon rain will bring spoil and destruction
Turning the white mottled brown
Releasing the streams
Yesterday’s secret tears running down

But for now
My vision is draw to the highlands
Captured by sparkling sunlight
Shining but showing no shadow
Driving the darkness away

Dressing up light for the dancing and leading me on

Dressing up light for the dancing, then it’s gone.