Exploring a Third Way

 

 “I had to photograph this jubilant orphan, who beat the odds and flourished
 after her seed washed up on a lonely rocky shore in Kittery, ME.”

Reflecting on my tiger lily’s triumph over adversity has inspired me to examine the impact of random and unexpected events on our lives.  For the tiger lily, whose species originated in China, it involved only a blind will to survive. However, for us humans, unexpected random events are usually not life or death. Yet, how we handle them has far-reaching consequences, altering the trajectory of our lives.

We can either view random and unforeseen events as an unwarranted disruption or a serendipitous creative force. When I was creating structural landscapes as a wall builder, I often started out with strong convictions about how to proceed, but then had to yield to realities on the ground. As Gregory Bateson, the visionary ecologist, cautioned us, “a map is not the territory.” In a similar manner, the map you plot in your head to follow in life will not include the steep mountains and unexpected abysses you will undoubtedly encounter.

In the same manner, I never know where I will end up when I start writing. One word prompts the next, one thought leads to another, and pretty soon, I have left the world I intended to write about far behind.

Until recently, it was generally believed that there were only two strategies for handling the random and unforeseen in life: A person could either pursue “a happy life,” pursuing security, stability, and having money with free time to spend it.  The alternative was to strive for “a meaningful life” based on high moral standards, strong principles, and a burning desire to make a difference in the world.^⁠1

In my younger years, I held both of these paths in such high regard that I couldn’t choose. I blamed myself for being too weak-kneed to make a firm decision and then have the gumption to follow through. I believe this is a common dilemma for many people. 

Recently, I found an alternative that could set us free. 

Rather than having to choose between a happy life or a meaningful one, psychologists Shigehiro Oishi and Erin Westgate have come up with a third option: “We propose that ‘psychological richness’ is another, neglected aspect of what people consider a good life. Unlike happy or meaningful lives, psychologically rich lives are best characterized by a variety of interesting and perspective-changing experiences.”^⁠2

Sometimes we become so fixated on happiness that we try to capture it by living a life chasing only positive feelings and comfort. But if we hope to achieve psychological richness, we must embrace all aspects of our lives, even the unpleasant, Oishi and Westgate write. “Discomfort is a sign that you’re growing,”^⁠3

According to Psychology Today, “Psychological richness entails accepting life as it happens, in its entirety. “If we consider stories that we accumulate and share with others as the currency of psychological richness, many of our experiences can lend new insights and propel us towards growth, thus adding up to wealth.^⁠4”

Consider this column about the orphan tiger lily an example of this new currency of psychological richness..

xxx

¹ https://medium.com/illumination/the-psychologically-rich-life-3f3bfa30343

² Oishi, S., & Westgate, E. C. (2022). A psychologically rich life: Beyond happiness and meaning. Psychological Review, 129(4), 790–811. https://doi.org/10.1037/rev0000317

³ Ibid.

⁴ https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/between-cultures/202205/how-to-live-a-psychologically-rich-life

My life has been like a broken pot

 

A pit-fired pot given to me by Dwight Graves*

I’ve always admired people who discovered their true purpose in life as teenagers, pushed through to achieve their goal despite all obstacles, and ended up with a fulfilling career. That’s not me.

My sense of purpose as a high school senior was directed toward escaping the confines of rural NH. I wanted to study psychology after reading Sigmund Freud. I was lucky enough to be accepted at Columbia in the heart of the Big Apple.

I had to work hard to catch up with my classmates, many of whom had attended prestigious private schools. Between studying a lot and being shy, I felt lonely. But worse, my excitement about psychology was soon extinguished because Columbia’s psychology department was fixated on hard science: stimulus and response as measured by experiments with white rats in Skinner boxes.

Rather than showing grit, I waved the white flag, gave up, and dropped out during my third semester. Rudderless and, partly as an olive branch to my disappointed father, I joined the Navy, which had been a valued part of his life. For the next three years, I learned a lot about human nature and small-group psychology while cruising the rivers of Vietnam and raising hell in bars across the Far East. 

After the Navy, I enrolled at UNH. I soon found a new, compelling purpose in life after taking courses with Professor Bobick, who had an exquisite grasp of sociology in its philosophical (starting with Homer) and literary roots. He wrote me a recommendation stating I was one of his most promising students.

 I chose a graduate program with generous tuition assistance, despite its orientation not being a good fit for me. Spending long, sedentary hours in sterile classrooms, I felt trapped like a frisky puppy perpetually confined to a timeout cage. 

I tried twice and dropped out each time. Because my sense of purpose was again lacking, I found myself thrown out into the real world without an occupation. 

Almost by accident, I ended up working as a self-employed mason building dry-laid stone walls, a skill I picked up during summer jobs in construction. I enjoyed doing hard physical labor, sweating under the hot sun. I loved being my own boss, which was an important discovery. As a bonus, I enjoyed the artistic side of doing high-end stone work.

My original plan was to earn enough money building walls during the summer to take the winter off and write. But I ended up writing very little, once again, because of a lack of clear purpose. After a decade of this routine, my creative self felt cramped. Still, out of inertia, I soldiered on for another 10 years until my joy of working bareback under the hot sun took its toll, resulting in three different skin cancers.

Seeking a change, I hoped a Master’s Degree would help me get published as a freelance writer, so I applied to Antioch Graduate School in Keene, returning once again to psychology. This time, the program was not about helping people, not manipulating white rats. 

 As I was still working as a stone mason, the grind was relentless. Many times I was tempted to drop out, but paying back 26K without a degree for a soon-to-be 50-year-old divorced man was too much to contemplate.

As it turned out, I thrived as a therapist. Working at my first job with combat veterans with  PTSD at Vet Centers gave my life meaning, along with an unbreakable sense of obligation. I took my responsibility seriously, going to bed early with no excess partying. I learned work habits that have since then held me in good stead.

Then I transitioned to the civilian world, working as a therapist at a Community Health Center, and then moving on to private practice before mostly retiring in 2021.  With more free time, during this transition, I found myself devoting more time to photography and writing.

Since the 1980s, I have done some writing: a few freelance pieces and occasional columns for the Concord Monitor, sometimes as a member of the Monitor Board of Contributors. In retirement, I decided to challenge myself by trying to write a column every week for the Monitor. I wanted to see if I had anything to say and, if I did, whether the Monitor would publish it. 

So far, they have. 

Writing here today about the many twists and turns in my life has given me a key insight: While a few folks may develop a long, lasting sense of purpose, most don’t. And I’m one of them. Rather than a single clear purpose, mine has meandered and shifted course due to the slings and arrows of life.

My sense of purpose is more like kintsugi, a Japanese art form where broken pottery is glued back together and then the cracks are dusted with gold. Instead of disguising the damage, kintsugi highlights the breaks, transforming them into unique and beautiful features. 

This practice is not just about repairing objects; it embodies a philosophical approach that embraces imperfection and the beauty of a repaired object's history. 

That’s the way we should all think about our lives.

xxx

* Dwight Graves was a well-known local potter from Warner, a peace activist, musician, Vietnam vet, and NH “Educator of the Year”

What if humans went extinct next Friday

 

CC Jean Stimmell

Yes, we might think we’re invincible and capable of doing everything on our own, like John Wayne or James Bond; that is, until we suffer a serious injury, illness, or reach old age. That’s when we develop a little humility and realize we’re not isolated islands, solitary individuals who must rely solely on ourselves to navigate what is hyped as a dog-eat-dog world. At that moment, we see that, at our core, we are all interdependent in the Buddhist sense of the word.

But it takes a lot to wake us up to this fact.. That’s what Mark Taylor attempts to do in a podcast with Sean Illing, basing a discussion of Taylor’s book “After the Human.”^⁠1

Why is it so hard for us to acknowledge that we are all interdependent beings, dependent for our survival on Mother Earth? Healthy ecosystems are as critical for us as an oxygen line is for a deep-sea diver. Intellectually, I know this to be true, and occasionally I actually experience feeling that way, one with the universe, after my ego dissolves during meditation.

But, regrettably, upon reentering the hubbub of everyday life, my ego quickly elbows itself back to life, sweet-talking me into eating red meat, not recycling enough, and often buying things on Amazon rather than shopping locally. Once again, I am hypnotically following the yellow brick road of our modern times.

There are numerous reasons why culture has conspired to separate me from nature, a circumstance we find most common in Western societies.

The Bible laid the groundwork by asserting that God gave humankind dominion over the Earth. René Descartes separated the human mind from the physical world. The rise of agriculture and urban centers distanced humans from natural environments. The scientific revolution marked a shift from mystical and spiritual views of nature to a more rational and mechanistic perspective.

Yes, we can make excuses, but still, many of us know better. Yet despite the consequences being severe, we can’t seem to cut the apron strings. It appears to be a quirk of human nature that we only respond to a threat when it’s close upon us, like only reacting to a sabertooth tiger when it’s poised to pounce and sever our jugular.

When the emergency isn’t pressing, we tend to procrastinate by watching the latest Netflix series instead of pondering our own extinction. That’s why Mike Taylor entitled his podcast “What if humans went extinct next Friday?” He is trying to get our attention by upping the ante.

And, oh, the stakes are so high:

Twenty-seven girls and staff recently drowned in an epic flash flood at a Texas camp; once again this summer, we are coughing and wheezing from raging Canadian forest fires. All around the world, we are witnessing unprecedented heat waves, droughts, floods, rising sea levels, and species extinction – at rates 1000-10,000 times greater than the natural, background rate before human interference.^⁠2

Taylor concludes, “We know everything we need to know to do what we know we ought to do, and yet we cannot do it, or we seem unable to do it. It's not just because of individuals making poor choices, it's because we've created a culture and a set of incentives and disincentives that push us in the direction that we're going.”^⁠3

If he is right that the human race will soon be toast, we should indeed be pondering what happens “After the Human.”

xxx

Photo Credit: A still-life I posed in my backyard

Footnotes:

¹ After the Human: A Philosophy for the Future by Mark C. Taylor. Columbia University Press. 2005.

² https://www.worldwildlife.org/stories/what-is-the-sixth-mass-extinction-and-what-can-we-do-about-it#:~:text=Currently%2C%20the%20species%20extinction%20rate,support%20current%20and%20future%20generations.

³ podcast referenced above with Mark Taylor

A call for young people to man the barricades

 

Waving Goodbye to our Democracy
CC Jean Stimmell

For the second time in my life, I hear a low, rumbling sound growing louder each day. It serves as a warning of what I hope will be a major earthquake—a seismic release of long-suppressed rage at our aging, faltering leaders of both parties who, through arthritic paralysis, created an opening for Donald J. Trump, a petty dictator, to take control. Exploiting our elderly politicians’ lack of vision and charisma, he has seized the reins and is guiding us like lemmings off an existential cliff called Planet Earth.

I’m old enough to have felt this tremor before, when the repressed, sanctimonious 1950s crumbled beneath a massive earthquake called the sixties. We had our own slogan back then: “Question Authority.” Another popular saying from those days was “don’t trust anyone over thirty.”

We challenged our elders because they were fixated on the status quo, obsessed with looking back at past glory rather than moving forward. And now, it’s happening again! 

Questioning authority for us in the sixties was a fundamental challenge to the entrenched, wealthy elites who were feathering their own nests at the expense of ordinary people. It also challenged the repressive social norms of the 1950s, which felt like a throwback to the Victorian Age. 

When we were young, we had a president who, rather than admitting defeat in Vietnam, kept the war going by sacrificing 58,000 of our generation as cannon fodder in his illegal, immoral war. 

Additionally, he orchestrated a break-in of the Democratic National Committee, hoping to gather dirt on his opponent to help him win a second term as president.

This petty theft was a misdemeanor compared to his war crimes. But back then, Republicans refused to tolerate his corruption: they joined with the Democrats and drove him from office. Unfortunately, Republicans today have turned belly up to Trump.  Our precious democracy is now facing a far greater threat than it did under Nixon.

And it’s not just me rehashing old sixties memories.

Thomas Friedman, columnist, author, and three-time Pulitzer Prize winner,  who is usually circumspect and scholarly, had this to say about Trump last week: “Of all the terrible things Donald Trump has said and done as president, the most dangerous one just happened on Friday. Trump, in effect, ordered our trusted and independent government office of economic statistics to become as big a liar as he is.”^⁠1

Off the top of my head, here’s a quick list of what Trump has already accomplished in only six months. He has assembled a secretive, masked army called ICE, reminiscent of the Gestapo, abducting suspected immigrants off the street and disappearing them.

 

He’s following Hitler’s playbook of scapegoating a minority; this time, it is immigrants, confining them to black site prison camps and foreign prisons that resemble concentration camps. Even more horrifying, according to CBS News, he is "looking into" how to send "homegrown criminals" who are Americans to foreign prisons.^⁠2 Then, no one will be safe, because, in Trump’s eyes, any person who dares to oppose him is a criminal.

Trump is breaking the law by using our military to suppress peaceful protests against his overreach; he is criminalizing colleges, intimidating law firms, hindering the judiciary, and, as I write this, planning to have the FBI arrest Texas lawmakers. 

Perhaps, worst of all, Trump, on his first day in office, reversed the Biden administration’s policies on climate change and scientific integrity, instructing federal agencies to prioritize fossil fuels over renewable energy.^⁠3

Sadly, I agree with Thomas Friedman, who concluded his column by writing,  “though I am a congenital optimist, for the first time I believe that if the behavior that this administration has exhibited in just its first six months continues and is amplified for its full four years, the America you know will be gone. And I don’t know how we will get it back.”^⁠4

We are not headed toward authoritarianism: we are in it. Time is growing short to save our democratic way of life.  

The time to resist and rebel is NOW!

xxx

¹ https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/opinion/columnists/friedman-trump-labor-firing.html

² https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-homegrown-criminals-foreign-prisons-cecot/

³ https://www.aip.org/fyi/trump-reverses-climate-policies-on-first-day-in-office

⁴ Ibid