Saturday, September 28, 2024
1978 Israeli Knesset endorsed the Camp David accord
1995 Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat signed the Oslo 2 Accord to transfer the West Bank to the PLO (Taba, Egypt)
2000 Israeli opposition leader Ariel Sharon visited the Temple Mount in Jerusalem sparking the outbreak of violence known as the Second Intifada
In bed at 9, awake at 3, and half-slept till 4:15. Lilly showed up at 6:15 to be let out into the windy morning, 15 mph with 25 mph gusts. The whole day is windy but warm, sunny, and lovely.
Prednisone, day 137, 7.5 mg., day 16/28. Prednisone at 4:50. Morning meds at 5:30 with 2 slices of Dave's Bread, butter, and strawberry preserves.
Katherine's visit is a shot in the arm. She is ebullient, as usual, and reminds me that happiness and unhappiness are contagious, something I first learned, in an explicit way, from Dennis Prager's book Happiness is a Serious Problem. He introduced me to the idea of happiness as a duty to those around us, especially to those in our immediate orbit. Remembering the book makes me think of my Dad of course and of how his PTSD after the war affected Kitty and me. In any case, Katherine's ebullience also reminds me of it.
Maladaptive self-focus, male old age, and journaling. Maladaptive self-focus is the psychological term for overthinking about one's self, self-absorption, or self-obsession. Arthur C. Brooks has an article about it in the current The Atlantic titled "How to Stop Self-Obsessing and Be Happier" and subtitled "Some introspection is healthy and necessary, but too much can trap you in a cycle of misery." The article caught my attention because I'm aware of how much time I spend thinking about myself, my history, and my regrets since I started writing in this daily journal (which I am increasingly coming to think of as simply my daily 'notes.')
Approaching the midpoint of one's ninth decade of life, there is a great deal of life to look back on and precious little to look forward to. And much of what the future holds is scary, even terrifying: painful and debilitating illnesses, increasing cognitive decline and dementia, increasing decrepitude and immobility, helplessness and fear. Keeping a journal or notebook at this stage of life is a mixed blessing. The writing and even the mere act of typing and formatting provide mental stimulation and exercise and may (who knows?) help stave off cognitive loss and delay or soften dementia. It also provides a daily opportunity to feel and express gratitude for what there is to be grateful for in daily life, everything from warm breezes, billowy clouds in cerulean skies, and the elegance and plenitude of trees to the sight of young parents caring for children (and of children caring for old parents). I have become consciously grateful for the opportunity to shop for food at our local supermarkets and especially for the ability to take leisurely drives in the rural countryside. On the other hand, journaling also invites reflection on one's long past life. If one has a conscience, reflection inevitably leads to an examination of one's conscience. For me, it has led to many regrets. It has led to a recollection of a notion I read about or heard about years ago, that the Last Judgment is not as Jesus described it in Matthew 25: 31-33:
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left
but rather standing in front of a mirror that reveals, inescapably, all one's deeds, good and bad, with no hiding from or sugar-coating the bad deeds, the wickednesses, the cowardices, the selfishnesses.
Keeping a journal in old age easily leads to much looking in the mirror and seeing one's failings, one's sins, and God knows I've done a lot of it over the last few years and it takes a toll. I need to practice some self-forgiveness. By chance, I picked up a book I've had for many years, a collection of spiritual exercises by the Jesuit Anthony de Mello, titled Wellsprings. One of the chapters is headed "The Redemption" and includes some mindfulness advice, such as
. . . I advert to the fact that I am living. I imagine a fully alive plant or animal . . . I think of a person who is fully alive. What qualities do I find in this person? For me, what does it mean to be fully alive?
One thing is certain, to be fully alive involves the renunciation of one's past and of one/s future. The past. Yesterday. I cannot be alive if I cling to yesterday for yesterday is a memory, a creation of the mind. It is not real. So to live in yesterday is to be dead.
I therefore let go of my yesterdays, my propensity for living in the past. One way of living in the past is holding on to grievances. As a first step toward being fully in the present I make a list of people I resent. I offer each of them an amnesty, an absolution, and let them go.
, , , , If I mean to give up living in the past I must drop regrets as cleanly as I drop resentments. What I tend to look upon as loss -- my failings, my mistakes, my handicaps, the lack of opportunities in y life, my so-called bad experiences -- I must learn to see them all a blessings. For in the dance of life, all things cooperate to do us good.
Having released myself from the future and the past, I come into the present to eperience life as it is now, for eternal life is now, eternal life is here. I listen to the sounds around me . . . I become aware of my breathing in and out and of my body so as to be as fully present as I can.
In another exercise, called "The Good News", he writes
One day, alone in my room I think of the things in my life I am especially thankful for, the things I am proud of. Then I turn to the things I regret and wish had never happended, especially my sins.
While I am thus engaged, Jesus Christ walks in. His presence brings the sweetest joy and peace. I tell him some of the things in my life that I regret. He stops me with the words, "That is all forgiven and forgotten. Do you not know that love keeps no record of wrongs. (1 Cor. 13:5) Then he goes on to say, "In fact, your wrongs have not just been forgiven, they have even been coverted into grace. Have you never been told that where the sin was great, grace was greater still? (Rom. 5:21)
I don't know that de Mello's exercises will help me with my regrets. It is much harder to forgive myself than forgive any other who may have hurt or harmed me. Self-forgiveness seems too much like minimizing my wrongs, treating them as if they were not real wrongs, real failings with real consequences for others. I need to think about this some more, or is that just more 'maladaptive self-focus'?
BTW, how does Arthur C. Clark recommend dealing with the problem of self-obsession? 1. Bring happiness to others. 2. Serve the world, and 3. Be more mindful. All good advice.
Anniversaries. Israel has been nothing but trouble and warfare from the get-go with plenty of blame on both sides. I'll be long gone by the time of its centennial in 2048, if it has a centennial. I'm inclined to think that hope for Israel died with the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in 1995. I hope I am wrong but as I write these words the world holds its breath wondering whether we are on the verge of a regional conflagration.
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