I'm in Santa Barbara this weekend at Pacifica Graduate Institute recording the "Imagination & Medicine" conference about "the Future of Healing in an Age of Neuroscience."
The first presenter, Bessel van der Kolk, is a seriously high-powered researcher and therapist deeply involved in treating PTSD and psychotherapeutic brain physiology studies. He outlined the physiology of trauma and treatment recommendations which amount to a description of one of the main functions of the better Aikido dojos. So I got up to the audience microphone, told him so, and asked if he'd studied the effect of martial study on recovery from violent trauma. He responded that he had always wanted to study Aikido and considered it "the King" of martial arts as might be applied to trauma related suffering. I offered a class. He asked for it on Sunday morning. Who knows, the next step might be inclusion in his rhythm and movement Conference in Boston in June? That would be quite an adventure.
Now I have exactly the neurophysiology I needed to support the Aikido as metaphor part of my dissertation that supports the building of the Guardians of Peace and my approach to conflict work. Wahoo!
Here is his bio.
BESSEL A. VAN DER KOLK THE BODY KEEPS SCORE
Integration of Body and Mind in the Treatment of Traumatized People
In the wake of the new insights into trauma’s impact on the body, memory, and relationship to self and others, a range of radical new approaches to treatment have been developed. Many of these can be considered as fundamental shifts from earlier therapeutic paradigms. Given the fragility of the interpersonal bonds following disruptions of trust, issues of empathy, interpersonal repetition and boundaries within the therapeutic relationship require scrupulous attention. Preoccupation with the trauma and learned helplessness require a variety of interventions aimed at restoring active mastery and the capacity to attend to the here-and-now. In this context we will examine the role of Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Model Mugging and therapeutic work programs. Since traumatic memories often are dissociated and may be inaccessible to verbal recall or processing, attention needs to be paid to the somatic re-experiencing of trauma-related sensations and affects which may serve as engines for continuing maladaptive behaviors. With the aid of videotaped demonstrations and experiential techniques we will present approaches from the fields of hypnosis, body oriented therapies and EMDR to introduce these new treatment options and discuss the integration of these approaches during different stages of treatment.
BESSEL A. VAN DER KOLK, M.D. has been active as a clinician, researcher and teacher in the area of posttraumatic stress and related phenomena since the 1970s. He founded the first clinic in Boston, the Trauma Center, which specializes in the treatment of traumatized children and adults, in 1982. Dr. van der Kolk is past President of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. He is Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University Medical School, and Clinical Director of the Trauma Center in Boston, Massachusetts. He is co-director of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network Community Program in Boston and originator of, and currently on the steering committee of, the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.
The first presenter, Bessel van der Kolk, is a seriously high-powered researcher and therapist deeply involved in treating PTSD and psychotherapeutic brain physiology studies. He outlined the physiology of trauma and treatment recommendations which amount to a description of one of the main functions of the better Aikido dojos. So I got up to the audience microphone, told him so, and asked if he'd studied the effect of martial study on recovery from violent trauma. He responded that he had always wanted to study Aikido and considered it "the King" of martial arts as might be applied to trauma related suffering. I offered a class. He asked for it on Sunday morning. Who knows, the next step might be inclusion in his rhythm and movement Conference in Boston in June? That would be quite an adventure.
Now I have exactly the neurophysiology I needed to support the Aikido as metaphor part of my dissertation that supports the building of the Guardians of Peace and my approach to conflict work. Wahoo!
I'll try to podcast our interaction and put a link here in the near future. Please subscribe to this blog and return to see when it becomes available.
Here is his bio.
BESSEL A. VAN DER KOLK THE BODY KEEPS SCORE
Integration of Body and Mind in the Treatment of Traumatized People
In the wake of the new insights into trauma’s impact on the body, memory, and relationship to self and others, a range of radical new approaches to treatment have been developed. Many of these can be considered as fundamental shifts from earlier therapeutic paradigms. Given the fragility of the interpersonal bonds following disruptions of trust, issues of empathy, interpersonal repetition and boundaries within the therapeutic relationship require scrupulous attention. Preoccupation with the trauma and learned helplessness require a variety of interventions aimed at restoring active mastery and the capacity to attend to the here-and-now. In this context we will examine the role of Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Model Mugging and therapeutic work programs. Since traumatic memories often are dissociated and may be inaccessible to verbal recall or processing, attention needs to be paid to the somatic re-experiencing of trauma-related sensations and affects which may serve as engines for continuing maladaptive behaviors. With the aid of videotaped demonstrations and experiential techniques we will present approaches from the fields of hypnosis, body oriented therapies and EMDR to introduce these new treatment options and discuss the integration of these approaches during different stages of treatment.
BESSEL A. VAN DER KOLK, M.D. has been active as a clinician, researcher and teacher in the area of posttraumatic stress and related phenomena since the 1970s. He founded the first clinic in Boston, the Trauma Center, which specializes in the treatment of traumatized children and adults, in 1982. Dr. van der Kolk is past President of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. He is Professor of Psychiatry at Boston University Medical School, and Clinical Director of the Trauma Center in Boston, Massachusetts. He is co-director of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network Community Program in Boston and originator of, and currently on the steering committee of, the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.Labels: Aikido, psychology, PTSD, recovery, trauma
| posted by Unknown @ 4/27/2007 10:29:00 PM
Earlier today my sister, Meghan, called from Santa Fe to check-in. She and her husband, Isaiah, and my nephew, Val, are there from Burlington VT to attend Isaiah's uncle's wedding.
Once again I tried to get into words one fraction of a corner of what is going on and going wrong round these parts of the sunny East Bay. Not only are the bizarre, Gordian circumlocutions reaching the point of inexpressibility, but the effort of keeping it all in consciousness in order to shuffle in a timely fashion between emergencies reduces the capacity for response. If you are feeling overwhelmed and having a hard time dealing with daily life, this may be the time to stop reading. I am about to attempt to give voice to the feelings beneath the layers of interlocked intractability stacked atop my spirit at the moment.
Aidan's death gave me my first window into really understanding (in the context of my historical difficulty with playing believable suicides on stage) how a person can awake to the reality that the voice of Life can not only be temporarily muted but unalterably silenced such that there is no real hope of hearing it again. Watching the arms wide, face open, beaming Hope lie down and Never again rise up creates an irreversible closure. It is possible to react and respond but not to prevent or change. The tomb with its rock rolled away may be visited but He is not there and won't be again. The possible responses to ending run the gamut from y to z in ways I imagine to be like the installation of a cochlear implant. It is possible to respond to deafness by drilling through the skull, and inserting cold metal and plastic leads between the skin and bone, and bombarding nerves with impulses. This cyborg wonder can lead to satisfactory functioning where there was none. Hallelujah! The true hearing of the Magic Flute will never happen again, even after the mind relearns how to process these entirely different spectra of inputs, because the variegated organic system developed during the body's sensitive period for absorbing all the nuance of sound is dead.
Easter People: A Message! He is not Risen! The idea of and stories about him go on in a beautiful and problematic way as do all Big Stories. But He will not be available for embracing, no matter how many other people, large or small, you embrace as his image and in his name. What is undying (athanatos, the Greek term for god) and incarnational is the presence of the Spirit which enters the valley of Soul-making, not the flesh and smell and taste and warmth of the treasured person. Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead.
So never mind.
All those preparations for later are laughable. The occasional emergencies you used to handle with grace, because "this too will pass"/change or "knowing nothing need be done - you begin", have only one time frame for response. Now. While you are still breathing and before it gets worse.
And culture helps. The contemporary pool of the collective psyche frames cosmos in these same terms:
So, D for Death.
And Dissertation:
When the year I lost to Pacifica not hiring enough staff was finally returned to me in the form of a no-fee extension (until Dec 31, 2007), enough time had passed that the Federal Loan people had moved me into repayment, as though my work were over. Not a problem, you might say, just reestablish your eligibility. Great, but after all the paperwork B.S. is finished to do just that we discover that, because all higher ed loans for our family are consolidated (as instructed - to avoid the Congress approved rate hike) Lisa must also be in school and earning nothing to get my in-school deferment in place. This wasn't required before but it is now, apparently. So we now have another round of paperwork to prove that Lisa will have no work or income as of her last day at Mercy, etc. before there is hope of stemming the tide of late fees and oppressive emails.
And did I mention that there is hope of getting help finishing the first two chapters - my Proposal after which I will be classified as making "acceptable progress" so my loan money will begin again?
Not a problem. There is a professional who comes highly recommended who guarantees our intensive process together over two days will result in those two chapters at 40 pages each. She charges $1000/day. I'll ask her to charge less but she, of course, doesn't have to. I get so beyond tired asking for help to try to get my head above water and then having to explain all this.
And Dollars:
So its time to choose between finishing my $70,000 degree and having money to make the driveabout possible, for which I have taken on recording three additional national conferences (Portland, Tulsa, and San Diego) between now and the time we leave. Everything we want to do takes money which we have less of every moment we move further from usual employment and closer to being away. Paying for Diss help, van changes and repairs, gas, storage, tech costs and Internet access, etc. while preparing to pay for Lisa's teacher training, rent, health insurance, etc. in the Fall. Lisa's last day as an Admin. Ass was today, though she'll go back a few more times to help out.
And Departure:
From our home of eight years by the end of this month. Selling/passing on furniture and clothes and taking pictures for Craig's List and sorting old papers and carrying things next door to the room given us for storage by our godssent neighbors John and Ingrid and searching for lost items that were there when I put them down for a moment yesterday and washing the dishes and taking out the extra trash and all the usual things times six but not the usual patterns because we're leaving so food in the fridge but not too much and somebody to sublet our sublet of a friend's place until we can get back to Berkeley in the Fall and going over there to measure and take pictures and plan where things will go and
And the Driveabout:
Ever spend almost three months packing, repacking, and living in a van with one other person and at least two different ideas of how to grieve and spend time off or with family and writing every day or getting away or together or apart? Would you want to be in there with me after reading this?
And Demonstration:
In order to be promoted to Yondan (4th degree black belt) I am obligated and privileged give a demonstration at the annual CAA Division One Gasshuku at Sunset Cliffs Aikido in San Diego on the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend. In order to do this it has been my pleasure to plan it, coordinate rehearsals with the dojo's and every one's schedule, rewrite it, lose the folder with my most recent notes in the confusion of everything else, and in my spare time do the soul searching required whenever Aikido needs demonstrating in a personal and specific way in front of people. What is a fourth degree black belt in Aikido exactly? How is that different from other levels of experience? Am I that?
And Development:
Huston Smith invited me last month to begin having tea with him every week and discuss ideas. There's no way in the world I'd turn that down. He nominated me to be a part of the Pacific Coast Theological Society which meets today and tomorrow. I pick him up at 3:15. The prep for that involves reading the papers that will be presented and manging to look presentable in order to be introduced around. Overwhelm is not reducible to a series of attacks by the cosmos. Especially in the U.S. we suffer too from an overabundance of blessings.
When Lisa and I return I'll be the primary bread winner while Lisa is in Montessori Teacher Training. This means a reliable income of at least $40-50k, largely set-up now and while traveling in other parts. In order to study, write, build the Process Arts, and create community on purpose I make $16k a year right now. Any suggestions? Must write resumes, update the website content / email addresses / I.T.infrastructure on which I depend for information support and professional credibility.
And Domains:
So that makes this the perfect time for our long abusive registrar of domain names, Registerfly, to finally collapse and get defrocked, sued, and investigated, thereby trapping our primary domain name Abcglobal.net where it cannot be transferred and cannot serve to forward any emails using that domain and makes certain that nobody can find our website after we returned from making a big splash at a major industry event, gave everyone our email and website addresses, and sent out a report and appeal for support letter directing everyone to that same website.
So, I reel. When I was younger I began talking, in response to the official diagnostic voice known by the title "ADHD", about my consciousness regularly being flipped off and on again - the slate of my mental chalkboard being suddenly erased. Slate wiping during these weeks is worse than it has been since puberty. I forget things constantly and trying to remember why I am in this room with this particular aardvark in my arms. Hamlet, speaking of aardvarks, seems more comprehensible, unfortunately, and I wander in my memory of questionable versions of his soliloquies I've offered as audition pieces over the years.
I am amazed at how much energy goes into making the outer world resemble the inner world (I suffer therefore you will suffer) and then goes into trying to change the outer world (fascism) so that it does not resemble the inner world (chaos and no control over death). I hurt, says the Ego. Therefore the world is a place of hurt, otherwise I wouldn't be hurting. Therefore it's OK to spread that hurt around. After all, the Truth is that the world is a place with hurt in. This isn't Fair so I'd best get what I can of whatever is left to suck on while I wait. Yike. "As above, so below; as within, so without." No wonder we hurt each other out there in the "Real World."
My Lent covered only a week or two, since I'm avoiding the ritual of the 40 days in favor of actually living in Death itself for however long this is going to take. A week ago, Saturday, was a day that effectively ended a week of dwelling in fear, often nameless, that had a voice similar to the question my sister asked today: "What happens when you can't actually do more?"
What if the Distress I feel drowning me, being insufficient over the years to actually change my behavior, leads to the Deconstruction of me? What if the distress of consuming our planet / home / body, being insufficient to get us to actually consume less, is leading to the demise of what we might define as humanity? The Modern MonoGod's Ohm (power - syllable) circumscribes contemporary consciousness within the spectrum stretching between Overwhelm and Opacity. Everything, whether "good" or "bad" arrives at so many levels and paces that it is not possible to integrate deeply in response to anything in particular. When some filtering or change is required the system / cosmos / principle is unresponsive.
The Sunday that followed was a day of fools and palms and children and tears. My little boy was there last year and was promised to the future now going on before me without him. I wish I were crazy enough to act out the play of it, rushing about crying "have you seen my son? He was just here a minute ago?" Still, that day walked in beauty. Then Monday was a return to fear and desperation.
What is there to...
How can I...
What is left to me...?
Alexander cuts the Gordian Knot Jean-Simon Berthélemy (1743 - 1811): Alexander durchschlägt den gordischen Knoten, Öl auf Leinwand, 113 x 145 cm, Paris, École des Beaux-Arts. Source: http://www.kzu.ch/fach/as/gallerie/lect/helden/12.htm
| posted by Unknown @ 4/13/2007 02:34:00 PM
Once again I tried to get into words one fraction of a corner of what is going on and going wrong round these parts of the sunny East Bay. Not only are the bizarre, Gordian circumlocutions reaching the point of inexpressibility, but the effort of keeping it all in consciousness in order to shuffle in a timely fashion between emergencies reduces the capacity for response. If you are feeling overwhelmed and having a hard time dealing with daily life, this may be the time to stop reading. I am about to attempt to give voice to the feelings beneath the layers of interlocked intractability stacked atop my spirit at the moment.
Aidan's death gave me my first window into really understanding (in the context of my historical difficulty with playing believable suicides on stage) how a person can awake to the reality that the voice of Life can not only be temporarily muted but unalterably silenced such that there is no real hope of hearing it again. Watching the arms wide, face open, beaming Hope lie down and Never again rise up creates an irreversible closure. It is possible to react and respond but not to prevent or change. The tomb with its rock rolled away may be visited but He is not there and won't be again. The possible responses to ending run the gamut from y to z in ways I imagine to be like the installation of a cochlear implant. It is possible to respond to deafness by drilling through the skull, and inserting cold metal and plastic leads between the skin and bone, and bombarding nerves with impulses. This cyborg wonder can lead to satisfactory functioning where there was none. Hallelujah! The true hearing of the Magic Flute will never happen again, even after the mind relearns how to process these entirely different spectra of inputs, because the variegated organic system developed during the body's sensitive period for absorbing all the nuance of sound is dead.
Easter People: A Message! He is not Risen! The idea of and stories about him go on in a beautiful and problematic way as do all Big Stories. But He will not be available for embracing, no matter how many other people, large or small, you embrace as his image and in his name. What is undying (athanatos, the Greek term for god) and incarnational is the presence of the Spirit which enters the valley of Soul-making, not the flesh and smell and taste and warmth of the treasured person. Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead.
So never mind.
All those preparations for later are laughable. The occasional emergencies you used to handle with grace, because "this too will pass"/change or "knowing nothing need be done - you begin", have only one time frame for response. Now. While you are still breathing and before it gets worse.
And culture helps. The contemporary pool of the collective psyche frames cosmos in these same terms:
- opacity (unresponsive to your preparations and thirst for fullness of Life) and
- overwhelm (fires to put out all the time with a dearth of moisture and a level of complexity so intense that finding any root conflagration on which to focus becomes impossible.
So, D for Death.
And Dissertation:
When the year I lost to Pacifica not hiring enough staff was finally returned to me in the form of a no-fee extension (until Dec 31, 2007), enough time had passed that the Federal Loan people had moved me into repayment, as though my work were over. Not a problem, you might say, just reestablish your eligibility. Great, but after all the paperwork B.S. is finished to do just that we discover that, because all higher ed loans for our family are consolidated (as instructed - to avoid the Congress approved rate hike) Lisa must also be in school and earning nothing to get my in-school deferment in place. This wasn't required before but it is now, apparently. So we now have another round of paperwork to prove that Lisa will have no work or income as of her last day at Mercy, etc. before there is hope of stemming the tide of late fees and oppressive emails.
And did I mention that there is hope of getting help finishing the first two chapters - my Proposal after which I will be classified as making "acceptable progress" so my loan money will begin again?
Not a problem. There is a professional who comes highly recommended who guarantees our intensive process together over two days will result in those two chapters at 40 pages each. She charges $1000/day. I'll ask her to charge less but she, of course, doesn't have to. I get so beyond tired asking for help to try to get my head above water and then having to explain all this.
And Dollars:
So its time to choose between finishing my $70,000 degree and having money to make the driveabout possible, for which I have taken on recording three additional national conferences (Portland, Tulsa, and San Diego) between now and the time we leave. Everything we want to do takes money which we have less of every moment we move further from usual employment and closer to being away. Paying for Diss help, van changes and repairs, gas, storage, tech costs and Internet access, etc. while preparing to pay for Lisa's teacher training, rent, health insurance, etc. in the Fall. Lisa's last day as an Admin. Ass was today, though she'll go back a few more times to help out.
And Departure:
From our home of eight years by the end of this month. Selling/passing on furniture and clothes and taking pictures for Craig's List and sorting old papers and carrying things next door to the room given us for storage by our godssent neighbors John and Ingrid and searching for lost items that were there when I put them down for a moment yesterday and washing the dishes and taking out the extra trash and all the usual things times six but not the usual patterns because we're leaving so food in the fridge but not too much and somebody to sublet our sublet of a friend's place until we can get back to Berkeley in the Fall and going over there to measure and take pictures and plan where things will go and
And the Driveabout:
Ever spend almost three months packing, repacking, and living in a van with one other person and at least two different ideas of how to grieve and spend time off or with family and writing every day or getting away or together or apart? Would you want to be in there with me after reading this?
And Demonstration:
In order to be promoted to Yondan (4th degree black belt) I am obligated and privileged give a demonstration at the annual CAA Division One Gasshuku at Sunset Cliffs Aikido in San Diego on the Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend. In order to do this it has been my pleasure to plan it, coordinate rehearsals with the dojo's and every one's schedule, rewrite it, lose the folder with my most recent notes in the confusion of everything else, and in my spare time do the soul searching required whenever Aikido needs demonstrating in a personal and specific way in front of people. What is a fourth degree black belt in Aikido exactly? How is that different from other levels of experience? Am I that?
And Development:
Huston Smith invited me last month to begin having tea with him every week and discuss ideas. There's no way in the world I'd turn that down. He nominated me to be a part of the Pacific Coast Theological Society which meets today and tomorrow. I pick him up at 3:15. The prep for that involves reading the papers that will be presented and manging to look presentable in order to be introduced around. Overwhelm is not reducible to a series of attacks by the cosmos. Especially in the U.S. we suffer too from an overabundance of blessings.
When Lisa and I return I'll be the primary bread winner while Lisa is in Montessori Teacher Training. This means a reliable income of at least $40-50k, largely set-up now and while traveling in other parts. In order to study, write, build the Process Arts, and create community on purpose I make $16k a year right now. Any suggestions? Must write resumes, update the website content / email addresses / I.T.infrastructure on which I depend for information support and professional credibility.
And Domains:
So that makes this the perfect time for our long abusive registrar of domain names, Registerfly, to finally collapse and get defrocked, sued, and investigated, thereby trapping our primary domain name Abcglobal.net where it cannot be transferred and cannot serve to forward any emails using that domain and makes certain that nobody can find our website after we returned from making a big splash at a major industry event, gave everyone our email and website addresses, and sent out a report and appeal for support letter directing everyone to that same website.
So, I reel. When I was younger I began talking, in response to the official diagnostic voice known by the title "ADHD", about my consciousness regularly being flipped off and on again - the slate of my mental chalkboard being suddenly erased. Slate wiping during these weeks is worse than it has been since puberty. I forget things constantly and trying to remember why I am in this room with this particular aardvark in my arms. Hamlet, speaking of aardvarks, seems more comprehensible, unfortunately, and I wander in my memory of questionable versions of his soliloquies I've offered as audition pieces over the years.
I am amazed at how much energy goes into making the outer world resemble the inner world (I suffer therefore you will suffer) and then goes into trying to change the outer world (fascism) so that it does not resemble the inner world (chaos and no control over death). I hurt, says the Ego. Therefore the world is a place of hurt, otherwise I wouldn't be hurting. Therefore it's OK to spread that hurt around. After all, the Truth is that the world is a place with hurt in. This isn't Fair so I'd best get what I can of whatever is left to suck on while I wait. Yike. "As above, so below; as within, so without." No wonder we hurt each other out there in the "Real World."
My Lent covered only a week or two, since I'm avoiding the ritual of the 40 days in favor of actually living in Death itself for however long this is going to take. A week ago, Saturday, was a day that effectively ended a week of dwelling in fear, often nameless, that had a voice similar to the question my sister asked today: "What happens when you can't actually do more?"
What if the Distress I feel drowning me, being insufficient over the years to actually change my behavior, leads to the Deconstruction of me? What if the distress of consuming our planet / home / body, being insufficient to get us to actually consume less, is leading to the demise of what we might define as humanity? The Modern MonoGod's Ohm (power - syllable) circumscribes contemporary consciousness within the spectrum stretching between Overwhelm and Opacity. Everything, whether "good" or "bad" arrives at so many levels and paces that it is not possible to integrate deeply in response to anything in particular. When some filtering or change is required the system / cosmos / principle is unresponsive.
The Sunday that followed was a day of fools and palms and children and tears. My little boy was there last year and was promised to the future now going on before me without him. I wish I were crazy enough to act out the play of it, rushing about crying "have you seen my son? He was just here a minute ago?" Still, that day walked in beauty. Then Monday was a return to fear and desperation.
What is there to...
How can I...
What is left to me...?
the undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
Alexander cuts the Gordian Knot Jean-Simon Berthélemy (1743 - 1811): Alexander durchschlägt den gordischen Knoten, Öl auf Leinwand, 113 x 145 cm, Paris, École des Beaux-Arts. Source: http://www.kzu.ch/fach/as/gallerie/lect/helden/12.htm
Did not, repeat, did NOT do this on purpose.
Sure was fun, though.
Only way it could have been better is if the bush were burning.
Only way it could have been better is if the bush were burning.
Labels: bdwc, Berkeley, Church, Epworth, image, Jesus, Methodist
| posted by Unknown @ 4/12/2007 11:18:00 PM
[13:16] iwantacomputer: how's you?
[13:16] bdwilliamscraig:
[13:16] iwantacomputer: ah
[13:19] bdwilliamscraig:
[13:21] bdwilliamscraig: Sayest thou so? Aye verily, and forsooth.
[13:22] bdwilliamscraig: Or (A merkin translation), Fuck Yeah!
[13:22] iwantacomputer: ah, those wacky Merkins
[13:23] bdwilliamscraig: Gets pretty hairy.
[13:43] bdwilliamscraig: I find myself wishing for a ghost to return and swear me unto vengeance, or pinochle, or a hermit's life, or something else straighforward.
[13:43] iwantacomputer: I didn't hear about the Registry Fraud thing, that sucks. Money / income worries are always troublesome. That would make things easier, it's true.
[13:45] bdwilliamscraig: Ah, well. I'll probably copy this into a blog entry, ifn you don't mind.
[13:45] iwantacomputer: I don't.
[13:45] bdwilliamscraig: Sorry to be so freakin heavy.
[13:45] iwantacomputer: blogaway! or should I say Blogs Away!!!!
[13:46] bdwilliamscraig: Heave to 'er lee, prepare to cast the grapplers and fire the main blogs!!! AAAarrhhhrrrr!!!
[13:48] iwantacomputer: It's understandable, and I can't give you the time, here at work. My brain must needs be focused elsewhere.
[13:48] bdwilliamscraig: Focus 'em, if you got 'em! Some other time. perhaps.
[13:49] iwantacomputer: yes, I'll be busy at work for the next couple months, but pop up on the chat window now and then.
[13:16] bdwilliamscraig:
The Beginning: hic et ubique (here and everywhere)
The Middle: dread fardels
The End: the undiscovered country
[13:16] bdwilliamscraig: Obsessed with Hamlet, again, for the moment.The Middle: dread fardels
The End: the undiscovered country
[13:16] iwantacomputer: ah
[13:16] bdwilliamscraig: You?
[13:16] iwantacomputer: not so obsessed.
[13:17] iwantacomputer: busy as all get out, but good.
[13:17] iwantacomputer: and what's a dread fardel anyway?[13:16] iwantacomputer: not so obsessed.
[13:17] iwantacomputer: busy as all get out, but good.
[13:19] bdwilliamscraig:
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, the oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, the pangs of despised love, the law's delay, the insolence of office and the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes, when he himself might his quietus make with a bare bodkin? Who would fardels (literal burdens, more or less) bear, to grunt and sweat under a weary life, but that the dread of something after death, the undiscover'd country from whose bourn no traveller returns, puzzles the will and makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of?
[13:20] iwantacomputer: that Bill. He shure kood rite.[13:21] bdwilliamscraig: Sayest thou so? Aye verily, and forsooth.
[13:22] bdwilliamscraig: Or (A merkin translation), Fuck Yeah!
[13:22] iwantacomputer: ah, those wacky Merkins
[13:23] bdwilliamscraig: Gets pretty hairy.
[13:23] bdwilliamscraig: How's married life treatin' ya?
[13:28] iwantacomputer: pretty darned good. Way too much going on these days, but overall, quite nice, thank you... And yourself? Where are you these days?
[13:37] bdwilliamscraig: it not so much "the dread of something after death", rather, the fairly certain conviction of there being no court of appeal, alternative, to ceasing, having to face (lying down if not face up) immense projects like dissertations and responding to global ecological meltdown, losing home, creating rehearsing and delivering my 4th dan demonstration, driving around for months with no certain income, needing to develop a next professional step that will result in our entire family income for the next year or two, recovering our domain names (abcglobal.net, processarts.org, etc.) lost to the Registerfly fraud, etc....[13:28] iwantacomputer: pretty darned good. Way too much going on these days, but overall, quite nice, thank you... And yourself? Where are you these days?
[13:30] bdwilliamscraig:
Short Answer: Fine (in the musical sense). Longer answer: struggling with living in a psyche and cosmos framed in terms of overwhelm and opacity.
[13:33] iwantacomputer: hrm... sometimes your phrasing is hard to parse, but I get the intent. Good to know that you are struggling. It's much better than the alternative.
[13:34] bdwilliamscraig: I wonder.
[13:34] iwantacomputer: better than not struggling? there's a vivacity in the struggle that seems important to me
[13:34] bdwilliamscraig: I wonder.
[13:34] iwantacomputer: better than not struggling? there's a vivacity in the struggle that seems important to me
[13:36] bdwilliamscraig: I guess, at the moment,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.
[13:43] bdwilliamscraig: I find myself wishing for a ghost to return and swear me unto vengeance, or pinochle, or a hermit's life, or something else straighforward.
[13:43] iwantacomputer: I didn't hear about the Registry Fraud thing, that sucks. Money / income worries are always troublesome. That would make things easier, it's true.
[13:45] bdwilliamscraig: Ah, well. I'll probably copy this into a blog entry, ifn you don't mind.
[13:45] iwantacomputer: I don't.
[13:45] bdwilliamscraig: Sorry to be so freakin heavy.
[13:45] iwantacomputer: blogaway! or should I say Blogs Away!!!!
[13:46] bdwilliamscraig: Heave to 'er lee, prepare to cast the grapplers and fire the main blogs!!! AAAarrhhhrrrr!!!
[13:48] iwantacomputer: It's understandable, and I can't give you the time, here at work. My brain must needs be focused elsewhere.
[13:48] bdwilliamscraig: Focus 'em, if you got 'em! Some other time. perhaps.
[13:49] iwantacomputer: yes, I'll be busy at work for the next couple months, but pop up on the chat window now and then.
Labels: busy, daily, ecology, Hamlet, kith, opacity, overwhelm, psyche, society
| posted by Unknown @ 4/09/2007 01:49:00 PM
I am my father's publisher.
Here is his latest "piece".
My experience with people who owe me money usually goes like this:
Here is his latest "piece".
My experience with people who owe me money usually goes like this:
Sorry Mr. W This transaction must be completed by snail mail. I comply. It comes back. (much later, without money) I call. I'm on hold for 15 minutes. During that time, I hear, over and over, the message that they are very innovative when it comes to customer service and that there is nothing too good for me. Playing in the background is a drum machine sound bite going constantly in circles. I finally talk with a guy from somewhere in the orient who barely speaks English. He wants my social security number, date of birth, blood type, mother's middle name before birth, and the name of my favorite NFL team. I comply. He finally feels that I am, Indeed, or MAY indeed be some kind of David Williams. He then says "May I have your password, please?" I , who have limited minutes, have now been on the phone for about 35 min. I say, " Maybe in a former life, I may have gotten a pass word, maybe four or five years ago, but right now, I have NO clue what it is. He says "Well, Everybody just got to have a password." I say, "Here is my pass word. ##****####>" He hangs up. I experience instant remorse, get on line and retrieve my friggin pass word, and call back. This time, in order to lubricate the process somewhat, I drink heavily before making the call.
I'm on hold again....the message, the drum machine, finally I get Rosita in Oaxaca. We get acquainted, I tell some one line jokes, she gets the password. Life is good. She says "what can I do for ju mester William." I say, "I'm just trying to get my money that your company owes me." Suddenly, what was becoming what could have been a wonderful long-term relationship, begins to go south. There could be some sort of a pun there if you are so inclined.
Rosita begins explaining their smail policy, in detail. I get up. Go to the kitchen. Get another drinky poo. Watch a re-run of Dragnet. Return to the floor. She is just finishing.
I say, "Look Rosita, You sound like a nice person. Help me out here. What would you do if you were me?" She says, (I can hear her turning off the recorder that is used for training purposes only) Look I gots 14 little keds, a drunken, miserable husband, and live in a cardboard box with two cheekens and my inlaws. What ju would do ef you were me?"
Well, 6 months later I receive 10% of the money.......in pesos. I feel GREAT. I have won! Isn't that so sick that we call that winning? I put the whole thing in an envelope and sent it straight away to................................... Rosita.
Have a nice day.
Dad
Labels: comedy, customerservice, DavidWilliams, family
| posted by Unknown @ 4/07/2007 05:35:00 PM
Aikido to the proverbial max
Friday April 6th (only one day of four Th-Su)07:30 - 08:30 am Aikido > Tissier
09:00 - 10:00 am BJJ > Clovis Silva
11:00 - 11:50 am Aikido > Newens
12:00 - 12:50 am Aikido > Tissier
01:00 - 02:00 pm Aikido > Hendricks
02:00 - 03:00 am Jack Kornfield (Meditation)
05:00 - 05:50 pm Aikido > Friedman
06:00 - 07:00 pm Aikido > Tissier
What a day!
What a week! I taught and trained Tuesday and worked on my Yondan demonstration, slept at the dojo to teach Wednesday morning 7:30am, taught and trained and worked on the demo tonight (Thursday) with Eric Winters, all day seminar tomorrow, and Teaching on Saturday. Wahoo! | posted by Unknown @ 4/05/2007 11:39:00 PM
