Scarcity Thinking or Realism?

I've been around groups of single women long enough to be familiar with the following complaint: There aren't enough quality men out there for all the quality women who are looking for quality men.

Kara Loewentheil is aware of it too, and uses it as an example of how not to approach dating. According to Kara, this is scarcity thinking, and will impact you negatively, as you make the dating experience a drag. And then, when you do get into a relationship, you would be so afraid of not losing that relationship (cause, where are you going to find another?), that you're willing to tolerate behaviour that doesn't correspond to how you think you deserve to be treated. 

In a sense, I can see how abundance thinking would give you an advantage in dating. It might motivate you to search for matches more often. Having an optimistic, or even just curious and experimental approach to dating, sends far more attractive vibes than believing your efforts are doomed to failure. But is it not possible to believe that there is an unbalance in the dating scene, yet still remain open-minded about finding a partner?

Because the statistics seem to bear the "scarcity thinking" out. From one angle at least: more women than men attend university. Those women then go on to pursue a man who has a similar level of education. The theory goes, not all of them will be successful. From a point of view slightly more relevant to me (as a homoflexible, polyamorous autodidact), there seem to be more women who are feminists than men who are feminists/allies. These opposite-sex attracted women then have two choices: remain single, or settle for second best. 

A realist might say that, sure there are few desirable matches out there, but there's no reason I can't be in the game. I am worthy of a relationship with someone who seeks a certain level of mutuality. I've been in a relationship before, and it's possible I will find myself in one again. Not to mention, I will be fine with or without a relationship, because it's proven that a relationship doesn't make you any happier in the long term. 

For me personally, being conflict-averse means that I often suffer in silence in a relationship. Unless I change my firm habits of concealing my feelings and thoughts if I think they will not be met with approval (sounds like the sort of thing requiring years of therapy!), being in a relationship may actually make me feel worse. 

But the cool thing is that I can be happy with my single state. It's a special talent I have, to appreciate my inner world and the gifts I am giving to myself all the time. To be content with being alive is something I can always come back to. I believe I am living in abundance.

Curiosity holds the space (Poem)

Looked down, looked away
But curiosity holds the space
What was forgotten, neglected
Now asks to be re-respected

Shooting sparks
I host their glee
Floating past
Like reveries
I'm in control
And when I stop
I'll keep awake
And stay on top

The Feminist Client (First published on September 11, 2017)

The Feminist Client 

September 11, 2017

Something was awry. And not just the fact that I was being hospitalised for my levels of emotional distress. This new psychiatrist was altogether too interested in me. He started stroking one hand with the other, a suggestive movement which recalled to me the letter I’d sent the mental health staff which included a reference to an orgasm-free masturbation session I’d had which had gotten me thinking about the deeper reasons behind me being hospitalised.

No stranger to sexual predators, I offered him my complete silence, and a defiant stare. I let him know, nonverbally, that I knew what he was up to, and I was not going to fall for his trap. It worked. He was fuming by the time he ended the session with me.

I relaxed a bit, but not much. For a mentally vulnerable 22 year old woman, the ward was a place full of menace. Some of that was from the patients (like the man who addressed all the females of the ward by the c word, volubly, and who made to harm one of the female nurses; like the man whose advances I resisted who would punch the wall immediately above my head), but mostly it was from the mental health staff.

It was the nurses I had the most contact with, and I was disgusted by their dehumanising attitudes towards me. I convinced myself that I would keep record of every injustice, every slight. In the end it proved all too much: it was all day, every day. It was the way of life of a system that is beginning to die out, but persists in reproducing itself to this day.

Psychiatry seems to me all about distrusting lived emotional experiences. I have spoken to client after client, and there isn’t a single one without a horrible story of abuse and/or neglect to tell. Instead of providing clients with immediate access to intensive psychotherapy, they are immediately drugged with powerful, usually sedative, neuroleptics, and enclosed within a small space with fifty-odd others who are similarly going through some of the worst experiences of their lives. Here’s the fun part: to get out of there you are forced to demonstrate “compliance” to this abusive system, and show that you are sufficiently social by opening up to the other clients, some of whom might lash out to you if you inadvertently trigger them. (In my time at Kiloh, I had a piece of wood thrown at me, and generic hospital dessert smeared across my back.)  

But let’s go back to the realm of emotions, that part of human experience which is so deeply distrusted by psychiatry. There is a long-standing tradition within Western philosophy to associate mental processes with masculine energy, and the emotions with feminine energy. Just as the dominant class of men detests women and treats them as an underclass, the psychiatric class loathes people who express socially unacceptable emotion. Instead of treating deep emotional distress as a symptom of a flawed society, psychiatrists use their power to obliterate the unique, organic emotional journeys of those who have been harmed by unequal power structures and the abuse inherent in such structures. Instead of honouring our emotions and validating our experiences, we are treated as abominations at worst and inconveniences at best.

The way the mental health system treats its clients is inhumane, and is an open secret that needs rectifying. Pioneer communities within countries such as Finland and Norway have implemented a much more humane system called Open Dialogue, which treats a person who presents with deep emotional distress as the biggest authority on themselves. They are asked about their experiences and listened to, within the context of their family, friends and community helpers, who are also present for the sessions. The focus is not on the individual as a biological error, but how their interaction with wider society has led them to a crisis point. Medication is a last resort.

Open Dialogue is a bright point in my experience in this world. It convinces me that somewhere, out there, my emotions matter. My experiences with deep emotional distress are meaningful and I am valuable to society. 

The good news is that there are the beginnings of Open Dialogue taking hold in Australia. While it is not available to anyone who presents with deep emotional distress, if things keep moving in the right direction, it very well might be. But we cannot rest idle and wait for “the inevitable” to happen. Nothing is inevitable. We have to make it happen, by educating our friends, colleagues and people around us. To let them know about the deep perversion of justice current psychiatric practices enact. To make them aware that everybody has the right to be treated as though their emotions are based on something real – because they are. 

Some things that happened to me in Iceland:

- a Disgruntled Citizen saw my Free Walking Tour guide's sign (for us travellers) held high, and wrested it from her hands so she could carry it up the street. She only gave it back when our tour guide explained she wasn't protesting anything. (I then joked to a nearby American couple that we could perhaps rally around a cry of 'More rights for tourists!')

- Getting to Harpa, the beautiful glass opera house, was bracing. The wind by the ocean was out in full force, so that I had to walk at an incline towards the beckoning hexagons. I must admit I felt so enacted upon by the weather that I had second thoughts about persevering through to my destination. The streets were clean and relatively free of foot traffic, so the only thing that made this rain-free day unpleasant was the constant needling of the wind into my flesh. Once I got there I was swallowed up into a warm, translucent cavity which offered a glitzy facet of the city - one a budget traveller like me had little other opportunity to see.

- pleased to have been guided by Nomadic Matt's travel guide to Iceland, I found myself in a charismatic cafe with eclectic furniture which offered pretty views of the colourful houses across the street. Hipsters attuned to the content of their laptops representing scarce sightings of locals as tourists were all but taking over. It didn't matter because the food was good. But there was something unsettling about Reykjavik Roasters, which ultimately led to not lingering: it was the offensive signature misogyny of the new Eminem cd. I was dismayed at the majority male staff, assaulting our ears with the most unfeminist Icelandinc soundscape I could think of. Grr.

- Trying to get closer to an insider's experience, I took a 3-hour 'Elf School' run by a religious guy called Magnus. The content of Magnus' lecture was interesting, but he became verbally sexually invasive to one of the German women he would exchange banter with, and I received an unwanted touch on the upper part of my breast when I requested a photo. Inwardly angry, but, like so many, feeling like I had to carry on as normal, I came to the conclusion that between the café incident and this now groping, it was safe to say that Iceland was still very much a patriarchy

- I should have remembered my short-lived friendship with an Icelander called Árni over the internet. We were both part of the facebook group for 'film-philosophy' and he seemed imaginative and clever. Little did I know that Árni would prove ignorant and hostile when I attempted to discuss Larsson's Millenium Trilogy. *Sigh*

- Anyway, there are signs that Iceland is being given new life by enterprising immigrants who've newly settled on its shores. The first cafe/restaurant I really took to was run by a former Brooklyn native, decked out with maritime themes in its paintings, and a loveably oddball eclectic style. I loved it so much, I almost didn't make it to the Free Walking Tour in time.

- back to that tour, the woman in charge (Dīsa for short) entertained us by sharing that she took showers for as long as it takes to listen to a Beyoncé's cd, demonstrating scrubbing her underarms while wrapped up in the emotions of the songs.

- my second official tour happened on the second-last day of my trip, a Golden Circle exploration of some natural highlights just outside the city. The tour guide was fond of making jokes, and two stuck with me:
a) If you want to get a job where you lie all the time, become a politician or a weatherperson.
b) Iceland's water is the source of that unpleasant sulfuric smell, so don't ask if she* farted.
(*Imagine 'she' being pronounced in a tone that represents higher status for women than in non-Nordic countries - almost with the playful affection one might have for a brother.)

Would I go to Iceland again? Absolutely. 

The language of love

Seared into my gaze, yet fading
Wrought into my step, shaking it off
Searching for the comfort that's unending
Accumulating confidence previously cast off

How could you have seen me
But been so wound up in fears
Unable to reach out, you were
Though I gathered you near

Reinvesting in the notion of affection
Somehow I've done so long without
Friendly ministrations recall past soothings
An antithesis to sweet nothings

I'll crave warmth from the people around me
I'm allowed to grow through endearments
Given and received, an atmosphere of generosity
Looking forward to the love generating velocity

Living through something disruptive

For a week now I've been mainly going outside after the hours of 8pm. Even so, this Saturday night, I chose to skip a sojourn around my suburb. I needed the avoidance of stressful touching of door handles, lift buttons and other such surfaces. I'm sure I'll resume tomorrow.

So far, as far as I know, I don't have the coronavirus, but a part of me expects to contract it despite the precautions I'm taking.

I dived deep into a heady tale yesterday, the vividly drawn Eastern European setting disturbing me. I hope I sleep better this morning. For morning is a better descriptor than night.

Dua Lipa plays on Channel V and it's slightly disconcerting, possibly too heteronormative.

I maintain my innocence, and my immersion in the world of post-traumatic growth.

A book by Sophie Hardcastle. Article in The Guardian. A downloaded chapter. An exquisite fear of another woman's hellscape. A decision to disengage.

The offensive doctor brought something to my attention (before I left his office forever). I wanted to bring my whole self along to the next man's office. Let him be discomforted. Let me bring all of my tricky, hard-won knowledge. Let the full canopy of my well-tended psyche wrench his certainty far from where he'd hoped. 

South Korea shows Hollywood how it’s done

I’m inordinately pleased to witness ‘Parasite’ win the Best Picture award at the Oscars. This film did not miss a single beat in creating a tonally immersive experience. Despite the violence contained within, I was transformed enough to see it twice.

In ‘1917’ we had the filmmaking community revisit its fetish for war, something I’m just not up for.

If we are to promote peace, we need to depict scenes upon scenes depicting peace. Building peace, one kind gesture at a time, takes a willingness to focus on the more palatable parts of humanity - the capacity for people to be sweet to each other, our ability to give our time, attention and sympathy where we didn’t even know we could, the frequent instinct to soothe, reassure and encourage.

‘Parasite’ had some scenes where siblings bond, the father demonstrates his pride for his son, and the closely knit nature of the poor family is implied by their filling of the screen together, a coherent unit.  I’ll take it. Give me more of the same. Let it grow, multiply, flourish. Let it be the main theme of the narrative. Let it touch those hard to reach places in my soul, the ones crying out for more representations for love and affection - so that I can mirror what I see on the big screen. I want to learn by osmosis. Picture me, directors. Picture me.