CH3R1's Open Salon Blog

"You don't lick it off the rocks, kid."

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:08:04 -0400

Like many others, I was very sad to hear of George Carlin's passing. He was a creative, intelligent, and damn funny guy. I'll definitely miss him.

In perusing the news articles on the Internet about Carlin today, I came across what is being touted as his last interview, with Psychology Today's Jay Dixit, a phone conversation that took place just over 1o days ago. Because I'm sure PT was eager to get this out to the public quickly, the piece suffers slightly from being rushed, but it's still a great, recent collection of Carlin's thoughts and insights about his life and career. I found it particularly satisfying because he spends a good deal of time talking about language, creativity, and writing.

Where the interview piece falls short is in providing context. As it stands now, the piece is little more than a rough transcript. Again, I realize Dixit was rushed, so I'll try to cut him some slack. What I would have liked to have seen, though, especially since this is a magazine purportedly about psychology, was a commentary from Dixit on the related psychological constructs that were touched upon in the course of the interview. Dixit's questions themselves didn't seem to be directly seeking this sort of information (e.g., "How is it that you find things that are unexpected?" seemed not only a poor interview question for a psychology magazine article, but a poor question altogether), but Carlin came to the table prepared nonetheless, stating at one point "But I want to add an element I overlooked. Psychology. We're talking about a magazine called Psychology Today." He says he overlooked it, but it seemed more like Carlin's polite way of saying Dixit overlooked it and getting the interview back on relevant tracks.

There's a lot of rich material for psychological exploration in this interview. What I'm providing directly below here may just look like a lot of quotes taken directly from the article - and they are - but what I'm also doing, I hope, is providing that context I felt was missing by categorizing them under the psychological constructs to which they relate and providing links to further relevant information. (Granted, most of these links are to Wikipedia, not the most authoritative source for psychology content, but they cover the gist.)

HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
Nature VS. Nurture: "The Irish have a genetic tradition, it seems, an affinity for language and expression. And so I got that. The Irish say: "You don't lick it off the rocks, kid."
Child Development & Autonomy: "So I spent a lot of time on my own [as a child] . . . And I experienced that - because psychologists ask you not if something's good or bad, but how you experience it - I experienced that as freedom, independence, autonomy."
Adult Development &Generativity: "There are people who take something away from what I do, and I know that and it pleases me and I am proud of that."
Aging & Experience: "So, observations made by a 20-year-old are compared against a data set that is incomplete. Observations made by a 60-year-old are compared against a much richer data set. And the observations have more resonance, they're richer."

THE SELF
Personality (& Intelligence): "You can tell from my answers that I take what I do very seriously, and I think about it. But I don't really take myself that seriously. . . . I got the [school] work very easily, . . . so I had time to clown . . . . . I was the neighborhood cut-up."
Self-actualization: "Abraham Maslow said the fully realized man does not identify with the local group. When I saw that, it rang a bell. I thought: bingo! . . . I've never felt like a participant, I've always felt like an observer."
Temperament: "I don't live an angry life, not an angry person. I rarely lose my temper, can't remember the last time, never had a physical fight in my life, don't carry grudges, don't carry resentment either."
Creativity: "[M]y friend told me about Arthur Koestler’s book about the act of creation and it had a section on humor. . . . [T]he jester can be a thinking jester who thinks poetically."
Rationalization: "What's going on here? What's the ground floor? What's the reality? Let's look at the situation: so he's dead, she's hurt, and you don't feel good. OK, so let's figure this out."

CONFORMITY: "I am contemptuous of the mass . . . . It's the group behavior that I'm talking about on stage. . . . I'm not a collegial, I don't hang out . . . . If you belong to something it owns you, and I don't care for that."

MEMORY: When asked if he remembered his first joke, Carlin replied, "No. But I do remember the first time I ever made my mother laugh . . . . I wouldn't have remembered it as well as I do if it hadn't meant a lot to me."

LATERALIZATION: "When I harvest the pieces of paper and I go through them and sort them, the one lucky thing I got in my genetic package was a great methodical left brain."

LEARNING & MOTIVATION: "I think with anything you do over a long period of time, you should be getting better at it. I'm talking about craft, art, or drive that comes from inside."

PSYCHOLINGUISTICS: "I use the [curse] words because I'm from that ethos. . . . It's a very effective language. . . . There's no shock value left in words. Humor is based on surprise, and surprise is a milder way of saying shock."

METACOGNITION: "As you're going along, you're thinking of what you're saying, you want to give it the proper vocal values, so you are kind of thinking about it, not reaching for the words, but kind of thinking about them. You're also aware of the echo of what you just said, and whether it worked or not, and what that might mean."

PSYCHOPHARMACOLOGY: "See I had always been . . . a heavy user of marijuana, . . . a value-changing drug. . . . So, the LSD was a much stronger experience, and the mescaline, and I don't know what they did or how they did it, I just know that going through that gave me the confidence in these changes I was feeling, in this direction, this metamorphosis, I was in the middle of."

PSYCHOANALYSIS: "Comedy can also be based on describing one's inner self - doing anecdotes, talking about your own fears. Woody Allen taps into a lot of self-analysis in his comedy."

And, of course, the writer/editor in me also enjoyed his comments on writing: "The writing is what gives me the joy . . . . I love reworking, I love editing, love love love revision, revision, revision, revision." If only he were one of the authors with which I worked . . . Alas.

One other saying Carlin used in the interview that I liked was: "But even if I am a cynic, they say if you scratch a cynic, you find a disappointed idealist . . . ." I guess that's because that's how I see myself sometimes - a disappointed idealist. Oh, and a rock licker (i.e., hopeful about the influence of nurture/environment).

Dreams Interpretted

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:08:44 -0400

I had an odd dream the other night.

Everyone's heard of the dream where they find themselves in one of their old classes and completely, woefully unprepared for some life-trajectory-altering test - oh, and they're naked. Well, I had the Bizarro World version of that dream. There I was in class, all studied up, uber-prepared to be tested, and fully clothed . . . and no one would even acknowledge that I was there, let alone give me the test. I was George Bailey fumbling around Bedford Falls trying to get people to interact with me to no avail. (Coincidentally, I went to college near and spent much time in New Bedford, MA. Ok, weak aside, but I was thinking it and thought I'd share.)

Now, most any psychoanalyst worth their weight in salt (or today's dearness equivalent - gasoline, I guess) doesn't invest much worth in most of the theories of Freud anymore. (Would you just look at the cover of the version of The Interpretation of Dreams that I own? Penis envy? Anyone?) Nevertheless, there is still something to be said about Freud's observations regarding the unconscious mind. So, keeping in mind the caveat that "sometimes a cigar is just a cigar," I sometimes try to figure out what my mind is up to, dreaming those bizarro dreams.

My theory is that this particular dream is directly related to my current employment situation. You see, back in November, I decided to become a freelancer. I've been pretty pleased with the decision - work seems to be coming in steadily, I like doing what I'm doing, and my stress levels have gone way down - but I think there's a certain part of me that's just not feeling challenged enough or feels like I have something to prove to someone (who I'm not sure). Interesting, but I'm not going to worry about it too much. I don't miss the work challenges of my former job, which were more a source of stress than they were a means to prove myself in any soul-satisfying, positive way. I think what I'm actually craving is a creative challenge. Happily, one of the things with which I've been most satisfied with this job change is that it gives me more time for creative pursuits, and this little blog is sating at least a small portion of that creative hunger!

Morbid Thoughts

Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:08:01 -0400

I watched a movie the other night called The Bridge. Kind of a morbid thing to do on a Saturday night, because it's a documentary about suicide, but it was pretty interesting. The director Eric Steel got the footage for the most crucial pieces of the film (i.e., people jumping) by setting up his camera to shoot the Golden Gate Bridge continuously during the year 2004. (Apparently, the bridge is the most popular place for committing suicide; dozens jump to their death from it every year.) To the right here is a still shot a photographer (unrelated to the film) got of one of the would-be jumpers. You'll be relieved to hear that she was actually prevented from jumping (albeit very much against her will). . . by that very photographer.

Cruel irony (not mentioned in the movie) - some of the antidepressant medications on the market these days improve feelings of motivation before mood. So, the risk of depressed people trying to commit suicide may increase during the first 8 weeks of drug treatment because they still feel miserable . . . but finally have enough energy and focus to do something about it (i.e., take their lives).

In my opinion, the best part of the documentary was when that photographer who saved the young woman discussed his transformation from uninvolved observer to active Samaritan. It begs the question - when does one get involved, what responsibilities do strangers have toward other strangers, and what do the answers to those questions say about us as individuals and as a society?

Apparently, Steel received a lot of flack for parts of the film because, while, as I mentioned, most of the crucial footage was shot passively/unmanned, there are a few segments where someone is clearly manipulating the camera, getting better angles and close-ups. Critics and humanitarians have faulted Steel for exploiting these people at their lowest, most desperate moments and not doing more to try to get them help. And that has been countered with the argument that it's not practical to call the police every time you think you see someone acting "odd" on the bridge and that by the time you might be able to get someone over there, the person will have likely already jumped anyway. I don't know. It's all an interesting commentary on dispersion of responsibility, if you ask me (the social psychological term for this is bystander effect). In the documentary footage, we see so many people walking, running, cycling by as these lost souls, all alone, wanly look over the railing at the water far below them. Because there are so many people, no one person feels it's his or her unique obligation to act (although one or two do actually ask if the person is "ok," the exception not the norm). That disconnect is particularly tragic in cases like this - especially when the only other potential life line for these folks might be the one pictured here to the right.

The funny thing about the bystander effect is that when you tell people about the phenomenon, most will argue that they'd be the one to help, they'd be that exception to the rule. I'm not saying every one of them would be wrong, . . . but most would be. There have been tons of studies conducted that replicate these findings. I'm not saying we're all hopeless lemmings. Knowledge, as always, can have a counterbalancing effect; knowing there is this phenomenon to which we can all be susceptible might raise our awareness of situations like this and our potential roles in them. In fact, after learning about the bystander effect, my friend Ezra posted an interesting piece about encountering a situation (although, thankfully, not a life-threatening situation) where he questioned his responsibility as a passerby. He gives himself a hard time, saying he "had (sort of) failed one moral test," but I say at least his conscience was in the right place, his awareness was heightened.

Another friend of mine, Marc Etkind, published a collection of suicide notes (not to worry - not his own) a little over ten years ago called . . . Or Not to Be (the title, of course, based on that oft-quoted phrase of Shakespeare's Hamlet). In it, he reveals that less than one in five people who successfully commits suicide actually leaves a note and that these sort of notes became more common with the rise in popularity and circulation of newspapers in the 18th century (there were some cases of people actually publishing their suicide notes in the paper).

The news media has also had another interesting influence with regards to suicide statistics. If you were surprised to hear about the social psychology behind group inaction, you might also be surprised to hear what one researcher found - "Immediately after stories about suicides appeared [in the newspaper], suicides in the area served by the newspaper jumped. In the case of national stories, the rate jumped nationally" (David Phillips, Univ. or California, San Diego, as reported in Malcom Gladwell's book The Tipping Point - not a proper citation, but now you know where to look for more info).

I will end my little post here with the same quote, by Edwin Shneidman, with which Marc begins his book - "I have never read a suicide note that I would want to have written." Amen to that.