The Curse Of "Should"

If you’re a regular with this blog, you know I teach at UCLA Extension.  At the end of last Quarter, I asked the students in my communication class to write a reflection on what they learned.  Oftentimes a person joins the class for one reason and leaves having learned something entirely different than anticipated.  I’d like to share an excerpt from what David (name changed) wrote because I think it’s something we all need to learn – over and over again!

Before I started this class I had a boatload of expectations for how my life was supposed to work out.  I kept wondering, though, why things always fell apart.  I was convinced that if you act a certain way, dress a certain part and do what you’re supposed to do then life would fall into place as it ‘should.’  I resented that my life hadn’t worked out the way I was told it would and was always waiting for things to happen as I expected they should.

As a Los Angeles native, I’ve seen it all – from a man with a five o’clock shadow wearing a pleated green tutu and wig riding a unicycle down Santa Monica Blvd. to a group of twelve-year-old kids who spent more money in five minutes at Saks Fifth Avenue than some countries generate in a year!  I thought that because I acted differently from those people that somehow I was better.

Although this class was about the dynamics of interpersonal communication, I learned something more useful: how to deconstruct my thought processes and so discover the reasoning behind my attitude towards life, relationships and personal fulfillment.  I’ve learned that the most challenging dynamic is often times the one you have with yourself.

I’ve recognized the many ways in which I’m hard on myself, the areas of opportunity where I can grow and most importantly I’ve discovered the ability to be surprised again – something I thought was long gone. I’m now at a phase in my life where everything is uncertain. If you asked me three months ago what my plan was, I’d have given you a road map, foolishly thinking I could walk it through without failing. Now I see that expectations of how life SHOULD be can be the demise to almost anything.

David believed that life “should” be the way he envisioned and when he encountered disappointments he became disillusioned and discouraged.  He couldn’t envision alternatives and couldn’t see the opportunities smack in front of him.  He hasn’t given up on his dreams; he has, though, given up on insisting how those dreams “should” become reality.  And so his life has expanded.

How about you – are you hung up on any “should” in your life?

Melissa Cistaro – Friend and Writer Extrodinaire

On Tuesday, May 5^th, “Pieces Of My Mother,” a memoir by Melissa Cistaro, arrives at bookstores.  Melissa is a friend and so, yes, in a way, this is a shameless plug!  However, I’m writing not just to plug her book.  I’m writing about Melissa because she inspires me and I enjoy nothing better than writing about people who inspire me.

As a child I became a voracious reader – from the Hardy Boys to “David Copperfield.” Early on I became fascinated with writers.  What kind of person could twist words with the slight-of-hand of a magician and so conjure worlds from the almost familiar to the outright exotic?  Although I was a good Catholic boy, I considered nothing more sacred than a book.  I loved the sheer physicality of a book – open the covers and another world tumbles out. 

I never aspired to be a writer, but I very much wanted to be friends with writers.  I wanted to sit in the company of my heroes and “saints.”  When I got to Fordham University I landed my own radio show, “Bluestockings”, where each Thursday night I’d interview poets, novelists and literary folk.  I was mentored by Marguerite Young who at that time had written the longest (1198 pages) novel in English, “Miss McIntosh, My Darling.”  She introduced me to Anais Nin, legendary feminist and diarist.  I believed they lived life differently from me and that somehow they had the eyes to see, the ears to hear and the hearts to feel in ways I didn’t.  

And now, all these years later, here’s Melissa – prettier than Marguerite and far less hedonistic than Anais – a friend with whom I’ve shared many a pot of tea.  She’s so wonderfully “not different” and yet from the ordinary dimensions of her daily life she’s written a memoir of her mother who abandoned her and her brothers and father.  She’s told the story of her anything but ordinary childhood.  This week her book physically appears on bookshelves after more than a decade of writing and rewriting, after having been rejected two score over.  And I am in awe.

I was seduced unabashedly by the romanticism of Marguerite and Anais.  But I know Melissa too well to shroud her in any romanticism.  In the harsh glare of everyday life, I admire her for raising a family, loving her husband and staying true to her children.  I celebrate her for being faithful in giving meaning to what was unfathomable.  I cheer her for slaying dragons and calling a truce with demons, as she offered peace to her childhood memories. 

To find the extraordinary in the ordinary – that is what goes into making us human.  And writers show us how.

Thank you, Melissa!