Gotta Go Low

“When they go low, we go high.”

~ Michelle Obama

*****

Years ago, when I was trudging and stumbling my way through one of the more difficult periods in my life, and with some frequency being targeted for unfair and painful attacks, almost daily I would call my long-time mentor and sponsor in recovery. I would vent and sometimes sob as I laid out my fears and pains to Sam. Over and over again he would remind me:

“Ron, the only path that will work is the high road. Otherwise, we can’t get there.”

“There” was the vision I’d established for myself through long conversations with Sam. It was a reflection of a life that Abraham Maslow would have called “Self-actualization.” And with it, a means to be at ease in the world amid tensions, difficulties, and challenges. In more practical terms: it was a commitment to be the best version of myself on a day-to-day basis no matter what.

At a later point, I would read from the work of Viktor Frankl, who said amid the devastation of concentration camps, “Yes to life, in spite of everything.”

The Conundrum

How does one choose the high road when a current reality may be horrible? Therein lies the great and strange conundrum we all face.

For most of us, unless we have gone into our own darkness, what Carl Jung called “shadow self,” we cannot get over ourselves sufficiently to select a higher way. Our misperceptions, misunderstandings, fears, grievances and traumas project themselves against our knowledge and against our will into and through our lives. Because we have not found our way to our own inner place of reconciliation with ourselves, we carry frustrations, resentments, prejudices and condemnation into our attitudes, actions and lives.

To be clear, and with a shout out to Maya Angelou’s brilliant thoughts, we really don’t know how to do better. As a result, we just can’t do better.

Because we have not gone low, deep into ourselves, going high is not possible.

That is not to say we should not try to do better. Of course, we should. And perhaps we’ll have some successes. Yet the ability to truly forgive, the means to fully love our neighbor as ourselves, is simply not sufficiently realized. We are not able to realize our highest selves..

The psycho-spiritual notion of the problem we face is “bypassing.” We try to deny or delay facing our own darkness. As a result it remains dark, and we remain unilluminated. We and the world are less realized as a result.

It is the heroic journey that each of us faces.

There can be no ascent of the Soul, without the descent into the realms we all wish to avoid.