By Elizabeth Clark-Stern

Franz Kafka’s 1915 novella begins, “When Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin.”  Never, in Stanley Corngold’s vibrant translation of Metamorphosis do we encounter the word “cockroach,” yet we know : “His many legs, pitifully thin compared with the size of the rest of him, were waving helplessly before his eyes.”

Gregor’s  family  responds with horror: “(His mother) all at once jumped up, her arms stretched wide, her fingers crying, ‘Help, for God’s sake, help!’ and did not seem to notice at all that near her the big coffee pot had bee knocked over and coffee was pouring in a steady stream onto the rug.” Kafka walks the edge of tragedy and comedy, for we cannot help but laugh, as Gregor responds: “at the sight of the spilling coffee he could not resist snapping his jaws several times in the air. At this his mother screamed once more, fled from the table, and fell into the arms of his father.”

This is a farce. We howl, but behind this Monty Python-worthy absurdity, throbs a brutal truth.

The story unfolds in searing detail: Gregor feels shock, horror, the family above all awash in shame. What are they to do when the son they so depended on as the high-achiever of the family, the hero, the provider, the bearer of the family dignity, turns into a hissing monster?

From a psychological perspective, this could be the story of what happens when a family member falls from grace, unwittingly, and all his most repugnant traits are exposed.  It is also a tale of what we call in this century “codependency.”  The family behaves as if Gregor’s transformation has revealed a terrible family truth that they must shut away from the eyes of a judging world.  Paradoxically, if each family member had a secure identity, they could see his misery as his alone, and relate to it without the baggage of their own shame.

We need our heroes to stay heroes, and when they return from war emotionally altered by trauma, we are horrified. “Where is my son?” we cry. “Where is the warrior, the breadwinner, the dignity-bearer? How can he cry out and weep in the night like a girl?”

It goes across cultures, developmental stages, the life span. How many parents look at their teenagers and see a cockroach?

I have two beloved Aunts, one in her 80’s, one in her 90’s. They are not sisters. They grew up in the twenties and thirties in Tupelo, Mississippi, seeing each other across the church pews on a sweltering Sunday morning, or in the park of an evening, catching fireflies.  When my parents married, the local paper extolled, “this marriage unites two of the oldest families in Northern Mississippi.”

These gloriously capable women have morphed into people none of us knows.  They have no teeth. They cuss, refuse to eat, refuse to move out of their homes, scream with irascible aggression, and when confronted, dissolve in tears, whispering, “How did I become an invalid so fast? . . . Oh, my God, I have lost my mind.”

My Aunts spent their lives striving for mastery. They both earned Master’s Degrees in an era when most Southern women earned a ribbon for the best fried chicken. In World War II, one was an army nurse, the other de-coded spy messages from the Japanese. They both went on to marry men with PhD’s, raise children, speak out against prejudice, often with dire consequences. In the 1930’s, my older Aunt was hauled in front of the dean at Ole Miss for writing an article on integrating the university. One managed a hospital nursing program, the other managed a college library. Both wrote books. Now, at last, they have come up against something they cannot master.

I find all of this frightening new territory. Our family of doer’s, helpers, and problem-solvers have explored every tactic, exhausted every resource. Nothing alters the reality of transformation of our Aunts. Nothing can make them better, less irrational, less tragic, less absurd. We are called upon to accept our own helplessness, our own weakness, our own inadequacy, our own vermin-nature. To nurture a new capacity in ourselves, to be with the monster.

What if Gregor’s family had responded in a different way? Instead of shrieking and slamming the door, what if they had been fascinated: ”What a transformation—our son, overnight, a bug! How did this happen? What a wonder of nature! How do we spread the news of this miracle? How do we learn, from this giant cockroach, who was once only a human boy—our son?”

This seems a fairy tale, for we human beings respond as Gregor’s parents did, with grief, horror, fear, shame. And yet, if we can build capacity to be with this, even this, we can transform our families, our world,

Copyright January, 2012 by Elizabeth Clark-Stern

In October, I was attending a women’s retreat at a beautiful venue on an island near Seattle. A friend and I were looking out at a tree, happily dropping its leaves.

I sighed, “Oh, here we go. Soon all the color will be on the ground, dried to a crispy brown.”

My friend smiled, “Haven’t you ever noticed how beautiful bare branches are? In the coldest, darkest time of winter, they reach their limbs to the sky.”

I smiled, and thanked her. I imagined the tree before me, bereft of its color, reaching up to the moon on a dark night. Its beauty seemed not unlike the arms of a person, pared down to her essence, reaching out into the unknown.

I am reminded of this image, as we enter January. The lights of the holidays are down, all the leaves have sailed forth from the trees, and we are left in darkness.

I am living through in a time in my life when many people around me have lost loved ones. Loss seems to go in cycles, like waves against the shore. This winter I know many people who are grieving. Some lost an elderly parent who was ailing, some lost a beloved family member who died quite suddenly, or they are still grieving a loss from long ago. We think we can prepare for the onslaught of emotion that comes with even a much-anticipated death. In my experience, even when we know what is coming, it is a terribly traumatic shock.

As human beings it is simply difficult to wrap our minds around the absolute finality of death. I lost my father to cancer in the prophetic year, 1984. I knew he was dying, but something in me held on, somehow not believing it would ever happen. I was young. I had never lost someone so close to me. For twenty years after that, every time I phoned my stepmother, I expected my Dad to answer the phone, crooning, “Happy New Year!” I only gave up this expectation when she passed, and at long last, I grieved the loss of my childhood phone number.

How do we bear this inevitable, dreaded, reality? Many religions ascribe metaphysical meaning to it, seeing death as a transition, or that chariot to heaven. Does this help, when we are in the throes of fresh, raw, grief?

For me, I now realize that the death of my father was a necessary rite of passage for me to open a whole new door in my own consciousness. I was gifted with many dreams with my father in them. In one I was carrying his emaciated, body through Fifth Avenue in Manhattan at rush hour, weeping and calling out, “Stop! Will someone stop? I need to take my father to the hospital!” No one stopped.

I now see this scene as a love letter from my Dad, from wherever he is beyond the grave. He was telling me to stop, to really look at my frantic, hectic life. To take my soul to the hospital, for it was unhealthy, and needed attention.

I still miss my father. I will until the day I die, but I am grateful for the spiritual opportunity his death offered me.

I invite all those who are grieving, who have lost loved ones, or who, like many of us, grieve the state of our world, the environment, the genocide of innocent people. Beneath the grieving is a brave new world of your own soul and human spirit, learning new perspectives, embracing new causes, reaching out to heal the world, as you heal yourself.

I realize that until I experienced the death of my father, my capacity for empathy was impaired. I thought of myself as a good person, but my activities and thoughts were too ego-bound, too full of trivial pursuits, too unaware.

I am not saying give up silliness and fun. Far from it. Paradoxically, we can discover more joy and humor, the more we embark on a journey to become aware of the great blessing of this life, every moment, every day. We learn not to waste time worrying about how awful things are.

We can bask in the beauty of the bare branches of winter, ever grateful for the seasons and our intimate relationship with all things.

Epilogue: This is dedicated to all those who have lost dear ones, to the lovely friend who showed me the beauty of winter branches, and to my wonderful father.

Copyright 2012 by Elizabeth Clark-Stern

I woke this morning with a feeling of urgency. Some of this was inspired by an interview I saw last night on the news, with Zainab Salbi, the CEO of Women for Women International. As leader and creator of this organization, Ms. Salbi has spent years opening up opportunities for women in the most war-ravaged countries on the globe. Since my own trip to Africa in 2007, I joined her organization, and monthly send the most modest of checks to my “sister” in the Congo. To listen to Zainab speak is to feel inspired. She cited the three women who won this year’s Nobel Peace Prize, all activists in countries where the status of women has historically been as beast of burden. She spoke with optimism that women across the world can have a stronger and stronger voice in the peace process in the coming years.

Is it time for the archetypal Feminine to come out of hiding and make her mark on the world stage? Zainab Salbi would say a resounding “Yes!”

What does this mean for women and men on the ground, in our own communities, in our own embedded lives? I ask this to counter my own zeal to drop my “ordinary life” and take off for Africa, Nicaragua, or Egypt. This morning, I had to look at this eager-beaver part of myself with tolerance and good humor. I know I have worked hard to build a practice, family, a dear community of friends. And there is gentle inflation at work, in the notion that the people of these countries need someone of my age and culture, to “rescue” them.

What then can I do? What can all of us do, to promote the collaboration, peacemaking, and psychological wholeness needed to make a shift in the deeply entrenched “enemy-making” patterns that have caused war, violence, and oppression throughout the ages?

In searching for an answer, I reflected on last night’s dream, an image of a mythological spirit of the deep forest, emerging into sunlight, flanked by a banner of red and blue.

This figure was both masculine and feminine, and seemed to represent a fulfilled and complete soul. Alongside was a young woman in her forties, who stood by the banner, and was like a young warrior woman, dispelling any fear about the emergence of this whole soul. I felt that this was the Spirit of the Depths, so poetically articulated by Carl Jung in The Red Book. It is time for this archetypal spirit to come forth, to stand up to the Spirit of the Times.This will look different for each of us, as will its expression in the world. For some it could be a call to greater activism, as written of in Andrew Samuels’ The Political Psyche. For many, it could involve a conscious awareness of the barriers we unconsciously construct to avoid compassion. Being mindful whenever we feel too full of ourselves, too superior, or simply too busy to extend our love and help to those right under our noses: an aging Aunt, a neighbor, a coworker. Just asking ourselves (myself) – How can I bring peace, love, and reconciliation into every minute of my life? –

And, make friends with the spirit of the depths – the Archetypal Mother; the Amazon, who fights for justice in all things. She is with us, in all her manifestations, feminine and masculine, anima and animus, young and old.

Happy New Year, Spirit of the Depths. May we all befriend you, and let your wisdom and love shine forth, in 2012, and beyond.

Copyright January 1, 2012 by Elizabeth Clark-Stern