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On Yoda, Trouble, and Transformation: The Cultural Context of Therapy and Supervision

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Abstract

In America, we miss the pivotal role of trouble in transformation, because our pursuit of a painless and trouble-free life aborts the process by which the psyche “gives birth” to change. As therapists, we know better: healing and growth require movement through, rather than avoidance of, troubling symptoms. Meanwhile our culture, in order to avoid facing the trouble of aging, sidelines and segregates our old people, which lets the Elder spirit waiting in each Old One wither from disuse. We do for our clients what Elders would do for the culture, carrying their accumulated weight of hope and despair, joy and sorrow, violence and peace. Eldering and therapy transform that troubling weight into “spiritual ballast,” providing the stable ground people need for the journey through life. So as therapists, we’ve been drafted, ready or not, and without our informed consent, into the role of Cultural Elder. We are midwives during the labor that births new beginnings. The supervisors among us can be seen as providing for apprentice therapists the final experience that initiates them into this crucial cultural role. In contributing to the reweaving of an unraveling world, our profession serves a function and carries a responsibility much broader than that defined by our credentials.

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Notes

  1. The author first heard this story told by Meade (2003).

  2. To be more complete, “recreational” drug use among adults is down, but up among African-American and Hispanic adolescents, adolescents in trouble with the law, construction workers, and the unemployed. The author reaches these conclusion after a limited survey of internet inquiries about drug use among e.g., adolescents, the poor, African-American and Hispanic youth, and various professionals and trades. Googling “drug and alcohol use’ trends” led to url http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=%22drug±and±alcohol±use%22±trends&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8.

  3. See Lucasfilm Ltd. (2009b).

  4. See Lucasfilm Ltd. (2009a).

  5. “The Dark Side” refers to the paradoxical flipside of The Force, in which its energy is co-opted for evil, power, and wealth. This is Star Wars’ take on the eternal struggle between good and evil (Lucasfilms Ltd 2009b).

  6. Archetypally, the female counterpart to Yoda, the male Elder, is the Crone (the Wise Old Woman; see Bolen 2001). It’s not coincidence that the weaver in the myth of the Cave of the World is an Old Woman, nor that the unraveler is an old male dog, but that’s another story. In this essay, “Elder” is used to include both genders.

  7. Elkhonen Goldberg (2005), a psychiatrist, makes a surprising scientific and medical case for the organized emergence of wisdom in the aged.

  8. A charming and inspiring collection of the stories and the wisdom of fifty “elders” is offered by Zuckerman (2008) in two formats. First, a book with photos and brief interviews with famous artists, politicians, scientists, and literary figures, all of whom are old, on the subjects of wisdom and life’s lessons. They include Madeleine Albright, Buzz Aldrin, Dame Judi Dench, Clint Eastwood, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Jane Goodall, Ted Kennedy, and 41 others; and second, a DVD of carefully selected excerpts from all 50 interviews. For a charming and humbling experience you will not forget, get it. Trailers from the DVD may be viewed at http://www.wisdombook.org/.

  9. The full quote, spoken by the late Joseph Campbell at the age of 83 (a few months before he died in 1987) while recommending skepticism in the face of “the authorities,” is this: “The older I get, the more I realize that ‘the authorities’ are just a bunch of troubled youngsters” (Tatge 2008).

  10. For more on “elder character,” see Hillman (1999), Goldberg (2005), or Pipher (1999).

  11. This idea is central to the work of Joseph Campbell (e.g. Tatge 2008; Meade 2003; or go to http://www.mosaicvoices.org/), and Christina Baldwin (2005), among many others.

  12. These meanings are in the Latin roots of the words “instruction” and “education” (Harper 2001).

  13. This is not meant to deny the fact that, in practical terms, the therapist has an obligation to take seriously and work with the “presenting problem.”

References

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Correspondence to Vincent P. Ward.

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Ward, V.P. On Yoda, Trouble, and Transformation: The Cultural Context of Therapy and Supervision. Contemp Fam Ther 31, 171–176 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10591-009-9093-7

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