Teaching Coping Skills for Those in Need?

Here is an idea for a non-profit that has been banging around in my cavernous skull. While I think many of the problems that afflict people who live in poverty are systemic, the presence of stress can exacerbate and amplify particular situations. Providing stress relief and teaching coping skills, I believe, can help people to deal with their problems with more cognizance and more cogently.

I. Problem Formulation: The Presence of Stress

Stress is a complex interaction between the mind, body and the external environment that begins with the release of adrenaline and Cortisol in the brain which raises blood sugar levels as part of the fight-or-flight mechanism. As such, stress is a natural reaction of the body to its environment that has worked historically to protect us from danger.

But in a more complex environment, such as the contemporary world, potential fight-or-flight triggers are ubiquitous. According to Brad Lichtenstein, dangers lurk around every bend. “Twenty-four/seven access to information,” he says, “long work hours, traffic jams, tough marriages, errant kids…even seemingly innocuous aspects of our lives are stressors.” The response in our society is often chronic, nearly omnipresent, stress. “You produce so much Cortisol that your adrenal glands – the factories that produce and regulate our stress hormones – poop out,” says Lichtenstein. “The result? Constant fatigue, emotional chaos and decreased immunity” (Foltz-Gray).

To put it another way, a biological reaction meant for a more primitive environment operates on overload, and the negative effects are numerous, including diminished immune systems, significantly increased rates of aging (as evidenced by the study of telomeres) and deterioration of the cardiovascular system as well as the potential for developing newfound mental health and behavioral issues. (Foltz-Gray)

People who live in poverty (particularly children) are more vulnerable to the consequences of stress for two reasons: they have more stressors that combine to affect their lives more significantly, and they do not have the resources to develop appropriate ways to cope or relieve symptoms. Karen Seccombe lists stress as a primary pathway from poverty to adverse child outcomes, and finds that stress manifests in “adult depression, parental conflict, less social support, child abuse/neglect, and child depression/behavioral problems” (66). Stress acts both as a depressant and a suppressant; it both further depresses those who are living in adverse circumstances, as well as exacerbating situations in a way that prevents pathways out of poverty.

As a fight-or-flight mechanism, stress can lead adults to maladjusted ways of coping that have reifying consequences for their children, which show up as domestic violence, child abuse or neglect (less parental investment and response), more television and less positive stimulation, fewer educational opportunities and success in school, less exercise, poor nutrition and diet, and methods of flight such as alcohol and drug addiction (Evans, G.W, and Kim, P, 2013). Studies suggest that children in poverty cultivate chronic stress that follows them into adulthood, which includes physical ramifications, such as the development of asthma, which is common in impoverished neighborhoods (Evans and Kim). Other research strongly indicates that poorly-managed stress is not only passed on to one’s children, but can lead to addiction, terminal disease and premature death. (Mate, G.)

II. Program Objectives: Health and Vitality

A common assumption may be that changing the conditions of poverty, such as substantial stressors like homelessness, violence in the home, unemployment, food insecurity and other factors that contribute to poverty may of itself alleviate stress. Common sense would indicate that on a pragmatic level, satisfying basic needs may or may not relieve stress but all that it really does is alleviate apparent need; there is no indication that it will alleviate stress. Sufferers of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), for example, continue to struggle with intense stress and anxiety when they are removed from the traumatic stressors that have impacted them, even decades later. Unlearning maladjusted coping mechanisms to deal with stressors involves more than meeting basic needs, and these mechanisms may continue to contribute to poverty in the future, particularly if one relies upon fight or flight mechanisms such as violence, criminal activity or drug and alcohol abuse in order to cope with stress.

Stress is also ubiquitous among all social classes, so while meeting basic needs is an imperative, a more pertinent and immediate solution to dealing with stress is to provide resources that contribute to optimal health and vitality, even amid difficult or adverse circumstances. An assumption that implementing appropriate methods for managing stress and encouraging people to maximize the health of their bodies, minds and environments inasmuch as possible with whatever resources are available to them is central to the concept of optimal health and vitality.

Our nonprofit stress reduction center serves the purpose of helping people who are living in adverse circumstances to optimize their health and vitality in regard to the impact of stress in their lives through a three-pronged practical and educative approach. First, participants are educated in direct and proven methods for coping with stress, primarily by way of mindfulness techniques. The medical model developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn has been shown in studies to be effective in significantly helping people suffering from terminal illnesses to cope with pain and other medical symptoms, as well as people suffering from anxiety disorders (Zinn, et al)). Secondly, as part of the program ways to achieve cardiovascular exercise through aerobics as well as other possible physical activities are explored, and participants are encouraged to develop a regimen suited to their specific physical needs. Thirdly, nutritional education is made available to participants on ways to maximize physical health by eating appropriate foods, and learning how to resist bad foods, within a sometimes severely limited budget.

The main objective of the program is to teach people who live in any circumstance, including people who live in poverty, healthy methods for coping that energize rather than enervate, and that lead to problem solving rather than fight-or-flight responses, the latter of which often exacerbate problematic situations. Experiencing less stress may result in less domestic violence, less addiction, more parental responsiveness to children, fewer incidences of disease (such as asthma), less hopelessness, less shame and depression, more optimism, more energy and more creativity as individuals begin to redress their own circumstances without as much anxiety, and with more determination, confidence and ambition.

III. Modes of Implementation: Education and Practice

A participant at the non-profit stress reduction center most often comes on a volunteer basis, but she may be referred through another agency, such as DHS or through the advisement of a case worker from another program or organization. Other methods of advertisement occasionally include paid ads, as well as community involvement through teaching relaxation and mindfulness methods for free on an occasional basis in the schools or in work environments, as well as other venues. Books and literature published by the organization also help to propagate knowledge about its existence both to generate interest among those who want to take advantage of the program, as well as among potential donors.

Learning how to manage stress requires some level of volition. Initial intake consists of a class educating participants about stress and the role it plays in their lives, followed by one-on-one meetings with participants facilitated by staff trained in motivational interviewing in order to assess and encourage further participation in the program. General information about exercise and nutrition is provided during intake as well. Brief follow-up meetings are organized by class instructors throughout the tenure of the participant’s progress through the program.

The emphasis of the program, however, is to provide methods of coping through mindfulness and relaxation techniques that are not reliant upon a social support system in order to succeed. A typical mindfulness class usually lasts for about six to eight weeks, two times a week, and includes the option of taking home books and audio recordings to assist in practicing at home. Classes are organized to accommodate the time needs of participants as well, and ongoing drop-in classes are also available at the facility. Other techniques for centering and stress management are sometimes implemented on a case by case basis for people who find it difficult to apprehend the material.

Lastly, the program serves to augment therapies for some participants who are concurrently in mental health counseling through another agency for other related issues, such as those who are addicted to substance abuse, for example, or others who are referred to the program due to anxiety disorders or other mental health issues. Likewise, when fitting, some participants are encouraged to seek additional support through other agencies for related assistance.

IV. Program Evaluation: Outcomes

Three methods are used to evaluate the stress reduction program: public hearings, program measures and theoretical evaluation.

a) Public hearings. Published reports, both formal and informal, highlight the successes of the program and how it has been shown to help participants manage stress, helping them to cope in the adverse conditions of poverty. Participants who have made progress in managing stress are showcased for the public, which is advantageous in advertising the efficacy of the program. On the negative side, this form of evaluation does not address inefficiencies well, or aspects of the program that might not be functioning as well as they should.

b) Program measures. During initial intake, participants are given stress tests that measure levels of stress. Upon completing of a class, as well as at other milestones, test scores indicate whether or not stress has been alleviated. Tests are administered for follow-up for some participants six months later, and a year later. The stress test can show whether or not those who complete the program experience less stress, but it cannot show definitely whether or not the decrease is due to the content of mindfulness practice, coupled with exercise and nutritional counseling.

c) Theoretical evaluation. The assumption is that a decreased level of stress leads to increased optimal health, and therefore revitalizes one’s capacity for coping and problem-solving in a way that avoids maladjusted methods of coping. A theoretical evaluation compares the correlation between levels of stress and one’s economic condition, as well as other factors related to poverty, upon entry into the program, then compares it again five years after completing the program through hypothesis testing in order to see if there is a positive correlation between stress reduction and various outcomes related to poverty. Hypothesis testing can show whether or not there is a correlation between graduating from the program and experiencing an economic shift, as well as comparing other outcomes, within a certain level of confidence, while accounting for numerous other, often arbitrary outliers that may play a role in perpetuating poverty or even making conditions worse (such as, for instance, a sudden death of a loved one, a disabling injury, an unexpected job loss, etc.). The problem with this method, however, is that it is time-consuming and costly, and requires numerous statistical studies which necessitate using other agencies to come to the best results. Moreover, while we can see positive trends that keep us motivated, it takes a long time to come to conclusions.

#21. Dream Segment on the Approach of Spring

 

I went back in time after much pleading through desire and regret, but upon my return found myself afflicted with amnesia. I recall much conversation with the Apostle Paul, who pushed me back further where, I vaguely recall, I was received into the heart of Jesus as his own personal time traveler. But most of that episode is burnt neurons, chemical crisps, that slight ache in my right vertebrae. I traversed continents and time then returned to my own room, and rubbing my eyes, made coffee.

Again, seeking to rescue a child, one of my own, from burglary, I hid in the back of my own car in the dark hours of the morning while a thief pulled out of our driveway. A child in my arms remained silent, and I finally gathered courage and sat up, leaned forward, and touched the thief, who gasped, and slipped out the window, evasive. Behind the wheel, I discovered I had stolen a police car, the mobile arm of the law, and driving the freeways heard the report of my own unintentional crime. I slipped off the road and down into a ravine that led to a forest, the car transformed into a motorcycle to navigate trails, small child hunched over my back.

Providence and Prayer

This happened.

Twenty years ago I lived in my first studio apartment in southern California in a run-down neighborhood. The apartment had thin walls and cockroaches. I worked swing-shift by myself running a plastic blow-molding machine, making about 800 polycollars (some kind of plumbing device) per night. One night I came home to find a bombed-out car, still smoking, in front of the apartment complex. My immediate neighbor was a woman with burn scars all over her face, who liked to stand naked out in the hallway smoking cigarettes, and would rush back into her apartment when she saw me. I slept on an old couch (it was a “furnished” apartment) across from my two huge bookcases filled with Calvinist and Reformed theology books, the sum of my possessions. I listened to KFI talk radio. I did not own a television, and the internet had not taken off as a cultural phenomenon yet, so I didn’t even have an e-mail address.

I had stopped attending any kind of church, though I was fresh from working at a Bible College. I had been terminated for being a Calvinist. I had yet to discover the Orthodox Church. I decided, however, to pray that providence would arrange for me to help someone in need at least once a day. As it turned out, about once a day I would find somebody in need and assist them. Many people needed gas, or their car jumped, or the guy just out of jail who I took to Dennys, etc. The prayer was being answered, but I thought to myself, “This isn’t necessarily being arranged by providence. I am just unconsciously actively looking for people to help and making myself more available.”

So one night I decided I was just going to forgo the whole experiment, drop my a convenience store, buy some beer and get drunk. After work I stopped at the first convenience store I saw, where I had never been before, and went in, grabbed a six-pack of beer, and took it to the counter.

The guy behind the counter hung up a phone, a stricken look on his face. “My wife just left me,” he said.

“Oh no,” I said. I got out my wallet.

“I can’t believe it,” he said. “She just called and told me she had packed and is going out the door this minute.”

“That’s terrible,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

He put his hands down on the counter, trembling, and began to talk, and I began to listen. No one came in the store, and for about thirty minutes he told me all of his troubles. Since this is a true story, nothing miraculous happened to give it a sense of closure. The guy and I did not become friends. His wife likely left him and he was likely miserable, although hopefully my presence for thirty minutes as a listening ear was helpful. I was overcome with Protestant shame and did not buy the beer, but that is not the point of the story (I bought a gallon of Diet Coke instead.) And although I’d like to say from then on I never doubted the reality of providence or serendipity or synchronicity or again, but I did.

Moreover, for some reason, after leaving that circumstance of working nights and living alone, I quit the prayer of helping at least one person a day. Maybe I’ll start it up again.

Is All Marriage Sacramental?

Marriage is a universal phenomenon across cultures, and existed before the Christian Church did. In fact, the early church merely blessed marriages that were conducted by the state — there was no ceremony for marriage itself in the Church. That blessing developed into the sacrament (or mystery) of marriage within the context of the Church, distinct from the contract that is established by the state.

Despite what the Republican contenders and many others try to establish, the reality is that the Christian Church did not invent marriage; however, the Church did bless it and sanctify it with very specific purposes, primarily for the transformation of two people, a husband and wife, a man and a woman, who through service to each other also serve God. While there is evidence that many of the early Christians believed that the basic function of sexuality was for procreation, there is no evidence that this was ever widely held to be the main purpose for marriage. In other words, marriage was not blessed by the Church merely as a justification for sex. Rather, the sacrament, or the mystery of marriage — the sanctification of a social institution within the context of the Church — understood in its best expression, is held to be a salvific enterprise whereby two people unite to cooperate with God for their mutual benefit, edification and salvation.That’s the Christian definition and interpretation of marriage, but it isn’t universal or even fundamental to what marriage is itself.

To put it another way, the sacrament of marriage takes something human and offers it back to God in the transforming mystery of divine grace. Marriage is transformed into something else as a sacrament than what it was previously. It is a mistake to conflate or confuse the human institution with the sacrament of the Church.

There is a real difference between marriage as a civil construction, a convention that changes, and marriage as a holy mystery that occurs in the lives of believers. To conflate or confuse the two realities also fosters serious questions about the role of the state in relationship to the Church.

If the institution of marriage is, as the Republicans and others claim, fundamentally a sacrament that should be defined on the federal level as per the Christian definition, this is an astonishing move toward theocracy and more government intervention into private lives. It is an affront to liberty in a democratic nation that has as one of its founding principles the freedom of religion and explicitly forbids the government from enacting religious duties or responsibilities. The First Amendment proclaims, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” But who administers or defines sacraments except religions?

More to the point, if the federal government is empowered to define marriage as a sacrament without distinction, thereby opening up the “official” definition to further modification through amendments in years and decades to come (a movement that would likely ultimately directly defeat and contradict its initial purpose), what other sacraments of the Church, or of other faiths, should the state be empowered to define? Baptism? Communion? Confession?

The answer is that marriage is not a sacrament unless it is performed in the context of faith. Sacraments and other matters of faith are not civic institutions and are not functions of the state, and the state should not be arrogated any power at all to define them. The way that a specific body of faith interprets marriage should be protected, but the way a democratic nation defines marriage for its citizens should be open to interpretation in a way that manifestly addresses the rights of everyone. In other words, the Church should be able to define marriage the way it always has, and to only marry those whom it will. On the other hand, the state should be able to administer Constitutional rights for everyone and marry whomever convention allows.

The Church may have an opinion regarding gay marriage, but its arguments should be substantial and not built on the fallacy that gay marriage threatens the Christian sacrament of marriage. In the final analysis, the practice of gay marriage, whereby nontraditional couples are given the same legal rights as traditional couples, does absolutely nothing to discredit or threaten sacramental marriage. Marriage as a human institution universal among cultures and marriage as a sacrament of the Church are two different things.

The Polarities of an Occupying Ethos

Crossposted at the Huffington Post.

The word “occupy” is a bit like the word “cleave,” which, as Alan Watts was fond of pointing out, has two meanings, one of which is the precise opposite of the other. Two separate people according to the biblical terminology are to cleave to each other as one flesh, which does not mean that they are to be cleaved in half, which is an action the butcher takes with his cleaver.

Like the word “cleave,” there are two meanings involved in the word “occupy,” one of which is the exact opposite of the other. We can occupy as those who dominate but have no genuine relationship to that which they try to possess and control, a dynamic through which all things become objects of consumption, expendable once used, and therefore ultimately lose all value; or we can occupy that to which we already belong, collectively, as easily and naturally as our blood and bones inhabit the boundaries of our flesh.

An occupation in the first instance is a military endeavor that usually devolves into continuous conflict and oppression; it belongs to the lexicon of war terminology. On the other hand, an occupation is also why you wake up most days and get dressed, drink your coffee and for which you leave your home with the goal of making money and supporting yourself and your dependents. The former is violent and radical; the latter is natural and progressive and useful.

To occupy, one might suggest, is the work of occupants, the former occupants of homes that are being foreclosed, many of whom have lost their occupations and cannot find another, due in part to the unregulated practices of radicalized financial institutions hedging their bets against their own losses.

To occupy a street or a park or a school or a city is an occupation that broaches vocation, although keeping oneself occupied without being brutalized, arrested and stigmatized, without being preoccupied with merely surviving in the attempt to occupy that space in which you truly belong, is the great difficulty. Many who occupy are lost occupants, or at least they represent the occupants of loss, the many who have senselessly lost both homes and occupations, who want to reoccupy that which has been stolen, the resources that belong to all that have been transmuted into commodities for the benefit of the few.

The polarities inherent in the word are as stark as the differences between attempting to dominate the earth, or being reconciled to it; seeking to possess an object for its abstract value, or valuing what you have for however long you have it. The Japanese poet, Issa, speaks of his relationship to material things, and of how the value of that which he truly possesses cannot be evaluated or apprehended through the type of possession that motivates burglary: “The thief left it behind: / the moon at the window.”

An occupation of dominance would want to grasp the moon, possibly mine it as per a science fiction nightmare generated in the mind of Heinlein, be the first to get there to plant a flag, lay claim to it, own it. But in a moment of loss, considering what the thief did not take because he could not take it, the poet truly possesses the moon, or rather, is possessed by it. That is the difference between an occupation of militant dominance, and an occupation of a natural inhabitant, the difference between living life in endless empty pursuits as a consumerist, and being content to simply consume what we already have. The few through domination coerce and manipulate and lie and destroy, and to some degree we are all, in the affluent western hemisphere, complicit.

We are all complicit to some degree with the manipulations of the few, the oligarchs, due to our corporate addiction to consumerist culture (or, alternately, our consumerist addiction to corporate culture), and this will be the downfall of any positive occupation, despite protests and arrests and deeply felt struggles to embrace community and responsibility, despite efforts to promote a peaceful revolution that moves naturally from the inside outward.

The implicit danger is subtle. It is to change the meaning of the positive aspect of what it means to occupy or reoccupy that public sphere to which we belong into the dominant and negative, military sense of occupation, perhaps in small ways, or by not admitting it when we do. I am reminded of bell hooks and her brilliant essay, “Feminism”, in which she describes the ways in which those who are dominated also in turn dominate others. She argues effectively that the woman who is dominated by patriarchy at her place of employment often goes home and dominates her children in turn. “It is first the potential oppressor within we must resist,” she writes, “the potential victim within that we must rescue — otherwise we cannot hope for an end to domination, for liberation.”

The reductionist agent that will change a positive sense of occupation, of living where we belong and laying claim to it, to the negative, that of seeking to dominate what is not ours to possess and which will never fulfill its promise to satisfy, is consumerism.

There is nothing ignoble or immoral about consumption. We must consume to live, and live to exist. We consume, whether food or drink or pleasures that are simple or complex. We consume energy, thoughts, ideas. We eat death, as the late Fr. Alexander Schmemann tells it — food that is composed of dead things that we must store in a freezer unit in order to preserve it. And we have opportunity to eat life as well, to consume God, spiritual energy, the Body and Blood of Christ, in the paradox of mystery.

Whether we consume death or consume life, we are built as creatures around the principle of consumption. Therefore, when all things, including the natural resources to which we belong and have every right to occupy and use for the benefit of us all, when everything is branded and manipulated and coerced into becoming an object of consumption for the sake of gratifying that which cannot be satisfied, this is without nobility or morality or value and leads to destruction. It is the consumption of death unto death. Consumption that never satisfies or fills the one who is consuming, the continuous digestion of that which lacks the psychic nutrients to provide us with genuine sustenance, is at its heart nihilistic and self-annihilating.

Consumerism is the ultimate preoccupation, the sort of which Nero is said to have practiced, in which we dazzle and gratify ourselves both in our entertainments and our greed for the monetary means to sustain them. It is a trap that causes us to be complicit, if not aware, with those who profit from our own noetic despoilation. Such is the pulse and heart of consumerism by which the 1 percent keep us captive, and in which money truly is proven to be the root of all kinds of evil.

The word occupy also connotes presence, however, which is the precursor to love. We cannot love that which we cannot know, and we cannot know that which is not in any way present. And we cannot be present unless we occupy, in the positive sense, that to which we belong. We all belong to the earth, rather than the earth belonging to us, and we belong to each other as an essential humanity in which difference is finally a technical distinction.

An occupation of diversity and of transformation, of seeking the continual renewal not just of individual human minds but of social structures, of financial institutions, of the way we do business or educate, of politics and spirituality and art, is an occupation and a vocation for which we are born, which is to be in communion with all things and each other through love.

#20. Religion

I hate dusty old religion, the old time gospel hour, 
even the hymns not worthy of hatred —
I hate the pallid pale faces with nice smiles,
the suits that cage subtle beasts and burning.
I hate the big leather Bibles with your genealogy
inscribed with Victorian penmanship on the inlet,
the long moralizing sermon, the organ and trill
in the voice of the elderly lady singing:
‘Were you there…?” and “Poor, poor…”
I loathe the feeling of accomplishment granted
by a tie with a clip and a pair of nice shiny shoes,
a wad of folded dollar bills placed firmly in the plate,
unpacked dogmas layered with dead flakes of skin.
A cloud of dust rises up from the bowl of your mouth
every time you open it to speak, an aged smell
exudes, suffocating me in verbal polyester. Worse,
I cringe at the praise god hallelujahs of your children
swinging from the chandelier as if they invented it,
the slick routine service slick with polished piety,
I despise the get-rich-quick heretic, claiming it,
as though faith were magic and money divine,
singing, “poor, poor” and “were you there…?”
I loathe the dry-eyed rituals of true believers
hooked on seriousness, drunk on all that’s humorless,
bitter with the insincere truth, naked fundamentalists
raging holy bloody war in the name of contorted love.

 

#19. Shadows

I cast my shadows out throughout the day,
(of course there are more
than one — they multiply with the variation of the light)
as if they   are not myself broadcasting out
again and again, twinning, unbending then bent,
against the pavement or a glass pane,
some thicker than others with a consistency of syrup,
some fleeting like wild birds that flutter and spring forth,
some distant and rushing to reunite at my feet,
some charging out like flakes of dust into the light.

Through evening I throw them out like seeds
wondering what plant will grow and whether
one might manifest features that only I know.
The darkness, then, is home, when the moon slinks away
all shutters are slid shut in the cloaked colors of night,
and all shadows reunite to dwell in my stark thin heart.