Sufferings Redux

Sufferings Redux

I had a long chat with a young man this gorgeous morning in late spring in the highlands of a state known for breath-taking vistas of snowcapped mountains and thermal springs. He came to me because a friend of his had told him that I was a cicerone of reliefs from emotional troubles, besides a nestor of meditation within a certain circle.

We talked for over two hous while taking a hike over rolling meadows and fording rushing streams. He was amazed that I could walk for hours in light of my advanced age. I told him as long as we walked slowly I could manage. I didn't tell him in my salad days, I was a long distance runner. I didn't want to brag. I have done enough bragging in my life.

He told me the severe problems he had with his foster parents to a point he entertained thoughts of inflicting grievous bodily harm on them. He pointed out although his parents were well-to-do, they didn't have any sybaritic excesses in their lifestyle while he himself was pampered at an early age and thus developed a marked predilection for a luxurious and sensuous way of life. As he grew up, he discovered to his horror and anxiety that he didn't cope well with disappointments and failures. It appeared that he didn't have the mental toughness and resiliency to succeed in life. The more his mother upbraided him for his lack of discipline and for a propensity of self-indulgence, the more his resentment for her grew, and along with that a perverse contempt for his easy-going father. Last month, to his great surprise, his father dressed him down in a calm voice but unsparing words after he was being rude and insolent to his mother. Consequently, he found himself hating both his parents and wanted to lash out at them, but he was smart enough to realize he was being irrational in his thoughts and yet he felt powerless to stop them from entering into his head. For relief, he started going to bars in the evening and talked to the bartenders and strangers about his unhealthy wishes. Last week he ran into some guy who had heard of me. So, here he was, requesting my help.

We stopped under a tree big enough to give us ample shade. I sat on the ground slowly massaging my legs and breathing deeply the fresh air while brisk winds rustled my hair. He was pacing back and forth in front of me, listening to my words:

"Listen, Roberto, you're a very lucky man. You've got to realize that. You have the smarts, the looks, the education, and your parents' money. Yet you recoiled and ricocheted from anger, from being resentful of your parents' refusal to continue pampering you. You retreated into that aching, moody introspection of yours and came up with this "brilliant" idea of hurting your parents because they treated you as a child. Well, you are a child. You still act like a child. If you want them to treat you as an adult, you have to act like an adult.

Take one step back and have a really good look at the situation. You're just an overspoiled brat, a self-absorbed, ungrateful young man. How dare you have those stupid, violence-filled thoughts! You were adopted! You are not your parents' flesh and blood and yet they love you. Too much, I'm afraid. They owe you nothing. It's you who owe them everything, do you understand? Happiness is to think less of yourself and learn to be grateful and pay back your debts, instead of asking for more and more, otherwise you would just destroy yourself, sooner than later."

He stopped pacing. He looked at me strangely, frowning, face reddened. He wanted to say something. He half-opened his mouth, cleared his throat, but changed his mind at the last second. Then abruptly, he turned and walked briskly away from me, and then broke into a trot. I watched him running. Sunlight bounced off his white golf shirt. He made a turn at the bend of a stream. I didn't know what he ran away from. Maybe embarrassment. Maybe anger. Maybe both. I didn't really care. I then diverted my eyes to the ground in front me and saw the footprints left behind by his pacing to and fro, the footprints of a sick, selfish animal. I got up and walked slowly back to town. I felt drained. I just came in touch with something not quite evil, but definitely pathological. Pure selfishness is pathological. It makes us think only of ourselves. It reduces us. It dehumanizes us. In some cases, it makes us act smaller than animals.