Welcome back to Realities, and happy 2010 to all.
Over the holiday break, I received an email from a woman making what she called an “unusual request.” She was having a problem accessing the Adobe Acrobat PDF files in our Free Library because she was visually impaired and used a screen reader (a software application that converts screen text to auditory or Braille output), but she kept getting an error message that the PDF files were restricted. Furthermore, she could not open the MP3 (audio) versions of the files in the Free Library either due to some alleged issue with Javascript (perhaps she meant Flash; the MP3 files don’t use Javascript), and wanted to know if I could do something to help. We do in fact restrict the PDF files with basic security that prevents copying, but have always been careful to distill these files so that they remain accessible to screen readers, and this was the first report I’d had of difficulty of this sort, though this woman certainly was not the first person to come to our web site with special accessibility requirements. She is not a Field training student, but of course I wanted to do what I could. Within the hour, after running a quick test, I redistilled all the Free Library files sans copying restriction, zipped them up, and sent them to her, and this seemed to do the trick.
Now, during the email exchanges that allowed us to troubleshoot what was going on and work out what to try, she began criticizing the design of the web site on the grounds that it had not sufficiently considered accessibility standards. I thought this was a strange tone to take in any case, but even more so since it was in the same breath, as it were, that she was asking for and receiving special accommodation of her “unusual request.” I did my best to explain that we indeed had taken accessibility into account in constructing the site. Making the Free Library files available in both visual and aural formats was itself an example of such consideration, as was ensuring that text was resizable throughout the site rather than locked in graphic files, and so on. There is a point, however, I went on to say, past which incorporating universal standards begins to have an adverse effect on site functionality. Furthermore, I explained, any organization must work within the limits of its available resources. To illustrate this, I pointed out that the site content is available only in English. Those who don’t speak English might be critical on the grounds that they are not being sufficiently considered. She took issue with this analogy, too, as she seemed to be inclined to do increasingly with my position, and it became apparent to me that I was wandering into the dimly lit halls of an unfriendly conversation, at which point I offered a final attempt to satisfy her objections, ending the note with my wish that she would enjoy the articles.
That was not the end of it. The next day, I received an email from the woman thanking me for the files and the “interesting exchange,” and asking if I would send one of the files again in a different format, as she had had trouble opening it. In light of the emails of the night before, the sudden return to a friendly tone struck me as disingenuous, and likely informed by the need for still further accommodation. I emailed back telling her that the files I already had sent would have to suffice, that I had not found the exchange of the previous evening “interesting” but “adversarial, critical, and inappropriate.” Field training is predicated on truthfulness, and this was the simple truth of it. I told her further that we at the Field Center do not engage in or tolerate polemics with either students or non-students, and that in my judgment there was not a good fit either for study or further communication between us. I trusted that she would respect this, and I again closed the note with best wishes.
Now here is where the thing becomes instructional, and I hope that this will be useful to anyone who has stayed with the story this far. Not surprisingly, I received yet another reply, this one criticizing me personally on the grounds that I was “making her responsible for my perceptions” and sadly, not living up to my own teaching, this sort of thing. It is a complaint I have heard more than once over the years by sincere but misguided students who do not realize that they are committing the grossest possible error in thinking about consciousness as cause, for they are invoking the subjective element in self-as-creator to justify irresponsibility, and it is hard to imagine a greater misuse. My response in this case was to have filters placed on the server to block the woman’s email and IP addresses. Her intention that she was not welcome, that she was being denied access, had found a way to fulfill itself.
That a stranger, even in the moment of asking for and receiving extraordinary help and support, would lapse into what is probably a well practiced stance of contention and blame is not unprecedented. That this woman would presume to lecture me on consciousness as cause in the same critical and egregiously disrespectful tone, without being invited to be my teacher, this too is not unheard of. It happens. This work attracts people in various states of contradiction and suffering, and sometimes the basic requirements of receptivity and respect are not in place. One can recognize this for what it is and respond appropriately by disengaging. No big deal. But it is worth writing about, even at some length, because there is an instructional point here that is essential to Field practice.
Field training tells us that “the world is the self writ large.” The whole model moves within the arc of the subjective, and even goes as far as to propose the notion of “radical responsibility” as a requirement of practice, a term that refers to the need to be willing to take responsibility even in situations where what is taking place appears to be the result of the will of others. This is imperative, because it is our willingness that creates, and the willingness to take responsibility at this ontological depth unleashes our creative authority, power, and reach.
That said, the subjective point can become a problem. Our Audio Series I program, “The Conversation,” addresses and resolves this problem by explaining how Field training can claim that “the world is the self writ large” and still avoid the unsupportable implications of absolute subjectivity or solipsism. From time to time, I talk to students and non-students who have bought into one of these implications and been snared by the contradiction it invariably entails. For example, one woman was living with a man who was physically abusive. This had been going on for a while, and the woman was exhausted. Now, criticizing this woman on the grounds that “the world is the self writ large” and that, therefore, she was responsible for his abusiveness, would have involved the great subjective error, which at the end of the day comes down to “blame the victim.” Such a position is heartless and has absolutely no place in Field theory or practice. If someone slaps you, then that person has slapped you. To collapse into subjectivity and ask how you created the slap would be to have your feet firmly on the wrong path. It is not that the question cannot be followed to a more liberating choice. The problem is that it too readily leads into mazes of confusion; the solipsistic denial of others; and displaced, disowned, or projected responsibility. The creative extrusions of consciousness into the world are often circuitous, subtle, and indirect—and importantly, as Field training tells us, no one can create for another. Too often, the simplistic “How did I create this?” misses the point, and leads us to overlook the many things for which we, as Particles, are not and cannot be responsible. Radical responsibility does not mean taking on responsibility that rightly belongs to someone else, for example. That is not conscious creatorship; it’s codependency. The one who has been slapped, however, does have a creative choice to make about whether or not that reality is allowed to continue. Its continuation, as Field training tells us again and again (and seems to need to), arises out of willful allegiance to the corresponding identity (in this case, that of the victim of abuse), and this is the right understanding of the subjective. The woman who lived with the abusive man did not want that situation, certainly, but she was willing to keep giving herself to the identity that made the situation inevitable. She was willing to be a victim. Thus, while she was in no way directly responsible for his abusiveness, she was radically responsible for her choice to be the one who continued to endure it. This is why Field training tells us that the creative willingness that shapes our reality implies a corresponding unwillingness to settle for less, which at heart means an unwillingness to be less.
Perhaps the woman with the screen reader does not see how she slaps people, even people who are doing all they can to be responsive and helpful. I would venture to guess that she had no experience of being disrespectful in presuming to lecture me about my failing to practice what I preach, and so on. I have seen Field training couples point the finger at each other in this way and even invoke “radical responsibility” as a kind of blame game or “tu quoque” argument. This is not Field training. It is an error in thinking that can range from simple confusion to sociopathic manipulation. We should never indulge in this sort of thing, nor tolerate it from someone else. It is first and last an abdication of responsibility, and worse, an avoidance that seeks to conceal itself within profound principles. Conscious creatorship hangs on the willingness to take responsibility, but one should never turn this into an argument against another.
If someone treats you unkindly or disrespectfully, if someone is abusive to you, if someone brings to you the burden of a mean spirit and invites you to dive into the dark waters of contradiction, you have a choice. You can refuse to participate. You can hold to the high standard of self-regard and continue resting in your ideal. And if this someone, tangentially acquainted with the idea of consciousness as cause, tries to turn the tables and cast you as the offender on the grounds that you have created the offense by being at the receiving end of it, then you can meet this disrespect with self-respect and disengage. This is the great value and power of Witnessing. Sometimes disengaging is the only practical way to stay true to what’s best in us. And is this not why such people come into our experience—to test us, to give us the opportunity to stay true to our better nature and refuse to collude with them in contradiction and suffering? We can understand that “the world is the self writ large” without allowing that to confuse us about how we are being treated. If someone else will not come up to our standard of respect and friendliness, I don’t see why we should sink to their standard of cynicism and complaint. The choice, as always, is ours.
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