Autor: Julio Cesar Tafforelli | Publicado: 2011-09-09T08:07:00-07:00



How Schemas WorkIt is interesting to think about our schemas determining our world view. Are we not more inclined to see our attitudes and behaviours as being self-determined, especially having made choices to leave familiar Mennonite and institutional ways of being? How is it that unbeknownst to us we are confined by another inadequate grid in the form of our schemas, a grid to which we choose to adjust our lives, sacrificing our natural flexibility, and opportunities for creativity, joy and compassion?

Schemas have the power to select what we pay attention to and what we ignore. As a result we may end up seeing events in our lives through selective perception, overgeneralization, mind reading, jumping to conclusions or exaggeration. These absurd mental habits keep our schemas alive and us caught in illusion.

Here’s a personal anatomy of a schema attack peppered with selective perception, overgeneralization and jumping to conclusions. My resistance to accepting life ‘as is’ was evident both at the beginning and end of our two week stint with Erik in May. Initially I was nervous that my tendency toward control and efficiency would reign above love for Erik, making his time with us even more miserable than how miserable I anticipated he would be in missing Bev and Paul. But at the end of the two weeks when we all realized that the time and our being together had been much better than any of us expected, I was surprised to find myself resisting reality again. I could foresee what would happen when Paul and Bev returned. Erik would leave and with him would go the welcome closeness that daily interaction offered. Bev’s return would signal a return of my jealousy that I had felt remarkably free from for two weeks. Paul would return enlightened from Kanuga, knowing with even more clarity how I needed to be gone from their lives. My life was over.

What my fear, fueled by limited perception and exaggerated thinking, kept me from seeing were these many truths. My relationship with Erik is not threatened by Bev or Paul, but enhanced by his relationship with them. My two weeks of jealousy-free lightness resulted from my choice to care more about creating a healthy space for Erik and being engaged in my own life rather than from Bev’s physical absence. When I am free to see Bev as a person rather than as my nemesis, lightness exists in our friendship. And as far as Paul goes, I should know already that it’s impossible to anticipate his response and that his wisdom is trustable.

Both the exclusion schema and perfectionism schema were active here. I take the understanding driven into me at childhood that the one guarantee of being included is being good, and understand that because I’m not as good as Bev, I can’t have a relationship with Erik; because my culture said that I had to live perfectly to measure up, I think that any failure means I’m not worthy of community contrary to Paul’s cautionary message that it is intent that matters. If my heart is intent on evil then there is no place for this in Watershed; if my heart is intent on learning to love and I screw up in spite of this, I will find grace.

Goleman cautions us that learning healthier patterns to replace the well-worn ruts of our defensive habits will take a long time. She encourages empathy as we follow the Noble Truths of Buddhist teaching: recognize our suffering, see the cause of our suffering, know that we can free ourselves from suffering and learn the path to be more free from our suffering.