Blessed are the pure in heart, but it is inconceivable that a statue went on to provide that lack of purity of heart and its symptoms should be defined by a Government Department in the rules and orders having the same effect as if they were contained in the Act. We forget that we are dealing with a fundamental and inevitable human impulse, and that it is our business to preserve those aspects of it which are good and to minimize those which are evil. They love darkness, and we know of whom that was first said. That love of darkness is shrewd. For, if we think of it, any attempt whatever to define obscenity—once we have put aside the vague emotional terms of abuse, foul, filthy, lewd, disgusting, et cetera (a Latin term for the expression that means: and other things; and so forth; and the rest)—in cool and precise. Individuals change as they grow. People are affected by their environments and the way they are treated. Two individuals may respond very differently to the same situation because they are different people terms cannot bring us to any crime against society.  

Such as a child may chalk on the pavement without endangering the structure of society—he is less likely to find himself on the episcopal throne than in prison, unless by the strenuous exertions of his friends he is sent to a lunatic asylum. So great for the official mind in this matter are the advantages of darkness! We still live in a society which meekly permits a man to be fined or even sent to prison for the unfashionable use of perfectly correct synonyms. Even a bishop may have to protect himself against a word. I remember being amused as a schoolboy by an incident that happened to the then Bishop of Winchester (Samuel Wilberforce, nicknamed on account of his extreme urbanity, “Soapy Sam”). He had preached a sermon in a country church on behalf of the restoration fund, and the local paper reported that he declared the church to be “nothing but aa damned barn.” Fortunately, his secretary was able to write the editor that the word actually used by his lordship was “damp.” 

 David, a middle-aged contractor, came to see me because his violent rage attacks were making his house a living hell. He told me a story about something that had happened to him the summer he was twenty-three. He was working as a lifeguard, and one afternoon a group of kids were roughhousing in the pool and drinking beer. David told them alcohol was not allowed. In response, the boy attacked him, and one of them too out his left eye with a broke beer bottle. Thirty year later, he still had nightmares and flashbacks about the stabbing. He was merciless in his criticism of his own teenage son and often yelled at him for the slightest infraction, and he simply could not bring himself to show any affection toward his wife. On some level, he felt that the tragic loss of his eye gave him permission to abuse other people, but he also hated the angry, vengeful person he had become. He had noticed that his efforts to manage his rage made him chronically tense, and he wondered if his fear of losing control had made love and friendship impossible.  

I introduced David to a procedure called eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR). I asked David to go back to the details of his assault and bring to mind his images of the attack, the sounds he had heard, and the thoughts that had gone through his mind. Just let those moments come back, I told him. I then asked him to follow my index finer as I moved it slowly back and forth about twelve inches from his right eye. Within seconds, a cascade of rage and terror came to the surface, accompanied by vivid sensations of pain, blood running down his cheek, and the realization that he could not see. As he reported this sensation, I made an occasional encouraging sound and kept moving my finger back and forth. Every few minutes, I stopped and asked him to take a deep breath. Then I asked him to pay attention to what was now on his mind, which was a fight he had in school. I told him to notice that and to stay with the memory. Other memories emerged, seemingly at random: looking for his assailants everywhere, wanting to hurt them, getting into barroom brawls. Each time he reported a new memory or sensation, I urged him to notice what was coming to mind and resumed the finger movements.  

At the end of that visit, he looked calmer and visibly relieved. David told me that the memory of the stabbing had lost its intensity—it was now something unpleasant that had happened a long time ago. “It really sucked, and kept me off-kilter for years, but I am surprised what a good life I eventually was able to carve out for myself. The following week, dealt with the aftermath of the trauma: how he had used drugs and alcohol for years to cope with his rage. As we repeated the EMDR sequences, still more memories arose. David remembered talking with a prison guard he knew about having his incarcerated assailant killed and then changing his mind. Recalling this decision was profoundly liberating: He had come to see himself as a monster who was barely in control, but realizing that he had turned away from revenge put him back in touch with a mindful, generous side of himself. David said that he also was doing his stuff, his sarcastic thing, and he did not know he was kidding. The blacker side of these role have crept into his personality. He like playing those sarcastic characters, and he lived doing it in his private life too, as a joke. It became part of his social humor.  

Next David spontaneously realized that he was treating his son the way he had felt toward his teenaged attackers. He then asked if I could meet with him and his family so he could tell his son what had happened and ask for forgiveness. Days later, he reported that he was sleeping better and said that for the first time in his life he felt a sense of inner peace. A year later he called to report not only that he and his wife had grown closer and had started to practice yoga together, but that also he laughed more and took real pleasure in his gardening and woodworking.  The most interesting problems in human culture have always existed on the borders between the professions, industries, system, and the critical areas which affect our daily lives. Entertainment, and increasingly all media trivialize these boundaries. As a result, the border between reality and unreality which has always been thin and constantly shifting has become even more fragile and dynamic in our times than ever before.  

The Winchester Mystery House

Whatever happens, respect the place and the spirits that are still occupying the area. https://winchestermysteryhouse.com/