Real Joe

I’m cruising with the flow of traffic at about 45 MPH, about 3 or 4 carlengths behind the truck in front of me. I glance in the rearview mirrow and notice a guy in a Jeep pulling up close behind me. I can sense his urgency. And I know he can spot the space in front of me, that it’s triggering a “slow driver” alert in his brain, even though I’m going as fast as possible along with everyone else on this packed but flowing freeway at the moment.

By continuing to glance in my rearview mirror, I can see him glancing in his rearview mirrors, looking for an opening in the right traffic lane so he can pass me and wedge into the space in front of me that I’ve carved out, thereby getting him to his urgent destination .001 of a second faster.

He makes his move and starts to pass. Bastard! I accelerate, closing up the gap in front of me, preventing him from squeezing into my precious space. I keep my eyes straight ahead, pretending to be oblivious. I don’t want to actually trigger a roadrage incident but I kind of like the idea of coming close to one. I just want to piss him off a little bit. I’m right, after all.

And then I catch myself, decelerate, and let him in. I know what it’s like to be like he appears to be … cocky, in a frantic hurry, intolerant of pokey drivers, a risk taker. It’s not a pleasant way to be, but it’s understandable. I don’t help matters by rubbing it in his face. And we both could end up triggering a chain of events that hurts others.

A different kind of Thanksgiving is in the works for us this year. Two of my three sons have steady girlfriends who we’ve not yet met and they’ll be joining us for the weekend… this weekend, since one couple can’t make it next week.

It’s a signal that another phase in our family’s life cycle is about to begin. And the task of integrating ‘outsiders’ into holiday rituals is typically a field fraught with emotional landmines. I like to think my wife and I will be able to navigate through it without hitting any but it’s unlikely. Comes with the territory.

I finished The Corrections last night and there are so many parallels to my family of origin it’s almost creepy. It’s the most psychologically sophisticated novel I’ve ever read. And its central scene revolves around grown children returning for the holidays. Yikes.

My buddy Rick and I were discussing the different approaches to retirement that we see people taking. Here’s his guiding quote:

Interest is the key to life
Interest is the clue
Interest is the drum and fife
And any God will do.

It’s from Richard Condon’s book, Any God Will Do.

Two new posts to my EgoOrgasms.com weblog: one on reviewing tech gadgets, the other on reading a motorcycle magazine.

My teenage daughter passed her driver’s test today… her second try.

It’s odd to feel parental pride when your kid does something that millions of kids do. But it’s a milestone in her life nonetheless, and one that I played a part in.

My boys were telling mini-horror stories last weekend about some of their driving escapades when they were first learning to drive. Time to be nervous all over again.

Hippies, Yuppies, Bobos and Stickies (Seniors Toiling Indefinitely): More older people are sticking to the job.

I’m likely to need to keep working well past the usual retirement age, given my lack of financial prowess to-date.

But my goal is not to ‘toil’ but to keep immersed in whatever my vocation is till I croak. Studs Terkel is my role model… 91 and still working.

I don’t currently own a street bike — I borrow them from sympathetic buddies once or twice a year — but I subscribe to Cycle World and try to keep up all-things motorcycle-related.

So when I’m perusing the mag and staring at the photos, my desire to own 3 or 4 different types of bikes lights up, with the mental image of how I would look riding them lurking in the background.

I’m often willing to put up with some pain in order to have an ego-orgasm and riding a motorcycle can sometimes qualify. For last year’s Real Joe Fry-Your-Ass Tour to Balltown, Iowa I rode my friend Larry’s BMW sportbike… a magnificent machine, but a nut-cruncher. And the previous year’s Freeze-Your-Ass Tour to Wisconsin I rented a Harley Sportster. For a great treatise on motorcycle ergonomics and the pain threshhold often required, see this article that appeared in the NY Times in October: Uneasy Rider: But to gird himself for the 350-mile ride home from a rally in New Hampshire last spring, Mr. Klerk said, ”I loaded up on Motrin.” He needed painkillers because the one design element missing from his motorcycle — and from thousands of new and pricey others — is ergonomics. ”My bike looks fantastic, which means it rides like hell,” said Mr. Klerk, a 43-year-old welder.

The cool factor.

This phrase jumps out at me whenever I’m reading a review about something — usually a tech gadget of some kind — as I try to reach a decision about what to buy.

This week, I’ve been trolling for information about the new Treo 600, a cell phone/wi-fi PDA/camera/MP3 player combo that’s getting rave reviews.

So while I try to weigh the pros and cons, there’s an image that creeps into my brain in which I see myself showing the gizmo to others and harvesting the oohs and ahhs. And it’s more compelling than whatever logic I might use to justify the purchase.

I took an unscheduled break in postings here to both work on my Small Business Blogging book and launch my companion site to Real Joe.

I’m calling it Ego Orgasms: One guy’s pursuit of mistaken mental pleasures. [Expired domain]

I’ve been thinking more about how it helps to think of God as a force, a law of the universe, much like gravity… and what problems are created when we think of God as a Being, no matter how Supreme.

The more I treat God as an underlying force to be relied on and to act in harmony with — like gravity — the more peace I experience in my daily life. I don’t need to make a leap of faith to believe in gravity, even though it can’t be detected with my senses. When I’m in synch with gravity, I move about without problems — with joy, even. When I’m not in synch with it, physical pain pays a visit.

Likewise, I don’t need to make a leap of faith to believe in God as an underlying force, even though God can’t be detected with my senses. When I’m in synch with this force, I experience peace — life without troubles. When I’m not in synch with it, psychological suffering pays a visit.

And here’s the interesting and tricky part: when I realize I’m psychologically suffering and that therefore means I’m out of synch, all I have to do is put myself in an “asking for insight” frame of mind. And then listen. Wait. Grab some solitude. And then ideas and help come. Every time. No leap of faith required. Reliable as gravity.

It’s tricky because “asking” in our culture implies another person being asked — in this case, God — which tends to trigger an image of God as a person. And when help comes, the tendency is to be grateful to That Person. Feel Loving. To want to Worship. Which, for most of us (not all), sows the seeds of a mental trap, that God cares about/loves me, therefore he/she/it is looking out for me, therefore good things are going to happen, therefore I’ll get what I pray for. And then life shits on me and I feel betrayed and quit seeking God as a source of strength and guidance.

None of this is original thinking from me. It’s mainly my making sense of the message in the book Coming to Life: Traveling the Spiritual Path in Everyday Life by Polly Berrien Berends.

Kent Nerburn included an excerpt from his letter to a young woman in a weblog posting last week. The excerpt ends with this:

“You seek absolutes, and though God is surely an absolute, God’s presence often is not. It is hidden in intimation, or cloaked in metaphor, as subtle as a whisper or a rustling of wind, at first almost inaudible and imperceptible, inseparable from ourselves. Only gradually does it burst forth full throated into music and song. And even then, it can recede at a moment’s notice.

I’d agree that this is how we often come to experience God’s presence but I’d argue that it’s our lack of perception, mental noise, and failure to learn how to listen that makes God’s presence appear to be fleeting. It’s always there for us to rely on. Like gravity.

FYI, I created the photo above using the nifty Church Sign Generator.

Real Live Preacher’s blog is getting to be so popular that it’s creating a temptation. He writes: “You know, it would be so easy to let this blog be the biggest thing in my life. So easy. I love to write, AND I’m getting more affirmation than I ever have before. So yeah, it’s tempting to start thinking that Real Live Preacher is my life. But it isn’t. I’m a pastor and a web designer and a husband and a dad. I even have some real live friends that I like to hang out with.”

Chuck, of The World According To Chuck, finds a metaphor: “But I’m stronger now, in an essential way. I’ve reached 45 years just in time to figure out who I am, or might be, and my father is dying. His strength is ebbing as mine is cresting, and suddenly this morning I had my metaphor.”

Kent Nerburn on A writer’s voice: “What I thought I might offer you tonight is a glimpse of two of the voices in which I have recently been writing… And if you are someone who writes yourself, or dreams of writing, think about the voice you use. Whatever it is, you must hone it and clarify it. It is the instrument through which the music of your heart or mind is played.”

I do think about my Real Joe voice, but I’ve tended to think of it as one instrument. It might be many.

A guy named John Gilliam has just launched a reflective weblog about his life called John of God’s Debris. He writes in a tone I can hear. See his first two posts about his marriage, here and here.

I’ve added him to my blogroll.

I’m on the stair climber machine at my local club. In walks a guy who’s a much better racquetball player than me, one who I play occasionally and who always trounces me.

I say hi to him and he says hi back and marches right by. I’ve not seen him in a month or two. I don’t remember if he knows I’ve had surgery or not. But regardless, I’m a nobody to him, a not-worthy competitor and therefore not-worthy of informal conversation.

Guys like this stick in my mind long after the rebuff has passed. I’ve been dissed and it bugs me. I occasionally have a daydream that involves me beating him, an ego orgasm fantasy in which he increasingly gets mad at himself for losing to, in his mind, an inferior player. But I’m no longer inferior. I beat him every time, or at least push him to his limits if I do lose. Ultimately he shows respect by engaging in lockerroom banter with me around other guys. I’m accepted. It’s climax time.

It lasts for a while but then it happens all over again when I play in the state tournament and the guys playing at a level above me seem to treat me the same way.

The obvious flaw in this mental strategy: there is always somebody better to reckon with, even if you’re world champion.

Not so obvious flaw: there are plenty of guys at every level who, despite inferior skills, are liked and treated with respect by guys who are better than they are. I can think of two friends who come to mind.

So the implication is that it’s something I’m doing or not doing that either A) contributes to their dissing me; or B) creates the impression that they’re dissing me when in fact, they’re not. They’re simply reacting to how I’m treating them, that they’re above me and that I have to gain their respect through competition instead of being genuinely interested in who they are.

It’s been a little over a month since my ACL surgery. When people I’ve not seen for a while ask me how I’m doing, I say “I’m healing” which prompts them to ask what happened, which then gives me the opportunity to tell them I hurt it playing racquetball. My brain: Are you impressed? I don’t want you to think that I tore my ACL doing something geezerly like stepping off a curb.

“It’s going to be a boring winter. No snowboarding.” My brain: Are you impressed that a guy as old as me snowboards?

And of course, once I have this ego orgasm, I’m soon trolling for another one with whoever’s the next person I’ve not seen for a while.

The downside? I don’t really listen to them, notice them, appreciate them, take interest in them. I’m too focused on getting my mistaken idea confirmed with an ego-orgasm… that I’m somehow not tough enough, not man enough, that I’m seen as a wimp. I know the history of this mistaken idea, but still, its power to affect my daily actions amazes me.

In 1991, I stumbled across the book Coming to Life: Traveling the Spiritual Path in Everyday Life by Polly Berrien Berends. These words caught my eye, and I was shocked. I was forty-two at the time.

“At the age of forty, one man was astonished to realize that he still looked at everyone as his parent–even the supermarket cashier girl. He didn’t just want her to make change and pack his bags. Instead, he realized, he was doing everything he could to get her special attention, approval, affection, admiration, and encouragement. Even before his turn came in line, he was hoping she would notice how handsome he was in his new shirt, how pretty his wife and child were. My, she should think, hasn’t he done well for himself? He caught himself winking, gesturing, posturing, shrugging, and fawning at this seventeen-year old… He was appalled. How could he be so childish? He figured he must be nuts.”

At the time, I thought, “Man, that�s pretty damn close to some of the crap that goes on in my head every day.” And I was relieved to find out that the author considered this goofball thinking to be pretty common. Slowly it began to dawn on me that there was a constant stream of these little thoughts running through my head. And that their mission was to get me to have what I started calling an ego orgasm.

An ego orgasm is whatever I do or happens in life that I think gives me a psychological boost but that turns out to be false. Mistaken. Often times destructive. And once it’s over, unless I see the mistaken thinking behind it, the hunger for another one quickly returns.

“Being with a woman all night never hurt no professional baseball player. It’s staying up all night looking for a woman that does him in.” – Casey Stengel

Likewise, it’s not so much that having an ego orgasm itself is hard on my psyche. It’s the preoccupation with trying to having one that exacts a toll.

This weblog is a way for me to build a list of my ego orgasms, past and present. Writing about them seems to minimize their power to fuck me up.

If some of mine sound familiar to you, maybe that’ll help you get your shit together just a little more. And then I’ll be happy and have a little ego orgasm to celebrate. heh.

If you have a story to tell about one of your own ego orgasms, I’d like to hear it. Use the Contact form on my Real Joe site to tell me about it. Let me know if I can use it here and whether you want me to attribute it to you.

Amazon.com has a new feature called Search Inside the Book which allows for the searching of words or phrases in the text of many books.

Doing a book search for the phrase “ego orgasm” brings up up twelve titles, all of which can be searched using the feature. For example, the book Thoughts Without a Thinker: Psychotherapy from a Buddhist Perspective by Mark Epstein has this historical reference on page 51: “. . . heart. Otto Rank provided an important, if often overlooked, bridge between the two views. Rank moved the theory from genital orgasm to a kind of ego orgasm, describing how the ego seeks to “unburden itself’ through its love relations, freeing itself from inner tensions and . . .”

Coolio.

I’m not sure where I first heard the term “ego orgasm.” Googling the phrase comes up with only a dozen or so references, none of them familiar. The plural, “ego orgasms,” only brings up one reference.

The fact that there is very little usage of the phrase initially struck me as good news. Yeah, I got the .com domain name!

But then it occured to me that maybe the reason for its sparse usage is that it’s a clunker. I guess we’ll see.

Tonight my sons are coming down for dinner and then our whole family is going to play Cashflow 101, the financial literacy game by Rich Dad, Poor Dad author Robert Kiyosaki.

I never learned about money from my parents, and my wife and I never really tried to teach our kids about money. So this seems to be a good way to start making up for it and have some fun at the same time. Some might say it’s a little late in life for me to start, but what the hell, I figure I’ve got another 60 years to get the hang of it. 😉

This week I got a little involved in an issue before our local school board and one of their sponsored charter schools that my daughter attends. I talked to my state representative (former school board member) about it and made a couple calls to board members. But I didn’t feel very effective. I wasn’t very knowledgeable and was aware that I didn’t have much of a relationship with board members or the superintendent. If an issue came up with the city, it would be much the same.

It made me realize that I need to spend a little more of my time and energy each week on civic stuff. So I decided to help the local league of women voters get their web site revamped. And tonight I might get back on the board of the citizens online group I helped found.

God doesn’t test people like this, he said. But he does bestow blessings to mitigate the hurt and sustain those affected by tragedy. “You take the blessings in whatever package, say thank you and you use them,” said Swedberg, who is expected to make a full recovery.

Good to hear an interpretation like that from a man of the cloth. One of his parishioners needs a little whack from him, though: “If he can withstand two major accidents, you know there’s a higher purpose for him.” Bullshit. Yeah, he’s got a higher purpose, but so do we all. His survival just means he’s lucky.

But what about this hobby of his, aerial acrobatics? For him to say that “… the accident is a reminder that evil is present in the world…” is, well, not quite honest. He’s indulging himself in a dangerous hobby when he’s got a wife, two kids, and congregation who depend on him. My motorcycling hobby is in the same category, but if I got smashed up doing it, I wouldn’t chalk it up evil in the world.

Do we thank God that he wasn’t killed? Or is God trying to tell Mel Gibson something? Article: Jesus actor struck by lightning twice

Stuart Greene’s column in the Nov. issue of The Rake is must-read: Dancing With Myself: Why must married men continue to abuse themselves?

“… the water was rushing, a scented candle, a little bath oil, things were swimming along nicely, I must not have heard the door open, and there was my precious staring in horror at my private moment.”

Yep, that’s happened to me. And yes, I too still take matters into my own hands once a week or so, even though I’m getting to be geezerly. Sometimes my rationale is simply prevention of blue-balls syndrome, which I seem to get after about five days of chastity; other times, it’s just a little fantasy indulgence. And the latest medical research, as Greene notes, is that more frequent ejaculations help prevent prostate problems. What more rationale do I need?

All of that is not likely to change what’s taught in sex ed programs for kids, however. Dumb dumb dumb.

For a good chuckle, visit World Wide Wank’s Random Masturbation Synonym Generator for little gems like “Working a cramp out of Pedro.” And on the same site, read Mark Twain’s Some Thoughts on the Science of Onanism.

Ego Orgasms. It’s soon to be a book. A radio show. A magazine. A major motion picture.

Well, maybe, but for now, it’s a weblog. From the creator of Real Joe.