Man will survive

 Remember the song I posted? After the first verse, Martin Gore sings just that, man will survive. And pauses. The sentence seems to hang in the air on it's own, complete in it's message, before it is concluded with the harshest conditions

The fact is, those words do stand on their own. They convey an idea I've heard before, in the classes of psychology - The belief that I will survive this. And not only in the prosaic way of living on, but this concept also encompasses not losing hold of yourself, becoming lost - My ego will remain intact.

The storms of life will be difficult, and sometimes you have to risk breaking your heart... but you can still have this sense of security, have faith in that you won't be overpowered, disintegrated. The storm might end in heartaches, but not in uncontrollable catastrophe.

This is important when growing up.

- A child with a sense of security uses hir parents both as a secure port to find solace in and a safe base to explore the world from. When the storms come, mother and father will come to you, hold you, and put you together again.

- My lecturer describes the difficult development tasks (life issues, we might call them!) and how a difficult task (like separation from our parents, for instance) that we manage to master works like a vaccination, strenghtening us the next time something like it turns up (when breaking up with our loved one or losing a relative) – But a much too difficult task leaves us bewildered and feeling overpowered, frightened of it and certain that we cannot handle it the next time it turns up.

- Also, let's look back at Antonevsky's model Sense of Coherence. Antonovsky said that everyone meet stress in their life, but it is whether you find life manageable, understandeable and meaningful that decides whether you handle it successfully. Belief would have man survive.

- In the same way, when going through therapy you will call the storm to you, go into the dark and difficult places of yourself. You must have faith in that this won't destroy you - Grawe describes hope in the therapy and trust in the therapist as the most important components of successfully therapy.

My next post will be on hope.

Writing this, I'm at Kulturhamnen once more.
A woman is reading her poems to us. She is visibly nervous, restless, her swedish grammar falls short at times, but her words ring true to us. Before reading the third poem she tells us ”This one, I haven't practiced at all”

But she goes through with it, with heartfelt applause. Goes into the storm.

Man will survive.