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Friends

You would be forgiven if as you read this blog you think I’m somewhat crazy.
      I want to tell you about some friends of mine -- actually a group of about 30 of them. These friends calm me when I get anxious, lift my mood when I get down. Some are humorous but most are serious in a pensive sort of way. They even massage away the aches and pains from my septuagenarian body. They whisper in my ear when I need to settle into sleep. These friends ground me in the middle of the night when I’m half-awake, my thoughts having gone all kerflooey with persisting dream fragments.
      I am often surprised by new depths of nuance and feelings that emerge in my relationship with these friends. Surprised, and delighted too that they still find new ways of engaging me.
      These friends offer me the gift of presence. They are totally emotional. They don’t speak their circumstances nor their stories. Some of them don’t even have names. They don’t have needs, other than that I spend time with them a couple times a week. Some of them have been loyal friends for about ten years. Some of them I have just met in the last few months. I take these friends out for coffee most Saturday afternoons. Other people in the coffeeshop seem to enjoy their company too. 
      How is that craziness thought doing?
      These friends are my songs. 

And I feel a bit embarrassed about this all, calling my jazz songs friends. They aren’t people, like what friends are supposed to be. And I have those too, cherish them, the people sort of friends. Some of those have been with me for decades, some just the last year or so. 
      I’ve noticed my jazz friends change as our relationship develops, even though they basically play out the same tunes and harmonies. We tend to grow together. Early on they searched for where we could go and what sort of compatibilities we could find. Then they became secure. The longer I play those friends the more nuances in the flow of feeling arise within them. There is a deepening, the finding of grace in their tunes, the security of being together again and seeking out what else we might find new in our relationship. Often they surprise me with just a slight adjustment of rhythm or an alternate harmonic structure that creates the same curiosity and delight as we had when we first met.

I wonder about other artistic mediums. Take, for example, an oil painting on the easel or a sculpture on the studio plinth. As the artist adds brushstrokes or refines the surfaces does that work of art speak back to them about what feels the best? Is there a settling as the artist sees the essence of the piece blossoming into its own unique beauty? Is it a presence -- a changing, emerging presence --— in the studio?
      I can’t imagine what it would be like for a work of art that has inspired the engagement of creation / creativity to leave the studio, going into a gallery or someone else’s home. How empty that easel or corner of the studio must be! How the artist must wonder if in its new home it will inspire the depth of emotional connection that had gone into its creation. I can only imagine the artist feels lonely in its loss.
      I’m glad for my art, those jazz compositions I play each week at the coffeeshop, that they remain with me. Others appreciate them acknowledging their presence, but ultimately they stay as my friends and we get to go home together!

And then, there is that other group of friends: the characters in my novels. I cry with them when they are bereft or overwhelmed. They are all full of words (far too many) and challenging circumstance. Those friends have a different vibe to them as compared with the songs I play at the coffeeshop. I see them, I see what they are seeing. And in their way of seeing, I see me.
      When it comes right down to it, I guess I’m like a kid with a whole host of imaginary friends. Perhaps with a monster or two under the bed, too. 
     
Now this is where all this gets much more difficult.
       Occasionally, while I was practicing as a psychotherapist my clients would voice how they perceived our relationship. They would say that coming to session was like spending time with a really good friend.
      I shuddered (probably not outwardly, but certainly inwardly). 
      I’m sure that what they meant was they felt safe, they felt accepted and valued, that their emotional load was lighter as a result of our time together. Perhaps in the course of their lives it had only been when with good friends that they had felt something similar.
      But about the shudder. 
      As a psychotherapist we are not to be our client’s friend. We are to be a professional. Friendship is about mutuality, each contributing to the wellbeing of the other. The professional relationship is to be totally focused on one person contributing the wellness of the other. The professional is not to meet their own emotional and interpersonal needs through the therapy relationship. 
      The ethics of the profession are clear about this. 
      But as a template for human relationship, friendship existed long before psychotherapy ever did. It is built into us to seek out safe relationships in which we are valued and supported. We fondly name the other in those relationship as our friends.
    
Recently at the coffeeshop I was able to share my new-found friends, the songs I mentioned at the start, with someone from years back whom I had served as a psychologist. That person said he enjoyed them too. And even though I was the musician and he was the listener, there was something mutual in our presence with those songs … together. That was kind of nice. 


    

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