It is Time We Begin to Matter

Ahmed was referred to me for a chronic deep depression. He had always lived in the shadow of his father, and this continues even after his father passed 10 years ago. His father was a very respected and revered man at the local temple. People often sought his advice and credited him for renewing their faith. Behind closed doors however, Ahmed's father was a tyrant. Angry and belittling particularly to his sons, he never let his children rest. If they appeared idle, reading a book or playing a game, he would order them to do a list of chores. That the children completed those very same chores that morning did not matter. Any opposition was met with insults or a beating.

Ahmed remembers having an interest in painting at an early age and through an arts program at school won several scholarships. His father however never saw any value in Ahmed's passion. Any chance he got, his father would discourage this. Ahmed remembers before a particularly important competition his father turning to him and saying, "you know you will not win, they will pay attention because you are a token minority, but do not think you have any talent." Ahmed withdrew from the contest.

These days, 50 years later, Ahmed struggles with feeling that his life has no meaning. He wants to return to painting, but is overcome with guilt and sadness when he does. He ruminates on the lost opportunity and he blames himself for giving it up too easily. When he has his easel and paintbrushes ready, he finds he can not focus. He will look outside and notice the lawn needs to be mowed and the gutters cleaned. Rather than deal with his difficult emotions and fight for a hobby that has tormented him, he will do household chores thinking that at least he is being productive. But the longer he is away from painting the more resentment he feels. It seems like he can not win, he tells me. It would not be so difficult to put aside painting once in for all, if not for the fact that he finds himself full of ideas that he longs to get on a canvas. It is the act of working with colours and texture and the self-expression he enjoys and misses most.

In essence, Ahmed is asking a very important question: Does he matter? This question is universal and has emerged recently in my own life also. What does it mean to matter? What if we feel like we do not matter? Whenever Ahmed chooses to clean the gutters over painting, it is not that he is choosing to be productive over being creative, though this is what he tells himself to justify his choice. It is that he is choosing to not matter. No one on their death bed regrets a chore they did not complete. And when Ahmed paints, he is choosing to matter, at least to himself. That he has conflicted feelings about this is so very human because to matter has consequences and be complicated. To matter means to have an impact on others and on the world, whatever that impact is.

This conversation with Ahmed changed me in a subtle but profound way. For most of my career as a psychiatrist and therapist, I thought it was my job to MAKE patients take the path towards mental health. And I was supposed to do that through caring. When I was burnt out, I took this as proof I was doing my job well, and that I was caring to the very best of my ability. I had wrongfully equated reaching my limit as pursuing excellence. But patients and care providers do not benefit as much from feeling cared for (especially when there are ulterior motives for the care being provided) than if an interaction made them feel like they matter. To feel cared for brings out gratitude but also indebtedness and resentment. Care can be experienced as attempts to control. To have a relationship where you feel like you matter on the other hand, is empowering, and invites you to be more authentic, to step into being known. I have always strived for the latter, but did the former. So my goal now is to interact in such a way that the other feels and knows that they matter. And in so doing, I too must matter. It has just become so obvious: the basic criteria for all interactions to be meaningful and equal is that all parties must matter.

So this holiday season, may I suggest putting down the screens, tuning out the news and taking a look around. I can not help but notice that the more political things get, the more we define ourselves politically, the less we feel like we matter as individuals. But we are SO much more than our politics. SO much more. Can you engage in the world in a way where you feel you really matter? Can you focus on the other making sure they feel like they matter too?