Category Archives: Joe’s Blog

If you see your feelings as unacceptable, you see yourself as unacceptable

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Coping with a dysfunctional parent

Gerry Kelly, host of Late Lunch on LMFM Radio, chatted to me last Tuesday, about coping with a difficult parent, having spotted my recent article, Difficult Mothers: the last taboo?

You can listen to the interview here:

I loved the phrase ‘kindred spirits’, which a recent reader of In My Gut, I Don’t Believe used about us. He felt a connection with me because he, too, had a difficult relationship with his mother.

‘My relationship with her was the most complex relationship of my life. If anyone listening to this takes away anything that is helpful, I hope it will be that there are no unacceptable feelings or thoughts. If you feel hatred, accept it. Because if you don’t accept it, then you don’t accept yourself and you can’t grow.’

Kids pick up tensions at home

‘I grew up too close to my mother,’ I told Gerry. ‘Probably because she didn’t have a great relationship with my father or with his two sons. She probably put too much emotionally into our relationship.

‘As a kid, I was aware there were all kinds of tensions in the house. You pick it all up like a sponge. Sometimes, you could cut the atmosphere with a knife. Even up to my early twenties, I dared not mention the names of my two brothers. It would be a huge no-go area with my mother.

Most complex relationship of my life

‘My relationship with her was the most complex relationship of my life. The joy of writing a memoir, or, in my case, being middle way through writing my second one, is it’s a huge opportunity to examine myself.

‘My mother’s mother died when my mother was two. So she never had a mother to model her behaviour. She got married in her late 30s. My father had two sons from his first marriage. It was a huge shock to her system to go from being an independent woman with no responsibilities to suddenly having a husband and two little boys.

‘It didn’t work out. She didn’t’ get on with them. They had a really hard time. Far harder than me. My challenge was trying to grapple with the emotional and intellectual task of trying to disengage from whatever strong mother–child bond I had as a kid.

Exasperation of trying to talk to her

‘I found it exasperating trying to reason with my mother. My father would take me aside and say: “Joe, there is no point talking to her.”

‘Obviously, that was a very sad thing about his own relationship with his wife. I don’t know whether my mother might have had some psychological issue that was undiagnosed.

‘A huge part of my choosing not to proceed with the priesthood was trying to disentangle myself from all the messages and learnings that I picked up from my mother.

Undermining my thoughts and feelings

‘She always seemed to undermine not only my thinking but my feelings. I’d say I feel something and she’d say: “Oh you can’t feel that.” Or I’d say I think something and she’d say: “Oh, you can’t be thinking that.” Or I’d remember something and she’d say: “No, it didn’t happen like that at all.”

‘So she was constantly undermining my confidence. She was doing the opposite of what a good parent is meant to do. A parent is meant to be encouraging the child to think for themselves, to feel their feelings etc.

Admitting feelings of hate

‘I remember in my late teens going to confession and confessing to the priest the negative feelings I had towards my mother. I had this love–hate relationship with her. But it was hard to admit the hate aspect of it – that there were times when I just hated her. And my dad would be going on about the things she did, but he didn’t always tell me what things. But I knew she had done stuff that had made his life pretty miserable.

‘But that priest – and as you know I’m not a believer – he was a man of compassion and he had wisdom and he was human. And he was able to tell me that’s OK. You feel as you feel for a good reason.

If you can’t accept how you feel, you can’t accept yourself

‘And, to fast forward, after nine years in the seminary, when I went to counselling, I remember the counsellor saying: “If you feel that your negative feelings towards your mother are unacceptable, then, you feel you are unacceptable.”

‘And if anyone listening to this take away anything that is helpful, I hope it will be that there are no unacceptable feelings or thoughts. If you feel hatred, accept it. Because if you don’t accept it, then you don’t accept yourself and you can’t grow.

Dawn Chorus Meath Ireland

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Dawn Chorus Meath Ireland 28 April 2022
Sounds of Dawn Chorus
Magnificent sounds of birdsong, dawn chorus, Ireland

Dawn Chorus, Meath, Ireland 28 April 2022

I recorded the dawn chorus this morning at 5.15am using an ordinary Android phone. It’s extraordinarily rich in sound, birdsong, an occasional bellow from a cow, and a very distant and barely audible plane, drowned out by the rich variety of birdsong.

How lucky we are if we live in the countryside, surrounded by nature; and how often we take it for granted. What a gift that we can hear! And that we live in a land at peace.

No doubt birds still sing in Ukraine, suffering the invasion of puny Putin’s deluded mind and his uninformed or blinded population.

I wish for the people of Ukraine that they too will sing the song of freedom and that all of their land will be liberated from the invading army of the autocratic dictator, the pariah Putin.

International Dawn Chorus Day is the first Sunday of May each year. Don’t miss it this Sunday 1st May. Derek Mooney on RTE Radio One will be doing his usual great job, celebrating the dawn chorus. For details, click here.

Audiobook coming soon of In My Gut I Don’t Believe

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I am delighted that the audiobook of my memoir In My Gut I Don’t Believe will be published shortly. I feel it’s an important part of my legacy, showing my life’s lesson. I learned, the hard way, that I needed to make decisions for myself – not accept decisions about my life made by others.

I learned that nobody knows me better than I know myself. I learned to trust myself – my hunches, thoughts, feelings and gut feelings. I learned to make and act on the basis of my honest judgement – not the decisions of others. I learned to stand alone.

I extracted myself from my old pattern of shelving my opinions and judgements because I gave undue respect to the opinions of others. I learned the importance of Aesop’s tale about the father, the son and the donkey: we should not act on the basis of other people’s judgements but only on ours.

Learning that very hard lesson, I made the biggest decision of my life when I was 27. I left my priestly path, even though I was only six months or so away from being ordained a priest. I became free. I learned to cast off the ideas that had influenced my life from childhood and I began to trust my doubt.

Trusting your doubt is the origin of wisdom. Attending to doubt is what brings about discovery – in science and in our personal lives. Doubt is wisdom. Doubt is your inner wisdom, whispering to you that you are bigger and better than the fairytales you were taught to believe were true.

I walked through glass – metaphorically. Leaving behind my self-containment. I learned to accept myself as I am. I grew beyond the myths that I had been taught were true: they were not true. I learned to base my life on what I knew, not on silly beliefs, which remain silly regardless of how many people believe in them.

Where are believers in Odin now? Where are the believers in the Greek and Celtic gods? They are few and far between. Yet their beliefs are as far-fetched and nonsensical as the beliefs of the current fashionable religions of our day. Today’s religions, cults and deities will go the way of the Norse, Greek and Celtic gods.

Don’t spend your life believing in myth. Trust your doubt. Trust yourself. Live your one and only life to the full.

Covid Earth

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Covid Earth

by Joe Armstrong

Life, as we know it, has changed.

Humanity is humbled by a microbe.

This morning, I look at the sky, beautiful and blue.

I hear birdsong.

I breathe.

I, for now, am one of the lucky ones.

Inhaling breath, exhaling, inhaling.

Alive, healthy, breathing still.

The earth breathes too,

Much of it relieved by our humbling.

Demand lessened, growth stalled,

The earth made blue again

By our demise.

Joe Armstrong © 2020

Covid Earth: This morning, I look at the sky, beautiful and blue. I hear birdsong.
Picture Source: www.pickpik.com/

I wrote Covid Earth a few weeks ago. Covid-19 has changed all our lives. It has caused us to stop and reflect. It has disrupted our plans and cleared our diaries. It has stopped or slowed the frenzy in many people’s lives.

No wedding is worth the death or serious ill-health of anyone. Covid-19 has tested our values. It invites us to reconsider what is most important about our big day. It is an opportunity for each of us to review our lives.

It gives us, the lucky ones who are still alive, time. It confronts each of us with the inevitable reality our mortality. Each of us will die. Some monks dig clay from their grave every day. It isn’t morbid. It’s truth.

I have finished a book during lockdown – writing one, that is. I’ve read plenty too.

I also downloaded and filled in the Think Ahead template. It will make life easier for people whenever I kick the bucket – which hopefully won’t happen for a long time yet! I suggest you download the editable PDF – it will make it easier for you to update it every year or so. And don’t forget to share it with your loved ones. It’s really for them that you are doing it.

Covid Earth: To learn more about Think Ahead, see here: https://hospicefoundation.ie/programmes/public-awareness/think-ahead/what-is-think-ahead/

There is a lot positive to be gained from lockdown. Who knew that birds sang so loud! Less traffic on our roads. More silence. For the lucky ones, time spent with loved ones.

For me, it has been good to remember what I love to do: write for a living and conduct Humanist ceremonies.

Famine

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Famine

by Joe Armstrong

Famine. Famine. Can I imagine it?

Famine. Either a feast or a famine.

Feasts I know. But famine?

Work drying up, the closest I know. Money tight. Or doing a fast, perhaps.

But famine. Famine!

Hunger. I’ve been peckish for a meal. But everyday persistent aching hunger?

Hunger. Countrywide hunger. A nation on its knees.

Beggared. The shame of hunger. Unasked for. Not chosen.

Crops fail. Shock. Fear. Courage! We are strong.

Crops fail again. And again.

Soup kitchens. Food parcels. No money for rent.

Disaster.

Bodies shrink. Tall emaciated figures on Custom House Quay in Dublin: our ancestors.

Children dead. Relatives dead. Neighbours dead.

The boat to England, America, anywhere away from this godforsaken land of hunger and famine.

Famine.

Can we imagine it?

Joe Armstrong © 2014

Famine. Famine. Can I imagine it? Taoiseach Enda Kenny with Ruth and Joe Armstrong 2014

Famine. Famine. Can I imagine it? Written by Joe Armstrong, it was first delivered in the presence of dignitaries including Taoiseach Enda Kenny TD at National Famine Commemoration, Strokestown Park, Co. Roscommon, Sunday 11 May 2014. Broadcast on RTE television.

Note on Famine. Famine.

Famine. Famine. Can I imagine it? I tried to visualise what it was like to be destitute during the Irish famine. It left such an indelible scar on the Irish psyche.

Compared to the famine, the Covid-19 lockdown of 2020, while tragic, stressful, worrying and fearful for so many people, is of a different scale to the Great Hunger. A million of us are not dying. A million of us are not emigrating. Most of us are well fed, clothed and housed compared to the catastrophe of the Irish famine.

Our ancestors hadn’t enough food to stay alive. Many of us are putting pounds on during lockdown. Tens of thousands of our ancestors were destitute. Most of us have the protections of the State to assist us, such as the Pandemic Unemployment Payment. We stand in compassion with all who suffer and with gratitude for all that we have and are.

The Gratitude Attitude

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The Gratitude Attitude

The gratitude attitude changes lives. It helps us to live in this present moment. This ‘imperfect’ moment. Imperfect is all we’ll ever have. Perfection is an illusion. It crushes us.

Gratitude attitude changes lives. This present ‘imperfect’ moment is perfect!

Gratitude is the opposite. It helps us ease past our illusions about perfection. We become attuned to here and now. We have, in this moment, more things to be grateful for than we could count or imagine. A day will come when we would love to have all that we have and are now.

Listen.

I listen to birds cooing outside my window. I breathe – now there’s a thing that won’t always be the case. I am aware. That too will pass. I can type and read and listen. There’s the clock ticking. The sound of the keyboard as I type. Pigeons sound again outside. Now I hear my breathing.

Humanist celebrant

Today I marry a couple. What a wonderful way to earn a living. Each couple is different. Each ceremony is different. Each gathering of guests is different.

People enquire about my services and book me. We plan their ceremonies together. Hours are put in. Fifteen to 20 hours per ceremony of planning and action. It’s not a way to get rich financially but I can’t imagine a more personally satisfying profession for me: I love it.

Voice

It uses those nine years I spent in a seminary – though now, happily, without the magical thinking that I could no longer believe in. I tap into the skills I learned as a teacher – handling a crowd, responding to whatever arises, speaking. Someone told me in the last week – a guest – that someone sitting beside them had said they could listen to my voice all day. A voice for radio. And yes, I’m grateful, I do like my voice. Yet another thing that I mightn’t even think about that I’m grateful for.

Sight

Eyes, without which I could not type this nor drive to venues nor to meeting couples. My age: yes, in my mid-50s I love my age. Young enough still, luckily, to be healthy of mind, body and emotion. Mature enough to have seen quite a bit of life and having a certain wisdom mostly learned that hard way – by suffering and mistakes made.

‘Joe the Human’

Humanity. What a gift is that! A friend used to call me ‘Joe the Human’. I was very proud of that nickname. And that many years before I’d even heard of Humanism, let alone joined the Humanist Association of Ireland.

Gratitude. Yes, it is part of our nature and a good thing to strive for things. But it’s also important to pause and rest and be enveloped by the joy and fullness of each moment and for so much that we are and have.

To ask me to conduct your ceremony, click here

For more on the gratitude attitude, click here

 

Yes, Yes, Yes

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Thank you Ireland for voting Yes in the recent referendums. We are now living in a much more compassionate, egalitarian state. It feels much more like a secular Humanist Ireland.

I never would have thought that I would have lived to see the day when the once theocratic state of Ireland freely acknowledged equal marriage and showed such compassion and recognized the equality of women in the latest two-to-one majority referendum, which recognized women’s autonomy over their bodies and their personal right to choose what happens with their own bodies.

Any crisis pregnancy is precisely that: a crisis. Ireland came of age – we became adults! – in finally acknowledging that the decision is not ours but the woman’s. It is not the state’s, but the woman’s decision. It is not the church’s, but the woman’s decision. It is not a doctor’s, but the woman’s.

If men had babies, it would never have been a debate.

How barbaric was the Constitution until the Irish people, finally grown to adulthood,  saw that they had no right to decide for a woman what is only a woman’s choice to make for herself.

When I left my priestly path after nine years in a religious order, I realized that it was my first adult decision. With the two recent referendums in Ireland, we have grown up. We have heard bishops tell us that we should go to confession for voting Yes. It might be a better idea if bishops confessed to woman, wearing sackcloth and ashes as is the biblical garb of contrition, for their oppression of women which continues to this day. A church that declares that it has no authority to ordain woman simply has no authority!

I get annoyed when I hear church folk say to believers that they can’t ‘pick and choose’. In fact, the authorities of the church have for 2,000 years picked and chosen. They adopt positions that are outright contradictions of earlier positions that they held dogmatically. For instance, the church once held that ‘outside the church there is no salvation’ and an American priest got into trouble with his own church for maintaining the church’s original unambiguous stance. To say nothing of their condemnation of Copernicus, the church maintaining its insistence that the universe revolved around the earth! It remains the church which needs a Copernican revolution, and a humble and contrite one at that.

And the church held dogmatically that Anglican orders were ‘absolutely null and utterly void’. The church no longer holds that position either. And the celebrated saint and doctor of the church Thomas Aquinas did not regard a fetus as having a human soul until 40 days after conception for a boy and 80 for a girl. Nope, I don’t think I heard anyone on the No side in the termination of pregnancy referendum mention that one. And when you study the history of the church it is clear that there was not one clear position on the status of the fetus nor on abortion through the ages, even though believers either don’t know this or are economical with the truth.

I recommend the scholarly work ‘Eunuchs for the Kingdom of Heaven‘ by Uta Ranke-Heinemann for anybody interested in discovering the truth about the Roman Catholic Church and sexuality and especially its two-thousand year oppression of women in its warped thinking and practices.

 

The present

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I was watching an episode of Mrs Brown’s Boys recently and ‘Mrs Brown’ spoke about ‘the present’. She said how the present – now – is, as the other meaning of the word has it, the gift. And that all we have is the present. It’s the same wise insight of that magnificent movie ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’. Living and appreciating the gift of the present moment. It’s all we have. It’s all we ever have. In this moment, all is well. Right now, there is so much to be grateful for. We have, right now, more than we could ever appreciate. More than we could want.

Now is an invitation to re-enter the gratitude attitude, bringing to mind the wonder of now. Being thankful, not to any deity, but cultivating an attitude of gratitude for all that is.

 

Remembering

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I spoke as a Humanist celebrant and chaplain at a commemoration event today for people who lost loved ones during the year. It is good to take time out to remember the deceased. People who have shaped us for the good; enriched our lives with their love and acceptance and wisdom and joy and affection. Those whose perspectives challenged us to grow and become more ourselves. Characters who etched themselves on the very stuff of our being. People we loved.

Be Happy Now

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There’s something about autumn. Beauty, colour and harvest. The farewell glance to summer. Winter biding its time.  Pink misty dawn. Walking the dogs on a moss-strewn stony country path. And glad to be me and happy in myself and grateful for life and love. And the sometime kids now twenty-something and finding their way and taking their chance in the world.

All we have – all I have – is now. Let’s be happy and enjoy.