Chapter 27: (v.2) The Presentation - Double Bind!

Christos woke up early in the morning and began working on his assignments and his presentation. His mood was good, and last day's event seemed to never have happened. He forgot the last words of the Teacher, which were that should either conquer his fear or be consumed by it.

He continued studying and learning the material he had to present, he started feeling better with the idea of standing in front of an audience and explaining what he had learned.

During the afternoon, he switched with the assignments of the other modules and strangely, due to his good mood, he progressed fast with them.

He kept working at this pace, one time preparing his presentation and then at other times dealing with the rest. After a week, he completed the assignments of the other modules and only the presentation remained.

This further improved Christos’ mood even more, and he believed that his newfound productivity resulted from addressing his fear of suicide.

As was usual happened with other phobias, this fear had not been completely erased; it resurfaced periodically. However, Christos immediately recognized what he feared and remembering how he learned that role of his private logic, the fear left him.

The fear of ridicule was nowhere to be found and Christos didn’t even consider the case of being ridiculed in front of the audience. “Could it be that the Teacher made some kind of a mistake?” he wondered. “Could it be that ridicule is not my existential fear?”

The week before the presentation passed with Christos finishing studying and preparing the slides. Everything okay up until then, Christos remained calm and felt ready to present.

One day before the major event, Christos rehearsed his speech several times, and having nothing else to do, he went to sleep.

“I wish you luck for tomorrow!” the Teacher said on the phone. “And always remember to speak with a loud voice! A loud voice states confidence!”

“Okay!” Christos said and fell to bed.

Waking up early in the morning, he drank a coffee, took his notes for the presentation and left the flat so that he could catch the bus for university.

Then, as he headed towards the bus stop, he saw a passing person, who appeared to have a caught a cold and continuously coughed.

To the eyes of Christos, that seemed like a bad omen, and he considered the coughing of that person to be a sign that his presentation would not go well. An annoying disquiet appeared out of nowhere: inside the four walls of his flat everything was safe, but who could know what destiny would reserve for him to the place he went? Who knew how he would be treated?

Inside the bus, Christos’ fear started to increase and it covered him, like a monster that lay its vicious tentacles. He became petrified on the bus seat as much mentally as physically.

“What is happening to me?” he wondered and his speech sounded toneless and without emotion.

When the bus reached the stop Christos used to disembark to, it took him a lot of effort to stand up and leave the bus in time, before it started heading for the next stop. His achievement to simply get out of bus and walk the street seemed like a marvelous feat to him.

Walking with hesitant steps towards the amphitheater where the presentation would take place, he noticed that he began to breathe fast and irregularly. When he reached a hundred meters from the amphitheater, a very strong impulse to run away came.

Then he remembered that he already ran away, when the professor assigned to him the presentation and he fled to Aleksandroupoli.

“You were afraid of ridicule then,” the voice of the Teacher sounded inside him, “and you will either eat it, or be eaten!”

“Indeed I fear ridicule,” Christos thought and these words made him regain some control over his actions. “And if I run now, I will lose the module and continue to be afraid!”

He grabbed the quartz crystal and slowly, step by step, he headed towards the amphitheater. With every step, he became more and more certain of the soundness of his decision, until he reached his destination.

Inside the amphitheater, many students and professors were there and already one of the students presented his work.

Christos entered the big room and sat on one of the seats. Then, upon seeing the student presenting, his fear returned. “What am I doing in this place?” he mumbled. “Will I make the presentation in front of all these people? I will forget my speech!”

Then, Christos tried to remember his speech, and realized that nothing came to mind. It was as if he never made any rehearse whatsoever, as if he went unprepared. And he would be the fourth candidate presenting in a row.

“I will make a fool of myself!" he thought and again, a strong impulse to leave started to drive him mad. Then, suddenly, he remembered his quartz stone and after squeezing it, he came to his senses.

After a few minutes, the student finished his presentation and the next one began. The student that now spoke obviously seemed stressed, his hands trembled and not only that, he made expression errors.

“In tha naxt slid,” the student said, wanting to really say, “in the next slide.”

“Oh no, he messed up!” Christos thought and it was as if he experienced himself what the student went through. Giggles would soon start to sound from the audience, followed by mocking laughs.

Nevertheless, to his surprise, nobody laughed. Not only that and maybe occurring only to Christos’ mind, the professors seemed to show some understanding on how much stressed the student was. Same as the rest of the students, who also had to present their own work.

That made Christos relax a little bit, since in the worst case, if he stuttered in his speech, the others would be forgiving, not considering his effort as a joke.

The student completed his presentation with a lot of struggle, and although the quality was not the best, the audience however applauded him, and so did Christos.

“So, there is recognition for his work,” he thought and putting himself on the student's place, he realized that he would have liked to be applauded too.

The third student that presented could talk very eloquently, his speech following an unimpeded flow.

“This one is good,” Christos thought, “surely better than me in presentation skills!”

Upon thinking that, he realized that he was next in line! The fear of ridicule made an unexpected comeback and Christos felt completely immobilized.

“Patience,” he thought and his body shivered, “the fear will go away!”

Yet the fear wouldn’t leave him and additionally, with every second that passed, Christos felt more and more his stomach being tightened like a knot and his mind clouded. He tried to listen to the speech of the student, but that was impossible at that point.

The third student's presentation reached its final slide and then Christos’ heart started to beat rapidly, as he came closer and closer with the battle he had to give with his fear.

Finishing his presentation, the audience warmly applauded the third student and his excellent speech. The student picked up his slides and sat victoriously on his seat.

Getting up with slow and without energy moves, Christos took his slides on hand and walked towards the projector. So much lost in his mind, that he accidentally stumbled on the foot of one of the professors.

He staggered a few steps forward, but regained his balance. From the audience a faint giggle sounded. “Oh no! It will all be over now soon!” he thought and hesitantly placed the first of his slides on the projecting machine, while at the same time the audience waited for him to begin.

Opening his mouth to speak and although he gave it his all, not even a single word came out. It seemed that something prevented him from realizing what he planned to do.

A few moments passed and the audience waited for Christos to speak. Christos looked at the people surrounding him and saw that most of them had a serious and slightly impatient expression on their faces, waiting for the time continuum to unfreeze.

“What should I say?” he wondered and then thought, “I am doomed!” He considered that the inevitable took place.

And then, unexpectedly, he became unblocked and the fog from his mind cleared, managing to utter the following words, “In this presentation, we will examine. . .“

The words of his speech started coming to his mind just as he memorized them last night and he began to repeat them mechanically, like a robot.

Speaking like that for the first two slides and propelling himself to move forward, Christos got into a certain rhythm in his speech, even though he could barely be heard.

“Louder, we can’t hear you!” said one of the professors.

Following the urge of the professor, Christos remembered the Teacher's words as well, who advised him to speak with a loud voice, and so he did: he raised the tone of his voice.

That resulted in him hearing himself better in the next slides, and that in its turn made Christos feel more confidence when he spoke.

A few slides more went that way with Christos keeping the same tempo, until he finally reached the last slide, where he made his conclusion and finished his presentation.

At that moment, the audience started applauding. Upon hearing that sound, Christos felt his feet becoming loosened. “I DID IT!” he thought. “I did the presentation!”

He took the slides with him and went to his seat. One of his fellow students said, “Good job, you did well!”

“I did well!” Christos thought excited. “I can’t believe it!! The Teacher must hear this!”

***

“Congratulations!” the Teacher said on their one on one meeting. “You managed to face your and beat it! And to even better accomplishments!”

“Does that mean I overcame my existential fear?” asked Christos not being able to hide his joy.

“You won a battle,” the Teacher said, “you haven’t yet won the war!”

Christos’ enthusiasm started to fade away and he became silent for a while. “And I thought that I managed to get rid of my ghosts for good!” he finally said.

“Don’t get disappointed,” the Teacher said, “what you did, to face your existential fear, required a lot of courage. But, a fear that you have carried for your whole life usually can’t go away so easily.”

“What must I do to make it completely vanish?” Christos asked.

“You must find yourself exposed many times to similar situations, so that it becomes well written inside you that it is not possible to become ridiculed, unless you yourself agree that you have been ridiculed!”

Those last words drew Christos’ curiosity and he asked, “What do you mean by that?”

“Christos,” the Teacher said, “from our conversations, we have already established that the most damage done to us is self-inflicted.”

“Oh, you mean that we apply the fourth mode of human behavior: Me towards me.”

“Yes, this is what I mean,” that Teacher said. “What interests me mostly is that you yourself not fear whether you are ridiculous or not, because firstly that way you will suffer and secondly, what we fear we usually attract it!”

Christos recalled that during the presentation, just before he stood up to talk, having already been blocked from the fear of ridicule, he almost stumbled and fell on the floor. That would surely make some people laugh and so he would verify the image established for himself of being a clown. He felt terrified upon realizing that.

The Teacher went on, “But now that you learn new roles, little by little the image of ridicule will go away. And if you stop fearing ridicule, you will stop giving motives for others to try to make you look like a fool!”

Getting angry initially for what he did to himself, he decided to do what it takes to change his self-image, for his own good. “Good!” he said decisively. “I will do this!”

“I am glad!” the Teacher said, “Is there something else we should talk about?”

“Yes,” Christos replied and asked the Teacher something he thought for a long time now, “Is there a limit in the growth of a person? I mean, does the development of a student reach an end?”

“No!” the Teacher replied. “Of course there’s no limit! The limits that exist are those we impose on ourselves! You will see that the more you discard your fears, the more you will grow!”

“But doesn’t the Intelligence Quotient, or otherwise IQ define how much an individual will move forward in his/her life?”

The Teacher laughed. “This Quotient, along with all the tests that measure it don’t say everything about what a human is capable of,” he said. “They test a certain ability of the human brain, to remember and to solve problems!”

“However, don’t we do exactly this in our work? Solving behavioral problems?”

“Yes, of course it plays its part,” the Teacher replied, “however, other things play their part as to how well we perform! And to see what I mean, let’s play a game!”

The Teacher gave Christos a document. The document had nine dots, that formed a three by three box. Underneath the dots, the document wrote, “With only four straight continuous lines, connect all the dots”.

At this point, we urge the reader to attempt this game themselves, so they be taught experientially from it, if the reader wishes it.

No matter how much Christos tried to connect the dots, he couldn’t find the solution. “I can’t do it,” he finally said. “It’s impossible!”

The Teacher then took the document and drew four straight continuous lines in such a way that all the dots were connected.

“What?!?” said surprised when he saw the solution.

“I didn’t say that a line can’t go outside of the box!” the Teacher said laughing.

“Wow, I’m impressed!” Christos laughed as well.

“You see,” the Teacher said, “you set limits to yourself: I will not go out of the box!”

The Teacher went on: “This is exactly how we set frames in our everyday life and we can’t solve our problems. For example, we say: “what will society say?” or “it’s impossible to solve this!” or “I can't do this because I'm not clever enough!” etc, etc. A whole bunch of excuses that limit our abilities and sustain the low self-worth image that the others have passed on us!”

“My father,” Christos said, “once told me that my IQ is not so high.”

“It is as if he meant, “You are not dumb, but you are not special either!””

“Yes, exactly like that!” Christos said. “It seems that whatever I have done until now, the path I chose as a physicist has that goal: To prove that I am special to my father!”

“But now,” Christos went on, “what I found and do in physics is something that I enjoy doing at the same time!”

“Of course you enjoy it Christos,” the Teacher agreed, “otherwise you wouldn’t talk about with so much enthusiasm!”

The Teacher continued, “So, going back to intelligence tests and IQ, if you fear you will not do well, you will attract that result yourself!”

“I understand that,” Christos replied and changing conversation topic, said, “and now that the presentation is over, the new goals I will set, are the old goals: to improve my social skills and to find a girlfriend!”

“Good,” the Teacher smiled, “I see that you begin to overcome your double bind!”

“The what?” asked Christos surprised.

“The double bind Christos!” the Teacher replied. “Have we not talked about it?”

“No,” Christos said. “What is a double bind?”

“Time for a bit more theory then,” the Teacher said and proceeded, “The term was first described by the psychologist Gregory Bateson and it says this: Sometimes you do something and your parents judge what you did, rejecting you thus. But even if you don’t do that thing, again they will reject you. This is a double bind.”

Christos recalled that when he didn’t study for school, Iulia criticized him for not studying. However, whenever he did study, she told him sternly that he didn’t do well enough. Nothing good ever resulted from her supervision. Upon remembering these past events, Christos became angry and told what used to happen to the Teacher.

“So,” the Teacher said, “you finally said: No matter what I do I’m doomed,” and you quit, correct?”

“Correct,” Christos agreed who started to calm himself down. “This is the story of my life, being constantly inactive, believing that whatever decision I make won’t have a good result.” Then he added, “How does one remove the double bind?”

“The solution for the double bind is to make clear what you really want, and persist on its achievement! In your case, you already have made clear that you want to socialize and overcome your problems on that area, so by acting on your goals, you escape inactivity!”

“However,” the Teacher stressed, “you still haven’t decided whether you want to solve the love part of your life or not!”

“But what are saying!” Christos shot back angrily. “Is this what I want to do then? Spend a life without a relationship?”

“Calm down Christos,” the Teacher said, “I didn’t say that. I meant you are not sure if your life will be better if you find a girlfriend!”

“Why do you say that?” asked Christos.

“Because the image you have for women is that of Iulia”, said Christos. “No matter how many women you meet, you project on them Iulia, and because Iulia is strict and bossy and you don’t like that, you say: better to be alone!”

Even though he became shocked from those words, Christos didn’t feel anything. “Will it be better with a girlfriend?” he finally managed to say.

“Of course it will,” the Teacher said. “First of all, since you never had a relationship before, this will be a new experience for you!”

“That sounds nice,” Christos said tempted.

“Also,” the Teacher added, “by having affairs with the opposite sex, you will change the image you have for women and you will stop fearing them and Iulia!”

“Will I succeed in doing that?” Christos wondered.

“That depends entirely upon you!” the Teacher said. “You might find a girlfriend today, or tomorrow, or maybe never! It depends on how much you really want to solve your problem!”

“Okay, I will give it a try!” Christos said.

After a while the meeting came to an end and Christos found himself on the streets walking. He thought about the conversation they had with the Teacher and the anger that lingered inside surfaced after he realized that his image for the opposite sex obstructed him from finding a girlfriend.

An empty water bottle appeared in front of him and he run towards it and kicked it forcefully away. “To hell with you!” he yelled at the flying bottle.

Two passengers stared at him puzzled and a little afraid and then Christos became puzzled also with himself, as in older times, he wouldn’t dare to express his anger in such a way in a public place. “It must be due to the presentation!” he thought. “The fear of ridicule has been reduced and now it doesn’t bother me if I become a public spectacle that much!”

And yet, just as he thought that it was better to do that in public, he also thought that those passengers could laugh with him and he could believe that he became ridiculed. "However, if my existential fear can be reduced,” he thought, “so can my dread for women also be reduced!” Then, he fearlessly thought, “I want to find a girlfriend,” and continued going home.

Then, after ten minutes of walk, the unexpected happened: in his way, he met a female fellow student of his, Elpida, and they started chatting. The girl looked nice and smiled at him from time to time, and Christos considering that as encouragement, suggested they went for a coffee. Elpida seemed to like the idea and agreed to go out with him the following day.

As soon as he entered his flat, Christos called the Teacher and informed him of the joyful event.

“See?” the Teacher said. “Because you desired something without fear, it became reality! So, what are you going to do now?”

“We will go for a coffee tomorrow!”

“Good!” the Teacher said laughing. “Remember, you will obtain familiarity with her by aiming for physical contact!”

The next day Christos went to Aristotelous square, the place where they agreed to meet with Elpida, having set as a goal to be more daring, so he could have a relationship with her and get rid of his fear of women.

Elpida appeared in the distance approaching and Christos nodded as a way to say hello.

“Hi,” Elpida said when she came next to him.

An indifferent tone appeared to be in Elpida's voice and that made him feel bad. “What has happened to her?” he thought but didn’t ask her about it. “So, where should we sit?” he finally asked.

“Ahh, I don’t know,” she replied, “do you have something to suggest?”

“Yes, let’s go sit at one of the coffee shops in the harbor!”

They found a coffee shop in the harbor and continued the conversation they started the previous day. Christos wanted to stop talking too much and start to approach the girl physically, so that he gained more familiarity with her. However, something deep inside warned him not to do so.

He touched her shoulder with his own, and Elpida pulled hers away. Christos then felt discouraged and didn’t attempt physical contact again. However, he didn’t want to give up, so he expressed to her, “I want to be in a relationship with you!”

Elpida replied indifferently, “But I only see you as a friend! And on top of that, I already have a boyfriend!”

At that point, Christos remembered Teacher's words about the spitting and stamp syndrome. It could have been that the girl played indifferent to make Christos chase and become stuck with her. Seeing that she didn’t see him as a potential mate, Christos stopped the conversation there, not wishing to give her any more importance. However then, Christos thought that the boyfriend of Elpida, who he didn’t know, had something that he himself had not and he was at a better position than him. That made Christos feel inferior and finally asked her, “Are you happy with your boyfriend?”

Unexpectedly becoming more serious, Elpida said, “No, I am not, he is a total miscreant!”

Christos became puzzled, “What does he do to call him a miscreant?”

“He always looks at other girls and not me!” said Elpida and added furiously, “let alone that he has cheated on me!”

“Oh really?” Christos asked. “And you are still with him?”

“Yes, I am,” said Elpida and then looked at Christos smiling. “However, from what it seems not for long!”

Christos started to become excited with Elpida's words, since she appeared to be deciding to quit on her boyfriend who she didn’t appreciate very much, and get along with him instead.

“So, what are we waiting for?” Christos asked with a voice trembling from anticipation. “Let us kiss!”

Elpida appeared thoughtful for a while and a little bit disappointed. “I can’t leave him,” she finally said. “I’m in love with him, sorry Christos.”

Becoming baffled from her contradicting reply, Christos got angry with her. He wanted to get up and leave, but he feared to do that, because they sat together for the time and maybe she would become angry with him. So, he endured until the time came for them to leave, in the meantime squeezing the chair's handle to unleash his boiling rage.

They talked about general topics and the conversation mysteriously ended to her parents and the great desire of Elpida to leave from them and never see them again. Affected by his own anger and disappointment, Christos then wished he never saw Elpida again.

Eventually, the time came were they left the coffee shop and Christos and Elpida took their own separate paths.

On the way home, Christos thought furiously, “What did she really want from me? Why did we go out for a second time?” He called the Teacher to help him find answers.

“I would suggest you find another girl,” the Teacher said after Christos narrated how their date went.

“But does she want me or not?” said Christos with a voice filled with indignation.

“From what you said, this girl wants to cause abandonment!”

“Abandonment?” asked Christos surprised. “But how? Why?”

“Because she wants to abandon her parents, you heard what she said: never to see them again!”

“I didn’t like the way she spoke either!” Christos added. “Her tone sounded completely indifferent! I failed on the physical contact part, but really, now that I think about it, I already felt repelled by her indifference!”

“Indifference is the lobby of abandonment, Christos,” said the Teacher. “It is what comes before abandonment. I lose interest for a person that is close to me, so I abandon him or her. This is a reason why indifference is so painful.”

“You mean that indifference is a milder form of ignoring in the roadblocks to communication?”

“You can say that,” the Teacher agreed. “That girl has a big issue with indifference and abandonment and this is why she can’t move forward in her life, she prefers an unfaithful boyfriend than being abandoned by him. The conclusion is that you shouldn’t become attached with this case, there are trees that bear fruit elsewhere. . .”

Then the Teacher added, “Anything else?”

Christos said, “I am impressed from what I thought when she told me that she has a boyfriend.”

“What was your inner dialogue?” asked the Teacher.

“I thought that her boyfriend was in a better position than me since he has a girlfriend and I don’t and then I felt inferior.”

“It seems that you got a bit jealous!” said the Teacher and laughed jovially.

“Hey, no I didn’t do that!” Christos complained.

“Your words do indicate that however!” said the Teacher and continued laughing.

Unwillingly, Christos agreed. “Okay, so I got jealous,” he said, “but I wonder why he must have a girlfriend and I not.”

“Because Christos you have only just started to socialize!” said the Teacher. “The guys you see get along well with women have put effort to be able to flirt and reach the dating skills you want to attain!”

The Teacher continued, “However, you can never know what problems the others might have. The boyfriend of your friend Elpida may have a girlfriend, but it could be that his parents are divorced or he could be a drug addict or a whole lot of other things! Usually, the image that people give outside is not their real image. Each one of us hides many things inside that doesn’t dare to show them not ever to one's self!”

"I can imagine this isn't good,” Christos said, “since I saw what the result was when I hid from myself!”

“No,” said the Teacher, “it is not. Jealousy is not something good either!” Then the Teacher added, “Jealous become the people who don’t have a good image for themselves. For example, the woman who envies other women because her husband likes to be in their company, literally degrades herself. She thinks: The others are better than me, and I am not worthy of keeping my husband. The result is to resort to nagging, quarreling and control, things that eventually tire her husband and force him to leave her. Same applies for jealous men of course.”

“So,” Christos said, “what I have to do to overcome my jealousy is to appreciate myself more!”

“Exactly!” the Teacher laughed, then changed the topic, “When are going to Aleksandroupoli for Easter?”

“I am thinking of going next week, on Wednesday,” Christos replied.

“Are you not staying until Friday, so you can attend the last group meeting?”

“The last lecture in school is on Tuesday, so if I travel on Wednesday, I will have more days for vacations.”

“Christos,” the Teacher said, “I suggest you stay until Friday and attend the meeting. You will gain more that way.”

“But Thessaloniki makes me stressed and I am getting tired of it as well.”

“You can find lots of things to do here, go for a walk, go to cinema or go with your friends for a coffee.”

Christos resigned and said, “Okay then, I’ll stay. Is it possible to do the meeting on Thursday?”

“I suppose it is, but I must first ask the rest of the team members.”

“Alright, I’ll wait for an answer!”