I think too much.

In which I consider this "elitist" curse.

It’s true. I’m always thinking.

I think — and worry — about current events. I think about anti-racism and poverty elimination and the noxious combination of patriarchy and capitalism. I think about every single item I throw in the garbage, destined for landfill or incineration, and therefore also destined to contribute to the warming of our planet.

I think about movies and the amazing shows I watch on TV. Like any good elitist, I (and my equally elitist husband) dissect and critique and predict and marvel at these performances. I think about the books I read. I think about teaching and teachers and students and the field of education. I think about creative instructional design.

And I think about the unconscious. Not the Unconscious, that elusive layer of the psyche that Freud posited. I don’t really understand what he was talking about. The unconscious I’m interested in is what I (and others) call psychic structure: the lasting beliefs and expectations that have concrete origins in our earliest (and ongoing) experiences and that drive our moment-to-moment behaviors.

I think about behaviors all the time. As interpersonal impingements. As expressions of existential need. As emotional and relational data. All unconscious.

Now. Is this elitist? It’s definitely a curse. That is, once you start noticing behaviors and wondering about the unconscious forces driving them, there is plenty of material to keep you busy 24/7. Endless. Inescapable. Undeniable. Very often discouraging. Pretty much the definition of a curse.

I confess I don’t really understand the charge of elitism. I guess it’s the assumption that people who think believe they’re better than — what, people who don’t think? If that’s the definition, I am

guilty as charged.

Because I believe strongly that people DO NEED TO THINK about their behaviors. And the unconscious forces that drive them. And I believe strongly that people who DO NOT THINK about their behaviors and the unconscious forces that drive them are hurting themselves, others, and our planet.

I do believe that too many people in these our United States do not think. They permit their unconscious needs — their fears, their insecurities, their biases, their emptiness, their entitlement — to run wild. This self-indulgence feels epidemic to me.

I think about this epidemic all the time.

Maybe the antidote to elitism is to require us thinkers to get in our bodies and stay there. Not to talk about, not to dictate to others, not to judge, not to trumpet abstract principles and theories (which, by the way, I personally adore). If we thinkers stayed in our bodies while we thought, we’d have to notice things like feelings — envy, self-doubt, self-righteousness — that point to needs — to be seen, heard, valued, held, accepted just as we are — and we’d have to take those feelings, which entwine with our thoughts whether we like it — or notice it — or not, into consideration. Which would make us not elitists who rise above others but thinkers who relate to others as fellow beings struggling in familiar and possibly even lovable ways.

And by lovable I do not mean cute. I mean love-able. Like “I am able to love you (and me) in spite of your (my) irritating/dysfunctional/thoughtless/damaging unconscious needs and the resultant behaviors.”

One last thought about elitism: Intellectualization is considered a high-level defense against anxiety. Read “anxiety” as a catch-all term for emotions we don’t want to feel. Like fear, insecurity, hatred, envy, self-doubt, etc. Asking elitists whose thinking allows them to escape such feelings to get into their bodies where those feelings reside is asking a lot.

But I ask it. And I do it. Because I believe it can change the world.