Playing the Fool in Life

Nobody can feel better than the man who is completely taken in.

To be intelligent may be a boon, but to be completely trusting,

gullible to the point of idiocy, to surrender without reservation,

is one of the supreme joys of life.

Henry Miller

As a counselor over the years, I have heard countless, heartbreaking stories of my clients who were unwittingly tricked or cheated by someone they totally trusted in their life, or were treated in a way they never expected, in short, being played as a fool. I have struggled over the years to find something consoling to say to them, and until recently had nothing comforting for them except to say that "this too shall pass," which, while true, is not the most consoling tidbit to say the least.

Recently I saw a James Bond movie, "Live and Let Die," for the twenty-third time, and saw a scene that involved a Tarot card deck and the "Fool" card. It hit me that throughout ancient mythology the Fool was a revered character. I also remembered that the Fool is a notable character in every indigenous tradition and every culture that exists. What is it with this iconic role? Why was it so respected as evidenced by its mythic and ubiquitous role throughout history in every existing culture? I wondered, "What if this role is so prevalent, not just because we all experience it sometime in life, but because there is some larger spiritual reason for it's existence? What if the playing the Fool in life was far from foolish and actually a higher calling?

To understand this line of thinking, one only needs to look at the role of the Fool in every story that it appears. It usually involves an unknowing "innocent" (usually being set up over a period of time) who is deceived or duped into having something taken from them. Usually the "innocent" is totally trusting or unsuspecting that this person could do anything bad to them, in essence giving this person the rare gift of total trust. This is where the divinity of the character appears. The Fool gives this person involved the gift of utter trust, and by doing so bestows a sacredness to the relationship. How many people in your life have you known who gave someone total trust? Not many I'm sure. The Fool does this without any reservation. If you have ever received this honor, you may know how such a gift feels inside. It is rare and special.

The "Betrayer", then, is held within a sacred relationship right up to the point that he commits the act of betrayal. It is through this gift of trust that the Fool plays his cosmically divine role: The Fool actually gives the person a chance NOT to commit the act of betrayal and remain in the privileged role of "trusted friend", a high and rare honor in life. If the person does NOT commit the act, knowing full well that he could get away with it, he avoids a weaker urge within himself and therefore grows in character and spirit. He overcomes a weaker impulse that we all experience in life, and flies with his better angels. The Fool, therefore, is the rare archetypal character that allows us, in an instant, this glorious opportunity---a redemption of sorts.

Whether it is a cashier who gives us too much change, or the trusting partner who gives us access to the private bank account, or the relative who signs over to us all financial rights, these are all examples of the Fool acting in total trust and allowing us an opportunity to fight our lesser impulses and rise to a higher standard of purpose in our life. Only the Fool gives us this opportunity in such a definitive way. So by giving back the extra change to the cashier, or NOT acting in an irresponsible or greedy way allows us an immediate character "check" and an opportunity to grow in one's own esteem.

It is interesting to note in one's life, can you remember a time when you had the opportunity to do something you knew was wrong and resisted it? Can you remember the struggle involved in your mind including the rationalizations like: "They won't even notice that much gone", or "I deserve it for all I've done", or "Who will it hurt"? This is the sacred vessel into which the Fool puts us and let's us decide for ourselves in that moment: "Who am I going to be here?"

I don't know how consoling this explanation will be for my clients in the future. One thing is certain though, playing the Fool is not as trivial or foolish as it may initially appear because playing the role of "the tester of Souls" is no small matter. It can only be played by those with the capacity for complete Trust in the first place. How rare and sacred such a person seems to be these days.

Emotional Moving Day

Ten years ago I had an executive client with a particularly difficult CEO for a boss. The CEO was famous for shouting at meetings so loudly that the surrounding offices could clearly hear him through the walls. On top of this, he was usually shouting about topics or issues about which he knew nothing. His CFO stopped correcting him about the factual mistakes he would be screaming about because there was no point anymore as the CEO would not remember having screamed about them after the meeting. On one occasion, after a meeting where my client was screamed at over some arcane reporting form, he asked the CFO, who was sitting there the whole time, why he had not defended him. The CFO answered, "Oh we haven't used that form for three years. Why bother pointing it out, he will just be embarrassed and besides, he won't even remember he said it by tomorrow."

After a five year tumultuous relationship, the CEO was fired one day for "inappropriate use of company funds." My client was thrilled to be finally rid of the crazy CEO and was elated for two whole days. What happened next surprised him. On the third day after the CEO was fired, he experienced a wave of anger that seemed totally disconnected to anything in his life at the time. Memories started flooding his head replaying the numerous crazy meetings he had with the CEO. Memory after memory came and went and he even found himself cursing the CEO as if he were in the room. These memories and anger feelings continued off and on for several days and then just stopped. My client was concerned that he might be going crazy himself and talked to me. I explained that it was a form of post-traumatic stress release. He had been forced to stoically bear these angry rants by his boss because the power differential would not allow him to fight back, and only after the boss was fired could he release the tension he felt at the time. He was literally "boxing away" his anger at the boss until such time that he could feel safe in releasing it. That time came when the boss was no longer his boss. After a couple of days of yelling at his past traumatic memories, he had released his pent-up anger and felt normal again.

Similarly, a client called me the other day who was going through a divorce and was disturbed that she was having crying fits after the divorce was finalized. "Why am I just crying all the time when I am glad to be out of the marriage?" I recounted the client's story and explained that it was literally all the tension of every fight and frustration she had experienced in the last ten years in her marriage. "Your psyche realizes it is now safe to release these emotions, since y0u are finally away from your husband," I told her.

We often bear the pain of interactions in relationships without realizing how much much pain we have actually gone through. We simply take the pain and put it in a box somewhere inside our self. Power differentials, the difference of perceived or accepted power between two or more people, are often the cause of this. We cannot yell back at our bosses because they might fire us---power differential---so we bury the pain/anger. We cannot yell/fight back with our spouses for fear of some retaliation---power differential---so we bury the emotion. Sometimes we cannot fight back because we realize that we are the more powerful in the situation and it might cause harm to the offending person, so we box the emotion just the same. I know of 240 lb. men who have been sent to the hospital by their 120 lb. wives because they did not feel they could fight back as their wife hit them with things. It does not matter who has the true power in the situation, whoever is not able to fully express themselves will have to eventually release the suppressed emotion from the box. It might be five days or five years later, but it will eventually have to be released.

The good news in all of this is that we really do not even have to know what it is that we are releasing when it happens, only that the release is healthy and necessary. Insights connected to the release are helpful and interesting at times in the process, but ultimately less important than the sheer release itself. If the emotion is coming out unexpectedly, just let it come out and the insight might come later. Have faith that you are not going crazy just simply unboxing old emotions---think of it as your emotional "moving day." Who knows, maybe you can move some of those extra boxes out forever.