I cannot quite remember the words to a Linda Ronstadt cover that is a favorite of mine, but one set of lyrics goes something like, "if dreams were fire, this old house woulda' burned down a long time ago." This reminds me, too, of the short essay I wrote in the backwoods cabin (that I promised to print here, but am still debating it - it is perhaps too personal and narcissistic), that was burning with thwarted desire - a desire to do something fulfilling that has led in recent years to a feeling of emptiness.
Many, I believe, feel called, or want to feel called, but so few act on it. In my own family, like many families, there have been many with sparks of talent, or even fires of it, but something always seems to have gotten in the way - everything from family needs to drugs and alcohol problems to neurotic fears. Most people do not talk of this - rather, they thrash around in youth, uncommitted, then fold on themselves with age, depending on hobbies to highlight their need to excel at something. But sometimes, entire family lines excel, with the mediocre or miscreant present only as occasional chaff. We might want to add a "but" to some of these families - some have old wealth, some have failings so deep that they overshadow the spectacular - but sometimes, we have to admit that some family lines are simply superior.
I speak here of the Oliver Sacks and his clan, whose recent autobiography, On the Move, I have nearly completed over the weekend. It is not that Sacks, on whose work the movie Awakenings with Robin Williams was based, hides his own failings; in fact, he is refreshingly up-front about them (note to future readers - the book begins surprisingly flat, but it builds. Keep with it). Among the surprises I learned was that he was homosexual, and clumsy at it at that, which one might expect given his age and milieu as a young man. His mother, on finding of his preference, told him, "You are an abomination! I wish you had never been born!" She never mentioned it again, and the doctor understands that as a committed Jewish mother, she was merely quoting from her scripture. But it hurt him at least a bit for the rest of his life.
Sacks (who is now dying from cancer, thus the book) also was an amphetamine addict while a young physician, something that he finally shed to save his life. He began to see a psychiatrist for this, and has continued to see him up to this day. He also stated, that from age 40 to 75 he had no sexual contact with anyone.
All big minuses in one way or another. On the other hand, the hundreds of people he helped with his talents for both humanism and medicine more than outweigh any of his problems. He had gifts which he exploited to the maximum. He has traveled the world, investigated what he felt he needed to investigate, and has engaged millions. He is, or should feel, rightly fulfilled.
But it is not just him - nearly his entire family was similarly gifted and energetic, given both purpose and the dispositions to express it. Both his parents were successful, and loved, medical doctors, as were two of his brothers (another was schizophrenic - apparently the cost to pay for a brilliant family line). A cousin helped form and mature the nation of Israel; an uncle was Al Cap, the famous cartoonist of Pogo. Sacks speaks frankly of his uncle's sexual (hetero) excesses and how it ruined his career, but this was just another wrinkle in the greater fabric of a family of brilliance.
How are such families born? We can argue nature and/or nurture for some time, but the reality is that such lineages do exist. The Sacks family, as it excelled, was Jewish and English at a time when Antisemitism reigned. They were given no favors by the Anglo elite. Perhaps it was because of the struggle that they struggled so? But many other disadvantaged families have simply stayed poor and unknown. Are there other reasons besides genes or culture?
In the previous book I covered here, Natural Born Heroes, the author notes that among the three traits of a hero numbered by the ancient Greeks, there is one that surprises: compassion. And while this book was about physical prowess, I believe we can extend that to professional excellence in general. Maybe it is not one's genius and energy that makes one great, but a sense of compassion that gives one genius and energy. Of course there is a link to genetics, but it is well known that few of us ever engage our full capacities. There is a cultural link, too, as all of the fields that we consider were formed by our overall culture. But maybe compassion is the secret ingredient passed through the family line, compassion meant not only for those we know, but also for those we don't know. This was certainly the case with Doctor Sacks, and perhaps it was for much of his family.
One of the greatest things that mystics agree upon is that enlightenment brings compassion. With that, it seems, comes full human potential. It can and does happen that success arrives without compassion, but I doubt many successful families continue this success without it. Could it be that it is unconscious narcissism, not our family genes or material backgrounds, that keeps most of us so ordinary? FK
Many, I believe, feel called, or want to feel called, but so few act on it. In my own family, like many families, there have been many with sparks of talent, or even fires of it, but something always seems to have gotten in the way - everything from family needs to drugs and alcohol problems to neurotic fears. Most people do not talk of this - rather, they thrash around in youth, uncommitted, then fold on themselves with age, depending on hobbies to highlight their need to excel at something. But sometimes, entire family lines excel, with the mediocre or miscreant present only as occasional chaff. We might want to add a "but" to some of these families - some have old wealth, some have failings so deep that they overshadow the spectacular - but sometimes, we have to admit that some family lines are simply superior.
I speak here of the Oliver Sacks and his clan, whose recent autobiography, On the Move, I have nearly completed over the weekend. It is not that Sacks, on whose work the movie Awakenings with Robin Williams was based, hides his own failings; in fact, he is refreshingly up-front about them (note to future readers - the book begins surprisingly flat, but it builds. Keep with it). Among the surprises I learned was that he was homosexual, and clumsy at it at that, which one might expect given his age and milieu as a young man. His mother, on finding of his preference, told him, "You are an abomination! I wish you had never been born!" She never mentioned it again, and the doctor understands that as a committed Jewish mother, she was merely quoting from her scripture. But it hurt him at least a bit for the rest of his life.
Sacks (who is now dying from cancer, thus the book) also was an amphetamine addict while a young physician, something that he finally shed to save his life. He began to see a psychiatrist for this, and has continued to see him up to this day. He also stated, that from age 40 to 75 he had no sexual contact with anyone.
All big minuses in one way or another. On the other hand, the hundreds of people he helped with his talents for both humanism and medicine more than outweigh any of his problems. He had gifts which he exploited to the maximum. He has traveled the world, investigated what he felt he needed to investigate, and has engaged millions. He is, or should feel, rightly fulfilled.
But it is not just him - nearly his entire family was similarly gifted and energetic, given both purpose and the dispositions to express it. Both his parents were successful, and loved, medical doctors, as were two of his brothers (another was schizophrenic - apparently the cost to pay for a brilliant family line). A cousin helped form and mature the nation of Israel; an uncle was Al Cap, the famous cartoonist of Pogo. Sacks speaks frankly of his uncle's sexual (hetero) excesses and how it ruined his career, but this was just another wrinkle in the greater fabric of a family of brilliance.
How are such families born? We can argue nature and/or nurture for some time, but the reality is that such lineages do exist. The Sacks family, as it excelled, was Jewish and English at a time when Antisemitism reigned. They were given no favors by the Anglo elite. Perhaps it was because of the struggle that they struggled so? But many other disadvantaged families have simply stayed poor and unknown. Are there other reasons besides genes or culture?
In the previous book I covered here, Natural Born Heroes, the author notes that among the three traits of a hero numbered by the ancient Greeks, there is one that surprises: compassion. And while this book was about physical prowess, I believe we can extend that to professional excellence in general. Maybe it is not one's genius and energy that makes one great, but a sense of compassion that gives one genius and energy. Of course there is a link to genetics, but it is well known that few of us ever engage our full capacities. There is a cultural link, too, as all of the fields that we consider were formed by our overall culture. But maybe compassion is the secret ingredient passed through the family line, compassion meant not only for those we know, but also for those we don't know. This was certainly the case with Doctor Sacks, and perhaps it was for much of his family.
One of the greatest things that mystics agree upon is that enlightenment brings compassion. With that, it seems, comes full human potential. It can and does happen that success arrives without compassion, but I doubt many successful families continue this success without it. Could it be that it is unconscious narcissism, not our family genes or material backgrounds, that keeps most of us so ordinary? FK
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