I Love My Phobias
By Richard Salbato
I must apologize for not writting a
Newsletter for a long time but I have had a physical problem. The reason I even mention this is that it is
one of my phobias. I never tell anyone
my problems, except close friends, until after I have solved them. If you tell people your problems, they
almost always think you want some help or sympathy. Close friends are a different story in that they are there to
share you life, good or bad, and friends know how to verbally slap you on the
head when you need it.
Now that I am completely well, I will
explain. Five weeks ago I worked at
least 40 hours on my computer in less than four days without working out. At my age that is body abuse. What happened is that a muscle in my back
locked up in a knot and pinched the nerves in my left arm making it paralyzed. Only with great pain could I move it and the
arms weight when walking was very painful.
Typing was almost impossible because I
cannot type with one hand. Do not laugh
but I do not know where the keys are. I
just think and my hands go to the right keys.
The letters on my key board are worn out so that even if I try to type
with one hand I cannot find the keys and do not know where they are.
What I am doing in this Newsletter is
something that I never do and that is explain myself to people. For the first
time on my life I am going to explain something about my inter being, something
that truthfully I do not think is anyone's business except God and myself. I have my reason for doing it now.
The Myth of Neurosis
What made me think about writting this was
a great book called "THE MYTH OF NEUROSIS" by Garth Wood. Seldom do I ever read anything where I do
not find some things I disagree with, but in this case, Garth Wood was right on the money. It was as though he got into my mind and
wrote what I was thinking. There are
many books written about the stupidity and even harm that the new psychological
world has brought to society. "Psychological
Society" by Martin Gross is one of them and I have read most of them. I
even have a special section on my web site called the remnants of Communism,
which is what I think this is. The
difference with Wood's book is that he gives an alternative.
Life has moments of unhappiness and there
are things that have happened in all our lives that if we dwell on them bring
mental pain, but this does not mean that we are in some way unhappy. All life has sad and unhappy moments and
memories. Self esteem brings happiness
even in unhappy moments and this does not come from mental exercises but from
real accomplishments in life. Making
hard goals and pursuing then until accomplished to the best of our abilities is
true therapy. There are normal
unpleasant mental states which are inescapable and often a valuable part of
everyday living. I often cry about things that make me sad, but this does not
make me mentally ill. In fact I am
proud that I have feelings and can cry.
Life is full of evil, death,
sinners, and we are sinners. But we
should not confuse evil or sinful actions with mental disease. Because we are sometimes sad and some
situations make us cry does not mean we are unhappy or mentally ill.
No man has a natural right to happiness
and no one is always happy. Happiness is
an inner thing obtained though great hardship and effort. It is the effort and pain that gives us that
self satisfaction or knowing that what we are is good. We must do it ourselves and not let others
do it for us. Inheriting a title or
money does not give us happiness because it does not give us self esteme. When we are not self made, the reward has to
go to others and not to ourselves. Most
of these people do not even have free will, but must do the bidding of
whosoever made them what they are.
They become clones or slaves to the person
making us what we are. We loose control
of our own lives. This is what happens
in destructive cults. In cults people
give up their own opinions and actions and only do what the leader or leaders
tell them. This can happen in a
country, Communist Russia, China, Cuba, Nazi Germany, it can happen in a family
when parents control too much of children's lives, and it can even happen in a
Catholic parish, when a priest takes to much control over all actions and
thoughts.
Happiness does not come from success unless
that success is living up to our own convictions and having a clear conscience
in our thoughts and actions. I know
successful people who are happy and successful people who are unhappy. I can tell just by looking at their
toys. Though successful in an earthly
way, people who lack self esteem or self respect need things to show off and
make people believe they are happy: fancy clothes, flashy cars, stupid but
beautiful girls to put on their arms to show that they are
"somebody".
Success does not mean unhappiness but it
must be from the self satisfaction of doing something that was hard and morally
correct according to your own conscience.
If you are successful but became so by violating your own moral code, you
will never be happy with that success.
You compromised your own believe system to have a worldly image of
success but in truth you will always despise yourself for doing it. I know
people who have great financial success at the late years of their lives but
made it by using others and taking from others. They live out their lives on Valium because they cannot stand
their own company. Many successful
businesses are full of these people. The
owners make money with illegal or immoral methods and the people who clime the
ladder of success with them condone these methods. They do not end up happy.
I think the primary reason for writting
this Newsletter about myself is to show that I am very happy with myself even
though I have never had a single success from a humanistic point of view. Liking oneself does not mean that one does
not have sorrows but those same sorrows must not be the fault of the person and
if they are they must be forgiven by God and oneself and corrected if
possible. Many sorrows are in this life,
this valley of tear, and there can never be a solution to all of them except to
have a clean conscience concerning them.
I am now going to say something that may
seem absolutely stupid. My greatest reason for self satisfaction and self esteem is my
failures. My
four major failures in life have been for refusing to compromise truth and
justice for expediency.
My Phobias
Phobias are nothing but fears. Having fears does not mean one is mental or
a coward. Bravery is doing what you
fear doing. One might be called
mentally ill if he had no fears. Fear,
like pain, can be a great mental protection.
In fact, some fears are very necessary.
God designed us to have a natural fear of falling at birth. All fears are of the unknown whether good or
bad and the greatest unknown is the future.
The best example is the fear of death because most of us are uncertain is
to what is on the other side of death.
To the one with strong faith there is no fear of death because it is not
unknown to him.
Of course, there are unreasonable fears
that should be overcome and this takes effort and when overcome we gain self
esteem. Examples of this could be fear
of crowds or flying or spiders or even going away from your own safe property
or home. Some people have fear of even
going outside. These are not mental sicknesses
- just fear. Giving in to fears is called cowardice. No
one calls a coward mentally ill. He is
just a coward. The brave overcome fear
and do what they have to do even if they are afraid. The truth is that we cannot be called brave if we do not have
fear.
Some phobias (fears) are not only
justified but necessary for survival in the physical world and even in the
moral world. This is why parents will
make children afraid of fire and its consequences, and why priests make
children afraid of sin and its consequences.
Some phobias are appropriate to one person's life but not appropriate to
another person's life. Some phobias are
even taught - like children talking to strangers. In fact there are times when we should even develop phobias for
our own protection. Conditions make
phobias appropriate like walking in the bush of Africa, whereas being afraid of
a lion in the zoo would not be appropriate.
All this is common sense and can be taken care of by ourselves without
the help of so-called experts.
I have had unreasonable phobias and
overcame them myself without the help of experts. My first unreasonable phobia was shyness. I was so shy that I kept everything inside
and this resulted in braking out in skin rashes all over my body. At 15 years of age, I lost all the skin on
my body. I had to tie my hands to the
bed so that at night I would not scratch myself in my sleep. When no physical cause could be found, the
medical doctor asked my mother if I keep things inside that bothered me. I overheard that conversation and tested
it. The next day someone at school said
something to me that I did not like and to this day he wishes he had not. I was 15 years of age. My mother had taught
me to be good to everyone no matter what they did. I know that was not the moral thing to do because it only encourages
people to do more. I went too far the
other way for a time but I never had a rash again.
My father gave me an unreasonable phobia
because he grew up in Colorado where Tarantula spiders are poisonous.
California has bigger Tarantulas they are not poisonous. At the age of five I was about to pick one of
these up to play with when my father went crazy. To make a point he put this very large spider in a jar and made
us look at it with fear for many days.
He made it very clear that we should have a spider phobia. Only in college did I realize that it was
unreasonable and overcame it by letting a very large Tarantula walk on my
arm. No courage here, just ego.
As I said fear of falling is natural and
in fact necessary but in the modern world of high rise buildings and airplanes
it should be overcome. I had this
natural fear and overcame it by becoming a sky diver. Funny story that I will save for people who email me but again
not courage, just ego. By the way,
just to show that we can overcome things ourselves without the so-called
experts, I also was prone to seasickness but figured out why myself and then
spent years on the sea without pills.
This was maybe the most painful sickness I have ever experienced and
others around me were not sick. I think
because they made fun of me (family members) my anger made me overcome the
problem. Anger can be useful. This brings us to the phobias that I have
but do not want to get rid of because they are useful and protective.
The Phobias I Love
Control.
My greatest phobia is being out of my own
control. I have had nightmares and very
bad ones at that. In fact so bad that
when I have had them I refuse to go back to sleep. I would walk back and forth all
night lone to prevent myself from sleeping.
These nightmares are of being in a very tight place underground unable
to move with just an air hole to breath and shouting out for people to dig me
up but no one heard or cared.
I have not had these dreams in 20 years because
I figured out all by myself why I had them.
It was always when I placed myself in the hands of other people and my
life was not my own. These were good
people and people who cared about me, but they did what they thought was good
for me and not what I thought was good for me.
How did I overcome this phobia? I did not, I embraced it. I just do not allow my life to be in
anyone's hands except my own. I can
become very extreme about this at times but in every case where I gave in to
control I was always sorry and at times became even angry. My very good friend comes to Fatima every
year and stays with me. He offered to
take me in his car to Coimbra convent because he did not want to ride in my truck. I told him I would go with him but that I
had both back problems and prostrate problems and that I always stopped every
30 minutes to walk around and go to the bathroom. Also at the Convent there are no bathrooms and so I must arrive
early to go to a coffee shop first. He
agreed but did not stop and arrived late.
There was nothing I could do short of beating him up and not only was I
very sick but ended up with a bad back for a month. Doctors have told me that I must have prostrate surgery and others
told me I must have back surgery but in both cases I have solved these problems
myself, but it takes a very careful lifestyle.
I must be in control. I often
wonder how girls get into the cars of boys when in fact they are in the boys control
and not their own.
I have a very strange life style that does
not fit into others life styles very well.
For instance I go to bed at 8:30 PM every night and get up at 4:00 AM
everyday. If I stay at someone else's
home even for one night, I become very tired at an early hour and become very
bad company. I try to be very polite
but get up at night at least four times to go to the bathroom and this does not
go well in other people's lifestyles.
Control by force
One thing that God will not do is force us
to do what He wants us to do. But
people often want to force us to do what they want. It does not matter if it is
for good or bad it is always bad if done with force. You can ask me or even convince me to do something but you will
never force me by threats, intimidation, or anything that is not of my own free
will. My good friend once asked me why
I became a black belt and learned to use guns when I seem so gentle and kind
externally. I have owned guns from the
time I was 16 years of age.
I asked him what he would do if someone
came up to him with a gun and told him to give him all his money and suppose
all he had on him was one dollar. Would
he give it to the man? "Of course!"
he said. "I would not", I told him.
I would die before I would let anyone force me to do anything. This may seem like a psychological disorder
but I do not think so.
I happen to be a great student of history
and history is full of nothing but the strong trying to force the weak into doing
what they want not by truth and logic but by the force of arms and power. History is full of the stories of
governments, gangs, and individual people who forced their ways on others and
this would not have happened if they just said, "NO!" Hitler would not have killed millions of
people if those who helped him had just said, "NO!" Of course they would have died and maybe
even worse than death.
Giving in to fear of death or pain gives
bully's power. I will not give them
this power over me or anyone else when I see it happening. I was kicked out of public school at the age
of 14 years for fighting but to this day I am proud of what I did. I never fought to protect myself but to
protect others. I do not like bullies.
We need order in the world and this means
rules and regulations and this is something I believe in but these laws must be
just and logical or I will do what the Christians of old did. I will not obey unjust laws even if it means
going to my death. It can be an
admirable thing to be jailed or even killed but it is never admirable to give
in to force and do what they want you to do.
The world is full of heroes who went to
their death rather than give up secrets, or agree to make statements or sign
documents denying their faith. What
some will say is that I do not have the prudence to know the difference between
giving up one dollar and giving up something important like faith, but the
truth is that giving up one dollar empowers the person to continue on with
other people and if stopped there and then, he is stopped from future theft and
force. Power only wins when people give
in to it. Real power is having the
conviction to never give in to force at any cost.
That same man who thinks he can take
something by force also beats his wife, girlfriend or children. He respects no one but his own wants and
desires. That one dollar empowers him
and encourages him.
Dependence-phobia
Both my father and my mother lost their
independence and when they did they lost their self respect because they became
a burden on others. At any cost (even death) I will remain independent of
others. If I help someone and in return
he helps me and it is a win - win situation, I do not consider this dependence
but if I depend on someone else I have lost my independence. Without independence you are in others
control.
Defense-phobia
My next greatest phobia is that I do not
like to defend myself. Very often people say things about me that are not true.
When someone accuses me of some crime or sin that is untrue I expect that
people should know me well enough to know that it is untrue or ask me about
it. This is not only the moral thing to
do but commanded by God.
If they just believe it without proof,
they are unjust and sinning themselves by believing these things without asking
me or seeing proof. I have known many
people here in Fatima over the past five years who suddenly avoid me and I know
why, but since they do not bother to ask me I do not offer any explanation. Even though they might not be my close
friends they should know better just by seeing the way I spend each and
everyday. Even if they might think
there be some truth to these lies or gossip they have a moral obligation to ask
me and if they do not I will not seek them out to explain. I do not need their approval to like
myself. I need my approval and if I
have a good relationship with my God, I have a good relationship with
myself.
I have lost three good friends over this
kind of thing, but all of these people knew me well for years and they should
have known better. I also have friends
and even relatives that do know the truth about me but do not defend me out of
expediency so that they can keep relationships with those making these
lies. To me this is a greater sin
because they know the truth.
I will not seek them out to explain what
they should have known by knowing me and my makeup which never changes. In fact when it comes to defending yourself,
it never works. Other people must
defend you. You can think of any
situation no matter what it is, one can never defend himself. If someone calls you a drunk or some other
type of sinner, what can you say? Only
those who know you well can defend you.
You cannot defend yourself. If
they do not ------- that is their sin because they allowed a lie to go
unchallenged.
Equal-Phobia
Forty years ago I realized that there was
a plan to brake down all chains of command making all people equal. I do not mean equal opportunity or equal
rights under the law which is good. I
mean equal in authority. The very chain
of command that makes up social order was under attack. I was in college when it started with the
anti-war movement and went to civil disobedience, and then to the woman's
liberation, and then to the brake-up of marriages. From there it expanded to taking away the father's authority and
rights over his children, and later to children's rights over parents
rights.
God designed this chain of command so that
order would prevail in the world and we also see this in nature. One great example is St. Ambrose ordering
the Emperor of the World to get off the altar because he did not have as high
an authority as a priest. Popes, even
if very humble personally, demand that the office of Peter be respected. When we allow people to disrespect our authority
we teach them to treat all authority with disrespect. When we treat everyone with equal dignity we end up by treating
God commonly and that is what is happening today at Mass. If we allow our own respect at home or at
work to be trampled on, why should we expect our children to honor God with
reverences and respect. Treating
everyone commonly destroys the social order and I have a fear of that ------ a
phobia.
Help-phobia
I do not want to die owning any debt even
if it is a dinner not re-paid. I know
this is not the right spirit of charity but it is me. People have a right to show their love of God by helping others
and this includes me but for some reason I have a hard time with this and it
bothers me. I suppose it is because
from 14 years of age I have made my own way and always helped others including
my father and mother but never had anyone help me. In bad times I have slept in my car rather than seek help and I
have always paid any debts. I will not
go to my deathbed owning anything. I
think that comes from my extreme interpretation of what a nun once told me, "Even
if confessed, stealing is not forgiven until paid back." Accepting help is not stealing but in my
mind I see it that way because I know I can find some way to pay it back. I
have a fear (phobia) that God will say to me someday, "You could have paid
it back but did not."
Expert-phobia
By experts I mean people with degrees and
titles in their names: Doctor this or
Professor that means nothing to me.
This does not make them good at anything, it only gives them license to
think they are good and to tell others that they are experts at something. But who are the true experts, the ones who
have titles or the ones who are successful at something. The experts at child psychology are not
people like Dr. Spock but people who have raised successfully good and even
great children.
Whose advise do you want to take, a Doctor
of child psychology who never had children or a man and woman who raised great
and good children. If you would do a
little investigation you would see that almost every great scientific discovery
was done by people with no degree or a degree in something other than what
field they are now famous for. I could
point this out in every field of science but to keep within the science of the mind,
let me point out that even the best fail for one good reason.
What was very prevalent in the United
States a few years back was foster homes.
Foster homes were homes where families took children out of orphanages
or reform schools and raised them as their own. This system was a total failure even when the people were good
people. Why? Because the children always knew that they were being paid money
to take care of them and they were not doing it just for love. The same problem happens with even good
psychology, the mere fact that you pay them to listen to you or to give advice (which
they seldom do) takes the love and caring equation out of the system, even if
it is not true.
Some people call themselves Christian
psychologists and base their advice on morals and Christian teaching but
because they take money for this advice they disqualify themselves for true
Christian psychology, which is properly called Moral
Therapy. Whenever you take money for dispensing
the gifts of the Holy Spirit you have sinned against God's laws and if you do
this, how can you teach morals.
I have been teaching Moral Therapy for over 20 years but never have I
taken any money for it. I give advice
by phone and internet at least 30 times a day, but I always show people how to
solve their own problems and do not presume to solve problems for them.
Self esteem comes from solving your own
problems not from me solving them for you.
I point to the truth but the truth must be applied to your life by your
own knowledge of your own situation which I could never presume to know. Nonetheless I must be doing something right
since thousands of people have placed their problems in my direction for advice
or just to share them with me. I DO NOT TRY TO HELP THEM. I TRY TO TEACH THEM TO HELP THEMSELVES.
Almost never do I give sympathy because
even when needed sympathy tends to stop action and action is always what is
needed to gain self respect. I almost
always avoid sympathy because sympathy is addictive and any addiction is bad.
Psycho-nuts make millions of dollars on
addiction - Valium, (cocaine was started by doctors) and hundreds of other
drugs, but mostly they create addiction to their own therapy by using sympathy
and trying without success to create self esteem without real action. The very hope of self esteem without real
action is forever doomed to failure.
Addiction means lack of self control and when you are not in control you
loose self esteem. People become
addicted to the sympathy of the therapist.
Some people try to have self esteem with plastic
surgery, hair styles, nose rings, etc. but the results are artificial and bring
no self gratification. Others who are
born with admirable qualities: beauty, brains, strength, etc. and try to use these
for self esteem fail because they are not something they accomplished
themselves but were God given. Those
who use God given qualities and improve on them with hard work and in helping
others create self esteem because it cames from their own efforts and hard
work.
Moral Therapy
Moral Therapy must come from Friends or yourself. The friend can be a priest, a father, a
daughter, a classmate, a workmate, or anyone else but it must be a friend. Not
all priests or fathers or daughters are friends. Catholic Moral Therapy works with a wonderful thing called a
conscience. We rid ourselves of a
guilty conscience and give ourselves a very hard goal to accomplish. We get rid of what we do not like about
ourselves and give ourselves great and meaningful goals to go after. Reaching the goal does not matter as much as
how hard we work towards it. True and
useful self esteem comes from what we do.
We must be able to look at our lives and be satisfied with how we lived
it.
It is true that talking about our problems
helps to get them into the open but we do not need people for this unless they
are very dear friends. Sometimes it
works just to keep a diary or sitting quietly with God. God speaks to us through our conscience, and
our conscience tells us what we should and should not do.
Success Phobia
There must be a balance between family and
work. Some people spend too much time on
financial success and some too much on family.
The proper balance depends on what is needed the most and if the balance
is for the good of all. If it is good
for only one and not all it is not good.
In the end all that matters is our children and loved ones and they need
both love and food. I have seen both
extremes - too much work and too much family to the neglect of work.
Financial success has a price even if
their is no family involved. Often it
requires compromise with morals or at least with the time needed for personal
growth. I have had both financial
success and personal growth success but in the end failed in the financial
realm because I was not willing to pay the price. I think if I had always had a family I would have had the reason to
be successful in the worldly way, but without family it just did not
matter. What mattered was just being a
good person and dying in God's grace. In
some ways I have a fear of financial success because I think it would corrupt
me. I have seen very great and holy
people with lots of money that were not corrupted by it, but I fear that I
would be. I have had the fancy cars and
the beautiful homes on the beach but I was not close to God.
True success is being happy with what you
have accomplished and what goals you still want to accomplish giving meaning to
life. The biggest problems in my life have
been my refusal to condone evil and that I never compromised my beliefs for
expediency. This is not the way to have
success in the world, but it is the way to have a clear and good conscience. To be honest I do not cry at sad moments
because I am numb to sadness but when I see a happy ending to a movie I always
cry and cannot help it, because I have never had a happy ending to
anything. This does not take away my
self respect because I know that all my failures were because I did not
compromise truth and justice for expediency.
I have made a great effort in four major
things in my life and have so far failed in all of them. One thing keeps me going and that is that I
never quit. I will not consider that I
have lost until I am dead. I might have
lost battles but I always consider that I will win the war. Some of these things have gone on now for 40
years and all at a great psychological and financial price.
Extreme Phobia
I have, according to the politically
correct, Homophobia but what does that mean?
I am not afraid of homosexuals and talk often with them, but what I will
not do is condone their lifestyle as normal. If that is a phobia then I love my
phobia. On the other extreme I know
people who will not talk with sinners at all out of fear that their sins might
contaminate them, but I have no problems being around sinners and have
converted more sinners (even extreme sinners) then I have the self righteous
religious who think they never sin. I hate sin (Sinophobia), even my own, but I
do not hate sinners nor do I hate myself.
I do hate all extremes except the pursuit of truth and justice.
Sometimes living in this secular world of
extremes makes me think of the movie, "Instinct" about what people called an Ape Man.
He did all the right things but was so misunderstood he was jailed like
an animal. He thought it so useless to
try and explain himself even to his daughter, he just said to her, "Goodbye!"
Notes on Moral Therapy
Anxiety can be good and useful
Guilt is always good and useful
Dependence on others is the enemy to self
respect
No one is an expert in the art of living
without common sense
Sympathy is seldom useful to solvable
problems
Sympathy should only be used in unsolvable
sadness - death etc.
Every life is different so only the person
can find the right way to his own happiness
Action and not words bring self esteem
Actions or lack of actions that make us
feel guilty diminish self respect
Fears are natural and some are good
No one is responsible for our actions
except ourselves
Self control is the greatest road to self
esteem
Only self determination brings about self
esteem and not outside control
Everything must be self - self discipline,
self control, self respect, self restraint
Avoid all extremes except love of truth
and love of neighbor
Avoid peace without justice
Sadness does not take away happiness
because there is always some sadness
All life has tears and sadness at times
Conflict is not always bad because good
and evil exist as a war
Bad people are bad and not sick
Selfish people are never happy people
Self absorbed people can never be happy
people
Excuses for bad actions bring no cure