Run toward the Roar

There’s a story that comes out of Africa – that I’ve heard told a number of times – which is often the case with important teaching stories.  In the old traditions, they have a way to insist on being told.  

This is a story that the elders of the tribe make sure to teach their young men. 

The Story

When it’s time to go hunting, the male lions of the pride gather, both the strong ones and the old ones.   They go out into the wild, and find a place between two large strands of tall grass.  In one strand, they hide the old lions – those who have few teeth, dim eyes, and old bodies.  But they can still roar.  In the other strand, the younger, healthier lions gather and also hide.  In between is a natural run, used by other animals, such as gazelle (dinner).  The lions on both sides wait in silence – until a herd, say, of gazelle, make their way through that run, the old lions all at once utter their roar.  The gazelle immediately run away from the roar – right into the tall grass where the hunter lions are silently waiting, and, as they say, dinner is served.  

The lesson always taught to young lions, is that if the gazelle had run toward the roar, they could have survived.  But it’s the running away from the roar that becomes their fatal mistake.  The lesson – always run towards the roar.

Now, I think I’ve heard this story told, in my recent decades, at least a half-dozen times – which means to me that I need to pay attention.

What to do with this story

At one level, it’s about lions training their young.  But, more importantly, this is a story meant to be passed through generations in the human community – my own people.  

So first, I am taken to my own history.

1) I was raised by pacifist parents, whose early adulthood was deeply formed in the 1930s by the Methodist Church and the Fellowship of Reconciliation. It was not just a “turn your own cheek” pacifism, but an insistence that violence was rarely a better way.  And they lived their talk.

So I would avoid fights.  At one time, in my very early teens, I was active in a local (Iowa) Boy Scout troop which met in the basement of a small neighborhood Lutheran Church.  One evening, after the adults had somehow all left, one of the scouts, who had been teasing me for a fight, finally had me cornered in the front yard of the church.  So I had no choice but to fight, so I did.  Then I walked home, and out of shame I never told my parents.  The other kid went to a different school, so I didn’t have other contact with him – except after a few weeks, he phoned me, saying he wanted “to make up for that fight.”  I understood that he wanted to fight again, and was careful to avoid him. 

Then some weeks later, my mother said to me in our living room, “I hear you were in a fight.”  Ashamed, I said nothing. Then she said,  “I heard you won.”  My entire world-view spun up into the air and hit the ceiling – I had no idea!!  And I had completely misunderstood the phone call from my opponent.  I realized I had hurt him pretty bad, and had actually “won.”  And my mother apparently wasn’t upset. (And I knew that if she wasn’t upset, neither was my Dad.)

This kid had roared, and I, in turn faced him.

In retrospect, and from my heritage, I’ve long been a person of few words.  There’s a quiet to the warrior class from which I’ve emerged.

Other life incidents now emerge in my memory, and I’ll add one more.

2) In my early adult life, I was employed for about seven years at a local hospital as a Medical Social Worker.  Part of my assignment was part-time to the Psychiatric Unit, where I was primarily responsible for preparing social background documentation on each patient.  Actually I was employed by the Social Work department, rather than the Psych Department.  And at the same time, for a few years, I had been privately pursuing additional psychiatric training of my own.  As a result of this, I had practiced a minor therapeutic intervention on a patient (which was technically outside my authority).  At a subsequent staff meeting, the head psychiatrist (who had never liked me), took the opportunity to berate me.  This was actually his right, but he was angry, and had slipped into ‘angry parent’ mode, asking me “Mr McDonald, did you know what you were doing?”  I quickly thought to myself, “he’s asking a yes or no question,” and after a very brief pause, I answered with a definite, “Yes.”  

Much to my surprise, many of the rest of the rest of the staff – immediately made me a hero.  He had roared, and I in turn, faced him.

One of the lines from an old favorite movie, “Zorba the Greek” (1964), now comes to mind:

3) Anthony Quinn as Alexis Zorba says to young Basil:

   “Life is trouble.  Only death is not.  To be alive is to undo your belt and look for trouble!”  

And what does he do when he loses?  He goes to a beach at the edge of the island, and at the edge of the water, he dances.  (Hence the then-popular Zorba’s Dance.)

Zorba has long been one of my heroes, (and that movie was the first video cassette I’d ever purchased). 

More recently:  Into the Jungle

4) A few years ago, I was approached by a woman in her middle years – who’d been in a serious auto accident where a passenger (and friend) was killed, and alcohol was involved.  She knew of me as a therapist, and that she was facing prison – so asked me if I would help her prepare.

So for the next year and a half, while awaiting her sentencing, we worked together.  I’ve had ex-prisoners as clients, but this was my first opportunity to prepare someone before incarceration.  This was a serious undertaking, during which I got to know her well.

Then I attended her sentencing trial, where she was sentenced to 15 years prison time.  And as she was being led away, I heard the roar of what she was facing, and at the same time, heard a voice telling me to face it with her.  At that moment, and knowing her background, I decided to follow her, so she’d not have to go in there alone.  At my advanced age, I can’t imagine being around for 15 more years, but I know I’ll give it everything I’ve got.  And, in the meantime, we’ve forged a close, supportive friendship.  We’re each good writers, so our primary medium is the written page – already many thousands of written words, all censored by prison authorities, and from her side, all handwritten.

I heard the roar of prison for her, and I ran toward it.  And for each of us, over time, it “has made all the difference.” ¹

One more final tribute – 9-11 firefighters

5) I doubt that few haven’t heard Tom Paxton singing his song honoring the NYC firefighters who died on 9-11

“Now every time I try to sleep I’m haunted by the sound

Of firemen pounding up the stairs while we were running down.” ²

They heard the roar, and ran toward it.

And, there are those who will continue to do that till this day, and long beyond.

May we all

Pay attention (and maybe follow).

Footnotes

   ¹ Robert Frost’ poem, “The Road Not Taken.”  

   ² Tom Paxton,  “The Bravest.”  

Afternote:

Psychology teaches us the important difference between reacting and responding.  The former is the more primitive response, in brain mapping, coming from the hippocampus:  Fight or flight – Run from the roar, or fight from base instinct.  But as we mature, and learn, it’s the cerebral cortex that takes over, with its ability to reason and process wider information –   Responding from thoughtful experience.  Knowledge and then wisdom – the meta-course of a mature/maturing society.  Long the purpose of a culture’s wise story-telling.

Often the (over-simplified) process of therapy is based on the following matrix:

1) Feel (know yourself) → 2) Think (process) → 3) Choose (act/behave) → 

4) Evaluate (include external perspective) → 5) Recycle

     Where there’s a deficit, the entire process can be corrupted.