This is Not a Petitionary Prayer: Carving Out a Space for

I am writing this piece for me.

Some will praise it. Some will criticize it. Some will see it as an occasion for conflict. Some will see it as an act of healing. Some will use it to shore up their positions. Some will make it an example of how not to proceed. In all of this, it is no different from any other piece of writing.

But none of that matters, because I am writing this post for me, to carve out a space that is mine, and to make a commitment to myself in the presence of witnesses.

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Although I am not particularly religious anymore, one of the things that I have always loved about Jewish ritual is that it is not about petitioning God for what you want, but about impressing upon your own heart how you want to be. Because of the nature of language, which relies upon a speaking subject and a recipient of that speech, it?s nearly impossible to write a prayer as though it is not addressed to someone else. So in Jewish prayer, the language addresses itself to God, and we ask God for lovingkindness, for patience, for wisdom, for strength. But really, what we are doing is impressing upon our hearts the necessity of constantly going toward lovingkindness, toward patience, toward wisdom, toward strength, because they are already there, very close to us, and not across oceans and skies. The ritual creates a space apart from the noise and conflict of the world, apart from all of its claims for attention, apart from all of its distractions, so that we can remember who we are. By separating ourselves from the world, we find a way to enter it with greater dignity and integrity.

But as I said, I am no longer religious, and I do not participate in these rituals anymore. Their time in my life has largely passed. But I realize how much I still need ritual, still need that place apart, in order to reacquaint myself with whom I am.

Consider this piece such a ritual.

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I have been writing about autism in particular, and disability rights in general, for nearly four years. During that time, I?ve struggled find my place in the autism community, the autistic community, and the larger disability rights community. And what I?ve found is that I?ve largely had to leave behind any sense of belonging in the autism and autistic communities, because it has become almost impossible to find a place in which I can simply exist as an individual without getting drawn into battles. The landscape is so fraught, the lines are drawn so clearly, the conflict is so intense, the level of rage is so high, that I find myself constantly in a position in which the substance of what I say, depending on where I say it, ends up putting me into camps that I?ve never acceded to being in.

What I have learned is that I have way too much faith in the power of my own authenticity. Up to now, I have assumed that as long as I was perfectly clear about my position, and perfectly clear about my intent, that I would not be seen as being in one camp against another, that people would understand that I am speaking for myself, and myself alone, and that I would be able to safely and freely cross lines and talk to anyone. But it seems almost impossible to exist as an independent entity without appearing to give aid and comfort to whomever someone else thinks is the enemy. If someone mentions me in support of their position, and the person who mentions me is in conflict with others, then all of a sudden, I am viewed as being in that person?s camp, whether or not I have serious disagreements with some of the person?s other positions. If I show up in a discussion and express the opinion that I believe that people of all neurologies and abilities deserve respect for who they are, then I become the enemy of people who tell me that I am simply disseminating a pre-approved ideological message and that I have no notion of the suffering of other people ? when, in fact, no one approves my messages but me, and when, in fact, I live to critique ideologies of all shapes and sizes, and when, in fact, I intensely and intuitively recognize the suffering of other people as a nearly palpable presence.

I am not a member of any organization or movement. I am not a member of Autism Speaks, of the Autistic Self-Advocacy Network, or of the Autism Women?s Network, even though I know and respect people who work with all of those organizations. I will work with people who support those organizations if I feel that a particular cause, at a particular moment, is just. I am not a member of the neurodiversity movement or of the autistic civil rights movement, although I support both movements, work very hard for the broader cause of disability rights, and consider both of those movements part of that cause. I largely stay away from organizations and movements because I am most comfortable ? and most effective ? as an individual who resists these kinds of identifications. I will talk and work with anyone who treats me with respect, whether one person I am speaking to thinks the other person I am speaking to is the most contemptible person on the face of the earth. As long as people refrain from verbal attacks, I will talk with parents who thinks that disability is a curse, and I will talk with parents who think disability is a gift, and I will talk with parents who want their children cured, and I will talk with parents who celebrate their children as they are.

I don?t think of the landscape as a set of binary alternatives. I see it as a place of possibility and creative potential, even as I realize that it is also a virtual minefield. In this, it is really no different from any other landscape.

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In the midst of this landscape, so fraught with pain and possibility, I am constantly being presented with a choice: do I base my work on rage or do I base it on love?

When I talk about rage, I am not talking about outrage. I?m talking about something far more elemental, and piercing, and consuming than that. I have experienced, when I was younger, that kind of rage. It was engendered by particular people who had done me particular, protracted, horrendous wrong. I no longer feel that rage toward them, nor toward anyone. I left those people behind long ago and, over the years, the pain of what they did has fused not with forgiveness ? for there is no forgiving certain things ? but with compassionate understanding for who they were. Coming to that understanding doesn?t make me an exceptional person in any way, because I didn?t do it for them. I did it for me.

So when I talk about love, I am not talking about smiling at people who have seriously harmed me and pretending that all is well, and I?m not talking about avoiding conflict, or anger, or outrage, or honest expressions of how I see or what I see. I?m talking about radical love for the dignity and humanity of every person, no matter what they?ve done or what ideologies they hold ? a love that is perfectly compatible with utter and complete outrage at whatever they?ve done or whatever ideologies they hold. And that radical love begins with love for my own dignity and my own humanity, however flawed my words and actions might be at any given moment.

I do not see any common ground between basing the work on rage and basing it on love, though I?ve tried very, very hard to find it. I?ve been caught between the two for a very long time, feeling that love isn?t enough because the unjust suffering of the world deserves my rage, and feeling that rage is way too much, because one runs the risk of directing it at anything or anyone that remotely appears to be connected with unjust suffering. Rage at unjust suffering is very problematic, because we are all connected with unjust suffering, in one way or another. There is rarely an ethical choice that is clear and just, where no one suffers. In this society, we all countenance other people?s suffering, and we all ignore it to one degree or another, and we all benefit from it in one way or another. While I write this, on the other side of the world, someone?s child is dying who ought not to be dying; and yet I go on, as though that child does not exist. I?ve got mine, and this child has nothing, and that is not a stroke of luck or a sign of hard work, but the result of an unjust system from which I benefit. And were the roles reversed, I have no doubt that that child would be simply going through her life as well as she can, trying to ease suffering where she can ease it, while I languished unknown and her life made no difference to my pain at all.

So I don?t think I can rage at it all without raging at everyone, including myself. And if I go that way, then where is that clear space, apart from the noise of the world, in which I can come back to myself and go forward with the work?

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A reminder to the reader: I am not telling you how to be. I am talking about how I want to be.

This is not a petitionary prayer. This is a ritual in which my own truth becomes impressed upon my own heart.

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I have been caught in the zone between rage and love for so long, that I have not done the love in the way I want to. And I think this is the case because I have learned to see love as a cop-out ? as a passive, feel-good way to stay out of the fray and anaesthetize myself to all of the pain of the world.

But now I realize something essential: Active love is the most painful place to be, and the most lonely, in a world of suffering. I think that my rage, when I was younger, was about joining in the suffering, because rage causes me suffering, and it makes me feel a part of others who suffer. At least there was some belonging there. But in a society shot through with extreme levels of verbal violence ? in newspapers, political debates, online comment forums, and even, occasionally, the streets of my sleepy little town ? basing my work on love makes me feel nearly irrelevant. I wonder to myself: How can love for the dignity and humanity of every person matter when the dignity and humanity of every person is under attack so constantly?

And the answer I find is that it matters because it?s radical love.

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I am well aware that this post has the potential to be used in any number of ways. Some will use it to defend their positions against other people. Some will think I am just plain misguided. Some will relate to it fully. Some will not relate to it at all. I wish that I had control over how my words are interpreted and used, but I don?t, because that is the nature of putting words out into the world. In order to avoid misinterpretation and misuse, I?d have to be silent, and that I will never do.

I have learned that whatever people think of what I write, they are talking about their own experience. They cannot possibly be talking about me, because there are several degrees of separation between someone?s experience of what I write and who I actually am, inside my body, my mind, my soul, and my own experience of myself.

So if you love this post, you are having an experience of me. And if you hate this post, you are having an experience of me. If this post makes you feel that the world is a wonderful place, you are having an experience of me. And if this post engenders anger and frustration at all that I?m saying and all that I stand for, you are having an experience of me. That is your experience, and I respect your experience, but your experience is not who I am.

I write about my perspective in order to create my still place in the midst of the tragedies of life and to cast upon the waters some words that might help to ease injustice and suffering for someone, somewhere. That is why I write, and for no other reason. Each of us has our own agendas. This is mine. This is who I am.

? 2012 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg

Source: http://www.disabilityandrepresentation.com/2012/08/19/this-is-not-a-petitionary-prayer/

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