Pull

As a child growing up in a middle-class suburb of a sleepy maritime town in Eastern Canada, I often had to check under my bed for an intruder. In the ten minutes I had spent in the bathroom preparing for bed, had a murderer furtively walked up our well-light driveway, squeezed through the open window into my first story bedroom, and crawled into the eight inch recess under my twin bed? The prospect of me actually finding a bloodthirsty, ravenous predator awkwardly jammed next to my tennis shoes between my box-spring and u-click hardwood flooring was infinitesimal. The violent crime rate in my community was significantly below Canada's already low national average and, despite this, the nightly-checked deadbolts on all three outer doors and the industrial grade siren installed on the roof of our garage demonstrated that security was not taken lightly by my parents. Despite these reassurances and the observation that nothing else in my room was out of the ordinary, each night before falling asleep I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach that could only be calmed by a quick peek below. This is one example of what I call pull.

I continued these nightly checks until I was at least fifteen. I am not surprised or embarrassed that I was checking under my bed until that age; I am curious about why I stopped. Did the impulse or fear that informed those nightly checks disappear? Not likely. Rather, I remember developing a stronger internal resistance to doing them. I told myself that it was childish to succumb to them. I reminded myself of the logicalities described above. The weight was just as heavy, but I cut the rope that exerted pull.

We are taught to ignore pull. Why wouldn't we? It is the desire for the 3rd piece of cake even though we are trying to lose weight. It is the need to get the last word during a fight with your spouse. It is the thing keeping you from finishing your paper or mowing the lawn or taking the car for an oil change. Pull also may contribute to mental illness. It can run out of control when you can only focus on how shitty you feel or how much everyone hates you or how you'll never be able to overcome your diagnosis. But this is just one side of pull. Pull is there when you feel a deep-seated love after connecting with a close friend. Pull is also present when you walk past a long-haired, scruffy youth who is street side in the pouring rain with a downward gaze and sign that reads "Left home. Broke. Need money for food and shelter." When we hold back an "I love you" to a friend because we are worried about how they'll take it or we brush off a 16 year old who left an abusive home, we miss the benefits of pull. 

When I interview patients, I get to experiment with pull. When a patient shares that their relationship with their partner is falling apart toward the end of the interview, my cognition might be screaming "hurry up! there is only 8 minutes left and you still have to rule out a diagnosis of OCD and ask them about their family history  of mental illness". But I may also have a feeling of pull, something that is responding to the halt in the patient's breath, the widening of their eyes and the subtle downward twitch in the corner of their lips as they deliver such a statement. Pull may be saying to me "Whoa. This is really important to them. Let's fill in the details later and just explore their experience in their marriage". As I experiment with listening for and following pull in my interviews, I find the depth of my relationship with patients is growing.

I am not suggesting that we blindly follow the weight of pull off of blind cliffs or to the bottom of the ocean. Nor do I want to check under my bed each night for an intruder. But I have found tremendous experiences in following pull. Be mindful of it. Play with it. As you begin to observe the voices of both pull and reason you can use your fully developed adult brain to choose pull. Get on the swings in your neighborhood park. Ride your bike to work. Connect with a friend. And when your adult brain yells out for you keep your pants clean or pass up your buddy's offer for beers, side-step it and follow your pull.