I first saw Nathaniel when I was about 19 or 20, and living in San Francisco. He came to deliver the opening lecture from one of the NBI lectures. It was in one of the city's premier hotels; I've since forgotten which. They used the grand ballroom and it was packed. I had been reading Ayn Rand's works and subscribing to The Objectivist. I was very fired up about the ideas and eager to see what this fellow looked liked, since I very much liked the articles he wrote for The Objectivist. He entered the room and walked down the long path between the rows of chairs and he owned the room. His level of comfort was palpable. My thought at the time was, "That is what a man should look like." He was clearly enjoying himself, the attention, and the interaction. He answered questions on the fly, speaking in whole paragraphs, mixing humor, philosophy, psychology and all crafted in an instant to fit the context of the question. "Impressive" isn't a big enough word. Years later when I felt the need to deal with some of my psychological issues he was the therapist I sought. I attended Intensives (2 or 3 day group sessions that lasted most of the day then started up again the next morning). And I attended group sessions of the normal sort where you met once a week for a couple hours. And some traditional private sessions. His therapy sessions were always part educational, always required the client to carry their own weight (no one was going to "get fixed" - they were going to learn how to pull themselves up out of their problems.) Over a decade later, I decided to become a therapist and Nathaniel recommended a school for my masters degree in Clinical Psych. I decided to put everything I had learned from him out of my mind as much as possible so as to allow a fresh look at all of the other theoretical orientations. For the next few years I took myself deep into all of the major theories and a great many minor ones. I went to conferences, read the origonal works, and loved it. Then, after graduation, I picked up a The Psychology of Self-Esteem and read it again. And was as deeply impressed as I was the first time, but from a stronger and richer background. California licensing laws require a 2,000 hour supervised internship. Nathaniel offered to sign off on any hours we spent together and part way into his group specifically designed to explore the pillars of self-esteem (this was when he was writing Six Pillars - and before it was published) he offered to let me continue to be in the group as an intern, when he learned I wasn't able to continue for lack of money. I recorded the sessions, and transcribed them later and printed a copy for him. And I set up chairs and took down chairs. In other words, Nathaniel was finding a way for me to continue that didn't look like charity. There are so many memories that come to me now. I remember we were leaving a group session that had been held in a hotel conference room on an upper floor, and as we went into the elevator, he began to sing. Something from a musical and he had a pretty good voice. I don't know what the others in the elevator thought - a couple of them were from the seminar, and a couple weren't. But I thought, this is what happens when you feel like you are overflowing with happiness and it is just running out of you in song. I remember seeing how deeply attached he was to Patreica, and how annoyed I was that he was letting her participate in the session, thinking, "Hey, I came to work with NB, not his wife!" But I soon fell under her spell and had quite a crush on her. Years and years went by and I hadn't seen Nathaniel. I had been out of the country. But when I came in for a group session, he talks about Devers, his wife. I'm stunned, thinking he had divorced and wondering how could anyone let someone like Patrecia get away. Then I learn she died, and I ended up sitting there with tears on my cheeks that had nothing to do with therapy. Devers is extraordinary and I came to love and admire her and worked with her on a number of occasions - she was a force to be reckoned with - a high speed, high energy bundle of benevolent ferocity - and often had Nathaniel bewildered and amused. I've never met Leigh. But with Nathaniel as the common denominator, I've no doubt that she too is very special and my heart goes out to her at this time. One day Nathaniel said, "When you find some special that you want to emulate, don't try to do what they do, or say what they say, but ask yourself, 'How is he or she experiencing things now, that would them lead to their reactions.'" (That's not an actual quote, just the idea of what he said.) I did that with Nathaniel, and he said that it was what he did with Ayn Rand. That is a kind of mentoring that is priceless. NB liked to use sub-selves as theraputeic techniques, sometimes like metaphors, but often more literal - as personality structures. The child self (that child we once were and that in some ways lives within us today), our opposite gender self (that model each of us has created in our minds to process what we think that opposite gender is all about), and so forth. One day Nathaniel complimented me on something, and asked how I arrived at my conclusion. I told him that I consulted my Nathaniel self. I said it with a smile and I don't think he could tell if I was kidding him or serious. I was at least half serious, in that I loved the opportunity to watch him think and process and ask myself how he came to this or that conclusion, and why he would react in a particular way. There are so many more things that I could say, that someone should say, about this exceptional man. Maybe another time.
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