A Better Way of Knowing

Becoming Whole in 4K

I grew up in a place where, for the most part, literacy caps at about a ninth-grade level.

This isn’t to say I didn’t get lucky. For one thing, in high school I was part of a poetry group who workshopped our writing every two weeks — its members socializing in the meanwhile.

And then, through the combination of a supportive mother and teachers, as well as institutions which promoted access to higher learning, I made it to the state university next door, where I was surrounded by people who came from families very different to mine, as well as a host of folks with PhDs. (My boss, a retired philosophy professor who had bought the used bookstore where I worked, would become my mentor.)

The result of this, however, became that I felt more and more isolated from my home turf, and more and more alone when among my new friends — prompting the affection for alcohol and marijuana which gave me the “social lubricant” I needed to feel at home with them. I felt different now, and couldn’t relate to people from town. But I also felt like an impostor around my new friends.

The more literate I became, the more dissatisfied I was with common parlance. I grew almost resentful to it, finding it (at best) sloppy and confused, and (at worst) fatally limited and misguided.

So began my descent into Hell. I can trace the beginnings of my slip from solitude into isolation somewhere around my graduation from UNI. From that moment forward, as I moved to Milwaukee with my then-girlfriend (a graduate student), I would begin to feel essentially alien in every social situation I would encounter.

I began to feel that every time I spoke with uneducated folks I was adopting a posture of resigned temperance. Whatever they were going to say I would have a contradictory reaction to and, instead of just creating a horrible scene every Christmas, I would hold my tongue and hope that I could just get through without having to comment specifically on any topic.

Or, I would drink. Then at least I got fuzzy and sloppy myself, and could at least enjoy goofing off with them.

If you’ve followed any addiction narratives, you see where this goes. The person continues to drink too much in social situations, and then begins to drink more and more whilst alone (a habit which had already started in college).

The first reason I stopped being able to communicate came from resentment. Why had I bothered going through so much effort to earn a degree if no one could care less about it? Any time a topic came up where I had learned a new perspective, it was never met with any appreciation. My strong desire to share what I had learned to help, for example, my parents live better lives was going to be a very steep climb, if it was even possible at all. This troubled me, because they had sacrificed so much for me to succeed, yet didn’t seem to desire to profit from their efforts.

Conversations would start with someone making a proposition. Generally, there was some piece of information missing from the assumption. But attempting to add that piece to the discourse was folly, for it often seemed that the person did not in actuality believe what they had proposed — at least not in the manner they had phrased it.

It occurred to me that folks had not even nailed down what I’d learned in high school composition class, that a thesis needed to be well-stated and backed up with evidence throughout the rest of the essay.

Oftentimes my conversation would do one of two things. Either they would backtrack, contending “well, I wasn’t saying that,” or they would get defensive and double-down on the proposition and lock into their contention.

Eventually, conversation would become completely impossible.

Looking back now, I realize I should have worked harder in my Humanities class when we studied Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle. I could’ve learned more, and it would’ve helped a lot.

For propositions are but one of at least four ways of knowing. The perspectival, procedural, and participatory all offer greater context which can offer much more calmness, and the potential for wisdom.

When I got my first successful two-year stint of sobriety, it was thanks to Alcoholics Anonymous.

I still had trouble with the propositions then. I would bristle when we read “How It Works” at meetings, I was flabbergasted at the weak and confused theology, and I resented older men in the groups who would say what I perceived to be shitty, mean things.

But I got sober through it all because of the other three ways of knowing. Interactions with many different people, all with a common goal — “the desire to stop drinking,” allowed me to get out of my isolation and “Into Action.”

I had not found Dr. Vervaeke then, and my confusion caused me to eventually leave the group and relapse.

Now I see the forest, rather than the trees alone. This perspective, enriched by my participation in the excellent After Socrates series, has upped my quality of life, and increased my agency.

But, more, it has given me a strong medicine for my isolation. And, combined with Internal Family Systems parts work (on which I will write soon), I’m starting to feel whole — and my Lenten sobriety is going swimmingly.

Add in philosopher Kent Dunnington’s work, and “baby, you’ve got a stew goin’.”

Now, I’m beginning to look forward to conversations with all sorts of people, especially my family. And I’m less hung up on my narcissistic perfectionism.

This allowed me to get a day job which I’m going to enjoy, and has me more confident than ever about my freelance writing career.

I look forward to your letters.

Attendantly,

Aaron