Bob Fecas 0:00
I simply drove to this person's house right away when I was feeling this rejection, and said, Listen, I'm sitting outside in the car if you want to come out and talk, you know. But I didn't go to the door and knock. I didn't want to intrude. I want to respect his freedom. But at the same time, I wanted to say, hey, let's, let's move on and see what's happening and if things need to shift, and if, if I have missed some things, please,
Josh Lavine 0:29
welcome to another episode of what it's like to be you. My name is Josh Lavine, your host today. My guest is Bob Fauci, who is a social self pres, two and 1279, trifix. Bob is a spiritual advisor and mentor a teacher at a Catholic High School in the Atlanta area from 1988 to 2016 and he leads retreats on prayer and meditation and other aspects of spiritual life. Bob was also a childhood friend of Don Riso, and when Don was writing personality types back before 19 in the 70s, Bob was one of the first people ever to read the chapter on type two. Bob has been a man of faith since he was a boy, and he's a very big and fun personality, especially with that two seven stem right up front. And in this conversation, we explore various aspects of his two Ness, including when he was very young, being inspired by the saints for their example of being a caring and loving and good person on earth, for how he connects with his students, and how he responds when he notices that people are being relationally distant from him, and also just how positive and buoyant he is as a human being. This conversation is really energetic, and it's really hard not to like Bob. He's very charismatic and charming, and you'll notice that in addition to exploring his inner life as a two, there are also just moments that Bob is being a two with me in this conversation in a really lovely way. So I'm very excited for you to observe and learn about type two from my friend Bob. I was thinking about our last conversation, and you were gonna potentially think of some examples of in your life, of this, like leading in, or moments where you caught yourself Yes, in the in the unconscious assumption that what you were doing for the person is the thing that was going to really make the difference for them. That's right. That's right, yeah,
Bob Fecas 2:19
yeah, yeah, I did give it some thought, and I'm I'm sure I came up with with more examples I had mentioned, you know, the pulling back of two particular friends in my past and how that made me feel. And it wasn't so much that I thought I was making the difference in their life or anything, but I certainly thought that we had a kind of relationship that I could sort of presume that I would be included in a way that that it didn't seem that the breakup did include, in other words, I was disappointed that I got wrong certain things about the relationship right, whether, whether, really about the whether, Whether I was at fault, or the other person was at fault, or whether it wasn't about fault, but it was just about the evolution of things. But the disappointment was certainly over my failing to get something, you know, to see something, yeah, that I thought, I thought I had seen and I didn't see at least, at least the breakup indicated that I was missing something, right?
Josh Lavine 3:49
You know, this is I thank you for bringing this up. First of all, because just losing a friend is really a tender subject, and I think we've all been there and can relate, and it's a universal human disappointment. But I think in particular, for type two, there's a there's a Absolutely, that's a real wound, because I'm thinking of how to sort of has this need to feel like they have a special place in the other person's life. You know, I've got my special sliver of this that my connection with this person is special, and what I give to this person is special to them, and our connection is special. And so the loss of that is, I can imagine really, really hard. So I wonder, yeah, I just wonder, what other words you have for it, or what, what those experiences, I
Bob Fecas 4:40
think, I mean, there was a kind of, I wasn't angry at things, and I don't think I'm repressing anything there. There was a greater sadness, just a sadness over the breakup and, yeah, and the lost opportunities that. And as I saw it, that we, we would, would not have those opportunities in the future together. And so I think sadness is a word that has resonance with my own losses in the past, that that I've, you know, not just with relationships, but especially, especially with relationships. I'm thinking of the one, most recent one, and I can remember at the 70th birthday party that was thrown for me by my students. And this person was one of my students and and some so some of the people were standing up and saying things about mister Fauci. And so you know how I fully expected this student to say something, right? Didn't say anything, and was rather removed from the whole affair of my being the center of attention or my getting and I was including this person myself and sort of, whoa, what's going on. And there was at my daughter's wedding. Also, this person was also more removed when we are together, when we're together, I saw a great deal of sharing, a great deal of sharing, and a great deal of, you know, going to films, reading books, blah, blah, blah, this person's relationship with the beloved, and my relationship with my wife, and our sharing things, etc, etc. And then all of a sudden, when we were in group and and, you know, the the first relationship, it was somewhat the same, because the person said finally that we pulled apart. He was saying because of a certain jealousy. He said he felt a certain jealousy. I mean, I see he was owning, he was owning something that he wasn't, you know, so, so anyway, I don't know if that's helpful.
Josh Lavine 7:09
It is, and actually I'm tracking. It's interesting to me, how you are tracking the state of a person's closeness or remove removedness from you. And I mean, that is, I'm thinking social instinct, but also it has a particular twoness. But what I'm wondering is, what your I think, where the Tunis really will come like the texture of Tunis will come forward is in your sphere, in a response, like, what, what happens? Or what would you what would your reflex be when you notice someone being removed? Yes,
Bob Fecas 7:45
in that way, yes. I mean, an alert goes on, yeah, and and the mind is questioning, well, what's happening here? Is it me? Is it the other person? Is it a complex of things, the environment that we're in at this moment, I don't think I immediately, I was reflecting Josh on the fact that, you know, when I entered the Jesuits at the age of 18, and Don Riso and we were together and so forth, we we had in in our novitiate years, the first two years, a structure called the speculum, which is mirror in Latin. And the speculum was to be done by our classmates, and we were instructed on how to go about reflecting on this other person. We were supposed to really fill fill out one for each of the people in our class, and it was supposed to be somewhat objective and dispassionate, but and we were getting so what I'm trying to get at is the fact that we were already at 18, being raised to be more reflective about ourselves. There was we worked on our predominant fault, for example, which the speculum was somewhat helpful in identifying, along with other work that we did, this was before the Enneagram had come with any popularity into the Jesuit Order, which it did in Canada, which is how Don Riso got into the Enneagram was with his work in the Jesuits when he was in the theologate there. But so, so I don't think my typical response is unconscious. I think I tend to be rather looking at the variables and saying, Well, you know, causation here,
Josh Lavine 9:48
what's a good diagnosis? Yes,
Bob Fecas 9:50
that's right, that's right. Yeah, I do think that, but I, but I am a two in the, you know, in so far as we cut the pie up in these ways. And it makes sense to me to to use these structures. I have been benefited by these structures. And I did look over your article on object relations. I didn't read it thoroughly, but I got the I got the gist of it, and would like to go back to it. But in any event, I'm just trying to say that my response to these things tends not to be, you know, sort of, but it tends to be more inquisitive and more diagnostic, you know, let's, let's get to the heart of this. And I would like to talk with the person, you know, that's my Yeah, whereas, you know, for example, with the second case, the more recent case of I simply drove to this person's house right away when I was feeling this rejection, and said, Listen, I'm sitting outside in the car, if you want to come out and talk,
Josh Lavine 10:52
right? Okay, that's real good.
Bob Fecas 10:55
I did the door and knock. I didn't want to intrude. I want to respect his freedom. But at the same time, I wanted to say, hey, let's, let's move on and see what's happening and if things need to shift, and if, if I have missed some things, please. So I tend to be somebody who's ready to engage, rather than someone who pulls back and immediately defends and, I mean, I think that is my training.
Josh Lavine 11:24
I think it's, I agree. I was just thinking that it's training. But, and also, it's remarkable that you drove to the person's house, there's a there's a going to the other person that that that speaks to, yeah, yeah, in this case, literally, physically, yeah, and, and the awareness in you of, um, how far, how far, or, let me put it, how, how close can I get to the person before it's an intrusion That's right, yeah,
Bob Fecas 11:54
me, to me, and I think that you know, the idea of autonomy and freedom is really important to Me, as you know, us too, as you know to be self defining, even to a fault, as we know in your article there, but, but I do, I do tend to be respectful and err on the side of taking maybe more time than was really needed or or what have you. But I would rather do that that way. And I think in my teaching, too, with my students, I tend not to. So I mean, this example just came to me. One of my students came into class, senior ethics class, and flung his his book bag up against the air conditioning heating unit and slouch down in his in his and put his head down. I And then other people gradually start coming in. I didn't say a word to this. It didn't say a word. But then we started the class and so forth. And this is so true ish, and we started the class, and I'm talking, and I'm bringing something up, and I just, I was, I walk around my class and all that and, and I just, he's got his head down. I just put my hand on his shoulder when I was laughing about something or something, you know, very casually, and I was very physical with my students. I mean, you know, yeah, how I wasn't fired, you know, today, in today's, in today's world, I would never make it. I would never, we were told, you know, you could, you could only do side hugs. And you know, I'm still hugging everybody and and some of us are kissing and all that kind of thing. So I just put my hand on this kit, and I could feel his body just relax. Never said anything. He came to me later, and we became good friends in the sense, I mean, not one of my better friends as far as student, teacher relations go. But I just that that sort of tendency on my part to want to respect boundaries, yeah, is is real. I think,
Josh Lavine 14:07
yeah, there's a there's a way like that story is really evocative for the aspect of two. That is just, there's a radar sort of always on for if a person's in self, some kind of suffering or pain, and kind of what you can do to help. And I guess what I'm sensing is in you, there is this, this constant inner conversation of, what's the what's the calibrated thing that I can do to just let that person know that I am noticing them and that I'm kind of here for them, and the gaze that you write, that's right, that's right, yeah, you're giving this person gaze, yes, and, and then kind of tracking the response to it in a certain kind of way, yeah.
Bob Fecas 14:56
And I hope, as I was doing with the light here, I hope, and I think it's. True, partially, again, because of my training, both at home and with the Jesuits i i think it is by and large for the sake of the well being of the person, and not that I don't, not that I don't appreciate being appreciated and loved. Absolutely I do. I've had far more of that than most, I suspect, far more response. But even the people that like like this, this person who's broken with me over the last five years, so I still sort of, this is two ish. I still sort of expect this person to come to the door of my he's been here many, many times. My wife loves him. My children love him. You know it's and, and, and that this will be patched up. I still fully expect that this will be resolved, not only at the level of my hope, but even even more friend
Josh Lavine 15:57
you're talking about, your friend that, yes,
Bob Fecas 15:59
that broke up, that broke up, that's right, right? So this calibrating, this caliber and these tentacles out there, picking up, picking up, picking up, and how am I to respond and so forth to and if, and if it were to, I mean, there's no question, there'd be work to be done. And at some point, some I uh, revisiting of certain things that would be difficult, no question. But that's what we do with friends. I mean, that's what we do with our beloveds. Is that we, we have to constantly rewrite history in in trying to understand, well, what really did take place and and what about what do I have to apologize for something, because I want to, if I should, that whole should thing is really big. I have this strong one wing so.
Josh Lavine 16:54
So one of the things that we were tracking with the light thing right before we turned the record button on is this question of, Am I motivated by actually helping this person or by their appreciation that I will getting a
Bob Fecas 17:11
response from them for my helping? That's
Josh Lavine 17:13
right. That's right. So how do you track that for yourself and like, what's your what's your relationship with that?
Bob Fecas 17:19
Uh huh, um. Well, just the recognition of the distinction is really important to me, right? When Don Riso was writing his first book, he gave my wife and me a copy of our types that he had just typed, you know, and said, Read this. I had never heard of the Enneagram or anything of that sort. And I, I mean, I mean, I he had said a few things about it, and I was rather suspicious of the quote numerology and all right, I read it, and I was just, you know, amazed as was as was Catherine, amazed at her and so and so he and I dialogued a good bit about that. He even gave me a credit in his first book for encouraging him to pursue not only the unhealthy side of the types, but But what about the genius, and, you know, the essence of the types that, as Hudson has gone on and given presentations on The essence of the various types. So I think the distinction between for its own sake and for my sake, that that distinction is really important to me in philosophy and psychology, and I feel called to to attend to the former. And I know I feel in my faith and in my understanding of reality, that I'll be care, I'll be taken care of. I'll get my needs met, if I tend, first and foremost, to the thing for its own sake. You know, helping out Josh with the lighting because he would like to get, you know, and, oh yeah, by the way, Josh is happy with me. That's the secondary thing. Is that, yeah, Josh thinks thinks well of Bob, because Bob was assisting in his work that he's doing with these insights, this
Josh Lavine 19:12
point you're bringing about faith is really interesting to me. I think that there is a an inner shift that can happen from let's see how I would put this, needing other people to meet your egos needs, versus turning to a higher source, whatever, whatever your faith orientation is, sort of having a relationship with. I'll use the word God and letting God be the person who or the entity, or whatever that sees you? Yes, yes, yes. And that's
Bob Fecas 19:45
been the case since. I mean, the truth is, you know, since I was a boy, I can remember my mother taking my brother, Steve and me to to church, to the Eucharist and and we would plop down in the pew, and then she would. Kneel down and bow her head and, well, I didn't know it was prayer at that, but you know what, where is she going, and what is she doing, and why did she leave us? And those kinds of questions, and my fascination with the transcendent from the beginning has has been a major part of my life. No question about it.
Josh Lavine 20:24
I'm just, I'm just, I'm fascinated by the not to reduce it to this, because I don't think it can be reduced to this. But faith in a higher order, a higher entity, a higher being of some kind, or however you conceive of God, serves a really interesting and important psychological function, which is a kind of, like, it takes the pressure off of other people in your life to give you your kind of narcissistic hits. Yes, you know what I'm saying. I do, like, uh, like, for example, as a three I could see, you know, needing to be loved and admired by all the people in my life, versus turning to a higher order to receive it from that, yeah, instead, or as a, you know, as a more personal, intimate substitute, or something like that, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, so I just, I'm dropping that here as a,
Bob Fecas 21:19
yeah, yeah. I would say, I would say that the that certainly in the Christian tradition in which I am a participant, the synthesis has been stressed. You know how, in John's first letter is, how can you love God whom you don't see, if you don't love your neighbor whom you do see that whole idea about the connection between the human and the divine, yeah, you know. And so I do think that I have been, by virtue of my faith, saved, I mean, even, even the fact that that, I mean, I don't think I get angry. I'm not saying I never go to eight. I'm not saying that my kids would tell you, you know, I tend to be rather calm. And if I lower my voice and say something like and look now, look, if I say now look, and I've got eyes are, you know, I am moving very rapidly to eight. And my kids know the system, and so when they were younger and living at home, they say, Dad, Dad, please don't go to eight. Right. Whenever they did that, they were right. Whenever they said, Dad, please don't go to eight. Or if Catherine ever said, Please, you know, I knew they could not be wrong. They could not be wrong, so, but I do think that the sadness term that I used, rather than the angry term, is, is, is part of the fact that you know unmerited suffering. I mean, you know, the victimization of the two, the unmerited suffering. I do think all of us, all of us, regardless of what, all human beings, are, abused. And I do think that I have had my share in that. And I do think that my faith in the place that, let's say Jesus of Nazareth and the saints in the church, I don't just mean the ones on the canon, but I mean those who also participate in this faith that I share with the Christian tradition. I think they have consoled me no doubt, sure, have consoled me in my unmerited suffering. Let's say yeah, and, and so you're, you're, you're bringing up that junction between the the faith issue and the one on one with real flesh and blood human beings, that's right, whom you would like to have respond to you at times, but, but I, I know that, given the degree of my belief in the transcendent, that that it is a I wouldn't call it a cushion. I mean, if you could look at all the books I've got Rumi and Meister, Eckhart and Theresa vavila and John of the you know, I am a buoyed up by this faith, and I feel that that my disappointments, let's say, in human relationships, always, are couched in that larger. La, love that, yeah, that I receive from, you know, above, from the Divine, from the transcendent, from the ground of being, etc,
Josh Lavine 24:53
yeah, yeah, uh, well said. And can do you have texture for? Let's. Right? I'm, I'm thinking of the the two tenant, two and seven, as we talked about, as kind of both live in you tendency to present the silver lining. I'm wondering, if you know, I'm wondering if you have, if you have texture about that thing that you feel consoled about, you know, like, what like the disappointments that you're describing. And we talked a little bit about the grief around the Lost friendships. But even just micro, micro moments, you know, where you just, I don't even yesterday or today, or something like wanting, some wantings to be seen in a certain way by someone, and then being missed, you know, and then that being a thing that gets consoled and kind of washed away or elevated, or something like that in your but what is that? What is that grief?
Bob Fecas 25:49
Um, because, by definition, you can't be quote, missed your word. By the way, we should talk about that sometime, that was one of the things my antenna went up when I when I saw you stressing so much the which is what how Don did in the beginning, and how so much Enneagram work is on deficiency and doesn't look enough at genius and gift, I think. But in any event, I think that you know the transcendent has certain. If I don't want to just repeat myself here, I want to get at I let me go to something that you made me think of a minute ago. Shakespeare, Hamlet, when Gertrude says, Me thinks she doth protest too much. We toos are famous for overstating. I do think we choose are hard to believe for many people, because of our our enthusiasm. I mean, that's a the enthusiasm word we typically think of with the seven, but the twos and the sevens have twos have a certain flavor of it too, for sure. That's right, no question. Ours may be focused on relationship and person, and sevens are on whatever their obsession is. At the moment, not a long lived obsession, as we know sevens, attention span is not really that great. But in any event, a two can be, can be pretty long lived in in focus when it comes to a beloved, a person, so but I do think that we have that tendency in this leaning in to, I mean, I can remember Catherine telling me at times now, you know, don't, don't over promise the kids things. Don't over express the plans for the summer, or what you know, and and the the grandiosity of the two is, is such that I think we, we do profess more than is the case and can be thought of, and sometimes are less sincere than we would like to be. I mean, we would like to think of ourselves given the image that we're constructing of ourselves. We would like to think of ourselves as that, as purely sacrificial, etc. But we're not. Of course, we're not. And of course we fall short, not only of our own image, but of the ideals presented in the religious and wisdom literature, philosophical Wisdom literature of the species that that some of us read and and are nourished by, you know, I would like to be very much like, like some of the people that whose books I have down here. I do think twos, who who twos can be, as we've said, they can be angry with others for not satisfying their needs. You know, I think of CS Lewis, I think may have mentioned that the four loves, Mrs. Fidget, you know, after all, I've done for you, the Jewish mother. You know, where you know, after all, I've done for you, and this is what I get. I haven't myself felt that I've just felt hurt and sad over things like the relationship, and not for what I have done, but for what we've had. I mean, wasn't this real? And why now not? I think, I think some twos really do despise the human. They portray themselves as lovers of mankind, but if you look more deeply, they are furious with mankind. And I don't think that's my case, but, and maybe it's because of this religious buffer that you're referring to as the satisfaction I'm I'm having my needs satisfy in this constant reference to the unconditional love of the Divine. You know, no matter and and I believe I fall short and. All the time of what I think I am called to, and so forth. But I also think those, those scenarios and scripts that I look to follow are part of my construction, and they're faulty as such. And so I'm continuing to to read and to study and to meditate and to pray, so that my perception of what I am called to is indeed closer to the mark than you know, yeah, then yeah, yeah,
Josh Lavine 30:37
yeah. You've been a man of faith for almost your entire life,
Bob Fecas 30:40
my entire life, for your whole life, yeah, yeah. Not to say that I haven't had my doubts and that I haven't been challenged at that level. Yeah,
Josh Lavine 30:51
um, I'm thinking about our last conversation where you talked about how as an as a young boy, you related to you. You were so inspired by the saints, yep, yep, and still and still, and you Yeah, and you felt called to be a man of faith and a conduit for it. Can you talk about that?
Bob Fecas 31:10
I would say, I would say a conduit for for the good the holy, not that I would expect that other people would would have the faith that I have, or see things the way I do, but that the generosity of the saints and the goodness of the saints is something that I don't find myself motivated more than by the lives of people who you Know and they're not like I say, all on the Canon. Some of them are people dead set against the faith that I practice, etcetera, like my one of my dearest best friends that I talk with almost he is an atheist and and despises some of my stuff. But we love one another, and so we we have fun teasing and all of that, you know. But, yeah, but Go, go back, Josh, what were you? You were
Josh Lavine 32:08
Yes, I'm curious about what it was like as a young boy in discovering the lives of the saints, yes, and your connection with that you're like, and I'm thinking of it being particularly two ish in the sense that it's like this. The here's the flavor I'm kind of after, is these examples of people who devoted their lives to loving and caring and being being sources of good in the world. Yeah. And how that resonated with you at this kind of soul level very early on. Yeah, well, I
Bob Fecas 32:46
mean, I was, I can remember vividly being in the third, fourth, fifth grade when I was walking to mass to serve mass, as a boy, two miles walking to to church and school was right there. So often I would, I mean, I would stay on either with breakfast that I brought, or the nuns would sometimes have me come in but, but the the readings of the Scripture, the the portrayal of the early martyrs and saints as a boy that definitely inspired me. And then, of course, the the liturgy that went with went with the Catholic Eucharist at that time. You know, we used a lot more incense, and, and, and it's still used. But I was really captured by that. And this is also, I have to say, in Charleston, South Carolina, which is a largely Protestant environment still to this day. But the Catholic community, though small, was vibrant, and maybe it's because of the the dialectic with the Protestant community that we felt our identity more, I think I told you last time that they were like, I think we had 12 or 13 of our 8090, something seniors who entered religious life. I mean, we were studying to be priests and nuns and so. So you know the effect, the effect of our teachers, on us who also were motivated by the lives of people before them. I mean, this tradition of being inspired by others. I don't know, I don't know how to see life, but in connection with those who, if they did not create my values, they certainly express sympathetic values, values that I resonate with and I can't imagine my life every day I read about different biography. And autobiography has always been a major source of nourishment for me, and the lives of ethical and religious saints have nourished that.
Josh Lavine 35:13
Yeah, um, so I'm thinking about your your life as a teacher, as a as, what are the words that you would use to describe your
Bob Fecas 35:26
a mentor? I mean, that's a very two. You know, the two sees himself, herself, not just as a teacher of a subject, but as somebody creating an environment in which relationships are going to thrive. And some students. I mean, I've always, always had, as a teacher, from the beginning, good relations with my students, not that I haven't been had trouble with some students and been rejected and sneered at by students. Absolutely. How could you? You can't please everybody, but, but I have definitely this, you know, to me, here's the I can remember articulating that, you know, in the teaching environment, we have the students, we have the teachers, we have the subject matter. All three have their place, their rights, etc, you know, but, but, you know, really the students, the students are the important, the really, really important. I mean, they're the living beings before us. And hopefully the subject matter that we're presenting will nourish them and help them into maturity and autonomy, you know, and that's you know, as a two, I know that I'm focused more on the student than I am, but I but at the same time, I was the hardest grader in our department. This is sort of that one thing, the one wing. My my chairperson said, Do you realize you you have the lowest grades in our department, and maybe you're the most popular teacher? I said, Well, I don't know about that, but I know I didn't, I didn't know about that. I said, and I've had and in the My chairperson said, she said, and I get little to no complaint from parents about you, and yet you give them C's and D's, you know? So, so this balance between the two and the one. My mother was a one, and I have a fair amount of that. I'm interested in the subject matter. I love studying philosophy and theology. So this balance between wanting to be of assistance, but also inspired by ethics or the lives of the heroes that have gone before us, and so forth. So so trying to work out this, this balance in my teaching, so that it isn't just about the kids, and it isn't just about having fun, although I do think that, as Whitehead said, if there's no enjoyment, there's no growth, there's no learning, and so enjoyment in class was important for me. And there'd be times when I when I could tell, especially after lunch, I'd say, Okay, kids, I see, I see what's going on. Give me 15 more minutes, and you can have the last 20 to do whatever you want. 15 concentrated minutes. I'm the judge as to whether you've succeeded or not, but I would make these compromises to try to existentially deal with what's possible in this moment. You know,
Josh Lavine 38:30
yeah, let me take a breath, because I'm tracking a few things that I want to put Yeah, go ahead. Let's see.
Bob Fecas 38:40
I'm amazed at how good you are. I mean, I don't see you looking at notes, and you've digested so much, as it's clear in your article there, you've digested so much of the Enneagram, and so your antennae are up there, and you are, you're you're tracking. You're tracking.
Josh Lavine 38:56
Thank you. Well, actually, that's a that is a that moment was really good and demonstrative from a two point of view. Because in our in our last conversation, there were these moments where you would notice something about me and compliment me, and I really appreciate it. It's really nice to hear, you know, yeah, but that, that is particularly, I would say two ish, oh, it is. It is no
Bob Fecas 39:19
and supportive and all but, but I feel, I also think, objectively, you're gifted. You know, thank
Josh Lavine 39:27
you. Appreciate it. I'll
Bob Fecas 39:30
try to let that land. And I'm not getting any I'm not getting any cut of any sort.
Josh Lavine 39:37
So I guess what I'm wondering is, or what I'm I can imagine being a student in your class, and there being a general levity, and kind of almost like, I can almost like there being a chaotic nature to like just there's so much. You have so much life force just coming out of you, you know. And it's like, and it just, it beams out of you, and it has this flavor of love and interest and curiosity and Joie de Vivre and all these kinds of things and and also, every once in a while, actually, not every once in a while, kind of a part of the flavor of you is this laser focus on the other person. And so as you're saying, I I'm wondering if you have words for relative to other teachers, how focused are you on, kind of the students themselves? And I'm also, I wanted to bring back this thing you said about touch, and I know that it's a potentially dicey subject in our era, but just how, how touch was a thing for you as as a teacher, just actually, like physically making contact, like hand on the shoulder of a student, kind of these kinds of things. I
Bob Fecas 40:55
mean, that was, that was a risk. And I you can tell, if you know, this laser focus I do have that you can tell those kids that they don't even want a word of encouragement from you, much less a touch or anything of that sort. So, but I did my father's Greek, you know, my brothers, we all kiss one another on the mouth. My daddy is, you know, he's gone now, but he but we always were very physical. My we played tickle games, we, you know, etc, etc, etc. And so I'm the oldest of the nine kids. Very physical with my, you know, bathing your siblings and and them sitting on your lap, and you're reading them, and then my own two children. So, yes, I am a physical but my wife here in our advanced years, we still make love regularly. I'm a very physical person and and I think relative to other teachers, I mean, this was something of a scandal, I think, for some people, but other people thought it was at least charming, and other people really were, you know, how we choose can be seductive. And I do think that that I do have those gifts of being able to make people at ease enough and enjoy whether it's the class or whatever. I could not because, I think because of my one side too, if you want to use it, that one side also, I can't take chaos in a classroom for very long. I think I have a sense of the tempo of things. And it's perfectly appropriate to have chaos at times, but if you really following the arc of a lesson plan and so forth, which I always was doing, ready to let extenuating circumstances intervene and present something richer and more important, I nonetheless would dudes, come on back here. You know, let's you know whether that's going rather quickly to eight to control. But I don't think I did it in an unhealthy way. I would do it playfully if they forced me. I mean, I could definitely say, you know, I would normally simply lower my head and get quiet and they knew, I mean, I wasn't teaching. I was teaching in Catholic schools by and large, where discipline was never a problem to speak of. I mean, if I had a kid, I mean, I remember one kid acting up and was really, really and I just pointed to him, and I started walking toward the door, and, you know, he followed me outside, and I closed the door. Everybody was dead quiet, and I just shrugged my shoulders. Talk to me what's happening. So divide and conquer. You know, I knew, I knew that I had to get him out of that setting where he had the audience, but, but, and he said something, and I said, well, well, if you want to take some time right now, that's fine, but I would like you to come back in five or 10 minutes and let's continue, and let's not continue this for sure, you know, I didn't have discipline problems by and large, because I I had that balance. I think, I think I worked on the balance. I didn't always succeed, but I worked on having that balance between, let's enjoy this and let's keep the the momentum of the dialog going. But, uh, but also, I am expecting you to finish this paper, and we have an exam coming. The data there were, there were criteria for the grade that made some of them get C's and D's, you know. So
Josh Lavine 44:54
here's okay. I have a question I'm kind of honing in my it's coming.
Bob Fecas 44:58
Josh, I. See, I see you move your body. You're ready. You're ready. Hit me. Hit me. Okay.
Josh Lavine 45:10
Do you have a way of articulating the kind of underlying you could almost call it like a unifying principle of your teaching and mentorship and how central your relationship with your personal relationship with the student is to that thing actually, let me so that's one way of stating the question. Another way of stating the question is, what are you? What are you at the end of the day, hoping to give or to a student or what, or hoping that a student walks away from your class or your mentorship with Yeah, and what is the your relationship being a conduit for it?
Bob Fecas 45:54
Yeah. I I mean not just the ideal, which I expressed to my students with people like Alfred North Whitehead, the aims of education. If you haven't read that book, it's a brilliant little book. Power. I want my kids to feel powerful with regard to their self confidence, their articulation and ability to to argue their ideas and their positions, their humility, to be able to shift their positions, not to, you know, I see myself as a catalyst for as a teacher. I was a catalyst for trying to create this sort of combustion that would end with their leaving the room. And to me, the best were sort of like, you could see it on their faces, and I felt it too, because I'm not looking at the clock, and then we're engaged, and all of a sudden the class is over. I mean, what? That's, what you want the whole of life to be like? You know, that's so that's Yeah. To me, question is a good word. Yeah. To me, I was I was excited that we should have a good time, that we should grow, that you should feel powerful, you should feel autonomous. You should think your own thoughts. Have your own values. You know, my children don't share my religious faith or anything of that sort. They they respect me, my two children, you know, and my men's group, we argue about things and but as a two, you know, I'm gonna say, well, let's go get a beer. I'm not gonna fold my arms like a one and say, Well, next, see you next time, you know, and just pull away because, you know, they didn't understand the truth as well as they could have. I do believe in truth, but I also think that the best thing for human beings is to have healthy relationships that make them continue to hang into the dialog and to continue the relating, and not to cut one another off and not to, you know,
Josh Lavine 47:59
yeah, I guess this is that's what I'm kind of sensing underneath everything you're saying, is that, you know, there's so many with different ways to be teacher, and some teachers focus, for example, more on the subject matter that's right than on the relationships That's right. And it seems that for you, the relationship is the essential container in which the subject matter comes alive and actually takes root in the other person. And so this, like, let's grab a beer. Is a certain or, or whatever, any kind of relational move that's right is That's right is, is a is a way to what just both kind of, let's see, let me, let me get the words. It's like, it's a way to
Bob Fecas 48:49
live and keep life going, and keep the the energy in the the juice, you know, I heard your boy, your boy, your psychologist that you interviewed. I watched a bit of his, his thing, you know, he uses that word juice. And I know, I know John Locke uses that juicy word too for the, you know, the sexual, as opposed to the, or by contrast, with the social and the self Pres. But in any event, I care about that, that juice a lot if I bring it to consciousness in that way, and I want, I don't think I am. I take personally the fact that some kids are just going to be not interested. I don't I take that personally. I did have to cultivate attention as best I could without interfering to those students who weren't as enthusiastic for the dialectic. I'm
Josh Lavine 49:48
curious about that. Yeah. So what? What happens? Well, I
Bob Fecas 49:52
would ask them. I would ask them, and in class, you know, I tried not to, because I knew that my tendon. See would be to be drawn to those who were enthusiastic about what we were doing, even if they disagreed, they were engaging. See where the energy was. I wanted to be, and I wanted to create an environment in which there would be more than less energy, and where those kids were were were laid back or suspicious or antagonistic even, I would try to involve them as much as I could, you know, seduce them, even, if you will, by virtue of bringing up things that they might or ask them, you know, I would go to them and, well, what do you think about this? You don't seem, you don't seem to be maybe, you know, I'm not judging where you are right now, but you don't seem engaged in any way. Are you thinking any thoughts about this and finding yourself skeptical about what we're talking about? How would you articulate? You know, so I did my I would give myself a, b, b minus with pulling in consistently enough the kids who had their arms folded or were sleeping or were whatever, you know, right, whereas I would give myself more closer to a solid A with the other kids who who were taking notes and who Were engaged and yeah, then sleepy, or, yeah, whatever.
Josh Lavine 51:22
And, and there's that kind of going to the other person, like, I'm thinking about the earlier in our conversation. We're talking about this, this radar you have about who's connected, who's removed, yeah, yeah. And this, these were more removed students. You, your tendency is to kind of go towards them, try to draw them out, bring them in to the general I would
Bob Fecas 51:44
say, I would say that I I would say that I could have been nourished completely personally by those who were engaged, but I my tentacles were alert to the others, because I think I had a moral responsibility to them as much As to the others and the others were easy to deal with. The more difficult ones I cultivated the practice of engaging the unengaged. Sure, yeah,
Josh Lavine 52:12
yeah, you know, I'm I want to split a hair, because, on the one hand, classroom dynamics is just a general teacher competence. And obviously in almost any classroom, we're gonna have some people more or less engaged. But there's a what I'm pointing to is the what I'm what I'm curious to unpack is your kind of in a relationship with the journey it seems that you want on in terms of or I'm wondering if it was like this, like earlier in your teaching career, did you feel more of a like an inner insistence to try to bring them in and then later relax yourself to kind of let them come on their own terms, without forcing it, without going to them, as much is that I would say,
Bob Fecas 52:55
especially as I mean I remember exactly how I was in some of my first classes in 1970 teaching Introduction to Philosophy and and so forth at Spring Hill College and mobile and and I can remember that I certainly had a script somewhat in mind. I had not yet acquired that facility for for really being able to give and take as much. And the tentacles were more on the subject and my facilitation of the subject matter, I acquired the, I mean, other than the natural twoness, I acquired that sensitivity to knowing where the kids were and knowing what time of day it was, what period of the day. It was because that affects, affects that what day of the week it was all if it's a Monday, if it's a Friday, if it's, you know, in February, or if it's the end of May, you know, all those things grew in my because it took so much in the beginning just to acquire facility with the subject matter, so that you could speak about ethics and values and a hierarchy of such and so forth and so on, all the different language and vocabulary that we use and in our specialties, you know, right? And as a young teacher, you're you really are focused more on and that's the way I think we were taught initially, but I read an article when I was probably 20, when I was still a student in college. I read an article in which the the presenter said, well, there are those teachers who give answers. There are those teachers who give the questions with the answers. There are those teachers who simply give questions and you have to come up with the answers. Then there are those teachers who create an environment in which the questions and the answers come from the students. Boy was I taken by that? I mean, look, I just presented it. I hadn't thought about it in a while, but I just presented the the four types of teachers there. And I wanted to be that fourth type that created an environment in which the questions and the answers the whole ball game was basic, you know, like Socrates tried anyway to do by engaging and and not. Of course, he there's a lot of irony in that whole thing. As we know he was leading his students very much down a particular path, more than I for sure, but, yeah, I think there was an arc to my growth, from being less facile with the poorer students and the time of day, and to becoming more inclusive of all the variables, with the students as the center and and the individuals and the day and all of that factoring in to Sure, okay, what is possible in this hour, given this group, and you know, you have three or four different groups. I mean, just think about that. No two groups are alike. The chemistry in each class is different, and you've gotta be ready to deal with what you've got. If I can only get through this. I mean, there'd be those times when, oh, it was pulling teeth, and there was no way, you know, they would yawn. Y'all would yawn in the face of Christ. That ain't my face. That ain't my face, you know? So anyway, I acquired a lot over the close to 50 years of teaching, you know.
Josh Lavine 56:41
Okay, I have a new topic for Okay, please. Let's see. I'm consulting my notes here.
Bob Fecas 56:49
Yeah, good. It's about time. I think you were so talented that you really have no I don't, I don't. I would love for you to be that talented, but, and there are people who are just phenomenal, I already think you're rather phenomenal at being able to to do all of this. I liked the way you dealt with the other two. And there's a typical two thing that I wrote down in my notes when you mentioned John's partner, you know, had met, I had met Alexandra, right? That's right. Yeah, I hadn't met her at my son's wedding, but I met so many people of his that I had forgot. But I wanted I texted you that I did remember her, Yes, but I didn't want John to get word here. It's a two. I didn't want to think less of me for forgetting that I had met his, his beloved that,
Josh Lavine 57:41
oh, that is such a good moment. That's such a good moment because there's, that's, we use the word super ego sometimes when we talk about type two, yeah, super ego of Oh yeah, just needing to be this, yeah. Basically I could, I
Bob Fecas 57:56
didn't have to text you. I could have let that lie, you know, yeah. But you know, what was even the likelihood that John would even hear that I did not remember meeting his beloved, you know? But, but you know, there was that little compulsion in the two to check the boxes and make sure you're protected, or that you you know. But you know, I saw that in me when I was texting you and and thought, well, there you go, right there.
Josh Lavine 58:28
That's excellent. I'm so glad you brought that up. That's great.
Bob Fecas 58:31
I can remember one thing came up and my mother once, and I think she was partially thinking of my grandmother, my father's mother, but she, my mother once called me a hypocrite, okay? And I do think that that twos run the risk of being less sincere, more grandiose and more promising. You know, the super ego is rather is rather large and looming and, and so, you know, I do think sometimes we don't, we don't measure up to the level of enthusiasm and promise that we we make or present and, and so I think that that is somewhat, you know, what my mother, a strong one, would say, Well, you know, you're being hypocritical, Bobby, you know, you, you
Josh Lavine 59:27
Yeah, this is a really interesting, and I think important point about the two, because the two, it's in the heart center. There's this, there's a distance between their image and their identity. And so the image of two we talk about as being, you know, I need to be this selfless, giving, loving person. And so, as you've been saying, you can sort of over emphasize that, or kind of be insincere in your expression of love or affection or appreciation, or whatever. Yeah. To keep yourself in alignment and congruent that image, that's right. Image, that's right, yeah.
Bob Fecas 1:00:09
And as I was saying about yeah, as I was saying about the saints and the lives of great people and so forth, that you emulate, you know, if you if you've acquired a super ego from the super heroes in our species, at that level of of goodness and holiness and all of that, then there's no way you're going to there's no way you're going to succeed. And yet, because of your nature, you profess these things, you know, that's
Josh Lavine 1:00:33
right. That's right. What's been your relationship over time, in terms of your your humanness relative to the angels or saints or that you emulate.
Bob Fecas 1:00:53
You know, I don't want to claim something that isn't me, but I do think that I take my place in with humanity. That's one of the things I love about going to church, is that I love when everybody is going up to the Eucharist, and you see, you see all kinds of people, and I'm a looker, I'm a gazer, I'm a gazer, and I'm looking around at everybody in the church, and everybody going to communion and coming back from communion, even after I've received communion, I'm not just absorbed in my faith about the Eucharist itself, but I'm enjoying humanity, and I really do feel that I'm part of this scene, and that I'm nourished by being In an imperfect part of this scene, so that I don't, I think I profess a standard that I don't hold myself to in my imagination. I mean, I think I consciously, I'm very aware of when I fall short of the ideals that I profess. And I remember Theresa vavilin her autobiography. She says, you know, I was once tempted to stop being the mistress of novices because I'm professing to these, these young women in areas where I'm still sinning. She says, I'm still falling short myself. Who am I to be? And she said, I saw that as a temptation from, as she would word, a temptation from the devil to quit this good work that I'm doing. I don't have to measure up to this ideal that I'm that I'm teaching or preaching or whatever. I should continue to preach it and not claim it as you know, I like St Paul and many of them, did you know, I keep pushing on trying to achieve this goal, but I am far from it, you know, so I think I've given myself a pass and a break even, as I have seen myself make mistakes and fail in relationships and in in my my self image projected onto my teaching with my students, or my relationships with my colleagues, or whatever. I mean, I think I go to four pretty, pretty easily when it comes I can remember the, you know, I would go to movies by myself when I was a kid, mentioned, right? And I would do all kinds of things. And I would take what, take the phone, off the hook, when, when, you know, and even now, I mean, I just cannot answer everybody who calls me. And I don't think I'm called to answer everybody who calls me on the phone. I will get back to some people, and I'm talking about people whom I recognize on my phone as friends who are calling for whatever reason, I take care of myself, I think, pretty well when it comes to my own needs and acknowledging my needs. My wife would think sometimes that, you know, I that I don't own certain emotions, you know, like, like, she would say, you know, you, Bob, you, you, you act as though your feelings don't get hurt. She would say, you know, this is yeah. And I would say, Well, I mean, that's how it looks to you, honey. But, I mean, I'm disappointed right now, but I'm not taking personally the fact that Simon or Mary or somebody else let me down or whatever. I mean, I may be, like I said, I tend to be more sad about certain things, rather than angry or, well, I'll show you, or, you know, vengeful, or anything of that sort,
Josh Lavine 1:04:46
right, right, right.
You know, I have to say it's so, it's you're so fun. You're so you have so much you have. So much energy and positivity. I
Bob Fecas 1:05:03
do think I have a lot of that. I think I do have a lot of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do. Go ahead, though. It's get the other side. Come on. We're coming up with something here, Josh, come on. Let's get me. Let's get the you got the right in there. Now let's get the left.
Josh Lavine 1:05:26
It's so funny. I mean, I, I've done a lot of these interviews, but the way you're you're the way you are paying attention to me, like these little moments that you notice. It's funny. That's very funny. It's disarming. One thing I find fascinating is this, like, for example, with friends of mine that are I would, I would call it, let's see what words I would use. As unrelentingly positive as you are, I also find that I have a certain skepticism about, like their real interstate, absolutely real interstate, absolutely and and there's a way that I can tell with people that I'm that I've known for a long time when they are spinning on a positive narrative that's not congruent with their real interstate, versus when they're expressing real positivity from that is actually connected, and are do you track that? I do?
Bob Fecas 1:06:24
I do. I think I try to back off from the overstatement, the grandiosity I am conscious of that. When I was younger, I was not conscious of that, okay, and I would be one of my friends. So when I entered the Jesuit says it was still, to this day, we're still friends. And he'll say, oh, Ficus, you know, I remember the first time I saw you, and you just lit up and came forward and said, Hi, I'm Bob Ficus. I'm from Charleston, South because we were just all getting to know one another. Imagine having four years of not going home. Our parents could come once a year to see us, four years, I know, with it was like a monastic order, which the Jesuits are not. I mean, we did go out, we went out and served and did all kinds of work in the community, but we were really so, and he's but he said, you know, Ficus, you were just, you were just too much. And I blush, I blush when I think of that because I know how I was. I was chosen by the first grade teacher to come to the parent night that I can't remember if I told you that, and I sat on a chair. I still remember it vividly. Sat on a chair, and the parents were listening and laughing and just really having a good time with Me, Alone in that little auditorium. So the grandiosity and the overstatement and the inflated ego thing is a real thing, which I see as a as a tempting thing. It's like pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, trying that leaning in thing, you know. But, but I do also think that it's genuine. My positive nature really is genuine. I have digested, to some degree, the tradition that I believe in, both at the level of theology and philosophy, and, you know, society the way I see that things should go for the poor, etc, and so I think I've kept a fair number of good friends over the years, partially because I am more sincere than less. I am more genuine than less and that has a history in my parents, my father, for sure, but also in the the vision that I got early on through religion and then philosophy and all the studies that I've done in sociology and all the literature, etc, etc. You know, the
Josh Lavine 1:09:06
positivity thing is, it's really fascinating to me because it's, it's not, it's not my reflex, my my tendency is to need to mine the darkness for as much is whatever is there. What's so interesting to me about we would call it the two seven stem that you have in your type structure. It's like there's a there's an insistence, or a loyalty to the redemptive side of life there
Bob Fecas 1:09:40
is, you're absolutely right. You're right. Or
Josh Lavine 1:09:42
it's like, it's like that over in a in a state of, like, if something triggers you, or you can see yourself going to that emptiness of the darkness, or whatever, there's a that loyalty is stronger than the pull into the darkness. Yeah. So, yeah,
Bob Fecas 1:10:00
I would say, I would say, you could put it that way. And you could also say, should it be true? By the way, should it be true that this faith has any connection with reality? It might be that it's not just the subjective side, but maybe I am pulled toward not just by habit, subjective habit, but maybe grace, yeah. I mean, I'll use that word, you know, maybe Grace touches my heart at moments like that, to encourage me to go forward and not to be overwhelmed by my failings and or other people's failings or but yes, no, you're, you're right. There is that redemptive thing? So
Josh Lavine 1:10:43
how do you so how do you know when you are spiritually bypassing something versus really honoring it and digesting it and kind of learning from it? Yeah, I
Bob Fecas 1:10:56
think that's a very good question. And I think you know, when I was reading back in college, when I first read Ludwig Feuerbach, the the great atheist who influenced Freud and and Nietzsche and Marx and others, you know, who was I thrown for a loop there? And I mean, I'm studying to be a priest, I couldn't even say the Creed at that time because I was, I was wrapped up in the whole issue of projection. How much of quote the Divine is just a projection, a wish, a wish fulfillment in, you know, the super ego thing and all of that. Yeah, so, I mean, I went through a difficult patch there, and I continued to read and study and found arguments to the contrary of of Feuerbach, and then went on and to read more and more and more, and I just have to date. Could things change? Could I lose my faith? Yes, I do believe I could, you know, like I used to say when I was teaching my kids, when we would do segments in sexual ethics, marriage, all of that, could I get? Could Catherine and I get divorced after telling all kinds of wonderful stories about my life with my wife and with my our children. Could my wife and I get divorced? Yes, we absolutely could. I don't, I mean, we continue to work on it. I don't think that's going to happen, but I'm no exception to what can happen to anybody. So I could lose my faith. I could, you know, lose my relationship with my wife? So what about repression? You're asking me, you know, you know, are you conscious of repression? You know, I think I would give myself, you know, probably a b minus a b in that area. I'm sure that I bypass certain things because I maybe am too tired, or, I mean all the excuses we can give and make for why we don't go to the shadow and just, you know, dwell in the shadow land, and just let it reveal what it's going to reveal. But I think I have, and I even recently have looked at more of the shadow, my shadow, all of that, and I'm sort of comfortable with to some extent, not that it doesn't leave me a little unsettled when I read through all the negative things about the two, all the negative, negative, you know, by comparison with the positivity that you're talking about, read about the negative things about the two, and I recognize them in me. I mean, I can be a little um, unsettled by that, because it's true, because it's true, but and I don't, I don't go back and reclaim the positive at the expense of the truth and the negative. I just know that that it's there, and I need to own it when it's impinging, especially when it's impinging on my psyche. And if I'm in one of those down states. I I don't always put on music, I don't always go for a walk, you know? I don't always try to assuage the pain of the the non positive. I do think that, but I don't think this is my my strong belief. I don't think that the negative and the positive are equally. I think that being is in our favor, and I think we're being called to greater manifestation of being. And in other words, hope I have. I have hope that that our species can continue. You to make some progress, even in the face of what we're going through right now, I still continue to hope I'm not blind. I look at and listen to the news and and and try to be in touch with what's really going on within me, whether I'm listening to news or whether I'm just my wife and I are apart right now, and because she's taking care of our grandchild, as I told you in New Orleans. So this is a but I like to be alone, but I miss her, and I miss our times together and so forth. I try to be present to the and not repress the the loneliness that I feel sometimes, and the Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to, I'm not just trying to present myself as balanced. I think I have worked on balance. And yeah, I think I continue to to work on balance. And I would give myself a, b plus, A minus for balance,
Josh Lavine 1:16:05
sure. Yeah, this is a, I guess this is a blunt question. What's like the most unhealthy you've been in your life? Psychologically speaking, yeah, yeah.
Bob Fecas 1:16:30
I would say probably, um, when I was, um, reading for you Bucha, and was in somewhat of a faith crisis, right? And I was also having, you know, there we are stuck all guys together, and, and, and that's around the same time that my good buddy there was beginning to back away. And that was also related that was also the time when I was extremely low weight, and I fainted giving the homily that we all had, I think I told you that the last time, you know, I do think I was going through a real difficult time of and one of my best closest friends gave me A book that was about, you know, repression and and psychological health and how we balance things and so forth. And I was reading that and being benefited by that, but that was a dark time for me, and I wrote about it all. I mean, I've kept a journal since, you know, since I was 18, and so the journal has been a constant companion and help to me too. So I would say that was the most difficult time at feeling good about myself, at feeling healthy, feeling even tension in the head area, you know, trying to sort these things all out, both at the level of philosophy and theology and friendships and diet, diet, meaning I needed to get more food right, and hold on more weight and all of that. So that was, that was a really difficult spot. I would say that I was in that was not a healthy time in certain ways for me,
Josh Lavine 1:18:23
sure. Yeah, did you find that your two patterns kind of activated in a more intense way during that time than other times?
Bob Fecas 1:18:36
As I look back not having had that knowledge that we have now, I would say, probably the the unhealthy. I mean, I felt victimized in certain ways by, by the universe, by, you know, by, you know, the negative forces that were undermining this quote, path that I was on that I thought I was called to, you know, the mission that I felt called to, and so forth, yeah, so I would say that that probably the unhealthy aspects of the two were more activated at that time, not striking out at anybody. I mean, but, but, you know, for example, I remember I didn't go to classes after I had fainted. The next day, I was just in bed recuperating. Was it? Was it a nervous breakdown? Was it related more to the fact that I hadn't eaten? We had this big history exam that day that I had stayed up so late studying for and, all you know, not being able to sort out where I was with my own path, where I was and. And, you know, certain people had already, certain friends had already left, the Jesuits, the Society of Jesus and and, and we were there with fewer people than we were when we entered. And you. And you know, not, you know, did I take more personally the suffering that I was going through like a two might do at that phase. It's hard to remember everything, but I mean, that was also a period at which I was rediscovering how I was going to study, which was really important studying. And I remember reconciling myself to getting C's and D's while I was digesting this methodology that I was creating for myself. And finally, I was getting A's and B's by the time I finished my college work and got into graduate school and so forth, because I didn't dissipate so much of my energy, but, but that, that, that piece of it, that feeling like, gosh, my grades are low. Other people are succeeding. Nobody else fainted giving their presentation. You know, yeah, you
Josh Lavine 1:20:56
know, brings up an interesting question about crisis of faith and meaning versus what you would, what you might call going down the levels of health in the Don Riso framework, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Cuz I so yeah, I'm contrasting my experience, yes, yes, internally with yours. And I'm thinking about, like, for example, when I was in college, I was both depressed and, I think unhealthy in terms of the like, down reset levels, and, you know, doing the things that threes do when they're not healthy, like presenting a certain image of I'm doing great. I'm going out every night. I'm doing, you know, I'm I'm being friends with people. I'm showing up with a smile on a handshake,
Bob Fecas 1:21:42
Oh God, I have a dear friend. I have some threes that I love so much, who I know I know what you're saying, and there. Meanwhile,
Josh Lavine 1:21:50
yeah, meanwhile, I was literally like crying every day in my room and and also cutting corners in school and do and desperate for my the approval of my professors, and just all the things that that, you know, yeah, that you read about in the unhealthy side of three, it was very bad. And, yeah, it's interesting. I mean, it's, it's, it's not this. It certainly was a crisis of meaning. But it was like, I'm not hearing from this moment, this time that you had in your life that was very hard. The same kind of like, Oh, when I was down there, I was being super intrusive towards people and hostile and kind of taking on, like, in the way that unhealthy twos can get in the DOM Risa levels framework,
Bob Fecas 1:22:41
that's right, that's right. I do. I don't think that. I mean, I was suffering. No question that I was suffering, but I wasn't seeing other people as the cause of it. Yeah, I as a matter of fact, I thought, you know, that I even had some assistance. I mean, my good buddy who was turning his back on me. I didn't give up my love for him or or and I had other friends, and you know, I just felt that because of my vision, I'm sure of of reality, even though that was being significantly questioned by the reading I was doing and the studying I was doing, and I still had this sense that I could weather this, that things were going to happen. I've always had this, this sense of context being really important for your suffering and your joys. And so, you know if, if I knew that in a matter of a month, we were going to be going to the camp on South West Louisiana where we would, we would go and, you know, read and fish and boat and all of that stuff. I mean, I would always try to see things, um, place my present suffering in the context of, relief. I mean, I got relief by thinking of the things that would be relieving me soon enough. You know what I mean. And so this friend has has turned his back on me, and this causes me tears and pain. But I have this other friend who's consoling me and who understands and I can, and I have my journal here that I can talk to, and then I'm going to the Eucharist later on. So, I mean, I'm giving, I'm trying to flesh out the the environment in which I am experiencing this suffering or this pain I didn't, you know, turn to alcohol or or sex, or any of the standard kinds of reliefs that that we as human beings can can clutch for assuaging our pain. I'm kind
Josh Lavine 1:24:52
of wondering what else that we haven't explored in two space? Yeah,
Bob Fecas 1:24:56
I think, I think I. Yeah, I think one area which, you know, you have brought up, and so much of the literature does that because of this inflated image that the two has of himself and so forth, that there, there can be this emptiness when they really settle into where they really are and they recognize their their motives more honestly, and in those moments of truth, does the does the two experience a kind of emptiness, because the super ego has just been burst, or something like that? You know? Sure. So that emptiness, I recognize, that experience of grandiosity when it's blown off the map here, when it's when it's not figuring what is one left with, when one doesn't have that inflated sense of self. And I still go back to and I do, I do feel sometimes, you know, some people would say it's maybe a kind of, not exactly, depression, but that it is a kind of low, or it's certainly by contrast with the image that that the two gives, it certainly seems like, whoa, like something like clinical depression or something whereas, whereas, what I find I do is I go for a walk or put on music, or, you know, I nourish myself in ways that Will will help me ride out the sense of of empty isn't exactly the word. It's it's more like a low it's a low affect and and I have a whole, you know, chest of tools that I draw on. Yeah, take a nap, meditate, listen to music, go get some exercise. You know, all those things that that good therapists would would encourage you to do. I certainly espouse all of those things. But I do think that there is that kind of low or empty experience. I would also chalk it up in my spiritual lingo to, you know, the dark night of the soul that John of the Cross and others write about. There are moments when I think I, who have been so blessed and fortunate, are being purged of any attachment to the the higher. You know, ecstatic. You know, we twos and sevens get the ecstasy junkies in their various realms of of working and, and. And I think the ecstatic is lovely, but it's not really what we're called to. We're called to what the moment is putting on our plate, and we're called to deal with whatever the moment is putting on our plate. And and when I've had those lower moments, or what I you know, in the Scripture, the the Hebrew Scriptures, they talk about the bread of sorrows and the bread of consolations. And then Jesus, a good Jew, says, you know, in the Lord's Prayer, he says, Give us this day our daily bread. And I think we're given bitter and sweet bread alternately at different times. Some people get far more sweet, consoling bread. Some people get bitter, more sorrowful bread. I feel like I want to eat what is, and that's not just the ideal. I really work it at trying to eat what is in the present moment, and if it's if it's to be a low effect and less stimulation or less pleasing content, you know, I want to be there. I want to be there in reality, that's where I really want to be, and I foster that with meditation, right, right?
Josh Lavine 1:29:16
Well, thanks for, first of all, doing this with me and also being willing to kind of explore this darker territory.
Bob Fecas 1:29:22
And Josh, if I come up with an, if I come up with something that is really more telling at that darker level, I may be more superficial. Should the dark side be as weighty as the bright side? I may be more superficial than than you need for present, presenting the two, you know. But in any event, if I come up with something that I think is a significant event that would reveal how I as a, as a two, dealt with the dark side, the shadow, I will. I can get in touch with you, right?
Josh Lavine 1:29:55
That'd be, yeah, that'd be great. Please do so thank you again. What's this been? Like for you.
Bob Fecas 1:30:00
I mean, it's been I was, isn't it interesting? I mean, I was tired to begin with, and I I was in typical two fashion, thinking, you know, I hope I will be worth his time. But again, the distinction, am I trying to please Josh or am I trying to really assist Josh in his work? I mean, I, I think I even thought last last night while I was working on my novella, you know? Well, I mean, Josh's work is as important as my work on fakes, you know. So let's try to get some sleep. I put it down and got some rest so that I could so I was feeling a little anxious about whether or not I could measure up, but then the stimulating questions and the subject matter made it possible, possible to rise to the occasion. To some extent, at least you be the judge.
Josh Lavine 1:30:54
Thank you so much. I really appreciate it, and it's lovely to chat with you.
Bob Fecas 1:30:58
You're welcome. You're welcome, and best of luck. I'm going to go back and look at your article with more with more intention, because I'm interested in that missing, the the missing and the gays and so forth.
Josh Lavine 1:31:09
That'll be a good follow up. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that'll be a good follow up. Okay,
Bob Fecas 1:31:13
all right, brother, okay. Bye. Bye. Thank
Josh Lavine 1:31:16
you so much for tuning in to my interview with Bob fikas. If you like Bob and you'd like to check out his writings, or you want to learn more about his work as a spiritual director and advisor, you can check out his website at Bob thecus.com I'll put a link in the show notes. If you are watching this on YouTube and you like the show and you like this interview, then I then please click the Like button, or I invite you to also subscribe to our channel. It's a zero cost and very effective way to support me and my work and the Enneagram school. Likewise, if you're listening to this as a podcast, then you can leave up to a five star review and also leave some words about what you like about the show. Really appreciate that, and it helps a lot. If you'd like to stay up to date with what's going on at the Enneagram school, then I invite you to come check out our website at the Enneagram school.com, and while you're there, you can also subscribe to our email list, which is where we send updates about all the goings on that are coming up. For example, I'm doing a live coaching series right now where on most Wednesdays, I am coaching someone, a volunteer, on a topic of their choice. And usually we know they're any grid type in advance, and so it's a really interesting and great way to see someone's process in action and watch how and if you are a coach, then you can come and geek out with me about coaching techniques. You can also watch how a person given their Enneagram type surfaces issues and processes them in real time. One other big announcement is that John lakovich and I are almost done, and I've been saying this for a long time. We're almost done with our first ever introduction to the Enneagram program that we'll be selling on the school's website. And so you can if you want updates about when that's coming out, then you can subscribe to our email list. And if you're also curious about our original content and previous teachings, then we have a course already out. It's about our developmental view of the centers of intelligence and object relations. So it's a fresh take on the fundamental premise of the Enneagram the centers, which are the body, heart and mind and the object relations that appear at each of those centers. If you think that you would be a great candidate for me to interview on the show, or you know, someone who would be a great candidate for me to interview, then I would love for you to reach out to me. You can just do it right through the Enneagram Schools website. Just go to the contact form, send me an email, and I'll get right back to you. Preference goes to people who have been officially typed by the [email protected] I think that they have the world's most accurate Enneagram typing service. And while you're there, you can also check out their subscription service, where they put out a weekly video where they type a celebrity in real time. You can watch their very sharp and good insights. All right, that's it for me. I hope you enjoy the interview, and I will see you next time
Unknown Speaker 1:33:46
you.
