Friday, October 7, 2011

The Death of Steve Jobs



Steve Jobs has died and we lost a giant who changed the world literally. But I ask myself why did he develop cancer at such a young age? And I want to add my thoughts to this question, with the understanding that it is at best guesswork. It is a guess based on years of experience with patients, over sixty years, now, added to a great deal of current research.

Steve was an unwanted child. What does that say? That the mother was having trouble could not take care of him and had no prospect of being a mother to him throughout his life. He was given up for adoption. But in those nine critical months while in the womb there is a tale. And we know now that if a mother is depressed the offspring is also likely to have depressive tendencies. When the mother is anxious the stress hormone levels of the fetus/baby goes up and he too is under stress; not just a stress for the moment but a stress level that is higher than normal and creates havoc in the system. It is imprinted and remains a constant active memory. It requires that the system deal with it all of the time, and that means, inter alia, repression; a closing of the gates so that the pain remains sequestered. The repression is a serious, active force grinding down the system bit by bit, often unknown and unfelt until irreversible damage is done. Research today is full of information about very very early trauma and later cancer and heart disease.

It is my opinion that most of us untraumatized individuals remain fairly healthy throughout life. It takes a massive intrusion while we are just starting out in life before birth that warps the system and begins its toll. It is a stealthy enemy; a quiet, insidious menace that gnaws away month after month, year after year until the organ fails and disease begins its life. I am thinking that it happened to Steve Jobs because a healthy active nondrug taking human should ordinarily not fall so seriously ill so early in life. Of course, this is a guess and if I am proven wrong so be it; but I offer a proposal, a hypothesis, if you will, about what may have played into his disease. It is not an unreasonable assumption. And you know that even when there is no love and no loving figure to watch out for you in the first weeks and months of life the damage, heavy imprinted damage is there. Early it doesn’t take much to do it. And very early in life it can be only a matter of days or weeks with no parental figure that catastrophic illness gets its start. Needs are so intense in the womb and at birth, as well as the first weeks of life on earth. They must be fulfilled.

Otherwise the good seem to die young. So goodbye, Steve, you changed my world and you never knew me. But I am indebted to you for my life today. It is so tragic that you had so much to give and yet you may have been given so little to start your life. Life really is not fair because if there were someone up there judging good deeds and giving out rewards how could he or she have missed you.

11 comments:

  1. Dear Art,

    Here is one short story which confirms what you tell all us about very early trauma:

    Here in Serbia where I am, was in news, previous year, that one girl have cancer. She is about 9-10 years old. After birth she was in incubator because she was low in weight, and she was born earlier than 9th month in womb. During her life in incubator at some point electricity was missed for several hours in hospital, and babies didn't have oxygen. She was the only survivor of all babies in hospital. And last year when she was 9 or 10 years old, she got cancer.
    So this is very early cancer at person with very early traumas.

    Nenad

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  2. you are so right, we did lose a giant; it's amazing how just one person, acting in concert with others, can make such a difference; of course i'm sorry Steve passed away so young, and i can only hope that he did not suffer unduly; at the same time, though, i do not hold out longevity as a goal, for myself at least; it's quality that counts, not quantity; and we all know Steve strove not just for quality, but for excellence; adios, amigo, and thank you, for everything; you truly left the world a better place.

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  3. Steve Jobs

    We are many, with all our Apples-products, who are missing the image of Steve Jobs because we loved his ingenious, super-designed, well coordinated and sleek products which in so many ways are simplifying our lives and communication. However, very few did really know him.

    Much of his doubtless genious, wasn’t it a product of a neurotic, enlightened despot propelled by all the early imprinted pain which you with a fairly riksfree guess is assuming that he was exposed to.

    We needed him both as a visionary, designer, coordinator of the Apple concept and the marketing-related seduction genius, and of course, we also needed him as a myth and hero.

    My guess is that his early death partly was the price he had to pay to create one of the greatest business successes in modern history. Evolution gave us a tremendous compensation for his probably painful start and journey in life.

    Jan Johnsson

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  4. Can't life be such a nasty tease. Especially when it is taken away from people so early and when they never really got to live it.

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  5. Thanks for posting this.

    I didn't know jobs was adopted and I have actually had the thought for a couple of days now that perhaps there was some early childhood tragedy that resulted in aided in Jobs contracting cancer. It's very sad.

    I myself was born 2 months prematurely to a possibly depressed mother and have often wondered how that has affected me in utero and later in life.

    Anyway, I love all your work and am really looking forward to your new book. All the best from Helsinki, Finland.

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  6. I received an email cartoon showing St Peter at the pearly gates introducing Steve Jobs to Moses (with the tablets of ten commandments under his arms): "Moses meet Steve, he's gonna upgrade your tablets." Underneath was a two liner that's been going around the net since Steve died: "10 Years Ago We Had Steve Jobs, Bob Hope, and Johnny Cash... ... ...now we have No Jobs, No Cash, and No Hope."

    I forward clever jokes to friends from time to time. Although I know it's a defense I also know we need our defenses. Another example of that (thanks again Steve) is the iPod I bought only several months ago. I live far from the center of Sydney and was finding the long trip on public transport to buy high quality foods once or twice a week a grind. The noise would get to me and the too frequent incidents of unreportable child-abuse (you know the kind of thing that many people regard as normal). When I did the trip with my iPod loaded up with my favorite music including plenty of Don McLean songs it became something to look forward to and then simply a pleasant chore. You can view this as a defense but we need plenty of defenses day-to-day in this world as explained by John Lennon in "What ever gets you through the night". The key in this Lennon song is the verse "Whatever gets you to the light...". Post iPod, I have been having many more connected feelings both during the shopping trip and at home.

    The best defenses are ones, like clothes, that you can simply put on or take off as needed.

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  7. Random thoughts about Steve Jobs?

    He had a vision and pursued it,
    he never settled for mediocre.

    He was a controller - so they said,
    but without,
    Apple would not be what it is.

    He was driven, in a hurry to get things done
    because I knew he had not much time.

    He said life is short,
    don’t live the dream of others.

    He said he had good parents,
    but he never said he love them.

    He stayed in his left hemisphere
    and became a man who could only look to the future.

    He needed to create something that is perfect,
    because he know something was missing inside of him because his mother abandoned him.

    Now he is in the “Hall of Valhalla” among other genius
    who, if you look back,
    have all had some kind of early trauma.

    Good by Steve, your deep anchored pain is over, but we will continue to enjoy what you have left us.

    Sieglinde

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  8. An email comment:
    "Very touching and very insightful and something that needs to be said
    about the obvious gap that goes unnoticed in this famous person's life
    and development. Thank you."

    ReplyDelete
  9. to all

    sorry I made a mistake.

    the sentence: "because I knew he had not much time."

    should read: because he knew he had not much time.

    was this a freudian slip?
    Sieglinde

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  10. I wonder how "at peace with himself" Steve was.

    He mentioned he'd hired a biographer because he wanted his kids to know him better...that he'd worked alot when they were young. Would they give up the billions their father left them to go back in time and play "catch" with him more?

    Also, a NYT op-ed mentioned the dark-side of Planet Jobs, including Chinese wage-slaves creating Apple products:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/06/opinion/jobs-looked-to-the-future.html

    I hope he was happy. And I hope it helps some people express their love in the present instead of waiting until someone dies.

    Too often the price of high success is low satisfaction in terms of personal happiness (see the movie, VIEW FROM THE TERRACE).

    Was he doomed from the git-go? His mother didn't want him in utero. Did his adopted parents (did he ever speak about them publicly?) love him "enough"? If not, that's a set-up for at least a driven character. Do such folks ever truly rest?

    He talked about never settling. But that can be dangerous if your standards are too high. No amount of money, cars, artwork, etc. can fill the hole in your soul.

    I prefer "good enough" living, sorta like the "redneck" ethos of "just get 'er done!" The links below are, at least to me, funny...and all-too-human approaches to problem-solving. I think if we were loved enough for being the "very ones we are" we'd all be okay. It's the NOT getting of love-validation-etc. that warps us. Even poor kids, if richly loved, seem to do just fine.

    http://strangebeaver.com/2011/03/redneck-solutions/

    http://strangebeaver.com/2011/07/redneck-solutions-part-2/

    http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=redneck+solutions+pictures&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

    ReplyDelete
  11. An email comment:
    "Dear Art,

    I read your blog "religiously". But then, I've been following you since your first appearance on the Dick Cavett Show in the 60's. As a rule, I don't read anything from you that makes my jaw drop, being as thoroughly versed in the "Primal Reality" as I am. But I did find your tribute to Steve Jobs to be curious and almost "unprimal" like. Jobs changed your life?? What I read sounded like what some people (I would hope millions) would say after your own demise...which I hope is still many years in the future; although I realize you must be a ways into your 80's by now (I'm 67).

    What I'm curious about is if you've more recently in Primal Therapy's evolution recognized the "imprint" in regards to how often it can occur before birth...and it's devastating effects, have earlier primal patients not been able to access these earliest "traumas", thus not have ultimately become as pain free as patients would now be benefitting from?

    As for PT getting acknowledged out in the bigger world, do you expect the research being done by others will ultimately stubble upon the primal reality? You've been persona non gratis in the scientific community, but there's a new generation coming up that you could help "train". Then again, I'm not part of this medical world, so I don't know what impact you're having. I hope millions of people are reading your blog; which I suggested you start. I'm glad you took "my advice".

    As for the impact you've had on me over these many years. I'm that handwriting analysis individual. The primal hypotheses helped me to essentially establish a whole bio-physiopsychological handwriting analysis system...one of the most significant Frameworks/Contexts being in recognizing that the blankness of the paper represents Feelings, the graphic mark the Intellect...and it's the "blankness" (all around the "letters") that dictate the individualized structure of the letter (intellect interpreting Feelings). Furthermore, the 3 Levels (bio-physio-psycho) are demonstrated as the 3 Zones of handwriting...lower "p, g" etc. middle --letters without upper or lower portions, the upper "l" "t", etc. And that's just the beginning.

    Now if primal therapy could just start emptying the prisons to start with.

    Sincerely,

    B."

    ReplyDelete

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Bailey Endowed Chair of Animal Well Being Science
Washington State University

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Editor