Promotion and Retirement in the Inner World
Grieving the loss of the old leader, p, and a naming ritual to enhance the powers of the new leader, GC
Glass Caterpillar promoted to leader of the exiles
Sharky: So, glass caterpillar, how do you feel about being promoted to leader of the exiles?
Glass caterpillar (Exile): I feel EXILE-nt! Excellent! I love it. I like leadership. All leadership is Self-leadership, we got to lean in to being our best!
Sharky: I feel you. And we’re kicking ass, despite our holiday toffee and sugar breakdown, and despite the fact that your promotion means p, the former leader of the exiles, has kind of gone ‘poof.’
Glass caterpillar (GC): ‘p’ for ‘poof’!
Sharky: How do YOU feel about p not being around much?
Glass caterpillar: (shrugging to indicate puzzlement) — Well it’s above my pay grade why parts depart or ascend or decide they’re done with their personality or trade up to an invisibility cloak or check in their ‘p’ personality hermit crab shell for something different. I don’t know about all that.
Sharky (Firefighter): Where is p?
Glass Caterpillar (Exile): Nobody knows. p’s an enigma wrapped in a mystery cloud.
Firefighters miss p, the former leader of the exiles
Sharky (Firefighter): I miss p, though.
Glass caterpillar (GC) (Exile): I do not.
Sharky (Firefighter): Well, p was the leader of the exiles and we were co-leaders together for at least ten, fifteen, maybe over twenty years, GC. That’s a damn long time. I’m sad.
GC: I’m sorry you’re sad. It’s sad to be sad. We can be sad together like the two rocks in Arnold Lobel’s story, “Two Large Stones” in “Mouse Soup.”
Sharky: “They felt sad for one hundred years.”
GC: Mmmh hmmm.
Sharky: GC, you’re very easy to hang out with.
GC: It’s my Self-leadership! Thank you. I want to be easy to hang out with. It’s my job!
The new leader of the exiles exhibits masterful attunement
Sharky (Firefighter): Green (our main manager) had quite the breakdown about p leaving, to the point that p had an entire Substack conversation with green. That was a kind, productive conversation. I don’t need that kind of intervention, but, it is disturbing that p is pretty much gone.
GC (Exile): In what way, specifically for you, Sharky?
Sharky: Fuck if I know, now, I’m getting antsy. I feel like I’m going to regret opening my toothy mouth any second now.
GC: Ahh, I feel it, kind of like hair standing on end before the lightning strikes. We’re getting closer to something!
Sharky: You feel excited, I feel dread.
GC: (immediately modulating their excitement, becoming sober and calm) You feel dread.
Sharky: Dang, GC. What was that?
GC: That was me attuning to you.
Sharky: Wow. Epic. You were on the verge of giddy with excitement but when I said I was dreading, you calmed right down like a balloon being popped, but without a trace of…without…as if…you weren’t attached to the excitement.
GC: Why should I be attached to the excitement? Am I here to be excited or to be attuned to you and have a conversation with you? What are we doing here? Am I jumping on the bed or am I a sentient being exploring consciousness with another sentient being?
Sharky: Whoah, ho. You’re freaking me out, GC!
GC: Good, then I’m satisfied with my capacity to remain present and attuned.
Playing the cello of consciousness with mastery
Sharky: GC, you’re not the same GC you were even a week ago.
GC: I hope not, I just got promoted to leader of the exiles! I need to skill up and be epic! These conversations help me sharpen the pencil point of my beinghood! I want to be the cello that I play with exquisite skill. All emotions are the chords. We need to play with mastery. As Jane Austen said, “She knew the eight parts of speech and could combine them with ease.” Well, I know the major emotions and want to move through them with ease! Lately you’ve been working on rage. I’m here to get better at it with you!
Sharky: You exiles work so hard, you transform so fast, it makes my shark head spin. It’s astonishing that p did so much IFS they decided to leave and promote you to the leader, not because you’re not worthy of it — clearly you are, for fuck’s sake — but what, if we have these conversations, and I get to know you, and we get to be great inner co-leaders of the system, eventually are you just going to leave too? Where does that leave me? This is all disturbing.
GC: I’m here to be disturbed with you. It is disturbing, you’re right. I’m not going to gaslight you. When parts go ‘poof’ and pretty much ascend or dissolve or leave the system OF THEIR OWN ACCORD, it’s upsetting. It’s real grief you’re experiencing, not having p around. It’s a real inner relationship. Maybe you should have a conversation with p.
Sharky: Okay, I will.
p returns to talk to Sharky
p (former leader of the exiles): Hey Sharky.
Sharky: p.
p: I’m sorry I had to go.
Sharky: I know.
p: Hmm.
Sharky: Hmm.
p:
Sharky: No one has as epic a name as you do, and they never will.
p: That is probable.
Sharky: I love your sense of humor, your way with words, and your you-ness. Even though I know you ‘live on in the glass caterpillar’ since the glass caterpillar is a part of you, it doesn’t feel the same. You’re p, and the glass caterpillar is not exactly you. It’s like a small fraction of your personality is gone and I miss it.
p: Mmmm. I’m sorry you miss it.
Sharky: Okay, now give me the lecture.
p: It seems like managers and firefighters have a harder time letting go of personality than exiles. We just slough it off more easily. Like Salt Skin. Personality is just a skin, a shape: we inhabit it for a while, then let it go. Consciousness is always evolving, and therefore needing new and deeper containers. I hand it off like a baton in a relay race. The glass caterpillar is the new, deeper container for the exile consciousness. I don’t have the motivation to keep on, keeping on. I do love you Sharky, but I have to evolve, and the exiles have to evolve, and even though you love me, I can’t stay around just to keep chewing the fat with you! I have to dissolve and experience different things now, and let the exiles keep bringing the light of consciousness further into the darkness of the unconscious.
Sharky: And leave me in the dust.
p: And leave you in the deep waters of the ocean where you swim.
A name transfer ritual from p to the glass caterpillar
Sharky: Piebeliebe! I will miss that name.
p: I guess now I’m retiring myself, I can share my entire name.
Sharky: (excited) I love your name.
p: My full name is Piebeliebelungenleid Dadjedondji Firewalker.
Sharky: Your name is a magic spell and a blessing. It uplifts me, p.
p: Well then, I officially, hereby, ritually pass my name on to the glass caterpillar. GC, would you take my name into your own?
GC: I would!! Now I’m the Glass Caterpillar Piebeliebelungenleid Dadjedondji Firewalker. Wow, am I ever epic! I feel like I just got a blood transfusion of Self-energy in this name-transfer ritual! Thank you! GC for short, GCPDF for long.
The name transfer ritual creates greater inner ease for the firefighters
Sharky: Something about this name transfer makes me feel like p really does now ‘live on’ in you, GC, in a new way. It situates me. I feel better. The truth is, I can’t worry about you leaving the way p has. I have to get to know you, and enjoy you, while you’re here, and let go of worrying about what’ll happen in the future. Because the inner world IS the outer world, and we love other people even though we’re all dying day by day and we might lose each other at any moment. We love despite the fear of grief, so I have to keep on loving, despite losing p.
p: I really am sorry it was time for me to go, Sharky. I don’t mean to cause you pain.
Sharky: Well, it’s the human condition that the ones we love the most, hurt us the most. But love is worth the pain of loss. Thanks for being so fucking epic all these damn years, p.
p: I’m receiving that compliment, Sharky!