1st step, get on the horse. Next step, stay on the horse.

Now that I'm not working at my job anymore, let me talk about my job without breaching my confidentiality agreement.  I am specifically not going into the detail I could, as most or all of my readers are looking for an introduction into the subject, and the less I say the less chance there is that I will incur legal penalties for my writing.

DCF (department of children and families), formerly known as DSS (department of social services), provides custodial care for children from abusive or otherwise dangerous families.  I will hereon refer to DCF as "the agency".

The above mentioned custodial placements are, to provide an incomplete summary: foster homes, group homes, and residential treatment programs.  The agency also solicits adoption for their advocated children.

Residential treatment programs, used for the children with mental health problems and behavioral concerns can be either for those who are repeatedly unable to socialize in a foster/group home environment or who have specifically been brought up on some criminal charges.  Those convicted of crimes are sometimes sent to DYS, the "juvenile justice agency of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts" (prison), in other cases they are sent to secured residential treatment facilities.  Those awaiting trail on a crime for which they have been indicted are most often placed in these secured treatment centers as they cannot (really) yet be committed to DYS and the agency, while retaining custody of them, will not newly submit them for foster care.

Residential treatment programs or, to the kids and direct care workers, simply "programs" provide a structured, scheduled daily lifestyle with therapy services and incentives for good behavior/investment in treatment.  Long term placements also contain schools, where the teachers cater to the various levels of education the residents have achieved.  While the classrooms are small, the teachers are run ragged attempting to address all the different academic issues of the residents.

Being in a residential treatment program means, for the adolescent, twenty-four hour supervision by direct care workers.  These individuals maintain the daily schedule, correct problem behaviors with specific program instituted consequences, assist with the day to day needs of residents, provide feedback, and ensure the safety of residents through searches and sometimes, physical management.

I was fortunate to work in a setting, which I will obviously not name here, that had a long-standing and comprehensively structured discipline system.  All communication was very clear, professional, and when necessary conforming to a powerful and directive language.  Residents that have been moved through multiple programs are usually experienced with physical management, either in observation or through personal experience.  

Every attempt is made to convince residents, and literally put them in a good place, to make good, healthy decisions that will foster their progress through the program and not compromise the safety of themselves, other residents, or staff.  However, for kids who have never known a disciplined, structured environment and who have often been brought up on charges involving the harm of others they sometimes see no other option than to physically act out.  

While physical management is by no means the main job of direct care workers at a program, it is the job on the minds of all staff at all times.  In these settings, the safety of clients is the number one priority, and when a resident becomes a danger to himself or others, it becomes necessary to physically restrain him.

I would like to speak about the tactics and practices involved in management but I believe that doing so would violate my agreement.  I am fairly sure that I can say it is done in such a way as to cause as little harm as humanly possible to the client.  

Moving on.

Treatment programs often have specialties, working with clients who fall into a certain category of mental health issue or criminal offense.  For example, there are programs who will specifically deal with psychotic patients, others who will specialize in dealing with, say, sex offenders.

Working with criminal populations, generally, a main goal is to help the clients/residents develop empathy.  This is an ability that is generally developed during childhood, but, for children who have had to literally fend for themselves, in terms of getting the necessities of survival, other concerns overwhelm this socially necessary development.  Of course, the development of empathy does not prevent criminal behavior, as empathy is just a recognition of the feelings/perceptions of others.  Allowing this recognition to affect one's decisions and actions is what prevents criminality.  So, a final step would be helping the kids become less ego-centric.

With juveniles, especially juvenile delinquents, especially male juvenile delinquents, often anger is the only emotion individuals are comfortable expressing.  Obviously, this is a huge impediment to therapy, and understanding that anger is only a surface sort of symptom of other emotions is crucial to self-awareness, something that many residents almost completely lack.

In my time at work I interacted with individuals who committed some horrendous crimes.  The thing that always struck me about my work was how easy it is to relate to these people even if you are somewhat disgusted by their actions.  It is a reminder of one's humanity and of the instincts that ultimately drive all of us.  I found myself asking at times, was I really that different from this when I was 14?  Different enough to justify these people living in custody and me wandering free?  What more experienced professionals have reminded me is while the feelings and motivations are sometimes the same, the difference is that socialized people have the coping skills and the "conscience", to use a non-industry term, to not act on the occasional destructive urges all people have.

OK.  I'll be back to this.  I've just lost my train of thought is all.

Filing (here goes)

"Times getting tough, gotta sign for unemployment"

-Hieroglyphics

Brackets for pure meta-commentary.  Parenthesis for examples or diversions within the subject.

I tried to file using the teleclaim center last week, but the wait on the phone was more than a half hour and they directed me to call again. The center opens at 8:30 AM, I am attempting to be one of the first who calls.  I figure while I'm waiting on the line I'll put something here.  You know I'm unemployed for real when I'm coming back to writing in this internet journal thing.  Plus I had a request to write more and my weakness to flattery is obscene.

I intend to write about love; its targeting, its application.

When you tell someone you love them, what exactly is it you are saying you love? [I just tried calling again, still not open]

When you tell someone you love them, do you mean that you love every part of them?  Do you mean you love their mind as a whole?  Their body as a whole?  What is it that is the most essential part of an individual that draws feelings (and other things I will attempt to explore) from others?

Let me first explore the idea that when you love someone you love every part of them.  I have an immediate problem with this idea.  If you love every bit of a person, from their eyelashes to their fingers to their toes, does this love become fractured if a part of them changes or disappears?  In the most benign example, say you fall in love with someone and shortly thereafter they cut their hair.  Do you love them less?  Is your love compromised because part of the person you fell in love with is now (albeit temporarily) gone?  What if they had a facial piercing and they took it out?  To cite a more serious example, what if a loved one is in a traumatic accident and loses, say, their legs?  Is a fraction of your love, that was your love for their legs, now gone?

I will allude to a future issue by asking what if they merely lose the use of their legs?  Do you love their legs less because they no longer respond to the person's mental commands?

Anyway.  Due to the questions noted above, I find this way of looking at love to be problematic.  [I am making a lot of typos along the way that I am missing.  I am out of practice.] I am willing to believe that some people view love this way, and it is certainly a recognized phenomenon that relationships sometimes break up because of, say, the loss of a limb in one of the partners.  However, I doubt it is true that these breakups occur because the relevant person loved the leg and their love is diminished, rather, the implications of living with a missing leg on day to day routines and concerns makes the relationship difficult and less desirable.  [No dice, by 8:33 AM, the wait to talk to a representative is over 1/2 hour.  Like calling a radio show when they're conducting a giveaway.]  This is interesting.  Perhaps when you say you love someone, you mean you love them for what they bring to the relationship.  First, let me dispose with this first idea completely.

If you love every bit of someone, you are not going to love them less if they, say, clip their toenails or lose a single hair off of their head.  At least, I think enough of us would not that it is fair to dismiss that extreme view.  However, I don't think it's so far from the way that a good chunk of people deal with love (or at least view it in an idealistic sort of way) that it is a ridiculous proposition.  To be more general, if you make a commitment of any kind to a person, I don't think it is fair to suggest that part of your vow or commitment is directed towards all of their fingers and toes, their hair and their skin.  Skin cells are coming off of us constantly.  Anyway.  Moving on.

I'm going to work on a more cynical and scientific idea.  Say you are willing to grant and cope with changes in the individual's body, but, what you love about them is still purely physical and mechanical.  You love their "body" in the sense that you love their physical appearance (the way light bounces off their form to create an image), the way their brain produces neurotransmitters in order to produce what you experience as their personality, the way their voice sounds (or the way their larynx is constructed to produce a sound), the way they smell, the way their skin feels, the way they taste.  This is a bit complex, but, the idea is that you love how their physical body works with the world to produce all the sensory manifestations you can experience by interacting with them.  I suppose, well, I know, that this view could extend to loving the way they make decisions, their motivation, the way they emotionally respond to events.  As a (mostly) scientifically minded individual, I have difficulty poking holes in this idea.  Let me start by saying that perhaps if you love a person in this way, you are neglecting the fact that what you love is the way that you perceive all the sensory information you are receiving from their body.  In other words, you don't love their smell, you "love" the way their smell affects your sensory organs and changes your affective state.  You don't love them at all, nor do you love the physical methods of communication that allow you to experience them.  If you take this view you must grant that what you are enjoying is the experience, not the other person at all.  Perhaps only the object of love can produce the combination of stimuli that you believe produces "love" in you, and perhaps you are willing to sacrifice yourself to preserve them so that this combination is not compromised.  This is becoming difficult so let me use an example in an attempt to deal a death-blow to this idea.

Say your loved one wants to go to an italian restaurant for dinner, and you want to go to a japanese restaurant.  If you insist on going to the japanese restaurant, the consequence may be that you perceive "dissatisfaction" or "anger" from them over the course of the night, that they may restrict your access to their sensory information.  This is displeasing because you enjoy the sensory experience they give you more than you enjoy the sensory experience your sushi produces.  You may even regret not going to the italian restaurant so as to have avoided these consequences.  In this case, though, does the other person's experience of the event affect you at all?  Does it matter to you that they are emotionally affected (negatively) by the facts: 1) they aren't eating something they like or 2) you were not willing to compromise your own desire to please them?  Since you love only the productions of their body, it is unlikely that their experience of these feelings would bother you.  

An alternate view of this would be that you "love" their emotional state because it is generated by their body and you want that state to be positive and pleasing to them rather than negative and displeasing.  But - what are you (am I) referring to with the word "them"?  Their consciousness (which is arguably an entirely biological production)?  

OK, this is getting really hard, especially considering that there is really no satisfying definition of consciousness.  I am going to go to the dictionary, one of the few external sources I use in the blog, for this.

Of course there are several definitions.

1. awareness of one's own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.

2. the thoughts and feelings, collectively, of an individual or of an aggregate of people

3. full activity of the mind and senses, as in waking life

4. awareness of something for what it is; internal knowledge

5. concern, interest, or acute awareness

6. the mental activity of which a person is aware as contrasted with unconscious mental processes

7. the mind or the mental faculties as characterized by thought, feelings, and volition.

I've tied a fucking knot for myself here, but, I am an Eagle Scout, I am excellent at tying knots.

So.  The scientist espousing this view of love "loves" the other person's consciousness, their thoughts, emotions, and....ah, fuck.  Anyone who takes this view of interpersonal relations probably would never use the word love.  Empathy for another person involves having another person's emotions affect your emotions, your thoughts, your decision making.  I don't understand how, if you "love" the biochemical construction of a person's brain, you could even be conscious of the substance of their emotional state.  Someone espousing this view certainly couldn't claim to know what the other person's emotional experience might be like.  Maybe my limited understanding of science is impeding me here, but I'm tired of dealing with this ridiculous viewpoint.  Fuck.  I can't knock it down.  

Alright.  Struck out.  Trying again.

Say you understood neuroscience, biology, chemistry, physics, whatever, so completely that you could scientifically rationalize and explain the interactions between your consciousness and another's and think (or feel, or make decisions appropriate to the belief) that a specific interaction you undertake can be accurately labeled as love.  

I don't understand this point of view, especially considering that the definition of love is far more complex than that of consciousness.  What I want to know is, for a person who is in this position, who has scientifically proved their love for another to themselves, could they grant that a person with a less developed understanding can experience love?  If the person they "love" does not have such a developed understanding, could they grant that the other is capable of loving them?

[I am fucking sick of this, and it is the reason I stopped writing before.  I throw out all these ideas and they are so god damned complex that I can't come to a thesis or testable statement based on a synthesis of them.  I can't imagine that anyone will get anything out of this blog post other than a profound confusion, or at best fascination, with the operation of my psychology.  It must be clear that I have difficulty believing in anything.  And yet, I do have beliefs.  That is what this is about, challenging these beliefs and then seeing afterwards if I still hold them.  Let me just go ahead and say what I believe love is without having completely logically justified my belief.  I can't expect to dismiss science and postulate a rationally viable option in its place, at least not in the span of a single blog post.  Before I jump into this, let me say that while I didn't list the definitions of love, I did look it up and several of the definitions claim it is purely sexual interaction and that I cannot stand for this kind of definition.]

I believe that love is a desire beyond all other desires.  It is an exception to the term desire that proves the continuity of all other experiences called desire.  Whatever well-being means, it is a wish for the well-being of all conscious entities.  It is not entirely selfless, as it must include at least some desire for one's own well being as a conscious entity.  To have this desire, one must recognize and place a large value on the subjective experience of all others.  

I think this kind of "desire" is different enough from, say, the desire for a candy bar that it deserves a separate category in language.  

I suppose the question is, can one love and at the same time particularly wish for the well being of a specific individual or group of individuals?  If you love, does telling an individual person that you love them even mean anything?  This is what I struggle with and all the rational arguments are just ramblings that attempt to logically justify something that is unjustifiable for a human being.  Our genes are non-living compounds that hold the design for a living being whose "purpose" is to promote and ensure the continuance of the genes.  If such a being acts merely to promote the existence and prosperity of others while doing nothing to reproduce itself, is it a genetic failure?  It has to be.  And yet it is not a failure in the minds of all other beings.  Which is it more important to serve - our genes, or all conscious beings?  

Love is service.  Love is denial and acceptance.  Love is conflict.  Love is sacrifice.  Love only means something to others inasmuch as it promotes volitional practice.  Love must be chosen and it must be chosen over instinct.

If you can help me complete any of my ideas or add to this please do.  I need help.  I apologize for providing such a flawed account and for not tying up all the ends I left hanging.  I am exhausted, and I have only been awake for two and a half hours today.