Notes on a Near-Life Experience Read Online Free PDF

bunch of statements on it that you have to rate from one to five, one being never and five being always. They are questions like:
    My life is of value.
    I am loved by others.
    I love myself.
    I contemplate suicide.
    Questions for crazy people. Any reasonably intelligent person can figure out what the right answers are. It's pretty easy. I put in some twos and fours on the less crazy questions so that it will look like I've really thought hard about the questions and my true feelings.
    The door to Dr. Lynder's office opens and a man and a woman step out. The woman looks like she's about twenty-five; she has long ice blue fingernails and wears leather pants. The man is balding and fairly nondescript. I imagine myself falling asleep during our sessions.
    “See you next week,” the woman calls after the man as he heads for the door. The man grumbles as he leaves. Before I can stop him, before I realize what's happening, my boring, balding therapist is out the door, leaving me with the blueclawedbimbo. She notices me before the door closes behind the man. “You must be Mia,” she says, smiling down at me. “I'm Lisz Lynder.”
    “Yeah, umm, hi.” I don't know what to say. I mean, I don't know why I assumed my doctor would be a man. When I get a closer look at Lisz Lynder, I notice some little lines around her eyes and mouth; I realize that she probably isn't as young as I thought, probably closer to my mom's age than to twenty-five.
    “Whaddya say we go back to my office and talk a little,” Lisz Lynder suggests.
    I follow her through the door she and the bald man just came out of.
    During my first visit, Lisz—she says I should call her by her first name, “Dr. Lynder's too formal”—explains that we'll talk about whatever I want to talk about and that nothing I say will ever leave this room unless I give my express permission or if she suspects that I have plans to harm myself. I must not look very thrilled about what she's said.
    “Mia, why don't you tell me why you are here and what you hope to gain through your visits.”
    “To tell you the truth, I didn't want to come here. My parents thought that all us kids should get counseling because of, you know, the separation. So my brother, Allen, and I are going to visit you, and my sister, Keatie, is seeing someone who specializes in helping younger kids. I think the whole thing is ridiculous. I mean, my parents are the ones who need counseling, not us.”
    Lisz isn't fazed by my answer. She says that if I don't feellike I have anything to say, that's fine. She also says that if it's okay with me, she'll think up some topics for us to talk about, write them on pieces of paper, and put them in a jar. Then if I feel like I need help figuring out what to “discuss,” I can take a piece of paper out of the jar and talk about what it says. If I don't like one topic, I can choose another paper and another until I find something I am willing to discuss. Or we don't have to talk about anything.
    “If worst comes to worst, if you don't feel like chatting, we'll play Uno or something,” she says.
    I try to smile.
    “But I want you to understand what I hope to do here as well. I am not going to tell you what's wrong with you, or tell you what you need to do to be a happy person or anything like that. My approach to therapy is a little different. I believe that we all possess the faculties we need to be happy; we just need to learn how to access them. So we're going to talk and you're going to find your own answers, a way to live that works for you. I'm going to be your guide, in a way…. If you ever get lost or really off track, I'll help you find your way back, and I'll try to help you understand what's going on in your life and what your options are for coping with certain situations. Everyone sees the world differently and has a different set of values, so we're going to figure out what yours are and help you be true to them. How does that sound?”
    “Great,” I