Gravity

Speaker 2

[00.00.02]

 All right, we're on. Ready to go. 

Speaker 1

[00.00.04]

 Ready? 

Speaker 2

[00.00.05]

 Excellent. Hello, everybody. Today we're talking about the film gravity. So an essential. Oh, so essentially we're talking about loneliness, isolation, disconnection and even, I suppose, avoidance. And to do that I'm joined by Anoushka Beasley again, our film expert. Hi, Anushka. Hi, 

Speaker 1

[00.00.27]

 Nadine. It's so nice to be back. Thank you for inviting me. 

Speaker 2

[00.00.32]

 I'm delighted. And I'm also delighted that we've chosen this film as well, because it's one of my favourites. I loved frozen, but gravity is is grown up fare, isn't it? 

Speaker 1

[00.00.42]

 Well, I have to be honest, I hadn't seen it before you suggested it. Um, somehow it escaped me. And so it was, um. It was. Yeah. Well, we'll get into it, but it was. It was really. It was really interesting. 

Speaker 2

[00.00.57]

 A little summary, perhaps to start us off then for everybody who may or may not have seen it, but maybe needs a refresh because it was released in 2013. It's basically. And by all means, uh, you know, give your own version. Anoushka. When I finished with my little intro. My understanding is that it's basically a metaphor for what it is to have given up on life and what happens when we are plugged back in. So the film tells the story of Doctor Rhinestone, who's played by Sandra Bullock, and she, along with George Clooney. Uh, George Clooney's character, Matt Kowalski. They get stranded in space after the shuttle that they're working from is destroyed by space debris. So they they get cut loose. He's got a jetpack for a while, but other than that, they are floating. She is floating in space, and just at the point that she gets hit, or that their shuttle gets hit by the flying debris, just at that point, she is telling rhinestone is telling Kowalski about her daughter's death, her little daughter, who is 3 or 4, uh, something like that died in a freak accident. And until that point. Rhinestones. Kind of. She's vegan. She's just spaced out, so to speak, and that as soon as they get hit, that crisis somehow provokes her re-engagement with life. It's kind of like a rebirth, that she's more alive in the face of extreme adversity than she has been since the death of her daughter. And so, while the film is about her attempt to get back to Earth, it's actually a beautiful metaphor for being untethered, disconnected from life because of extreme pain and what it's like to re-engage. Anoushka, what do you make of that summary? Does that speak to you? 

Speaker 1

[00.02.42]

 That's spot on. Absolutely. Um, you know, it's such a wonderful metaphor, this, this movie being set in space. Because if they can be a perfect setting for grief, I think space would be it. There's, you know, we we imagine spaces as this vast, almost void. I mean, there's actually a lot going on in space. But, you know, for us, most of us humans, we think there's nothing out there. We don't know what's out there. And she's she's floating around in space. Her she's carrying around this terrible grief. And and this is where we this is where we find our characters, you know, this is where we're transported to another world. A world that in the opening, you know, sometimes films present, you know, these sort of few lines of text before the film starts. And one of them is something like life in space is impossible. And they talk about the harshness of the reality of space, the temperature of it. There's this, the size and expanse of it. 

Speaker 2

[00.03.56]

 So the world that they are cut loose in the world that she is in is impossible. She is not living. She's not thriving. I think that's kind of the message they're setting up. Would you agree? Absolutely. There's, um, there's something very brutal. There's something very hostile about the that period of grief that we will all find ourselves in at some point in our life. And so Stone's environment there in space is it's yes, it's it's impossible. You know, we don't know how to how to manage. We're you know, there are these astronauts are out there trying to find out about this, this galaxy, this cosmos, but we don't know enough. And that's very that's so similar to how we feel when we're grieving. We don't we don't know anything anymore. You know, there is a a huge feeling of ego annihilation or you're catapulted into a place where nothing makes sense, nothing looks the same, nothing can be relied upon. And, you know, that's your hostile environment. That's that's that space that that's, you know, it's impossible. And I think they they that that is a beautiful parallel then isn't it, for the internal state for her that what you're saying is her external environment matches her internal environment, that they've put her in this place that is, like you say, hostile, utterly 

Speaker 1

[00.05.31]

 terrifying. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, as soon as we look at grief, we're looking at attachment. And why is that? Because, you know, there's something that we've lost. And what was our attachment to this lost person? Um, you know, in 1969, Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, she wrote the seminal book on death and Dying, and she named The Five Stages of grief, um, denial and isolation, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. And these five stages, you know, we, you know, they've they've gone on to be really the, the bedrock of how we, how we try to understand grief And also in 1969, John Bowlby published Attachment and Loss. And in this book, he identified behaviors in the first year of life which maintain attachment, but also, more importantly for us, those related to separation, specifically crying and searching. Now these behaviors, they increase the infant's chances of survival. So, you know, if you cry, if you're hungry, if you're you're lost. If you've lost your parent, you know, you you know, the baby will search for the parent. So it makes sense that when a person is grieving, they return to these behaviors, these very primal biological ways of coping with with death. You know, the, the, the idea of how do we survive? 

Speaker 2

[00.07.05]

 So it's like an acknowledgement. You're saying the system's acknowledgement that I am in crisis? Absolutely. And that there has to be kind of there has to be a recognition of the fact that you're in crisis in order to get yourself out of it. And that numbness that Ryan Stone has at the start is, is the antithesis of that because she's given up? 

Speaker 1

[00.07.29]

 Absolutely, yes. I mean, there are so many different ways that a person will experience grief. And we all, you know, that's one of the they're very unique things and unique things about grief. We do it differently. Every single one of us. And that's because of so many different factors. It can be because of our personality, our attachment style, our relationship with the person that we're grieving. Um, you know, our internal working models, how we how we attach in life. Um. And, you know, one of the things about Sandra being in space is that, you know, one of the identifying characteristics of grief is, is how we search for for the for the lost person. You know, that that kind of pining, those, those, those awful pangs of grief, you know, that come so suddenly and, and, um, are often they feel so unbearable. And sometimes the only way to cope with that is, is this numbness, you know, it is a reaction to that pain. And, and, you know, on the one level we can see that that's what she's doing. She's absolutely numbed this pain. And at the same time she's in space, she's searching. You know, there's almost this unconscious metaphor of, of she's out there and she's looking for something in another world that perhaps. She couldn't find on Earth. 

Speaker 2

[00.09.11]

 Mhm. Yeah. And she sort of did try to didn't she. During. She says I just drive because Matt Kowalski, George Clooney's character, is utterly rooted isn't he. He's got country music on who's down there looking up at you. He says he's very rooted, very connected to to earth. And, and she says, he says, you know, what do you do? And she says, I just drive. She got the news of her daughter's death while she was driving. There's a sense then that, again, something that we do a lot and might come back to this actually, unless now is the right time for it, that we go back to the point of crisis, and we try and resolve it by finding a different ending somehow. And she's doing that every time she gets back in the car. Is her trying to sort of rewrite the ending that's not explicitly said in the film, but, um, there's a lot of people who sit with me and in, in the counseling room and they say, I don't understand why I'm doing this or why. Why do I keep going back to this point of pain? Or why do I keep going back to this person? Or why do I keep going back to that job that doesn't work? Or people go back to the thing that's not working and it confuses them, but their psyche is looking for a solution that it didn't have at the time. 

Speaker 1

[00.10.21]

 Yes. And again, you know, it's connected to to the searching that we do, um, which is, you know, they've they've shown now that there are parts of the brain, when we grieve that are actually more active than other parts. And those are the parts that are almost hoping, looking for that reward, trying to search for something familiar, trying to remember what was lost. And. She gets back in the car. That's the last time that she can remember having a live connection with her daughter. So she gets back into that place because it's familiar and she drives. And then the flip side of that is I just drive, she says, you know, that's that's that's all I do. That's what I do. So there's an autopilot going on there that the kind of the disengagement from the world. But at the same time there is searching. 

Speaker 2

[00.11.27]

 And that's the part of the brain you're talking about that's lighting up the part that is, um, like a heightened searching. 

Speaker 1

[00.11.36]

 Yes. So we're looking for the lost object. You know, every day our nervous system is conducting very sophisticated testings, deciding what to focus on, what to see, what to ignore. And this is how perception and searching increases in grief. Because now the filter has to get specific. It has to locate someone who's no longer there. So we have to get rid of all the extraneous information. And we need to really kind of knuckle down on what we need to find this person. So the searching gets really intense. You know, you kind of hear these stories of, you know, how somebody who's grieving the rest of their life kind of falls away. You know, it's, you know, that there's this tunnel vision and and that's exactly that's exactly why it's this kind of neurobiological part of us that's, that's wired to, to find, find that person, because that's what makes us feel safe. And I think I'd like to say a word anyway about the, the power of that. You mentioned it. You alluded to it earlier how overwhelming it is when we're in that state. 

Speaker 2

[00.12.55]

 Um, and I also write, okay, there's two things I want to say. I definitely want to talk about that feeling in a very real way, and how 

Speaker 1

[00.13.04]

 catastrophic it is to be alive in the world and have that feeling of disconnect. And I think the second thing I want to mention is that it's not always for somebody who's dead. That, or rather, it can if we've oh, what am I trying to say? That the experience that that feeling of loss, that feeling of searching, that you keep talking about, that catastrophic, narrow, focused desperation is, in my experience, like falling off the side of the earth. It is like a kind of spinning in space. Uh, pretty much everybody knows my mom died when I was little, so this feeling is really familiar to me. And there have been times in my life where I have lost, lost contact with somebody who is alive, somebody who's in the world. And sometimes simply being out of touch with somebody can provoke and evoke. If the person has enough characteristics that remind me of that same connection, or they somehow evoke a kind of. A massive maternal connection. They can sometimes send me spinning back into that place. It's it's something that's very familiar to me now. It's I understand how it happens. I can feel it when it's about to come on. I can even feel it before it happens that this person is becoming somebody who for a while, I'm going to have this kind of attachment to. There's nothing I can do about it. I just have to notice it, let it flow through me and the feelings. Even though that person is not dead, but they're somehow unavailable to me, then it becomes, it becomes, I suppose, a version, a fraction of that overwhelming feeling of disconnect. I don't know whether any of that made sense, 

Speaker 2

[00.14.57]

 and maybe I need to say it again in a different way. If it didn't, 

Speaker 1

[00.15.01]

 I think that makes complete sense to me. Um, you know, part of part of that pain, part of that absolute terrible, overwhelming pain that you feel, you know, when when there's when there's a loss of someone that you love that, that the idea that you're not going to be able to survive it, that that you don't know how to, that you don't know how to get get through it is sometimes what what leads to the avoidance. I can't I'm not going to be able to survive this. So I'm just not going to feel it. And you know. The truth is we have to we have to go through this because there is this is what life is. You know, the sense of loss is endemic to the human experience. Grief is our response to that loss, but it's also a form of learning. We have to be able to understand how to do life again. And so when we delay the learning, when that mourning is interrupted by avoidance, we can get triggered very, very quickly, immediately in certain situations by certain people, certain events. And, and we can become flooded. Um, and that that trauma of the grief returns to us and, and it almost feels as real and sometimes even even more so because it is so heightened. We weren't expecting it We've done such a good job of avoiding it, and we weren't expecting it in that particular scenario. So yes, it, it, um. 

Speaker 2

[00.16.56]

 You know, that was beautifully eloquent. That was it was really lovely the way you worded. I wish I could remember the two sentences you said. 

Speaker 1

[00.17.04]

 Oh, well, don't ask me, I can't 

Speaker 2

[00.17.06]

 know. You said to me about, about that we our task is to reengage one of our, you know, we yes, we can understand why there is a disconnect, why people feel safer in that avoidant space. But we have to re-engage 

Speaker 1

[00.17.21]

 and back to the film. That's what she does, isn't it? That there's the the, uh, for people who haven't seen it, there is a beautiful scene where she finally gets some safety. She gets inside the International Space Station, which has been an ordeal in itself to get that far and then to get inside it. And in this weightless state, which is beautifully filmed, she's kind of in the in the atrium, really, of the International Space Station. And she sheds her spacesuit and she curls up in the fetal position while kind of gently spinning in space and falls asleep in the fetal position. It's like. It's like this sort of circular womb, isn't it? This kind of rebirth happens, and that feels like a shedding of of. It's a layer that she's taken off. Okay. I'm, I'm, I'm engaging in a different way. It is like a rebirth. I'm now going to start 

Speaker 2

[00.18.19]

 trying. I'm going to fight for my life 

Speaker 1

[00.18.22]

 I absolutely love. That's my favorite still image, if you like, of the movie. It's so beautiful. It's so artistically shot. And and you know, I love it because she, you know, she's an embryo in her sack in that moment. And, you know, these are the two, you know, the two big CEOs, if you like, of of life or birth and death. And, you know, we know so much about birth and we know so little about death really. You know, we so you know that that image there it almost it's like it gives her permission, you know, um, I'm getting in touch with every part of me, all all the different parts of me. And I'm, I'm allowing myself to to accept the part that's, that's really terrified that that actually feels in danger because I've lost somebody, this person that I've, that I've loved. I've lost them. And and I can and I can feel so scared. I can feel like a little baby. Biologically, that's what happens to the infant. They feel in literal danger when they feel lost. And so her returning to that place as an adult in that moment, in that, in that scene, for me, it's it's the human acceptance of all of our different parts and all of our different stages in life. 

Speaker 2

[00.19.59]

 So they're all culminating in that one moment. Mhm. 

Speaker 1

[00.20.02]

 Yeah. 

Speaker 2

[00.20.07]

 I'm thinking because. 

Speaker 1

[00.20.11]

 There's a slightly different angle that you brought out there. As much as it is about a rebirth, that it is about a kind of 

Speaker 2

[00.20.19]

 consolidation, a kind of allowing a revisiting. I think it's important. I think it's difficult for us as people to see and allow space for our own grief when it is as all consuming, because it is agonizing, isn't it? We just want it over. And there is something very still about that scene, a kind of an acceptance that comes from it. This is where I am. So I'm going to go back. I have to go right back to basics. I have to strip away all my expectations. I have to strip away all this avoidance, all this pretense. And I have to reconnect with myself, with all my experience, with everything. Absolutely. You. We. We have so many assumptions of what life should be about and what it should look like and how we should, how we should feel in it. And she lost her child. It's not how we expect the order of things to go it. It can almost feel it feels wrong, you know, in, in many ways, um, just just biologically and, and. We, we grieve for, for these kinds of losses in, in different ways and different cultures as well. There are various different beliefs and expectations around, around mourning in different cultures. Um, and I tend to think that, you know, in Western societies there can be a much more kind of stiff upper lip, you know, let's just carry on. Let's just you know, do what we need to do. You know, we can we can be sad for a little while, but not too long. Um. And how and how long do we give ourselves, uh, for. For losing. For losing a child. Um, it's there's something about permission. Absolutely. When I, you know. So when I, when I look at that scene with her there, I think there's just permission for for everything that that 

Speaker 1

[00.22.31]

 we, that we endure and that we experience here in this life. Life can be tough. 

Speaker 2

[00.22.40]

 Um, and therapy offers people that space, doesn't it, to really allow all of it to be. Yeah. Um, you know, there's a point in the, in the movie where Kowalski's radioing Houston and, uh, Stone, you know, asks him, um, what's the point if they can't hear us? And he says, well, just because, you know, they can't they can't hear just because, you know, we can't hear control doesn't mean control can't hear us. And it made me, you know, think about that relationship, you know, between the the therapist and the client. The therapist doesn't always know if the client can hear them. And it might sometimes feel like it's radioing into the dark. But, you know, he says it just could save their lives if they keep talking. And and I like that, you know, I like the idea of, you know, sometimes we just have to keep talking. Um, just keep making that connection. Just keep being there. Just keep being present. Again. I've not spotted that. That's really beautiful. 

Speaker 1

[00.23.50]

 We come back to avoidance. You mentioned about ten minutes ago about her avoidance that that it is all she can do to keep breathing in space well, in her life, because the space is the metaphor, isn't it? But all she can do is, is to just sever that part of her that is. I mean, broken is not even a strong enough word as it has been utterly devastated, um, by this. And also, there's something that the filmmakers do really well that they make the death of the daughter the way that she died just really random and tragic. She just falls over in the playground at school. It's just it's not like some dramatic, violent death. It's just something that could happen anywhere, at any time to anyone. I think there's something about about that that I think it's brave for the filmmakers because they are absolutely bringing in something. Um. This could happen to you. This could happen to anybody. This is a simple loss. 

Speaker 2

[00.24.54]

 I think that in itself is, 

Speaker 1

[00.24.57]

 um. 

Speaker 2

[00.25.00]

 Yeah. Brave and interesting move on their part in terms of the avoidance, if we move on in the film just a little, there's a scene later on where she does give up. Something just goes so terribly wrong she can't launch one of the, um, is it one of the landing pods or something? She can't launch from the Chinese space station that she then has to get to, and she just gives up. She turns down all the dials where she is. She turns everything off. It's again a metaphor, isn't it, for her? Just saying, I can't. I know that I'm supposed to re-engage and that that's what I need to do, but. But I just can't do it. And then Matt Kowalski appears next to her, doesn't he? After it? Because, of course, I haven't not mentioned is that he sacrificed himself for her life. He untethered himself from her because they tether themselves to each other. He untethered himself from her and goes off into space and sacrifices himself for her survival anyway. Then he reappears in this moment. And he's obviously not there because he's dead, but she hears him say, I get it. It's beautiful, it's safe, and there's nobody up here that can hurt you. 

Speaker 1

[00.26.11]

 And he's acknowledging, I think that's such a powerful moment because he's he's giving voice to the thing that has been unvoiced until now, which is I understand why you're doing this. 

Speaker 2

[00.26.23]

 And and you need to at some point re-engage. And it's an invitation to her, isn't it? To. To try. What do you think? Yeah. 

Speaker 1

[00.26.36]

 Um. So the gods are so many, so many points in what you've just said. Um, where should I start? So. 

Speaker 2

[00.26.47]

 Okay, first the randomness. It's, um. Anything can happen in this life. We know we might have an idea. We might construct an order of things, but actually, the only order is randomness. There's there's there's something, you know, very deliberate, actually, about that. You know, um, she's she's enjoying this. Weightlessness up in space. Um, and it was it was actually gravity that pulled this little girl to the ground and ended her life. And this is the truth that living, ah, living can be so unpredictable. Anything can happen. And at any point, we can stop being pulled to the earth, and and it just. And it just stops. Um, you know, she's used to she says to Kowalski at one point, you know, one of her bolts that she needs to fix the telescope falls and starts floating around in space, and he grabs her and she apologizes and says, you know, I'm used to a lab, you know, and my bolts falling to the floor, and, you know, that same that same thing that she's used to has taken her daughter. It's it's it's it's, you know, it's it's worked another way. There is such a, there's such a shock factor to, to grief. We we don't expect it. We know it. We, we know the thing that is the most certain in this world is that we will die, but we don't expect it. Almost. Our unconscious cannot process it. So there is such a shock, such a confusion for her. There's such a an emptiness, you know. Um, and so she struggles. She struggles to she struggles in space to get back to Earth, but also to get back to herself. That's that's the metaphor here. And, you know, that's one of the, one of the aspects of, of, you know, the grieving process. How do I, you know, reintegrate you know, she's stone has got difficulty getting back to, uh, reintegration. And how do we how do we do that? How do we start living again? How do we how do we get on. How do we. How do we launch ourselves and to land? And he says, you know, did you try the soft landing jets? And she says they're for landing. And he says landing is launching. It's you know, it's it's the same thing. You just you just gotta begin, you know, you gotta. 

Speaker 1

[00.29.32]

 And. Yes. So, um. Yeah, there's a lot there. I've forgotten where, where I was the 

Speaker 2

[00.29.42]

 second it was about. It's beautiful up here. There's nobody up here that can hurt you. Was that. That was the second quote that I said. Maybe there was something about that you were to say. 

Speaker 1

[00.29.51]

 So you know, it's it's it's funny because when he when he enters her pod and he gives her that, that speech, um, there's something about it. Um, you know, he says, I get it. It's nice up here. You know, you can just shut down all the systems, turn out all the lights, and just close your eyes and tune out everybody. You know, that's that's what she's been doing. She's on autopilot. She's not been living. She's not. She's not been engaging. She's been driving. Um. She's just been working. She doesn't know how to live without her daughter. You know, there's there's nobody up here that can hurt. You would say. I mean, what's the point of going on? He says, what's the point of living? And. When when I'm hearing him talk to her. Because, you know, I'd only seen that was the first time I'd seen the movie. I thought, this is really harsh. I didn't for a second think it was a hallucination. I didn't actually know. I thought maybe he'd, you know, found his way back to her. And I thought, you know, I see what you're saying. I know, I know exactly what you wanted to do, but, you know, it feels you should go a little bit gentler and. And then when I realized that it. This is a part of her. This is this is that part of her that is needing to be harnessed, needing to be located, needing to be found. She's. Yes. She's hallucinating. Yes. She's suffering from a lack of oxygen, you know, carbon monoxide poisoning, all the rest of it. But she is also she is also having to overcome the adversity. She has to go to a place within her psyche. She might not want to go to. She might not have been before. She's she's really having to summon something from herself, and she has summoned him so that he can sit down next to her like, like a life coach and tell her what she needs to hear. So she's she's she's talking to herself so that she can start living again. Mhm. And they present it as a beautiful peacefulness don't they. Because she does just turn off all the buzzing bleeping alerts. And there's a real peacefulness. 

Speaker 2

[00.32.12]

 And the suggestion is that life is violent. Living is violent. Choosing to engage is a kind of. 

Speaker 1

[00.32.21]

 There's a there's a force life force. It is a forceful thing. We have to, um, work hard at living, at being engaged, at being present. That that is not easy, that life is difficult. And I love that. That the contrast and perhaps will come later to the her reentering the Earth's atmosphere and the violence of that and the loudness of it and and how she feels about that. That's again one of my favorite scenes. But the contrast. 

Speaker 2

[00.32.52]

 Why wouldn't you want to just slip away? I, I when she was just turning off all those dials and and shutting her eyes and it disappearing, just fading away. So much of me was going well. Of course you would. Of course. That's exactly what you would do. You would just let yourself drift off. Because to to reengage is so much harder. I like I like that, that it's it's harder, you know, it's harder to work at life. It, it does often feel like that for a lot of people, especially when they're grieving. It feels really, really difficult, um, that there are so many complications that come with grieving. There's such a loneliness often, um, you know, grief also knocks on the door of other losses. So, you know, if there are other losses which have not been processed. And often we don't, you know, we can feel the impact of that even more intensely. And it can it can feel so, so difficult. So yes, the, the most extreme. Form of coping with grief would be suicide, would be this idea of just shutting the systems down and and not trying anymore. Yeah. Drifting off into a peaceful place. I think it's important that we definitely. You were saying then that one grief can stimulate our experiences of other griefs. 

Speaker 1

[00.34.45]

 And maybe it's important to say that grief is not necessarily about death either. That grief that we can grieve for, missing people that aren't necessarily dead, but people we've lost or 

Speaker 2

[00.34.57]

 hope that we've lost, that it's not just about grief. Would you agree? Definitely not just about loss. Sorry. Not just about death. 

Speaker 1

[00.35.07]

 I mean, I don't always even go to death when I think of grief to be honest, I, I think I think of I think of loss. That's that's the first place I go to and I think of grief. And I think that we lose things every day. I mean, we, you know, you can lose your keys. You can, you know, that can screw up your day. You know, you can, you know, lose your phone. You can you can lose money. You can lose a job. You can lose a friendship. You know, the friend is still out there in the world, but no longer in the same way you can. Grief is about loss. It's like, yeah, absolutely. And there are very there are so many different kinds. Um, and. The world that we're living in in a moment. You know, we were almost constantly having to decide how to attend to a level of grief. There are there are walls, there is crime. There is. You know, we live through a pandemic there. You know, there are there's illness, um, random deaths without explanation, you know, um, so it's almost we are whether we consciously understand this or not, we are deciding daily what to do about loss. 

Speaker 2

[00.36.40]

 And. 

Speaker 1

[00.36.44]

 I don't know whether this is even going to link to the way you finish that, but the way you started it, you were talking about her being about all the things that you can lose And I suppose I want to ask maybe open a conversation about what happens if we don't grieve, then, because avoidance is not the only, um, coping strategy for grief that isn't there is, uh, for want of a better word, maladaptive. That is unhelpful. 

Speaker 2

[00.37.13]

 So she goes to avoidance. Ryan Stone goes to avoidance. But. 

Speaker 1

[00.37.19]

 If we don't process these losses like the loss of a friendship. I think it came from when you when you were talking about loss of a friendship, that if we don't process those griefs, then we can then that, that will then bleed into the relationships that we form with other people too. So we might lose control of the people. We might cling to other people. We might be so frightened of loss 

Speaker 2

[00.37.46]

 that we. Exaggerated that. That we become exaggerated in our attachment need. That we become incapable of living without somebody right by our side, up close in front of us, that that need to become attached to use the word that you used earlier. So she avoids, she cuts herself loose. There's an avoidance in that. But there is a more anxious attachment, isn't there, that pulls makes people pull other people to them, and it can feel perhaps claustrophobic for other people, for the for the other ones who are being pulled towards. Um, and so unprocessed grief and loss isn't doesn't always propel people, does it? Into avoidance. It can propel people into a sort of clingy, grabby, um, state. I wonder if you have any comments about that. Well, it makes me think about the different attachment styles, actually, you know, losses shaped by many factors. Um, one of them being, um, our internal working models of relationships. So this involves our expectations of others, of ourselves. And, and it leads us to how do we, you know, how how does our attachment style have us show up in the world? And, you know, perhaps a more avoidant attachment style, um, might be unconsciously feeling or I'm not going to get the care that I need. So there's an emotional system shutdown, you know, a pushing away of people. Um maybe a different kind of person, a more anxious attachment style. There might be a real kind of overwhelm with the the thoughts and the feelings and the memories that are kind of intense rumination. Um, 

Speaker 1

[00.39.39]

 it might be really hard to to do anything else, actually, but. But almost fixate. And maybe that can lead to the dependency that clinginess that you're talking about. Um, you know, the secure attachment style. 

Speaker 2

[00.39.58]

 What what that is a is probably, you know, is, is perhaps what we hope for finding eventually is a kind of dual process of grieving where we can stay connected in life with an acceptance of what we have lost. And you know, that that makes me think about one of the stages of grief that Kubler talks about, which is the denial. Um, and, you know, there's lots of fables and stories that, you know, people talk about when I think about grief. And 

Speaker 1

[00.40.38]

 the one that I like is, is called the Peach Blossom Spring. It's a Chinese fable, and it's about a fisherman. And he sails into this idyllic utopia, um, and and it's everything is wonderful, people. I don't think people age. Everybody is happy. There's luscious fruits, you know, um, fertile foliage. It's it's all wonderful. Um. 

Speaker 2

[00.41.02]

 But he can never find it again. And he tries and he goes back. Time and time again, looking for this village that he found once that he can never find again. And I think that's that's, for me, such a big part of this process. How do we accept that the world looks different, our world looks different, that. This land is lost. 

Speaker 1

[00.41.36]

 Hmm. 

Speaker 2

[00.41.40]

 That's a really beautiful fable. What's it called 

Speaker 1

[00.41.42]

 again? The peach Blossom Spring. Hmm. 

Speaker 2

[00.41.47]

 And that we're all searching basically, for that original bliss, 

Speaker 1

[00.41.53]

 which is, you know, Stone gets back into the car and, you know, listens to the radio station and wants to be back in that place, as you were saying. Exactly. Searching for that. That time where. It felt different. The world looked different. 

Speaker 2

[00.42.15]

 Hmm. What is that line that Kowalski comes out with? And I can't remember exactly where it is. I think it's when she's trying to get into the, um, the International Space Station quite near the beginning. 

Speaker 1

[00.42.28]

 And she's 

Speaker 2

[00.42.28]

 clinging on to the outside. She's clinging on in space, not refusing to get into the space station. And he says, you're going to have to learn to let go. 

Speaker 1

[00.42.40]

 Oh, yes. 

Speaker 2

[00.42.40]

 You've got to learn to move away from this. You can't. You can't stay here. This life here is impossible. And that's it. So yes, you can stay here, but you're not living. You're not thriving. 

Speaker 1

[00.42.51]

 I love that line. It is so heartbreaking to hear him say it. And at the same time, I love that he said it because there's just there was just something so compassionate. You know, it's it's the kind of thing that you you want a friend to that to eventually say to you, you're going to have to learn to let go when, when she's a he or she has allowed you to be in that space for, for as long as it's possibly, um, beneficial, maybe. And, and after a while we can get stuck. We can we can get stuck in that grief and and we actually sometimes need someone to, to say to us, you have to, you have to learn to let go. 

Speaker 2

[00.43.53]

 And it's gentle. That's what you're saying? It's a 

Speaker 1

[00.43.55]

 gentle. Yeah. Really? Really asked. It has to be because it's not something that we don't know, but it is something that we have actively avoided doing for a very long time because we don't think we can. 

Speaker 2

[00.44.17]

 What a beautiful thing to be able to offer somebody that you love when you see them drifting, to be able to be the person that can risk kind of being told off by your friend, but to risk being able to say to them, you're lost, come back, come back. There is it's worth fighting for. You know you are loved. There's enough here that I think that's hard for people. I think, you know, Matt Kowalski makes it look easy. 

Speaker 1

[00.44.45]

 Well, yes. I mean, you know, he has that ability. George Clooney, doesn't he? But it doesn't. Um you know, interestingly, this this kind of gentleness that you and I are talking about, You know, in some ways it it's been we're picking it up. We're we're kind of we're, we're bringing it into, into wider society. You know in in 2022, um, the DSM recognized prolonged grief disorder and they added it as a condition. Now, you know, it's this is an interesting, um, conversation because, you know, there are many societies and countries that will that would grieve and they will and they will grieve for years. And it's not a disorder. It's not a condition. It's just life. Um, what, you know, crying, you know, grieving is a very normal response to this kind of loss in life. So, you know, who are we to call it a disorder? But at the same time, there's something about us recognizing that there are people in pain and that maybe these people in pain are suffering and silence and maybe they're not getting help and maybe they're not talking about it. And by us naming it, we're actually. Talking about it. We're actually giving permission for people to say, I need. I'm struggling here and I need help. I'm stuck. Um, and, uh. And I think that's a good thing. Um. 

Speaker 2

[00.46.24]

 Yeah. Agreed. 

Speaker 1

[00.46.27]

 You mentioned George Clooney's, um, ability to deliver those kind of lines with with real ease. And I'd like to mention that Sandra Bullock's mum died when she was younger. I mean, I think I think she died in about 2000. That's my understanding. But Sandra Bullock will have made this film around 2010, 2011, 2012. It came out in 2013. You just think about the the moment that Sandra Bullock, as an actor read this script or whether they even approached her directly and, you know, and kind of said, this is sort of made for you, because what we're talking about when we look at Sandra Bullock's character is that she loses her daughter. But for the actor. 

Speaker 2

[00.47.11]

 She's drawing on the loss of her own mother when she's playing that part. There's a that must have been powerful for her. Clearly, you know, we can't speak for Sandra Bullock in this, but I think that's that. That's perhaps why her performance is so powerful. 

Speaker 1

[00.47.30]

 Yeah. Now, you know, I think, you know, every, every kind of every choice that an actor makes, um, you know, is a really interesting one, you know, and what's what are the motivating factors for that? And I can't help thinking that she would not have been able to do a role like this if she hadn't have gone to some of these dark places already for herself, if she hadn't have done, you know, a large amount of of that grieving that, that stone her character that has been there laying perhaps, you know, not not able to do. You know, I, I'm really I'm really thinking that there was something. You know, there's at one point, Kowalski says, you know, she's panicking. She's you know, she. And she said, he says you need to focus. You need to listen to my voice. What can you see? And she says, I can't see, I can't breathe. Um, how do you do? You know, how do you do a grounding exercise in space? Um, and yet and yet that's what's happening, you know, um, and, and, you know, there's no way that that, that she could have taken a role like this on, you know, if she hadn't of have gone through that emotional overwhelm herself and, and had to learn to emotionally regulate, um, and, and ground herself 

Speaker 2

[00.49.09]

 and to live again and to live again 

Speaker 1

[00.49.10]

 and to find a way to feel safe again. Because that's such a big part of grieving. When we don't we don't feel safe, not for a while 

Speaker 2

[00.49.23]

 And I find it fascinating that the. The pivotal moment is crisis. It's the threat to her own life, which is is what gives her that spark. Are you living or are you dying? What are you doing here? So the crisis is kind of her redemption, I suppose. And it's. It's the thing that it was the starter gun that actually begins her journey back to what Kowalski calls Mother Earth. It's. It's the crisis that life or death, when your life is threatened or what are you going to do when the chips are down? This is this is your choice. And of course, she really does. Doesn't she just retreat and die? But maybe now would be a good time to talk about that rebirth and that re-entry to Mother Earth, that journey back that is loud and messy. 

Speaker 1

[00.50.15]

 Yeah. I mean, so, you know, the etymological root of survival is the Latin super vivere and which is we, you know, live beyond, you know, to outlive And, you know, this is interesting because, you know, like I said before, our unconscious doesn't understand death. You know, we we see it in our dreams. And, you know, in our dreams, we might sit and have dinner with our long deceased father, for example. But, you know, it's not something that we consciously understand. So, um. You know this how we how we approach a death, how, you know, there's there's a very, um, there's a, there's a resistance, um, a very, a very, a very strong, a very strong resistance to it. I'm, you know, it's not it's not something that I'm, I can logically, consciously comprehend. Um, and there's this, there's this part, there's this line in the movie where Kowalsky comments on the view on the sunset and, um, what he's referring to as a moment where something beautiful is, is able to be recognized in the darkness. Um, you know, in modern times, we refer to the, the, the dark night of the soul. Um, and, uh, this comes from the 16th century mystic and poet Saint John of the cross, who was referring to a phase of passive purification at the point where God's presence is, God's presence is felt, but it's not stable. We often turn to to God, to religion in times of grief. Why are we doing that? We're looking for help. We're looking to get some kind of find a rope, if you like. That's going to pull us out of of this darkness, of this pit, you know, that we're in and and so that hallucination that she has, you know, with, with, with um, with Kowalski in the pod, you know, she's she's needing to find her own higher self to help her out and, and and allow her to reintegrate. Um, and it is so scary. You know, she she says to him, um, you know, that she's only she's only done it, you know, she's only landed on a simulator. Um, and that she's crashed every time. So, you know, what she's saying is, I've never done this for real. I like and and in a way, she's saying, you know, I don't know how to live. But the truth is, we do it every day. We we sometimes don't give herself enough credit for for what we do, do what we are doing. Um, and, uh, and, you know, so, so actually, she's having to summon so much courage, um, really overcome so much fear to. Make that re-entry. And and you're absolutely right. When when it begins, it is loud. I mean, this the film itself is is quite quiet in many places. You know, it's one of the kind of, um, you know, hallmarks of this movie, the silence and space. But it it gets loud. It is it is violent. It is shocking there. And, you know, there's that kind of space jet sound and and she's just. Yeah, you know, she doesn't know if she's going to make it. And there's 

Speaker 2

[00.53.53]

 fire everywhere. And she says either way it'll be one hell of a ride. She doesn't know whether she's going to live or die, but she's laughing like she's kind of. And she's shaking and bouncing around in the seat. And there's. Yeah, that is life. Loud and messy, unavoidably confronting. 

Speaker 1

[00.54.18]

 And she has decided that she has to do that, that she can't do the silent drifting away. So it's such a stark contrast, isn't it? It's quite assaulting. That scene where the pod is, is going through the Earth's atmosphere, and 

Speaker 2

[00.54.32]

 you're rooting for it to survive it. Um, yeah, but it is. It is violent and loud and assaulting 

Speaker 1

[00.54.41]

 and that. Exactly that. You know, one of the things that we can lose in grief is, is that it's a loss of creativity. Um, you know, the joy of of what gives us purpose. What gives us meaning? Why? You know what? What puts a smile on our face in the morning. And you're right. She's she's laughing and she's. She's. She's going to give it a go. She doesn't know what's going to happen. She's. She's finally saying, I don't need a guarantee here. There are none. But I'm here and that's enough. And yeah, there's something about her getting back in touch with that. That creative part of herself. 

Speaker 2

[00.55.36]

 How is it creative? Because creativity is about an openness. About a willingness. Yeah, it's it's about. It's about not necessarily knowing where you're going to end up. I think 

Speaker 1

[00.55.55]

 it's, um, 

Speaker 2

[00.55.58]

 it's a faith 

Speaker 1

[00.55.58]

 trust. Yes. And and and and and joy, you know she's she is laughing because she has surmounted something that she felt was insurmountable. And there is a pride in that. There is something wonderful in feeling like we. Can do it. We have done it. And in that moment, she she feels that she feels that pride in herself. 

Speaker 2

[00.56.37]

 And let me invite you then, to close this episode by talking about the moment where she lands. She lands in the water. Um, I'm just going to. I'm going to leave an open door here for you. Tell me your perspectives on that. Because, again, another powerful scene where she lands in the water. So much symbolism. Well, when when she when when the water. When she lands on in in earth. In in the water. On Earth, her pod is flooded. And that was the point. I'd been silent like the movie up until that point. And then I gasped out loud because I just thought, no, no, they are not going to do this. They are not going to end this. Here she has. She can't have survived that entire ordeal in space. Only, you know, to literally crash and burn now. And I was so worried for her. And it's that it's that moment. It's that moment where she is having to find that lost, that she has to give it that last push. You've you've come this far and she she has to absolutely really want it. And she does. And she, she has decided to live. And when, when she opens up the pod and she just falls onto the sand, she is exhausted, as you would imagine. She is relieved there is such relief for her. Um. And she tries to stand. And that that is the metaphor. That is what this whole ride, this whole life, this whole process of living is all about. Even though she wobbles, and even though it's hard for her to do it, she has to learn to stand on her own two feet. 

Speaker 1

[00.58.33]

 And she does. 

Speaker 2

[00.58.36]

 Tentatively, like you say, shakily. Yeah, but she does. Yeah. And there's a very. 

Speaker 1

[00.58.45]

 Very interesting camera angle, because what they do is they take the camera right down to the ground, and they look up at her, and she looks in all her shakiness. She looks powerful, doesn't she? If she's standing there like this, you know, and she's I think she's a tall woman, isn't she? But she's not. She's not a big, imposing figure at all. There's something quite, um unimposing about Sandra Bullock's stature, I think. But they make her look really strong. And determined, and she stands rooted. And the fact they've got her in this kind of muddy sand means that her feet just sink a little bit. So she is absolutely in contact with the Earth and like you say, two feet on the ground, which is what Kowalski said in space, isn't it? You're going to have to start living your life two feet on the ground. That's what he says to her. Yeah. And there she is, her two feet in, in the mud. And maybe that's it. Maybe it is mud rather than sand. 

Speaker 2

[00.59.38]

 Everything. Everything is dirty. And she still has this stature, this power. Everything is dirty. Life is messy. It it is, um, you have to get stuck in. And, you know, one of the things about Sandra Bullock, you know, which I love is, you know, she's got that she's that girl next door. And so she. There's something around this could happen to anyone. You know? She might be a brilliant. You know, medical engineer and and an astronaut, but actually, she's not doing anything different to what any of us. Might need to do one day and can do you know there's some. Yeah, there's there's something about the fact that in grief we can sometimes feel so lonely. But actually, it's the one thing that really connects us all. It happens to all of us. 

Speaker 1

[01.00.54]

 I 

Speaker 2

[01.00.54]

 have so much more to say, but I feel like that's such a beautiful place to end. What do you think? Yeah. Yeah, maybe it's good here for now. Before we do go, is there anything else that we've that you've not said that you feel you want to say? And, you know, I can either add it on the end or I can perhaps move it to a bit further in the middle or something. Is there anything that you've not said that you really do want to say 

Speaker 1

[01.01.24]

 Um. Well. So doctor Stone has gone into space, which is such a poignant metaphor for what happens when we when we lose someone that we love. Where do they go? They no longer occupy the space that they used to. What space are they in now? Which world? Um, sometimes people try to contact psychics to try and find out where their loved ones are at you. No one knows. This is a branch of philosophy, of religion, of psychotherapy, of science that remains disputed with no empirical absolutes other than the certainty that death comes to all of us, and the sheer gravity of that fact can weigh the individual down. And often we don't want to go there. We don't want to think about it. We don't want to talk about it. Which is why you and I have decided to talk about it. 

Speaker 2

[01.02.22]

 Yeah, like you said, life is messy. We have to get stuck in 

Speaker 1

[01.02.28]

 We. If we choose not to, then we're sitting on the sidelines of our own life. We're behind a glass pane. Gritty stuff is where it all is. 

Speaker 2

[01.02.41]

 You speak so eloquently about such enormous concepts, such enormous feelings, and you speak really eloquently about them. It's really lovely to hear you. Thank you, 

Speaker 1

[01.02.54]

 thank you. Are we all right? So don't click anything and I will stop the recording. Okay. Uh, is that good? Yeah. And then we should start 

Speaker 2

[01.03.08]

 stop recording right now. Have you got any kind of uploading or anything like that in the corner? It just 

Speaker 1

[01.03.13]

 says recording and it says don't close the app while recording. But there's no I mean, I've got 100% are 

Speaker 2

[01.03.19]

 brilliant. 100%. I'm going to stop recording left. Right.