The Hub or the Rim

2004

My wise old mentor Sebastian Sinclair took out a bicycle wheel from behind his chair and propped it in front of me against a footstool. “Are you the hub or the rim?” he asked.

“Uh,” I said…”Explain.” 

 He looked at the wheel, then me, then the wheel.“Think about it.”

I stared at the wheel, aired tires, shiny rims. “It looks new.” 

“Yes, tis.”

I’d evolved from being the client Sebastian couldn’t get rid of, he’d reminded me, half-kiddingly, to now his understudy. Trained in Ericksonian therapy, Sebastian was meeting with me as part of my mentorship requirement for my counseling license. Every week I reviewed with him my client load, and he, the psychologist of forty years, offered me feedback. 

A technique Sebastain had borrowed from the renowned psychiatrist Milton Erickson, now passed on, was to be the observer of the client, listening to the person’s words and studying their non verbals.   

This day I brought with me my puzzlement over how to treat a middle aged man, I called Dean, who was suffering from high anxiety and possibly its cousin, depression.  

 I told Sebastian that Dean seemed like a leaf in the wind, blown about by little trifles. But trifles he magnified to monumental concerns.  

He was an actuary for a large insurance company and while he had the job for ten years, he reported his days were ruined because his boss was aloof toward him and his co-workers didn’t appreciate him. At home he said his wife, daughter and son were no different. 

Sebastian patted the bike wheel, as a place we needed to return to, but said, “Go on, tell me more about Dean.” 

I told him Dean had been a client with me for no less than ten sessions, and came in most weeks. I’d listened to Dean play the part of pity me. Despite feeling unappreciated, he’d told me his wife and kids had given him a nice birthday party. And his daughter had invited him to father-daughter activities at school and his son asked him to go to a recent college game with him. His wife usually greeted him with a kiss every night when he came home. And was obliging with her intimacy toward him. He said he loved them and believed they loved him. He’d never been unfaithful in his 25 year marriage. 

“I kidded the guy that most men would like his problems.” 

Dean’s boss had always given him raises and his colleagues all signed his birthday card and even sang to him on his 50th. 

Even though I reminded Dean of these basic facts, he always returned to the down-on-himself feeling of being unloved and not respected. 

Sebastian asked me what my next step with Dean would be. I said I hadn’t really explored Dean’s attachment style, which could shed some light on his overall feelings about his relationships; attachment style being shaped early on. 

“Good idea. Anything else?” 

I said no. “So, to the wheel then,” he said. “Any ideas?”

Chuckle. “He who brings bicycle wheel to session have wise things to say.” 

Chuckle. Nodding. “Ah, grasshopper, very wise…” Sebastian said, taking off his spectacles and cleaning the lens with his shirt sleeve.” But all joking aside, the wheel was offered to me in my training to represent the difference in the absolute and the relative. The hub represents the absolutes. And there are few. But from which all matters run. The rim,” he said, encircling the shiny metal with his index finger, “is the relative. It is important to know the difference.” 

He handed me the wheel. “It’s a Schwinn.” I set the object in my lap and felt the smoothness of the spokes.

“I heard the analogy first not from Milton Erickson,” Sebastian said, “but from a young priest who was doing a homily on Paul’s letter to the Philipians. In his homily he talked about how it’s important to return to our core when the throes of life come one’s way.” 

I ran my fingers over the black hub, steel; made up of its shell with nuts and bolts. 

“Your client Dean seems to need a philosophy on how not to be so swayed by the throes of his work-a-day life, work and home. Make sense?”

“Makes sense, alright,” I said. “But I’m not too sure how to get any philosophy across to Dean. Seems he just kind of wants to come and vent.” 

“And that’s Okay. But you might introduce to him, subtly, whether he ever thought about his general approach to life and living.” 

That day with Sebastian, some 20 plus years ago, was the first time for me that I’d ever considered my creed, or a life philosophy “Take the wheel,” he said, “for your next visit with your client, just set it somewhere in your office. Your client likely has other things going on with him which makes him a general discontent.  No voila, now all better. But see what happens.” 

As usual, I left my weekly check-in with Sebastian with more questions than answers. Later that week Dean showed.

I’d placed the wheel against my desk, unobtrusively, but noticeable enough for a conversation topic. 

He took his position snuggled into my couch, and oddly began a harangue how his refrigerator was a mess. “Half of the milk cartons are on the top shelf, the others are on the bottom. And no one listens to me about how they should be. I am getting too old to bend way over in the back to get my chocolate. I’ve asked time and again to keep the milk on the top shelf. But…

I broke in. “But no one listens to you.” 

Dean half smiled. “I know, not a big thing. But it is indicative of an overall problem with respect.”  

For some minutes we sat in silence, until he said, ”Your car break down?” pointing at the wheel. 

I threw in my two cent narrative about the hub and that it represented the absolutes, or one’s core values. And that when we are swayed by life's throes of gravel hitting the wheel rim, ultimately we give our power away to that which is irrelevant. It’s always important to return to our core values. 

Dean nodded, seemingly dismissing the analogy as superficial. We talked about past weeks until he left, but without his usual thank you. 

I went about my week, contemplating whether I’d see Dean again. But mid week I got a surprise call from him. “Hey,” he said, voice as chipper as I’d ever heard it. “I been thinking about the wheel. And you know it makes a lot of sense. I appreciate it.”

“Good. So you are cured,” I said.

“Ha. Ha,” he said. “I just wanted to tell you I really liked our session. See you next week.” 

I related to Sebastian about Dean’s aha moment. ”You know,” he said. “This is a funny business. You never know what sticks with a client. Sometimes you think you’ve lost them. But the wheel story seems to be one that holds up.”  

The names of the persons in this essay have been changed.