The human pschye is an amazing place but it has a tendency to gravitate toward the negative. How many of us become the criticisims of the people around us. Its so easy to take the ideas that others impose upon us for their own very human reasons and keep them as precious core beliefs. Painful memories are more easily called upon than happy ones. Rather than let things go and release our pain, we tend to hold on to it.....stuffing it down inside ourselves to keep it where we want it. And why would we want it? Why would we work so hard to keep it? Because we have in our minds the idea that the person who caused the pain can be changed - that their attitude towards us can be changed - that one day they will say sorry and they will be the person we hope they will be.
We don't have to give up on them to release that pain. We just have to accept them as they are.....that that's just where they're at and their reasons for being they way they are...are very very human - just as we are who are for the same reasons.
And the truth is.....whether or not they change is irrelevant. If they did turn around and apologise and change and become the person our idealistic label for them tells us they should be.....the chances are we would find some other reason to hold onto that pain. Because we have convinced ourselves we need it. It has become such an integral part of us for so long that we are addicted to it - like cocaine. And just like cocaine - it makes us sick - in body and mind. We must kick it or we can never evolve.
So it is a habit and it is not our natural state of being. When we start to dwell on the negative, when we call up the memories that hurt, when we indulge in the criticisms of others that we know not to be true.....we gotta try to remember to reach for the positive. A happy memory or a mantra to use as a weapon. Eventually it will become instinctive. When that happens we will start to really win.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
How Extraordinary
How extraordinary are the moments of quiet. I often come short of the philosophy, 'Speak little, listen much' but today I didn't - and it was beautiful. There are moments, if you lie quietly in the early morning, when nobody is about and just ponder for a while. Sometimes, if I remember to listen, I can hear the universe and it amazes me.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
Sometimes....
Sometimes I come across something that really does get under my skin. These are days when the human race disgusts me and I think about reclassifying myself and denying that I was ever connected. You read about things happening overseas in other countries that are truly wrong. Kids being sold to slavers and the sex-trade by their own parents and much much worse. It deeply saddens me and there's not much to do but take comfort that these things are not happening in my own country.
But now and then.....my illusions are shattered and I discover that evils just as great are being done to the most innocent and vulnerable members of our society - our children. In our own backyard (in our town) on this very day they are debating whether or not to charge a man with murder or manslaughter because he used lethal force on his two-year old nephew. Thats right folks....two. This child was two when this 'creature' roundhouse kicked him in the stomach and split his pancreas. The man that killed that child is a murderer - plain and simple - there is no 'debate' on the issue. What is worse is that this is not an isolated incident and nor is it the worst of what happens either and its happening in NZ on a regular basis. It is happening on a grand scale to children all over the world, from the individual crime against a child to the great political shams created so that some fatcat can roll around in more money or more land or more power. So much terrible suffering by so many so young.
There is a sickness in the human race that must go. It is the lack of respect for life, the lack of respect for anothers right to know the basic necessities of life - food, water, shelter and love. It is the dreadful pretense that we call ourselves human when so many of us have barely a humane bone in our bodies.
But now and then.....my illusions are shattered and I discover that evils just as great are being done to the most innocent and vulnerable members of our society - our children. In our own backyard (in our town) on this very day they are debating whether or not to charge a man with murder or manslaughter because he used lethal force on his two-year old nephew. Thats right folks....two. This child was two when this 'creature' roundhouse kicked him in the stomach and split his pancreas. The man that killed that child is a murderer - plain and simple - there is no 'debate' on the issue. What is worse is that this is not an isolated incident and nor is it the worst of what happens either and its happening in NZ on a regular basis. It is happening on a grand scale to children all over the world, from the individual crime against a child to the great political shams created so that some fatcat can roll around in more money or more land or more power. So much terrible suffering by so many so young.
There is a sickness in the human race that must go. It is the lack of respect for life, the lack of respect for anothers right to know the basic necessities of life - food, water, shelter and love. It is the dreadful pretense that we call ourselves human when so many of us have barely a humane bone in our bodies.
Monday, November 22, 2010
The ancestors gift
We have a certain habit in the western world to romanticize native ancestry a bit. We don't often hear of the ikky stuff we're not comfortable with but I think its a neccessary thing to know, just to keep things grounded. My Maori ancestors were into cannibalism and slaves.....ewwwww, I know, but nevertheless they did have some amazing ideas (none of which was Kai Tangata/manmeat or slavery). One in particular has been essential in my own developing, healing pschye. In complete contrast to their somewhat brutal lifestyle, I consider it to be quite an 'evolving concept' for me. Used in todays world and applied to the self-worth wounds we all know and wish we understood, it heals and helps to bring us past that which holds us back.
It is the concept of the self-universe. Old pre-christian Maori cosmology taught that each person is the center of their own universe. What is starting to work particularly well for me is the understanding that that is the only place I need to be.
As a child, regardless of whether or not we had the most caring parents in the world, we will have come to a point where we came to understand that we were not the centre of our parents universe - that somewhere something else came first. In that moment, our sense of self-worth is first wounded. And even with the most caring parents in the world, we cannot possibly be the centre of every decision at all times, simply because they too are human, with moments of selfishness and fear.
In many cases, the worst things in the world really did come first....and in others it may have been a perception of something coming first such as a new baby or a job. Whatever age we are at, when that happens, will govern how we continue to perceive each situation in our lives that re-illustrates the idea that we are not the centre of our parents universe. People will often go through their lives using the same coping mechanisms that they developed at that very age creating behaviour patterns from then on.
For me, as a miltary brat and the oldest of four, I often felt somwhat out-in-the-cold. Just about every oldest child I have ever met knows the words......'you're the oldest, you can cope' or something to that effect.
There's a special growing sense of invisibility with each child that comes into the family that you just kind of quietly ignore when you're the oldest girl. Isn't sibling placement fun! hehehe....we all have our hangups on that one. And military kids come to understand very early on that things like the career, booze, guns and mates will always come first. The pressies when they come home again for a bit are lovely but watching the next door neighbour go out with her Dad every weekend kinda outlines that perhaps something's lacking a bit in your own family dynamics. So I set about 'helping' without being asked to - even when people didn't want it - especially when they didn't want it cos clearly they needed it! Haha - its probably why oldest girls often have the reputation of being bossy. But it was my way of saying....no, no - you need me - I matter. I continued to behave this way well into my 30s before I recognised the behaviour pattern, what it did and where it came from and why it had to go.
So this is why the self-universe works for me........in my meanderings, I already understand that everything matters. All that lives and breathes matters on a deeply spiritual level. The life giving energy of the larger universe we live in feeds on the experiences we bring it. It takes it into itself and records it for all time and it all grows and creates life.
To know also that I am the centre of my own universe, which is the only place I need to be, changes everything. I no longer feel the need to paint myself into the centre of other people's universes like a child's drawing on a photo. That's a lot more energy I can put elsewhere! Thanks Tipuna/ancestors!
It is the concept of the self-universe. Old pre-christian Maori cosmology taught that each person is the center of their own universe. What is starting to work particularly well for me is the understanding that that is the only place I need to be.
As a child, regardless of whether or not we had the most caring parents in the world, we will have come to a point where we came to understand that we were not the centre of our parents universe - that somewhere something else came first. In that moment, our sense of self-worth is first wounded. And even with the most caring parents in the world, we cannot possibly be the centre of every decision at all times, simply because they too are human, with moments of selfishness and fear.
In many cases, the worst things in the world really did come first....and in others it may have been a perception of something coming first such as a new baby or a job. Whatever age we are at, when that happens, will govern how we continue to perceive each situation in our lives that re-illustrates the idea that we are not the centre of our parents universe. People will often go through their lives using the same coping mechanisms that they developed at that very age creating behaviour patterns from then on.
For me, as a miltary brat and the oldest of four, I often felt somwhat out-in-the-cold. Just about every oldest child I have ever met knows the words......'you're the oldest, you can cope' or something to that effect.
There's a special growing sense of invisibility with each child that comes into the family that you just kind of quietly ignore when you're the oldest girl. Isn't sibling placement fun! hehehe....we all have our hangups on that one. And military kids come to understand very early on that things like the career, booze, guns and mates will always come first. The pressies when they come home again for a bit are lovely but watching the next door neighbour go out with her Dad every weekend kinda outlines that perhaps something's lacking a bit in your own family dynamics. So I set about 'helping' without being asked to - even when people didn't want it - especially when they didn't want it cos clearly they needed it! Haha - its probably why oldest girls often have the reputation of being bossy. But it was my way of saying....no, no - you need me - I matter. I continued to behave this way well into my 30s before I recognised the behaviour pattern, what it did and where it came from and why it had to go.
So this is why the self-universe works for me........in my meanderings, I already understand that everything matters. All that lives and breathes matters on a deeply spiritual level. The life giving energy of the larger universe we live in feeds on the experiences we bring it. It takes it into itself and records it for all time and it all grows and creates life.
To know also that I am the centre of my own universe, which is the only place I need to be, changes everything. I no longer feel the need to paint myself into the centre of other people's universes like a child's drawing on a photo. That's a lot more energy I can put elsewhere! Thanks Tipuna/ancestors!
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Re: Warrior Women
I was talking to a very dear friend the other day, whose been going through some pretty tough change for some time now. She was talking about a new tattoo that would mark a new way of being for her. And she said something so profound and so ordinarily lost for most women that it set me on a real bender this week.
She said...."I'm not a survivor, I am a warrior."
There's a huge difference to me because to say that you're a survivor implies that you were (and probably still are) a victim. When someone talks about a soldier living through 'the-battle-of-such-and-such', they don't say...."so-and-so is a survivor of the-battle-of-such-and-such'. They say, "so-and-so is a veteran of the-battle-of-such-and-such". An even if the word 'survived' is used, it's never in the context of the soldier being a victim in the first place. Victims are survivors when they win through their challenges - warriors are veterans.
Now don't get me wrong.....I'm not belittling the efforts of those who call themselves survivors - hell no. Until a week ago - so did I! It's no small feat to get through the garbage life can chuck at a person - life's a funny beast. What I'm saying is that with term survivor, we may not have entirely moved out of the arena of 'victim'. As a veteran of domestic abuse, there is has definitely been a subtle change in my thought patterns when I think of that time in my life. I believe that we can get further still in our healing processes by addressing ourselves as warriors rather than survivors.
She said...."I'm not a survivor, I am a warrior."
There's a huge difference to me because to say that you're a survivor implies that you were (and probably still are) a victim. When someone talks about a soldier living through 'the-battle-of-such-and-such', they don't say...."so-and-so is a survivor of the-battle-of-such-and-such'. They say, "so-and-so is a veteran of the-battle-of-such-and-such". An even if the word 'survived' is used, it's never in the context of the soldier being a victim in the first place. Victims are survivors when they win through their challenges - warriors are veterans.
Now don't get me wrong.....I'm not belittling the efforts of those who call themselves survivors - hell no. Until a week ago - so did I! It's no small feat to get through the garbage life can chuck at a person - life's a funny beast. What I'm saying is that with term survivor, we may not have entirely moved out of the arena of 'victim'. As a veteran of domestic abuse, there is has definitely been a subtle change in my thought patterns when I think of that time in my life. I believe that we can get further still in our healing processes by addressing ourselves as warriors rather than survivors.
Friday, April 16, 2010
A sense of self worth
Self worth.....not self esteem.......very, very different in my book. And it's fascinating to realise that every single case of depression that I have ever come to understand (including my own) has stemmed from a damaged sense of self-worth - the idea of your own preciousness. A damaged sense of self-worth always seems to begin in childhood and the consequences continue to ripple throughout our lives. A question that I have (amongst many of course) is.....are we born with this sense of preciousness intact or is it something we learn (or don't). In other words, do we already have it and it is taken by a death or a callous act.....or is it something that the people around us encourage us to feel & understand?
And the thing that gets on my bal-lee-lees is that even as a rational, reasoning adult, I can't seem to repair it - no matter what epiphanies or emotional techniques I come up with. It's like a spiritual memory just out of my reach. And I understand why some psychology exercises should technically work well to repair this kind of damage but don't - like the one where you get to shout at someone who is 'standing in' for one of the people who were the source of your pain. Maybe the damage is specific the person who caused it and surrogate techniques can't work because of it.
What I know is that I came to believe, as a very young child, that I didn't matter much. I kept it as a core belief all the way through into adulthood and even though I have a loving family of my own - this belief still persists.
However, having said all that - perhaps it's not so strong as it used to be. I have come to understand that every living thing is special to the universe because we are all unique from the moment we are conceived and every experience that we gain - every moment of understanding we achieve - enhances our uniqueness throughout our lives. Yes.......that's kinda cool and I think it definitely helps.
And the thing that gets on my bal-lee-lees is that even as a rational, reasoning adult, I can't seem to repair it - no matter what epiphanies or emotional techniques I come up with. It's like a spiritual memory just out of my reach. And I understand why some psychology exercises should technically work well to repair this kind of damage but don't - like the one where you get to shout at someone who is 'standing in' for one of the people who were the source of your pain. Maybe the damage is specific the person who caused it and surrogate techniques can't work because of it.
What I know is that I came to believe, as a very young child, that I didn't matter much. I kept it as a core belief all the way through into adulthood and even though I have a loving family of my own - this belief still persists.
However, having said all that - perhaps it's not so strong as it used to be. I have come to understand that every living thing is special to the universe because we are all unique from the moment we are conceived and every experience that we gain - every moment of understanding we achieve - enhances our uniqueness throughout our lives. Yes.......that's kinda cool and I think it definitely helps.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Re: Spiritual con men
My husband taped something for me the other day, and discovering it, I sat down tonight to watch it with keen anticipation. Its a short little piece on some holy man overseas somewhere and as I watch, my illusions of holy men in religions (other than those that I'm familiar with) are rapidly dissolving.
Now I don't need to mention him or where he's from because there are so many of them, just like him, in so many religions and spiritual practices. There they sit, having removed themselves from daily life, daily worries and mortal peril. They sit surrounded in opulent wealth, often wearing some sort of robe denoting poverty and simplicity, with thousands of followers hanging upon their every word. I was reading (about a month ago) about a couple just like it who live in India and charge westerners exorbitant fees to share their 'wisdom'. And don't think for a second that I'm excluding churches here.
To make it worse, the squares and commons that the 'gatherings' of these 'holy creatures' are held in, are usually the everyday home of the poorest of the poor. What's wrong with this picture?
So there I am thinking, you fake person sitting there pretending to be wise and wearing pretend-poor-mans robes. No wonder mankinds sense of spirituality is so up the bo-ay when these con-men and women are the ones telling people what to do and how to be.
Now I don't need to mention him or where he's from because there are so many of them, just like him, in so many religions and spiritual practices. There they sit, having removed themselves from daily life, daily worries and mortal peril. They sit surrounded in opulent wealth, often wearing some sort of robe denoting poverty and simplicity, with thousands of followers hanging upon their every word. I was reading (about a month ago) about a couple just like it who live in India and charge westerners exorbitant fees to share their 'wisdom'. And don't think for a second that I'm excluding churches here.
To make it worse, the squares and commons that the 'gatherings' of these 'holy creatures' are held in, are usually the everyday home of the poorest of the poor. What's wrong with this picture?
So there I am thinking, you fake person sitting there pretending to be wise and wearing pretend-poor-mans robes. No wonder mankinds sense of spirituality is so up the bo-ay when these con-men and women are the ones telling people what to do and how to be.
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