Last night my conscious and semi conscious mind were on a roll.... I would dream something, disturbing - nd then I would half wake, and ask my unconscious something else - and go back to dreaming. I slept hard for nearly 12 hours, and woke exhausted.
I wrote all of it out - and somehow, my finger slipped, and I managed to delete the whole entry - (I never know, when this happens, if this is an act of God or of technology....) We are now 10 hours later, and I will try and see what my mind has processed of this.
For those of you who know me or have read my work, you know my back ground and my life story. I grew up in violence and abuse, alcoholism and addiction, frightened and insecure as long as can remember. I do not say these things for sympathy - but only to explain the theory of development that comes with such a back ground. Let me state, categorically, that I am infuriated when I see some of these forces still driving me, beyond my conscious mind, after so many years.
When being raised in situations such as these, children find clever adaptive strategies, to make their lives still livable. We must. My eldest brother, he became detached, and cold. He doesn't suffer, because he doesn't FEEL. My middle brother, arguably the most sensitive of the three - well, I am not sure what his strategy was - just that he found Jesus... and he is OK. Don't look - don't tell.
Me? I set out to be the best little girl in the world. I became compliant, forgiving, christian in my soul. I heard the voices of Gods and angels. I beleived that every one was good underneath, and that if people weren't sick and injured and ill - they would not be the way they are.
I believed what Anne Frank said - "in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart.” I tried to forgive everyone, 70 x 7. I turned the other cheek.
Sounds good, no? Well, out of all the maladaptive ways to deal with dysfuntion - I suppose that this might well be the best, but it is not driven out of health or purity, it is driven my a neurotic need to be loved, out of a need to make sense out of a world that is fundamentally senselss, a world that is broken - full of broken and damaged people.
Because of good genetics, or being a lonely child, or some sense of struggling against chaos - I began to route my escape early. I found God in a small Kenosha church when I was 7 - and I became a devoutly liberal progressive Christian at the age of 7.
As a young teen I read Fromm and Frankl - where I discovered self responsibiity - that one must MAKE meaning from meaningless suffering. These ideas saved my life at a time when life was too unbearable to live.
As an older teen I discoved Jane Roberts, who channelled a spirit named Seth. Now, regardless of our shared skeptisicim about people who channel spirits, this material was good. It taught that we are responsibile for our reality, and we can change our reality by changing our thoughts. I also was introduced to Dan Millman - another author who talked about living life with a purpose. These books propelled me into college, into finding a life of my own, beyond the small world of my home town.
I dabble in wicca, in Christainity, Buddhism. I read Jung, Hillman, Moore. I listen to Pema Chodron, I work through toltec shamanism, step by step. I write and think about these issues a lot. I have studied the deep thinkers, I have gone through hundreds of thousands of dollars of therapy. I chant, I pray, I study --- I have worked my whole life long on 'personal growth' -
And perhaps I have come a long way towards my child hood dream of attainin some sort of spiritual enlightenment... but, I'm still broken. I am still that 6 year old child wanting someone to take care of her. All this work - all this reading - all of this emotional pain of trying to heal....
When is it going to be that I consider myself OK? When will I outgrow my nuerotic compulsions, my needs for nourishment from others? Am I lovable if I am still broken? And, more - is this drive to grow, to really really grow - is not this just another nuerotic manifestation of a child like attempt to make some bargain with the powers that be - "If I become perfect, will you love me then?"
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