What have you heard about Narcissism?
What have you read?
What have you experienced?
I am certainly no expert. And I have not read all that much, but I think a lot of what the official literature says about Narcissism is really misguided. I tend to place a high value on what individuals write from their personal experience.
One site I think is really insightful (and terrifying) is written by an actual Narcissist:
https://narcsite.com/2017/01/15/what-do-narcissists-feel/
I think those in the medical community assume Narcissists are born that way, maybe they might give some attribution to how living through trauma changes an individuals DNA and this is passed on to his or her offspring.
I think those in the therapy or child development community might think Narcissists are a product of a parenting style or a childhood learning environment that may have included trauma.
If you read this blog, you will read my case for what we call Narcissism is actually the same exact behaviors societies around the world naturally organize themselves around to defend against physical threats of all kinds, and it's only when the threats go away, and the trauma from the battles goes unprocessed, that those same behaviors go from protecting a community to knocking the door wide open to all manner of corruption, self-dealing and destabilization and blocking it's progress in every dimension.
Countries, organizations and families literally start harming themselves and isolating themselves away from the outside world, in a self-created world with no accountability, no self control, and no growth. It is a completely closed, self-replicating system.
For example, it is said by many people that the emotions of Narcissists are different than those of neuro-typical people.
Continuing soon...going to bed I am a sleepyhead!!
Wednesday, April 18, 2018
Descendants of Pain
In my post called generational amnesia, I wrote about the powerful emotional boundaries that define the outer reaches of safety and possibility for many descendants after a family or community experiences trauma, in many cases limiting their experience.
Many populations share the experience of their community being under active threat by another more powerful group. Blacks in the Southern states, Irish or Polish immigrants coming to the United States, Jewish people under threat of the Nazis. The experience is almost universal affecting every ethic group at some time in their history, since we have evolved through tribal leadership into monarchy alliances into modern day governments.
Just as individuals recreate personal traumatic circumstances over and over again, until and unless they ultimately outgrow it into healthier patterns, families and societies do the same thing, and we are still processing historical and communal atrocities together now.
When there are actual threats to the safety of individuals and families, they naturally align themselves into strong authoritarian hierarchies. Common attributes are strong top-down leadership, suppression of emotion, focus on obedience, suppression of self-expression, focus on contributions to the group and allocation of resources as group resources, among other things. Narcissism is what we call these same behaviors when the threat is no longer active and present, and the patterns themselves become the threat of harm to the individuals in the family.
Re-contextualized as such, narcissism as a group pattern becomes a rational response to circumstances, that just no longer exist. If you are living through religious persecution, the most stark example being the Holocaust, all members lives depend on the leader. That person can never experience their actual emotions because they have to be 'on' and anyone displaying actual emotion threatens a chain reaction that could sideline the whole group.
If someone is excessively emotional, they are a threat because any show of emotion could alert a guard, disrupt an event or take valuable time and ultimately endanger the entire group.
If someone breaks out of their proscribed role and is too much of a truth-teller, that too could cause group members to break down emotionally or it could cause too much attention or take too much time, threatening the entire group.
If someone was too talented, or attracted too much attention in a positive way, that too presents threat, as others in the community might be resentful, they could be tempted to steal, or guards to rape, making the family a target by other community members, or by the powerful outsiders.
If someone had too much independence, or wanderlust, or they were too confrontational, that person would be allowed to just go.
The imperative for everyone in the whole group would be to constantly stay safe, focus on the good and what good fortune they did have, and enjoy all the time possible with your loved ones so 'they' --the outsiders--did not win.
Leaders would have been called on to ration so much----who received health care, how to distribute limited food, who to invest limited resources in and mostly, who to trust. All members of the family needed to go through the leader for every decision, otherwise, the entire family could literally die. So, the reality everyone was facing justified whatever kind of emotional pressure it took to ensure complete and total compliance. The leader felt free to use every tool--overt and covert to keep everyone safe and alive, and the family members were just grateful to give over all sorts of things--autonomy, self-determination, recognition, the right to question decisions, privacy, and so much more, all as a way to express their gratitude for the work the leader was doing to preserve everyone's life, and gratitude all of those issues were not rested on their shoulders personally.
Members were taught and also instinctively responded by not ever questioning the leader. They also instinctively and reflexively gave all of their resources to be managed by the leader, who could ensure they could be used to barter for the life or safety of someone, could be given to another family in need, or could be protected from theft. Trust of the leader by the members was implacable.
Leaders had to absorb knowing about all of the danger, while keeping everyone in the dark and as happy as possible, while knowing some of their decisions about healthcare and food rationing meant some members would survive and thrive and others would not, and they had to reconcile themselves with the fact that sometimes that meant some family members would not survive because of their decisions. All while staying in 'role' nearly 100% of the time. No time to grieve. No time for sadness, anger or fear about their circumstances. This required superhuman strength.
Smart leaders begin grooming another family member to take over should the leader die or become incapacitated. All extra resources must be diverted to them so that the hierarchy remains and the subservient ones become dependent on them.
Also, leaders can not afford to feel their actual feelings, so they delegate others to feel for them. Leaders are also responsible to create an emotional tone for the entire group, and when everyone's safety is at stake, there is a big difference between what the leader wants the group to feel and what the leader and members actually feel. The leader gets good at using projective language, or projecting events or experiences onto others, emotions that would normally be felt by individuals in the moment are sublimated and sourced out to the entire group.
Leaders must control the emotional tone and keep the members safe from acting out on their aggressive instincts, both from conflicts arising within the group and from their natural feelings of anger and aggression toward the outsiders threatening their safety. They accomplish this by having the flexibility to tread lightly on those who can't handle much criticism even though they might deserve it, and creating whipping boy types from those with a stronger constitution even if they are not culpable for a particular act. This unpredictable and disproportionate distribution of rewards and consequences keeps everyone in a state of deprivation and under the leader's emotional control.
For this supersized and highly emotional role which is disproportionately larger than all other group members roles and contribution, and as a tranquilizer of sorts, because if the leader were to try to begin to emotionally process all of the trauma they are experiencing, it would open the floodgates and emotionally level them and incapacitate them, which is not a benefit to them or their members, they reward themselves with the largess of their group.
AND THIS IS WHERE THEY CAN DO SOME PROPERTY DAMAGE
Usually, because they can not feel, and to feel is to have limits and moderation and conscience, and self-control, they feel very entitled, and so they overdo it. The way this happens is unique to the trauma they have personally lived through, how much pent-up anger and revenge they feel but can not direct to the actual perpetrator, how inhibited they are from expressing that revenge, and how many resources they have access to. That is the formula for how egregious the entitlement expression is in real life. The corollary is the same formula for their followers, and that his how NOT angry they are and how NOT motivated they are to hold their leader accountable.
Everyone, at all levels of the hierarchy knows, the reckoning of accountability must never come. The leader must never be held personally accountable for the decisions that he or she made when the family was facing the threat. The accumulated trauma of so many losses, and the questions of conscience when there were so many grey areas and yet a decision had to be made, the emotional load from all of that accumulated atrocity is too great. That a person would have been called to perform the role of leader in those circumstances was too much. All of the fault lies with the persecutors, the outsiders. The leader has no guilt. The leader, like the followers, the entire community was ultimately all victims of the outside aggressors, without which these ghastly acts of survival would not have taken place.
Coming to terms with all of the losses and facing the multiple atrocities and layers of trauma of an experience like the Pogroms could re-injure everyone in the community, allowing the perpetrators to win yet again. Which must never ever happen. And, so, with the strength and resilience of the human spirit to survive and flourish, even in the most harrowing of circumstances, this kind of cancer encapsulates into itself, never to be spoken about in most families. Never to be thought about by most people. Never to be re-experienced and re-integrated. But, it does live on.
Just as living with a super-sized responsibility in a family and a community, while living under a tremendous amount of stress and constant threats with access to huge amounts of group resources creates a situation where a leader feels personally entitled to group resources and doesn't have self-control, groups who live under these circumstances have the propensity to cause even greater harm to their members or unwitting bystanders.
AND HERE IS WHERE THEY CAN DO SOME REAL HUMAN DAMAGE
When your family or your community has been victimized in some way---starved by your king intentionally because he wants everyone to become Catholic, starved by your king intentionally because he can sell potatoes for more money than if he just gives them to his citizens, forced to live in squalor without access to healthcare, food, education, shelter, or worse, shipped off in trains to your death, you have the lived experience of being treated like you might as well not exist. There is no value to your life, or anyone in your family or your whole community. There is no dignity. There is constant degredation. Everyday is worse than the last and you don't know how low it will go.
The anger and rage you develop toward your captors, which you can not express, lest you endanger everyone's lives further fills you with a resignation and fury that gives you the energy to live the rest of your days. But you learn never to ever trust an outsider.
The trouble becomes that sometimes that rage has nowhere to go, and everyone is a dead man walking anyway, a lot sooner than anyone all would normally be, and because no one is allowed to feel or else they release that torrent of emotion that levels members in instant incapacitation--the third rail---so no one is allowed to develop self-control, moderation, no one take in feedback about how their actions affect others, which are all necessary to develop a conscience, sometimes, in that rage and frustration, or maybe because something has triggered a reaction and a member doesn't have good self-control, they take all of that pent-up fury and rage they feel toward the outside aggressors, which is righteous and normal--and they instead direct it toward someone in their own group who has done nothing to them. Maybe someone younger, smaller, weaker? And because of how accountability and consequences are disproportionately allocated by the leader, maybe they feel there will be no consequences. Maybe they threaten their victim with saying not to tell or they will turn the entire group against them. Maybe they're confident the leader will cover for them. Remember their state of mind and life circumstances are quite different, they can not afford to value a life like we do in our society in this day an age, so what is the big deal. The true horror comes to the victim when their entire community turns on them, en masse, simultaneously, at either the direction of their attacker or the leader, sending them out alone, injured, into a hostile environment, with no resources, heaping blame for their new status as social leper, when the person has done nothing to deserve this vicious community betrayal.
In this way, all members practice a depersonalization and preparation for their communal demise. They act out the betrayal each person feels by playing it out in real life. The entire community has a fatalism, and an active or passive interest in self-harm and this scapegoating and community expulsion of a member serves to push someone into acting on those urges, perhaps when other members feel constrained. Again, people in these situations do not get to develop their own conscience, and they don't have the same value for the life of an individual or for their own life, as someone who has not faced such deprivation. Someone in this situation might think or feel the rational thing would be relief from suffering, or freedom, and in that situation, the only real option to achieve that is death. So, we need to be very careful about applying our armchair 2018 opinions about life and good and bad and nice and mean and really think about what it might be like to live day after day in the kinds of hardship and deprivation that I am talking about here.
The problem is that because of the nature of these types of atrocities: war, famine, religious persecution, sometimes the trauma was so great that our ancestors encapsulated the damage to survive and live another day, but they kept the same authoritarian group structure and parenting patterns as though your family is still facing a very dangerous active threat. And, consistent with those patterns, no one questions what the family has always done, even if it's causing harm. That is called Narcissism.
I will write many posts about the hallmarks of Narcissism and which threat they are intending to address, and how they are intending to address them. I don't think I can change your family's pattern, but, maybe it might help to have some emotional distance and compassion for them, so you don't have to spend a million hours wondering "What the motherfuckng hell?" like I have done in my life.
Many populations share the experience of their community being under active threat by another more powerful group. Blacks in the Southern states, Irish or Polish immigrants coming to the United States, Jewish people under threat of the Nazis. The experience is almost universal affecting every ethic group at some time in their history, since we have evolved through tribal leadership into monarchy alliances into modern day governments.
Just as individuals recreate personal traumatic circumstances over and over again, until and unless they ultimately outgrow it into healthier patterns, families and societies do the same thing, and we are still processing historical and communal atrocities together now.
When there are actual threats to the safety of individuals and families, they naturally align themselves into strong authoritarian hierarchies. Common attributes are strong top-down leadership, suppression of emotion, focus on obedience, suppression of self-expression, focus on contributions to the group and allocation of resources as group resources, among other things. Narcissism is what we call these same behaviors when the threat is no longer active and present, and the patterns themselves become the threat of harm to the individuals in the family.
Re-contextualized as such, narcissism as a group pattern becomes a rational response to circumstances, that just no longer exist. If you are living through religious persecution, the most stark example being the Holocaust, all members lives depend on the leader. That person can never experience their actual emotions because they have to be 'on' and anyone displaying actual emotion threatens a chain reaction that could sideline the whole group.
If someone is excessively emotional, they are a threat because any show of emotion could alert a guard, disrupt an event or take valuable time and ultimately endanger the entire group.
If someone breaks out of their proscribed role and is too much of a truth-teller, that too could cause group members to break down emotionally or it could cause too much attention or take too much time, threatening the entire group.
If someone was too talented, or attracted too much attention in a positive way, that too presents threat, as others in the community might be resentful, they could be tempted to steal, or guards to rape, making the family a target by other community members, or by the powerful outsiders.
If someone had too much independence, or wanderlust, or they were too confrontational, that person would be allowed to just go.
The imperative for everyone in the whole group would be to constantly stay safe, focus on the good and what good fortune they did have, and enjoy all the time possible with your loved ones so 'they' --the outsiders--did not win.
Leaders would have been called on to ration so much----who received health care, how to distribute limited food, who to invest limited resources in and mostly, who to trust. All members of the family needed to go through the leader for every decision, otherwise, the entire family could literally die. So, the reality everyone was facing justified whatever kind of emotional pressure it took to ensure complete and total compliance. The leader felt free to use every tool--overt and covert to keep everyone safe and alive, and the family members were just grateful to give over all sorts of things--autonomy, self-determination, recognition, the right to question decisions, privacy, and so much more, all as a way to express their gratitude for the work the leader was doing to preserve everyone's life, and gratitude all of those issues were not rested on their shoulders personally.
Members were taught and also instinctively responded by not ever questioning the leader. They also instinctively and reflexively gave all of their resources to be managed by the leader, who could ensure they could be used to barter for the life or safety of someone, could be given to another family in need, or could be protected from theft. Trust of the leader by the members was implacable.
Leaders had to absorb knowing about all of the danger, while keeping everyone in the dark and as happy as possible, while knowing some of their decisions about healthcare and food rationing meant some members would survive and thrive and others would not, and they had to reconcile themselves with the fact that sometimes that meant some family members would not survive because of their decisions. All while staying in 'role' nearly 100% of the time. No time to grieve. No time for sadness, anger or fear about their circumstances. This required superhuman strength.
Smart leaders begin grooming another family member to take over should the leader die or become incapacitated. All extra resources must be diverted to them so that the hierarchy remains and the subservient ones become dependent on them.
Also, leaders can not afford to feel their actual feelings, so they delegate others to feel for them. Leaders are also responsible to create an emotional tone for the entire group, and when everyone's safety is at stake, there is a big difference between what the leader wants the group to feel and what the leader and members actually feel. The leader gets good at using projective language, or projecting events or experiences onto others, emotions that would normally be felt by individuals in the moment are sublimated and sourced out to the entire group.
Leaders must control the emotional tone and keep the members safe from acting out on their aggressive instincts, both from conflicts arising within the group and from their natural feelings of anger and aggression toward the outsiders threatening their safety. They accomplish this by having the flexibility to tread lightly on those who can't handle much criticism even though they might deserve it, and creating whipping boy types from those with a stronger constitution even if they are not culpable for a particular act. This unpredictable and disproportionate distribution of rewards and consequences keeps everyone in a state of deprivation and under the leader's emotional control.
For this supersized and highly emotional role which is disproportionately larger than all other group members roles and contribution, and as a tranquilizer of sorts, because if the leader were to try to begin to emotionally process all of the trauma they are experiencing, it would open the floodgates and emotionally level them and incapacitate them, which is not a benefit to them or their members, they reward themselves with the largess of their group.
AND THIS IS WHERE THEY CAN DO SOME PROPERTY DAMAGE
Usually, because they can not feel, and to feel is to have limits and moderation and conscience, and self-control, they feel very entitled, and so they overdo it. The way this happens is unique to the trauma they have personally lived through, how much pent-up anger and revenge they feel but can not direct to the actual perpetrator, how inhibited they are from expressing that revenge, and how many resources they have access to. That is the formula for how egregious the entitlement expression is in real life. The corollary is the same formula for their followers, and that his how NOT angry they are and how NOT motivated they are to hold their leader accountable.
Everyone, at all levels of the hierarchy knows, the reckoning of accountability must never come. The leader must never be held personally accountable for the decisions that he or she made when the family was facing the threat. The accumulated trauma of so many losses, and the questions of conscience when there were so many grey areas and yet a decision had to be made, the emotional load from all of that accumulated atrocity is too great. That a person would have been called to perform the role of leader in those circumstances was too much. All of the fault lies with the persecutors, the outsiders. The leader has no guilt. The leader, like the followers, the entire community was ultimately all victims of the outside aggressors, without which these ghastly acts of survival would not have taken place.
Coming to terms with all of the losses and facing the multiple atrocities and layers of trauma of an experience like the Pogroms could re-injure everyone in the community, allowing the perpetrators to win yet again. Which must never ever happen. And, so, with the strength and resilience of the human spirit to survive and flourish, even in the most harrowing of circumstances, this kind of cancer encapsulates into itself, never to be spoken about in most families. Never to be thought about by most people. Never to be re-experienced and re-integrated. But, it does live on.
Just as living with a super-sized responsibility in a family and a community, while living under a tremendous amount of stress and constant threats with access to huge amounts of group resources creates a situation where a leader feels personally entitled to group resources and doesn't have self-control, groups who live under these circumstances have the propensity to cause even greater harm to their members or unwitting bystanders.
AND HERE IS WHERE THEY CAN DO SOME REAL HUMAN DAMAGE
When your family or your community has been victimized in some way---starved by your king intentionally because he wants everyone to become Catholic, starved by your king intentionally because he can sell potatoes for more money than if he just gives them to his citizens, forced to live in squalor without access to healthcare, food, education, shelter, or worse, shipped off in trains to your death, you have the lived experience of being treated like you might as well not exist. There is no value to your life, or anyone in your family or your whole community. There is no dignity. There is constant degredation. Everyday is worse than the last and you don't know how low it will go.
The anger and rage you develop toward your captors, which you can not express, lest you endanger everyone's lives further fills you with a resignation and fury that gives you the energy to live the rest of your days. But you learn never to ever trust an outsider.
The trouble becomes that sometimes that rage has nowhere to go, and everyone is a dead man walking anyway, a lot sooner than anyone all would normally be, and because no one is allowed to feel or else they release that torrent of emotion that levels members in instant incapacitation--the third rail---so no one is allowed to develop self-control, moderation, no one take in feedback about how their actions affect others, which are all necessary to develop a conscience, sometimes, in that rage and frustration, or maybe because something has triggered a reaction and a member doesn't have good self-control, they take all of that pent-up fury and rage they feel toward the outside aggressors, which is righteous and normal--and they instead direct it toward someone in their own group who has done nothing to them. Maybe someone younger, smaller, weaker? And because of how accountability and consequences are disproportionately allocated by the leader, maybe they feel there will be no consequences. Maybe they threaten their victim with saying not to tell or they will turn the entire group against them. Maybe they're confident the leader will cover for them. Remember their state of mind and life circumstances are quite different, they can not afford to value a life like we do in our society in this day an age, so what is the big deal. The true horror comes to the victim when their entire community turns on them, en masse, simultaneously, at either the direction of their attacker or the leader, sending them out alone, injured, into a hostile environment, with no resources, heaping blame for their new status as social leper, when the person has done nothing to deserve this vicious community betrayal.
In this way, all members practice a depersonalization and preparation for their communal demise. They act out the betrayal each person feels by playing it out in real life. The entire community has a fatalism, and an active or passive interest in self-harm and this scapegoating and community expulsion of a member serves to push someone into acting on those urges, perhaps when other members feel constrained. Again, people in these situations do not get to develop their own conscience, and they don't have the same value for the life of an individual or for their own life, as someone who has not faced such deprivation. Someone in this situation might think or feel the rational thing would be relief from suffering, or freedom, and in that situation, the only real option to achieve that is death. So, we need to be very careful about applying our armchair 2018 opinions about life and good and bad and nice and mean and really think about what it might be like to live day after day in the kinds of hardship and deprivation that I am talking about here.
The problem is that because of the nature of these types of atrocities: war, famine, religious persecution, sometimes the trauma was so great that our ancestors encapsulated the damage to survive and live another day, but they kept the same authoritarian group structure and parenting patterns as though your family is still facing a very dangerous active threat. And, consistent with those patterns, no one questions what the family has always done, even if it's causing harm. That is called Narcissism.
I will write many posts about the hallmarks of Narcissism and which threat they are intending to address, and how they are intending to address them. I don't think I can change your family's pattern, but, maybe it might help to have some emotional distance and compassion for them, so you don't have to spend a million hours wondering "What the motherfuckng hell?" like I have done in my life.
Thursday, April 5, 2018
Generational Amnesia
Generational Amnesia: A theory of how our society evolves in real time.
As I described in the Aspirations Become Abuses post, that social expectations about child rearing best practices are constantly changing and that this results in our society constantly reframing very ordinary things into dangerous or irresponsible behaviors with the potential to harm children, another process of change also affects how parents themselves define their parenting priorities. Each generation of parents is usually motivated to do better job with their kids, or to produce more successful kids than their parents were able to do for them.
The gap of communication this creates between generations is masterfully illustrated in the show Master of None with Aziz Ansari in the episode entitled Parents.
In my observations of friends, family and clients, I've noticed people seem to be able to focus on in improving one or two things for their kids, and that these selections are very specific to the problems and limitations for a particular family. For example, my clients who separated from their fundamentalist religious family focused on literacy, education and very much foster the expectation that their children should aim to get well paying jobs. People in their family had dyslexia, and some were stuck in a very dysfunctional harmful community environment because they could not read, go to school and thus could not financially support themselves.
Another family I know focuses on providing the best primary school environment for their children, and wants them to deeply feel like they are part of a supportive group of students and friends and teachers who understand their unique gifts. I happen to know their mother very much felt invisible and that no one in her family was in a position to place her needs at the forefront, and she deals with the health consequences and wellness challenges in her own life as a result.
Another family I know keeps their children close, with just a couple of friends, and does not allow them to go to birthday parties or social events, and most of their social life is centered around the family. In their family, their father's job in law enforcement is a constant mirror of the dangers we live with and a reminder of what people are capable of when they are at their worst. Their mother struggles daily with feeling safe, and trusting people, so she is wanting to give her children safety and the best chance to be protected until they're out on their own.
In my own case, as a young person I (wrongly) decided the conflict in my family could be traced to not enough money, and that if my mother had financial self-sufficiency, she could've emancipated herself from an abusive situation. I also (wrongly) concluded that no one loved me, and I literally was in my mid-40s before I recognized this was incorrect. So, it's accurate to say our family did not express kindness or affection. I also took a lot of responsibility and assumed many things were my fault, because I was some sort of bad influence (also wrong).
So, when I approached my parenting priorities, and my priorities for my daycare kids, it was and still is the utmost importance that I constantly empower all children to feel capable and work toward independence. I work hard to listen and be present and empathize with their emotions. I work hard to teach them to negotiate with one another instead of fighting, and I demand they show respect and kindness to eachother at all times as well. And, we do a lot of things that can be described as Attachment Parenting. It's really important to me that our children do the activities they choose and become adults that follow their own lead and internal drive, so that they will never be influenced by people who do not have their best interests at heart. I want them to have fulfillment in each area of their lives, so they must be the one to choose their careers and hobbies.
The other part of Generational Amnesia is that for everything parents do actively and consciously to fix the past on behalf of their children's future, they also hide their personal trauma and much of the adult content of the real history of their relatives.
For example, my friends who fleed their fundamentalist community. They do not tell their girls about the harsh discipline, indoctrination, and isolation they suffered personally. They do not talk about the sexual, physical and emotional abuse that goes on which is covered up by the church. They do not talk about the desperation of their cousins, aunts and uncles who feel trapped in an impossible situation. And, if they go home to visit family, they try to keep all conversations on the surface to avoid an unpleasant scene. And they only talk about how conflicted they feel-- angry but willing to help--when the kids are asleep.
So, the kids only get the urgent message to read, with a very strong 'or else' feeling. And they get a 'you must work and earn a lot of money' message with an emotional 'or else' intensity to go along with it. But they don't know why. Maybe they grow up feeling sorry for their extended family, and don't understand why their parents left. Maybe they will grow up to think their parents are selfish.
They will have no idea why their parents truly left, or just exactly how difficult that was and what a huge accomplishment that was until they are much older, if ever. This is very intentionally done by my friends on their kids behalf. They are at risk of struggling with a ton of residual emotion that they don't understand---shame, anger, sadness at being cut-off, or whatever, purely because they don't know their real family history.
And they are exactly like millions of other descendants of similar stories of horror and hardship. Generally our parents and elders do not share the stories of brutality, abuse, danger, atrocity. And yet we know life is full of those things even today.
We are coming to know that healing and resolutions happens when we work to resolve our trauma with someone to witness our injuries. Generally we think of this process as being contained to one individual for events that take place in that person's lifetime and personal experience. Science is showing us that trauma can change our DNA, and our descendants can be affected by things that happen in our lives. I think we are close to discovering we can work toward healing our family's collective trauma, through knowing more about the history and extrapolating about what those experiences must've been like for the individuals who lived through them.
I will write many examples of this using experiences of individuals in my own family.
As I described in the Aspirations Become Abuses post, that social expectations about child rearing best practices are constantly changing and that this results in our society constantly reframing very ordinary things into dangerous or irresponsible behaviors with the potential to harm children, another process of change also affects how parents themselves define their parenting priorities. Each generation of parents is usually motivated to do better job with their kids, or to produce more successful kids than their parents were able to do for them.
The gap of communication this creates between generations is masterfully illustrated in the show Master of None with Aziz Ansari in the episode entitled Parents.
In my observations of friends, family and clients, I've noticed people seem to be able to focus on in improving one or two things for their kids, and that these selections are very specific to the problems and limitations for a particular family. For example, my clients who separated from their fundamentalist religious family focused on literacy, education and very much foster the expectation that their children should aim to get well paying jobs. People in their family had dyslexia, and some were stuck in a very dysfunctional harmful community environment because they could not read, go to school and thus could not financially support themselves.
Another family I know focuses on providing the best primary school environment for their children, and wants them to deeply feel like they are part of a supportive group of students and friends and teachers who understand their unique gifts. I happen to know their mother very much felt invisible and that no one in her family was in a position to place her needs at the forefront, and she deals with the health consequences and wellness challenges in her own life as a result.
Another family I know keeps their children close, with just a couple of friends, and does not allow them to go to birthday parties or social events, and most of their social life is centered around the family. In their family, their father's job in law enforcement is a constant mirror of the dangers we live with and a reminder of what people are capable of when they are at their worst. Their mother struggles daily with feeling safe, and trusting people, so she is wanting to give her children safety and the best chance to be protected until they're out on their own.
In my own case, as a young person I (wrongly) decided the conflict in my family could be traced to not enough money, and that if my mother had financial self-sufficiency, she could've emancipated herself from an abusive situation. I also (wrongly) concluded that no one loved me, and I literally was in my mid-40s before I recognized this was incorrect. So, it's accurate to say our family did not express kindness or affection. I also took a lot of responsibility and assumed many things were my fault, because I was some sort of bad influence (also wrong).
So, when I approached my parenting priorities, and my priorities for my daycare kids, it was and still is the utmost importance that I constantly empower all children to feel capable and work toward independence. I work hard to listen and be present and empathize with their emotions. I work hard to teach them to negotiate with one another instead of fighting, and I demand they show respect and kindness to eachother at all times as well. And, we do a lot of things that can be described as Attachment Parenting. It's really important to me that our children do the activities they choose and become adults that follow their own lead and internal drive, so that they will never be influenced by people who do not have their best interests at heart. I want them to have fulfillment in each area of their lives, so they must be the one to choose their careers and hobbies.
The other part of Generational Amnesia is that for everything parents do actively and consciously to fix the past on behalf of their children's future, they also hide their personal trauma and much of the adult content of the real history of their relatives.
For example, my friends who fleed their fundamentalist community. They do not tell their girls about the harsh discipline, indoctrination, and isolation they suffered personally. They do not talk about the sexual, physical and emotional abuse that goes on which is covered up by the church. They do not talk about the desperation of their cousins, aunts and uncles who feel trapped in an impossible situation. And, if they go home to visit family, they try to keep all conversations on the surface to avoid an unpleasant scene. And they only talk about how conflicted they feel-- angry but willing to help--when the kids are asleep.
So, the kids only get the urgent message to read, with a very strong 'or else' feeling. And they get a 'you must work and earn a lot of money' message with an emotional 'or else' intensity to go along with it. But they don't know why. Maybe they grow up feeling sorry for their extended family, and don't understand why their parents left. Maybe they will grow up to think their parents are selfish.
They will have no idea why their parents truly left, or just exactly how difficult that was and what a huge accomplishment that was until they are much older, if ever. This is very intentionally done by my friends on their kids behalf. They are at risk of struggling with a ton of residual emotion that they don't understand---shame, anger, sadness at being cut-off, or whatever, purely because they don't know their real family history.
And they are exactly like millions of other descendants of similar stories of horror and hardship. Generally our parents and elders do not share the stories of brutality, abuse, danger, atrocity. And yet we know life is full of those things even today.
We are coming to know that healing and resolutions happens when we work to resolve our trauma with someone to witness our injuries. Generally we think of this process as being contained to one individual for events that take place in that person's lifetime and personal experience. Science is showing us that trauma can change our DNA, and our descendants can be affected by things that happen in our lives. I think we are close to discovering we can work toward healing our family's collective trauma, through knowing more about the history and extrapolating about what those experiences must've been like for the individuals who lived through them.
I will write many examples of this using experiences of individuals in my own family.
The Mother
If you like Sourdough bread, you know about The Mother. The source of fermentation and flavoring of the bread that makes it taste more sour than other types of bread. In each batch, a small amount of this dough is reserved to be reused for the next batch.
This is kind of like how a style of mothering runs through a family for generations, creating a unique flavor for each family.
When we started this endeavor 10 years ago, I mistakenly believed my mothering decisions which I wrote about on the post called Generational Amnesia were self-evident and non-controversial, because these basic ideas are pretty commonplace on parenting blogs and books written by experts. I can tell you, the state and federal inspectors overseeing my daycare business activities appreciated my style, and it was easy to be closely aligned with their childcare aspirations and standards. The daycare parents seemed to really appreciate it based on their comments. The kids seemed to really love it. My son says he misses our daycare business frequently. I even got compliments from senior citizens when I took the daycare kids out as a group on field trips.
I had to surrender the daycare business because of a year of debilitating illness, followed by echos of illness that reappear from time to time. This is disappointing for sure, but I can always create a new business that is more of a match with our circumstances.
What I didn't expect was how controversial and challenging and polarizing my parenting style, or my business success would be for my in-laws and some of my key friendships. In my blog post called Chapters, I talked about how there have been times in my life when everything changed all at the same time, in such a way that there was no way I could ever go back even if I wanted to. When I had to close my business, there were many changes in a lot of my relationships that happened around the same time.
In some of these relationships, I sincerely believe my style of parenting creates problems for some of the family and friends around me. I sincerely believe it separates my kids from fitting in with the kids in our neighborhood. And, I think the contrast between how my husband grew up and how we are raising our kids creates conflicts in our marriage and extended family.
The reason I say 'I believe' is because I don't know for sure. I have many relationships with people who just stop talking to me or acknowledging my existence instead of voicing their objections and trying to work out new ways of relating so we can continue to be close. Even when I ask them to tell me what is wrong, and even when I say I would like to apologize and make changes going forward. And then, months or years later, they circle back around and want to continue the relationship as though nothing happened, which, is rough for me, because I am certain we will have a repeat of the icy phase.
I have many posts to write about mothering, leadership, independence, and the lesser acknowledged strategies that keep many groups together and what it means for people with differences who don't fit in.
Maybe what I learned sifting through all of this can spare you hours of confusion and searching in the darkness?
This is kind of like how a style of mothering runs through a family for generations, creating a unique flavor for each family.
When we started this endeavor 10 years ago, I mistakenly believed my mothering decisions which I wrote about on the post called Generational Amnesia were self-evident and non-controversial, because these basic ideas are pretty commonplace on parenting blogs and books written by experts. I can tell you, the state and federal inspectors overseeing my daycare business activities appreciated my style, and it was easy to be closely aligned with their childcare aspirations and standards. The daycare parents seemed to really appreciate it based on their comments. The kids seemed to really love it. My son says he misses our daycare business frequently. I even got compliments from senior citizens when I took the daycare kids out as a group on field trips.
I had to surrender the daycare business because of a year of debilitating illness, followed by echos of illness that reappear from time to time. This is disappointing for sure, but I can always create a new business that is more of a match with our circumstances.
What I didn't expect was how controversial and challenging and polarizing my parenting style, or my business success would be for my in-laws and some of my key friendships. In my blog post called Chapters, I talked about how there have been times in my life when everything changed all at the same time, in such a way that there was no way I could ever go back even if I wanted to. When I had to close my business, there were many changes in a lot of my relationships that happened around the same time.
In some of these relationships, I sincerely believe my style of parenting creates problems for some of the family and friends around me. I sincerely believe it separates my kids from fitting in with the kids in our neighborhood. And, I think the contrast between how my husband grew up and how we are raising our kids creates conflicts in our marriage and extended family.
The reason I say 'I believe' is because I don't know for sure. I have many relationships with people who just stop talking to me or acknowledging my existence instead of voicing their objections and trying to work out new ways of relating so we can continue to be close. Even when I ask them to tell me what is wrong, and even when I say I would like to apologize and make changes going forward. And then, months or years later, they circle back around and want to continue the relationship as though nothing happened, which, is rough for me, because I am certain we will have a repeat of the icy phase.
I have many posts to write about mothering, leadership, independence, and the lesser acknowledged strategies that keep many groups together and what it means for people with differences who don't fit in.
Maybe what I learned sifting through all of this can spare you hours of confusion and searching in the darkness?
Wednesday, April 4, 2018
Aspirations Become Abuses
...viewed through the lens of the past. And how quickly it changes...
My husband and I have been parents now for about 10 years. We are a few years past the intense early years which featured intense sleep deprivation, constant fear that we were doing everything wrong all the time, hyperfocusing on individual decisions like co-sleeping vs. kids sleeping in their own room, times one zillion because there are a zillion things just like that when you are a new parent.
To cope, we had conversations about all that stuff with all our new parent friends, read the internet voraciously, talked to our elders, and our pediatricians and still we were very insecure. Tough times.
I even had an in-home daycare business, so I was able to talk to the parents about their choices and study their parenting styles and create working theories about how those things worked for their individual children's needs. Still it was a constant barrage of choices and decisions, each of which had their merits, none of which would yield any feedback for several years.
In this time I learned a great deal about how rapidly parenting standards and norms change. Most people reading this blog will have fond memories of their own childhoods and remember fondly things like playing outside with their friends for hours on end, with no adults in sight. Or maybe, making a batch of cookies, and licking the spoon and bowl with the leftover batter. Maybe having their mom bring homemade cupcakes for the whole class for parties. Maybe riding in the payload section of a pickup truck, or sticking your head out the window while driving on the highway?
Each and every one of those things would earn any current day parent a side-eye at best. Possibly some well-intended question or discussion from nearby parents? At worst, you might find yourself the subject of a CPS investigation like the mom who recently got in trouble for allowing her children to be outside in her fenced in backyard for 10 minutes while she looked on in the kitchen.
What is considered normal, ordinary parenting for one generation, quickly turns into meeting a legal definition of child-neglect and abuse for another. In the 5 year span between the birth of my two children, I have noticed an even greater emphasis on academic preparedness, and the managing of every minute of a child's experience has become the defacto expectation of good mothering. This is despite mountains of evidence demonstrating that it's good for a developing child to experience boredom and allow their imaginations to develop. Evidence be damned, the anxiety that accompanies modern day parenting interferes with people's ability to trust their judgement. The competition that takes place among some groups of mothers pushes people into greater areas of absurdity, regardless of the impact it actually has on children.
The only reason I mention any of this at all, is to say, many things we now consider to be abusive or neglectful behaviors by our own parents, may have been common and ordinary practices for their time. For example, just as my family members were not convinced that smoking was absolutely hazardous to their health, I don't think they had words or concepts to describe emotional abuse. They lived by the saying, "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me." I am pretty sure they thought if they were not beating me or harming me physically, whatever else they did was not abuse. Also, from their perspective, providing food and shelter was hitting it out of the park and everything else was just bonus. They would have said proudly they were very good parents.
This does not mean the many negative outcomes borne by me, my mother and my uncles just occurred randomly with no relation to their parenting decisions. It does not mean the serious issues we all have, and the fallout from those times is meaningless or insignificant. No. Each of us has suffered immensely from the things that have happened and we each have a big job to work through it.
For me, it takes a tiny bit of the power and impact away to consider my mom and grandparents were just a product of their own family culture, along with the standards of the day. It's a demonstration of the phrase "if you knew better, you would do better..."
I am also humbled, knowing at some point in the future, things I do now to be a good parent may someday come under the same sort of scrutiny when my children have children of their own.
My husband and I have been parents now for about 10 years. We are a few years past the intense early years which featured intense sleep deprivation, constant fear that we were doing everything wrong all the time, hyperfocusing on individual decisions like co-sleeping vs. kids sleeping in their own room, times one zillion because there are a zillion things just like that when you are a new parent.
To cope, we had conversations about all that stuff with all our new parent friends, read the internet voraciously, talked to our elders, and our pediatricians and still we were very insecure. Tough times.
I even had an in-home daycare business, so I was able to talk to the parents about their choices and study their parenting styles and create working theories about how those things worked for their individual children's needs. Still it was a constant barrage of choices and decisions, each of which had their merits, none of which would yield any feedback for several years.
In this time I learned a great deal about how rapidly parenting standards and norms change. Most people reading this blog will have fond memories of their own childhoods and remember fondly things like playing outside with their friends for hours on end, with no adults in sight. Or maybe, making a batch of cookies, and licking the spoon and bowl with the leftover batter. Maybe having their mom bring homemade cupcakes for the whole class for parties. Maybe riding in the payload section of a pickup truck, or sticking your head out the window while driving on the highway?
Each and every one of those things would earn any current day parent a side-eye at best. Possibly some well-intended question or discussion from nearby parents? At worst, you might find yourself the subject of a CPS investigation like the mom who recently got in trouble for allowing her children to be outside in her fenced in backyard for 10 minutes while she looked on in the kitchen.
What is considered normal, ordinary parenting for one generation, quickly turns into meeting a legal definition of child-neglect and abuse for another. In the 5 year span between the birth of my two children, I have noticed an even greater emphasis on academic preparedness, and the managing of every minute of a child's experience has become the defacto expectation of good mothering. This is despite mountains of evidence demonstrating that it's good for a developing child to experience boredom and allow their imaginations to develop. Evidence be damned, the anxiety that accompanies modern day parenting interferes with people's ability to trust their judgement. The competition that takes place among some groups of mothers pushes people into greater areas of absurdity, regardless of the impact it actually has on children.
The only reason I mention any of this at all, is to say, many things we now consider to be abusive or neglectful behaviors by our own parents, may have been common and ordinary practices for their time. For example, just as my family members were not convinced that smoking was absolutely hazardous to their health, I don't think they had words or concepts to describe emotional abuse. They lived by the saying, "sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me." I am pretty sure they thought if they were not beating me or harming me physically, whatever else they did was not abuse. Also, from their perspective, providing food and shelter was hitting it out of the park and everything else was just bonus. They would have said proudly they were very good parents.
This does not mean the many negative outcomes borne by me, my mother and my uncles just occurred randomly with no relation to their parenting decisions. It does not mean the serious issues we all have, and the fallout from those times is meaningless or insignificant. No. Each of us has suffered immensely from the things that have happened and we each have a big job to work through it.
For me, it takes a tiny bit of the power and impact away to consider my mom and grandparents were just a product of their own family culture, along with the standards of the day. It's a demonstration of the phrase "if you knew better, you would do better..."
I am also humbled, knowing at some point in the future, things I do now to be a good parent may someday come under the same sort of scrutiny when my children have children of their own.
Higher Power
Have you ever seen the movie Bedtime Stories with Adam Sandler? In the movie, a huge number of coincidences take place, all in a row, so much so that it seems impossible to attribute it to just being random and viewers are led to believe something strange is going on, like someone or something is orchestrating them behind the scenes.
Popular books like The Secret or Think and Grow Rich talk about similar phenomenon, promising readers that they too can create beneficial magic in their own lives. These ideas are so prevalent in our society that most people have heard phrases like, "Like attracts like..." or "The power of positive thinking..."
In this blog, you will read many "Woo Woo" interpretations of my life events. I will also do a post of all of my favorite authors and books, including one of the most obscure but interesting ones Sri Aurobindo and his partner "The Mother." Several ideas from the world of woo woo have become mainstreamed by authors like Deepak Chopra and the mind/body health movement.
When my childhood life and outlook was quite bleak and hopeless, you better believe I was a regular in the Self-Help and Metaphysical sections of the bookstore. And it worked, big time!! These were not the only tools I used to change my life and improve my outcomes, but they were excellent in helping me reframe my life circumstances, and see where I did have options when I felt quite trapped and stuck and powerless, which helped me feel a lot more hopeful and empowered.
Whether you are grounded in your religion and think of coincidences as guardian angels, or acts of God, or messages from your loved ones, or
Whether you study the seasons and movements of the earth and sky, searching for messages and insights, or
Whether you get messages in your daily meditation that pertain to your life and help you resolve issues,
Whether you call it your own imagination, or insight or cosmic intelligence, or if you have dreams that give you valuable information you can use in your life...
I would say, you are tapping into the same source which, for our purposes I will generically call spiritual energy.
Sometimes we search for meaning and direction and answers when we can not understand our current life circumstances. Sometimes, we wish for answers when relationships take a turn and communication can not happen. Sometimes, we seek direction for decisions and direction for the future.
There are many reasons we may speculate and seek to understand. Where do you get your information when you are left to fend for yourself? How do you find peace and calm when your life is complicated and difficult?
By all means, spiritual energy is a resource to help you in your life. There are times when my life is very much like the movie Bedtime Stories, and at these times I am sure to document them for my husband who choses not to use his spiritual resources. I call them Weirdness Installments, and I promise to share some of them here too.
Popular books like The Secret or Think and Grow Rich talk about similar phenomenon, promising readers that they too can create beneficial magic in their own lives. These ideas are so prevalent in our society that most people have heard phrases like, "Like attracts like..." or "The power of positive thinking..."
In this blog, you will read many "Woo Woo" interpretations of my life events. I will also do a post of all of my favorite authors and books, including one of the most obscure but interesting ones Sri Aurobindo and his partner "The Mother." Several ideas from the world of woo woo have become mainstreamed by authors like Deepak Chopra and the mind/body health movement.
When my childhood life and outlook was quite bleak and hopeless, you better believe I was a regular in the Self-Help and Metaphysical sections of the bookstore. And it worked, big time!! These were not the only tools I used to change my life and improve my outcomes, but they were excellent in helping me reframe my life circumstances, and see where I did have options when I felt quite trapped and stuck and powerless, which helped me feel a lot more hopeful and empowered.
Whether you are grounded in your religion and think of coincidences as guardian angels, or acts of God, or messages from your loved ones, or
Whether you study the seasons and movements of the earth and sky, searching for messages and insights, or
Whether you get messages in your daily meditation that pertain to your life and help you resolve issues,
Whether you call it your own imagination, or insight or cosmic intelligence, or if you have dreams that give you valuable information you can use in your life...
I would say, you are tapping into the same source which, for our purposes I will generically call spiritual energy.
Sometimes we search for meaning and direction and answers when we can not understand our current life circumstances. Sometimes, we wish for answers when relationships take a turn and communication can not happen. Sometimes, we seek direction for decisions and direction for the future.
There are many reasons we may speculate and seek to understand. Where do you get your information when you are left to fend for yourself? How do you find peace and calm when your life is complicated and difficult?
By all means, spiritual energy is a resource to help you in your life. There are times when my life is very much like the movie Bedtime Stories, and at these times I am sure to document them for my husband who choses not to use his spiritual resources. I call them Weirdness Installments, and I promise to share some of them here too.
Tuesday, April 3, 2018
Normal
Normal.
Normal is the default. The most common. Straightforward. Ordinary. Regular. Everything outside of normal is contrasted with normal and held to the standards of normal. Normal is the majority. The world is made by normal people to accommodate normalness.
Only by people not being normal can we understand what normal is in a particular context. We have all sorts of measurements of normal---we measure physical normalness by things like blood pressure, heart rate, BMI. Intellectual normalness is measured with IQ or SAT test scores. But things like emotional or spiritual normalness are measured by the absence of something, rather than the presence. People are normal if they are not dealing with any number of emotional or mental conditions like ADD or Autism or Schizophrenia and others. Spiritually they are normal if they are not psychic mediums or healers.
In Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration, he identifies 5 levels of human development, and he calls normal Level 1: Primary Integration.
Statistically speaking, normal or conventional people make up large majorities of societies across the globe and throughout history. Relations between normal individuals/groups and any kind of outsiders are very challenging at best and very dangerous and possibly fatal at worst. This fact is easy to observe when the differences are visible, with things like someone's skin color, sexual orientation, or physical disabilities.
When the differences are invisible, it is much harder for everyone--normal or otherwise-- to understand why someone can't just be 'normal' or why something that comes so easily to most people is so difficult, if not impossible for others. This frustration and misunderstanding drives a lot of negative behaviors toward others who can not meet the normal standards within a particular group.
Non-normal people---described by Dabrowski as existing somewhere between his Levels 2 and 5, also make this mistake, and assume they should easily be able to conform or meet a standard of a particular group, and that this should be a goal to aspire to attain. In this way, both normal--Level 1 and non-normal--Levels 2-5 affirm and reinforce this idea of normal, and in so doing, usually the non-normal person in the situation is found lacking by everyone. No amount of changing behavior and no amount of concealing differences, as well as no amount of contributing his or her unique gifts can usually bridge these communication gaps between levels. The gifted person is the outsider, and it's common for them to blame themselves when these relationships ultimately expose how different the individuals are resulting in awkward distance.
Humans are social animals and most of us want to find connections and the place where we belong. Most of us are conditioned to find our group and then conform and uphold the rules of the group in order to fit in and gain acceptance. Gifted people have a much harder time finding and keeping relationships for many reasons:
--they fail to see how different they are from others, especially normal people
--they do not realize that other gifted people are also extremely unique, and because of this, there are generally not groups of gifted people
--they may blame themselves for not being normal, misunderstand, or under value their gifts, and enter into relationships in an apologetic manner
--they may not be familiar with the concept that gifted people have very uneven or asynchronous skill sets or maturity levels, so they may experience more failure or awkwardness than normal people.
Gifted people may be jealous of the benefits of normalcy:
inclusion
group protection
internal uncomplicated-ness
straightforward experiences in school or on the job
being in-sync with time, social events, holidays
shared experiences and support
And, at the same time may be angry or confused by them.
How can a person:
--not be curious about ___?
--not feel moved by or responsible for ___?
--not see this obvious thing in front of them...?
Simultaneously, Gifteds may think if they could resolve their issues or deficits, they would automatically be welcomed back into the group of normalcy. They do not realize the magnitudes of differences between the two groups that will separate them and elude them forever from rejoining the huge numbers of people who enjoy Level 1 - Primary Integration.
But, aside from the qualities we identify that we are missing in our lives---inclusion or support or whatever---due to our Giftedness, our childhood traumas, or our mental or physical diagnoses, could we ever really be happy or at home in a group or a family where:
-People are not curious
-People do not reflect on their behavior, and actively seek personal growth
-People value merging with the group or identify with tradition in an unquestioning kind of way
-People actively shut down their critical thinking skills, even if it causes harm to themselves or others
Or, where:
--the externals--reputations, status, appearances, net worth matter more
than individuals internal quality of life, or personal expression
--performance and achievement matter more than fulfillment
And usually:
-Where a hierarchy guides who gets group support and resources, and who is expected to accept supporting roles?
-Where fulfilling your role in the group is more important than finding your voice and your own goals or finding personal fufillment?
Just as gifted people complain that normal people misunderstand them, or cherry pick them for the good parts but are not supportive in times of need, it's important to remember, as Gifteds, we can not cherry pick the good parts of life in Primary Integration while forgetting the downsides.
Usually we all have a really good sense of how different we are than most others, but, rather than realizing the things we don't like about our interactions with those in Primary Integration as things that pertain to most or all of those individuals/groups--because statistically, they are all variations of people at Level 1----we tend to think, "If I just fixed x, y, z about myself, or about my life, I could try to find (inclusion, fun, protection, loyalty, support) in another group..."
Unless it is a group of gifted people, or individuals dealing with similar mental or physical health challenges, it is important to remember that everything that separates people between Level 1 and the other Levels 2-5 is constantly operating in the background, and just because we're all rooting for NCAA teams during March Madness, or enjoying our new basketweaving skills together, our surface interests, and our surface topics of communication obscure our differences for short periods of time.
Once our differences become apparent, and these relationships become awkward or distant, it is not a failure on anyone's part. Gifted people especially are at risk of experiencing these relationship changes as failures. This is because there are vastly larger numbers of Level 1 individuals, and society has validated them as normal, so their behavior becomes the standard by which Gifted people judge themselves against. Also, the Overexcitabilities experienced by Gifted people, magnify these events in their emotions or imagination, and getting over the disappointment and inaccurately perceived failure or personal shortcomings takes up a lot of time in reflection and study.
Learning about Giftedness, and Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration and his theories about Overexcitabilities can help Gifted individuals reframe these disappointments as natural consequences of what happens when people from different levels of personal development interact, and possibly save them hours of anguish and repeated disappointments that could be better spent directed toward discovering relationships that have actual potential. Or finding other ways to inspire and develop themselves that will actually be rewarding.
For those of us who never had the option of being at level one, due to traumatic life circumstances or complicated health situations, we have an additional layer of grief to process as we come to understand our Giftedness. We never had Level One, so we never experienced interal uncomplicatedness and we did not get to make an active choice to grow beyond our secure or workable circumstances. We must accept this loss, as we learn to find internal places in ourselves where we feel secure, at ease, uncomplicated, or protected. Not an easy task for sure. But it is possible, and has the potential to actually be fulfilling. I know, I am still super duper jealous and sad, mostly about the internal uncomplicatedness part. Sounds like heaven.
Normal is the default. The most common. Straightforward. Ordinary. Regular. Everything outside of normal is contrasted with normal and held to the standards of normal. Normal is the majority. The world is made by normal people to accommodate normalness.
Only by people not being normal can we understand what normal is in a particular context. We have all sorts of measurements of normal---we measure physical normalness by things like blood pressure, heart rate, BMI. Intellectual normalness is measured with IQ or SAT test scores. But things like emotional or spiritual normalness are measured by the absence of something, rather than the presence. People are normal if they are not dealing with any number of emotional or mental conditions like ADD or Autism or Schizophrenia and others. Spiritually they are normal if they are not psychic mediums or healers.
In Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration, he identifies 5 levels of human development, and he calls normal Level 1: Primary Integration.
Statistically speaking, normal or conventional people make up large majorities of societies across the globe and throughout history. Relations between normal individuals/groups and any kind of outsiders are very challenging at best and very dangerous and possibly fatal at worst. This fact is easy to observe when the differences are visible, with things like someone's skin color, sexual orientation, or physical disabilities.
When the differences are invisible, it is much harder for everyone--normal or otherwise-- to understand why someone can't just be 'normal' or why something that comes so easily to most people is so difficult, if not impossible for others. This frustration and misunderstanding drives a lot of negative behaviors toward others who can not meet the normal standards within a particular group.
Non-normal people---described by Dabrowski as existing somewhere between his Levels 2 and 5, also make this mistake, and assume they should easily be able to conform or meet a standard of a particular group, and that this should be a goal to aspire to attain. In this way, both normal--Level 1 and non-normal--Levels 2-5 affirm and reinforce this idea of normal, and in so doing, usually the non-normal person in the situation is found lacking by everyone. No amount of changing behavior and no amount of concealing differences, as well as no amount of contributing his or her unique gifts can usually bridge these communication gaps between levels. The gifted person is the outsider, and it's common for them to blame themselves when these relationships ultimately expose how different the individuals are resulting in awkward distance.
Humans are social animals and most of us want to find connections and the place where we belong. Most of us are conditioned to find our group and then conform and uphold the rules of the group in order to fit in and gain acceptance. Gifted people have a much harder time finding and keeping relationships for many reasons:
--they fail to see how different they are from others, especially normal people
--they do not realize that other gifted people are also extremely unique, and because of this, there are generally not groups of gifted people
--they may blame themselves for not being normal, misunderstand, or under value their gifts, and enter into relationships in an apologetic manner
--they may not be familiar with the concept that gifted people have very uneven or asynchronous skill sets or maturity levels, so they may experience more failure or awkwardness than normal people.
Gifted people may be jealous of the benefits of normalcy:
inclusion
group protection
internal uncomplicated-ness
straightforward experiences in school or on the job
being in-sync with time, social events, holidays
shared experiences and support
And, at the same time may be angry or confused by them.
How can a person:
--not be curious about ___?
--not feel moved by or responsible for ___?
--not see this obvious thing in front of them...?
Simultaneously, Gifteds may think if they could resolve their issues or deficits, they would automatically be welcomed back into the group of normalcy. They do not realize the magnitudes of differences between the two groups that will separate them and elude them forever from rejoining the huge numbers of people who enjoy Level 1 - Primary Integration.
But, aside from the qualities we identify that we are missing in our lives---inclusion or support or whatever---due to our Giftedness, our childhood traumas, or our mental or physical diagnoses, could we ever really be happy or at home in a group or a family where:
-People are not curious
-People do not reflect on their behavior, and actively seek personal growth
-People value merging with the group or identify with tradition in an unquestioning kind of way
-People actively shut down their critical thinking skills, even if it causes harm to themselves or others
Or, where:
--the externals--reputations, status, appearances, net worth matter more
than individuals internal quality of life, or personal expression
--performance and achievement matter more than fulfillment
And usually:
-Where a hierarchy guides who gets group support and resources, and who is expected to accept supporting roles?
-Where fulfilling your role in the group is more important than finding your voice and your own goals or finding personal fufillment?
Just as gifted people complain that normal people misunderstand them, or cherry pick them for the good parts but are not supportive in times of need, it's important to remember, as Gifteds, we can not cherry pick the good parts of life in Primary Integration while forgetting the downsides.
Usually we all have a really good sense of how different we are than most others, but, rather than realizing the things we don't like about our interactions with those in Primary Integration as things that pertain to most or all of those individuals/groups--because statistically, they are all variations of people at Level 1----we tend to think, "If I just fixed x, y, z about myself, or about my life, I could try to find (inclusion, fun, protection, loyalty, support) in another group..."
Unless it is a group of gifted people, or individuals dealing with similar mental or physical health challenges, it is important to remember that everything that separates people between Level 1 and the other Levels 2-5 is constantly operating in the background, and just because we're all rooting for NCAA teams during March Madness, or enjoying our new basketweaving skills together, our surface interests, and our surface topics of communication obscure our differences for short periods of time.
Once our differences become apparent, and these relationships become awkward or distant, it is not a failure on anyone's part. Gifted people especially are at risk of experiencing these relationship changes as failures. This is because there are vastly larger numbers of Level 1 individuals, and society has validated them as normal, so their behavior becomes the standard by which Gifted people judge themselves against. Also, the Overexcitabilities experienced by Gifted people, magnify these events in their emotions or imagination, and getting over the disappointment and inaccurately perceived failure or personal shortcomings takes up a lot of time in reflection and study.
Learning about Giftedness, and Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration and his theories about Overexcitabilities can help Gifted individuals reframe these disappointments as natural consequences of what happens when people from different levels of personal development interact, and possibly save them hours of anguish and repeated disappointments that could be better spent directed toward discovering relationships that have actual potential. Or finding other ways to inspire and develop themselves that will actually be rewarding.
For those of us who never had the option of being at level one, due to traumatic life circumstances or complicated health situations, we have an additional layer of grief to process as we come to understand our Giftedness. We never had Level One, so we never experienced interal uncomplicatedness and we did not get to make an active choice to grow beyond our secure or workable circumstances. We must accept this loss, as we learn to find internal places in ourselves where we feel secure, at ease, uncomplicated, or protected. Not an easy task for sure. But it is possible, and has the potential to actually be fulfilling. I know, I am still super duper jealous and sad, mostly about the internal uncomplicatedness part. Sounds like heaven.
Sunday, April 1, 2018
Ancestry
Many of my friends are very interested in researching their ancestral information and taking the DNA tests to confirm what they are learning. Talking to them about what they have learned is fascinating. I also really enjoy watching the shows called Who Do You Think You Are? And other similar ones that feature celebrities working with Genealogists who can furnish them with original documents and obscure stories that make their search complete. It's a great way to learn history too.
What if we took it a step further? And used our knowledge of world history, along with popular historical dramas, and thought of our family's ancestry as a family to-do list? I am not the first person to think of this, I just saw a meme on Facebook that basically said generations of family trauma is constantly operating in the background until one family member is able to address it, and then the entirety lands on that person's life.
Many movies touch on this theme: Ms. Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon, Holes, and many others suggest that a family's trauma, unfinished business or true crime can act like a generational curse or a hangover. And conversely, a family's success can buoy it's descendants for generations afterward.
Personally, I believe it's it's incumbent on all of us to wrestle with and make peace with our family's history, whatever it may be, as much as our personal circumstances allow us to. It has been my experience and observation that if we deal with it as directly and proactively as possible, we become stronger and healthier partners, parents, professionals. And, if we try to outrun it or deny it, it seems like it will catch up with us eventually anyway.
In this blog, you will read many stories of my family's trauma and crimes, along with those of my friends. And I'll be drawing parallels between what happened generations ago to what is happening now, especially as it pertains to someone's mental condition, or the issues in their family. If we can see these connections, we may have opportunities for objectivity, detachment, and we may be able to have more perspective about ourselves and our families.
What if we took it a step further? And used our knowledge of world history, along with popular historical dramas, and thought of our family's ancestry as a family to-do list? I am not the first person to think of this, I just saw a meme on Facebook that basically said generations of family trauma is constantly operating in the background until one family member is able to address it, and then the entirety lands on that person's life.
Many movies touch on this theme: Ms. Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Bruce Lee's Enter the Dragon, Holes, and many others suggest that a family's trauma, unfinished business or true crime can act like a generational curse or a hangover. And conversely, a family's success can buoy it's descendants for generations afterward.
Personally, I believe it's it's incumbent on all of us to wrestle with and make peace with our family's history, whatever it may be, as much as our personal circumstances allow us to. It has been my experience and observation that if we deal with it as directly and proactively as possible, we become stronger and healthier partners, parents, professionals. And, if we try to outrun it or deny it, it seems like it will catch up with us eventually anyway.
In this blog, you will read many stories of my family's trauma and crimes, along with those of my friends. And I'll be drawing parallels between what happened generations ago to what is happening now, especially as it pertains to someone's mental condition, or the issues in their family. If we can see these connections, we may have opportunities for objectivity, detachment, and we may be able to have more perspective about ourselves and our families.
Thursday, March 29, 2018
Mental Illness
As you read through this blog, you will read many stories which describe symptoms of mental illnesses.
Specifically, there are stories of people with Borderline Personality Disorder symptoms, Narcissism symptoms, Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder symptoms, Attention Deficit Disorder and Manic Depression symptoms, as well as those with alcohol and drug addictions.
Growing up as I did, where people spoke honestly and openly about their struggles, diagnosis and medications, I learned a great deal about each of these conditions. Not only did my family members struggle, but also I had a lot of access and exposure to other adults in our community who were family friends and acquaintances.
My mother specifically would bring me along to many of her volunteer commitments where I would meet people struggling with all of these issues. And as an adult, I would go on to continue volunteer work with similar communities.
At this point I have close to 50 years of education in these matters. I am not afraid of my own challenges or those of others. I offer the stories to bring dignity and hope and new ideas to people on all sides of the struggle.
I have heard the phrase that "Mental Illness is learning to communicate so that you do not become victimized." And, watching my family and those of my friends wrestle with these issues, I can say, there are definitely huge gaps in connection and communication between people at the level of Dabrowski's Primary Integration/Level 1 and those who are struggling with mental health challenges.
Usually there is one patient struggling with a mental health crisis--who's no longer at Level 1, along with many family and friends who are helping and supporting and communicating at Level 1. Because of the nature of one vs. many, one who can not communicate the same way as the many who understand one another just fine, there is an inherent imbalance.
Level 1--aka internal uncomplicatedness, gives those people the perception that they do things the right way and think about things the right way, and that they are the healthy ones by default. They have the power in the situation when someone they love is experiencing a mental health crisis. The person who is typically at greater risk of being actually victimized is the person in crisis. This is true even if the well-meaning family and friends are uncomfortable, scared, inconvenienced or otherwise by the symptoms of the mental illness.
Feeling like the victim of someone else's mental health crisis is not the same as the experience of being alone, unable to communicate effectively, and unable to advocate for one's self. That is why state and federal laws typically favor the patient. Obviously, this is not always the case, as people experiencing mental health crises can also present a risk of harm to themselves or others.
Most frequently, people's inability to connect, relate and work together---because they are at different levels of personality development---to resolve the immediate crisis, as well as all the others that follow, lead to people on all sides feeling victimized and disconnected and defeated by the situation. Knowledge of Dabrowski's theory could provide greater understanding of these gaps.
In Dabrowski’s Theory of Positive Disintegration, mental illnesses are seen as ordinary and necessary crises and steps toward the development of one's individual personality. The presence of Overexcitabilities, whether they are psychomotor, intellectual, sensual, imaginational or emotional gives evidence of a person's developmental potential toward such effort. And their presence inherently means a gifted person will have a deeper and broader experience than a neuro-typical person. In DSM-V parlance, descriptions of his overexcitabilities are nearly identical to descriptions of common mental illness diagnoses like Attention Deficit Disorder, Bi-Polar Disorder, Major Depressive Disorder among others.
Dabrowski is not alone in doubting the existence of true mental illness and coming up with alternate theories. There are movements underway to change the way we approach things like psychosis and mania and schizophrenia and to place those events into a primitive people’s context, where individuals undergoing such events are seen as undergoing sacred connections between the worlds of spirit and earth.
Many tribes leave someone in this fragile state to their own devices until such time as their symptoms subside, allowing them to return to everyday life. When they are ready, they are typically invited to share any insights they learned in the experience to assist tribal leadership with the spiritual lessons they learned during their event. These individuals are seen as healers of sorts.
I have read about current day psychiatrists and hospitals employing this type of approach, and several authors are writing books suggesting that a mental health crisis is a self-healing and self-limiting event to assist the psyche. I share this to give you hope about alternative treatment ideas, as well as new ways to view mental health challenges.
In the Gifted community, taking mental illness at face value, and treating it with current methods, primarily talk therapy and medication can sometimes be viewed as dangerous to a gifted person. People seem to fear that medicine specifically will subdue one's gifts and thinking of one's self as flawed and chronically ill will take away a person’s motivation and energy they need to apply toward growth and development.
I can only say my personal experience has been that talk therapy and medications have enhanced my life and my family members lives. My approach is to consider all healing modalities, and explore anything that might be relevant in the effort of self-development. I also think my family and I have benefited from an approach that seeks to contain and minimize the symptoms of our mental health challenges. But, what works for us, may not be appropriate for anyone else. You have to search until you find the right solutions for your situation.
Specifically, there are stories of people with Borderline Personality Disorder symptoms, Narcissism symptoms, Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder symptoms, Attention Deficit Disorder and Manic Depression symptoms, as well as those with alcohol and drug addictions.
Growing up as I did, where people spoke honestly and openly about their struggles, diagnosis and medications, I learned a great deal about each of these conditions. Not only did my family members struggle, but also I had a lot of access and exposure to other adults in our community who were family friends and acquaintances.
My mother specifically would bring me along to many of her volunteer commitments where I would meet people struggling with all of these issues. And as an adult, I would go on to continue volunteer work with similar communities.
At this point I have close to 50 years of education in these matters. I am not afraid of my own challenges or those of others. I offer the stories to bring dignity and hope and new ideas to people on all sides of the struggle.
I have heard the phrase that "Mental Illness is learning to communicate so that you do not become victimized." And, watching my family and those of my friends wrestle with these issues, I can say, there are definitely huge gaps in connection and communication between people at the level of Dabrowski's Primary Integration/Level 1 and those who are struggling with mental health challenges.
Usually there is one patient struggling with a mental health crisis--who's no longer at Level 1, along with many family and friends who are helping and supporting and communicating at Level 1. Because of the nature of one vs. many, one who can not communicate the same way as the many who understand one another just fine, there is an inherent imbalance.
Level 1--aka internal uncomplicatedness, gives those people the perception that they do things the right way and think about things the right way, and that they are the healthy ones by default. They have the power in the situation when someone they love is experiencing a mental health crisis. The person who is typically at greater risk of being actually victimized is the person in crisis. This is true even if the well-meaning family and friends are uncomfortable, scared, inconvenienced or otherwise by the symptoms of the mental illness.
Feeling like the victim of someone else's mental health crisis is not the same as the experience of being alone, unable to communicate effectively, and unable to advocate for one's self. That is why state and federal laws typically favor the patient. Obviously, this is not always the case, as people experiencing mental health crises can also present a risk of harm to themselves or others.
Most frequently, people's inability to connect, relate and work together---because they are at different levels of personality development---to resolve the immediate crisis, as well as all the others that follow, lead to people on all sides feeling victimized and disconnected and defeated by the situation. Knowledge of Dabrowski's theory could provide greater understanding of these gaps.
In Dabrowski’s Theory of Positive Disintegration, mental illnesses are seen as ordinary and necessary crises and steps toward the development of one's individual personality. The presence of Overexcitabilities, whether they are psychomotor, intellectual, sensual, imaginational or emotional gives evidence of a person's developmental potential toward such effort. And their presence inherently means a gifted person will have a deeper and broader experience than a neuro-typical person. In DSM-V parlance, descriptions of his overexcitabilities are nearly identical to descriptions of common mental illness diagnoses like Attention Deficit Disorder, Bi-Polar Disorder, Major Depressive Disorder among others.
Dabrowski is not alone in doubting the existence of true mental illness and coming up with alternate theories. There are movements underway to change the way we approach things like psychosis and mania and schizophrenia and to place those events into a primitive people’s context, where individuals undergoing such events are seen as undergoing sacred connections between the worlds of spirit and earth.
Many tribes leave someone in this fragile state to their own devices until such time as their symptoms subside, allowing them to return to everyday life. When they are ready, they are typically invited to share any insights they learned in the experience to assist tribal leadership with the spiritual lessons they learned during their event. These individuals are seen as healers of sorts.
I have read about current day psychiatrists and hospitals employing this type of approach, and several authors are writing books suggesting that a mental health crisis is a self-healing and self-limiting event to assist the psyche. I share this to give you hope about alternative treatment ideas, as well as new ways to view mental health challenges.
In the Gifted community, taking mental illness at face value, and treating it with current methods, primarily talk therapy and medication can sometimes be viewed as dangerous to a gifted person. People seem to fear that medicine specifically will subdue one's gifts and thinking of one's self as flawed and chronically ill will take away a person’s motivation and energy they need to apply toward growth and development.
I can only say my personal experience has been that talk therapy and medications have enhanced my life and my family members lives. My approach is to consider all healing modalities, and explore anything that might be relevant in the effort of self-development. I also think my family and I have benefited from an approach that seeks to contain and minimize the symptoms of our mental health challenges. But, what works for us, may not be appropriate for anyone else. You have to search until you find the right solutions for your situation.
Giftedness
What comes to mind when you hear the word Gifted? What does it mean that someone is Gifted?
Does it mean they are special? More talented? Is their future bright? Will they get all kinds of stuff they may or may not deserve? Extra help...? Extra opportunities...?
Is it like a special club others can’t belong to like the VIP lounge at the airport...? Or access to first class on a long flight? A ride to easy street?
Would you be surprised to learn that most gifted people really struggle with many facets of regular life? And many of them are envious of their ‘internally uncomplicated’ peers, and the smooth simplicity that is being ‘normal?’
Giftedness offers no guarantees of life satisfaction. No guarantees of finding one’s tribe. No guarantees of professional achievement or satisfaction. Statistics on how gifted people fare in life can actually be pretty abysmal.
Giftedness is a frustrating paradox of constantly being told how rare or exemplary you are, in some areas, only to experience considerable difficulty with using those assets to actually improve your life. Things most people take for granted like having close friends and a satisfying way to spend your time can elude you forever, despite working hard to achieve them.
Giftedness requires you to be on a growth path to find your place and fulfillment in life. It automatically separates you forever from most other people, and demands you actively participate in the mess and stress in between Primary Integration (internal uncomplicatedness) and the goal of a very distant future called Secondary Integration (internal and external uncomplicatedness and true autonomy) which very few people ever reach.
The only guarantee is you will never ‘fit in’ with normal people and you will never experience the ease and simplicity most people take for granted, known as ‘internal uncomplicatedness.’
In short, it is a hard and demanding road, and can be very mysterious, solitary, and even dangerous. Most people will think you are too fortunate and too lucky, or too weird to consider you a peer or a friend, or they will be closed-minded or hostile to your actual challenges. And there's just no straightforward, predetermined way forward.
Awesome!
Movie examples of Gifted characters:
Max Fischer in Rushmore
Elf
Ferris Bueller
Flint from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Good Will Hunting
Harry Potter
The Incredibles
Matilda
Searching for Bobby Fischer
Temple Grandin
Does it mean they are special? More talented? Is their future bright? Will they get all kinds of stuff they may or may not deserve? Extra help...? Extra opportunities...?
Is it like a special club others can’t belong to like the VIP lounge at the airport...? Or access to first class on a long flight? A ride to easy street?
Would you be surprised to learn that most gifted people really struggle with many facets of regular life? And many of them are envious of their ‘internally uncomplicated’ peers, and the smooth simplicity that is being ‘normal?’
Giftedness offers no guarantees of life satisfaction. No guarantees of finding one’s tribe. No guarantees of professional achievement or satisfaction. Statistics on how gifted people fare in life can actually be pretty abysmal.
Giftedness is a frustrating paradox of constantly being told how rare or exemplary you are, in some areas, only to experience considerable difficulty with using those assets to actually improve your life. Things most people take for granted like having close friends and a satisfying way to spend your time can elude you forever, despite working hard to achieve them.
Giftedness requires you to be on a growth path to find your place and fulfillment in life. It automatically separates you forever from most other people, and demands you actively participate in the mess and stress in between Primary Integration (internal uncomplicatedness) and the goal of a very distant future called Secondary Integration (internal and external uncomplicatedness and true autonomy) which very few people ever reach.
The only guarantee is you will never ‘fit in’ with normal people and you will never experience the ease and simplicity most people take for granted, known as ‘internal uncomplicatedness.’
In short, it is a hard and demanding road, and can be very mysterious, solitary, and even dangerous. Most people will think you are too fortunate and too lucky, or too weird to consider you a peer or a friend, or they will be closed-minded or hostile to your actual challenges. And there's just no straightforward, predetermined way forward.
Awesome!
Movie examples of Gifted characters:
Max Fischer in Rushmore
Elf
Ferris Bueller
Flint from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Good Will Hunting
Harry Potter
The Incredibles
Matilda
Searching for Bobby Fischer
Temple Grandin
Disclaimers
As you read through this blog, you will read many stories of communication breakdowns. It will be tempting to take sides. Maybe you will consider me a victim, or an enabler, maybe even a perpetrator at times.
When I am writing these summaries, I am less interested in who did what to whom, than I am in what are the outcomes of a particular event or behavior, and what needs to change going forward as a result.
Since I am the only one who’s behavior I can change, I tend to view situations from the perspective of my culpability and my actions. This is not to absolve others from their actions or responsibility. Believe me many hours have been spent in tears and bewilderment and confusion about why others do as they do. I just find my own life quality improves faster if I focus on my contributions to situations and changes I want to make going forward.
This is not a suggestion that you should do the same, or that this technique will be effective for you.
When I am writing these summaries, I am less interested in who did what to whom, than I am in what are the outcomes of a particular event or behavior, and what needs to change going forward as a result.
Since I am the only one who’s behavior I can change, I tend to view situations from the perspective of my culpability and my actions. This is not to absolve others from their actions or responsibility. Believe me many hours have been spent in tears and bewilderment and confusion about why others do as they do. I just find my own life quality improves faster if I focus on my contributions to situations and changes I want to make going forward.
This is not a suggestion that you should do the same, or that this technique will be effective for you.
Growth
Everyone's favorite!
NOT!
Some people seem to go through life without having to think too much about growth. They are suited well enough to fit in at their schools, churches, neighborhoods and teams. They are satisfied enough with their grades, their jobs, their relationships. Their lives seem uncomplicated, except for the 'normally' hard events of life: losing loved ones, financial hardships, health challenges. Many people aspire to be 'normal' and uncomplicated, and for their lives to run smoothly and to feel a sense of belonging. Dabrowski would say these people are experiencing Primary Integration.
Then there are those with dream lives of all sorts: celebrities, authors, inventors, athletes, activists, world leaders. And we have the sense that they too have their lives all together and they're at the top of their game because they are so exceptional. These people seem to be high functioning and possess mysterious gifts and talents. These are the people that contribute their gifts and their work changes the world.
We can't always see the effort, struggle and hardship behind the scenes. Most people feel like this level of achievement is outside of their reach. Not all people in this league have achieved self-actualization and true self-determination, but these are where you might find those who've achieved Dabrowski's Secondary Integration. Some familiar names: Mathatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Buckminster Fuller, Stephen Hawking, Mother Theresa.
In between there is a lot of mess: stress, strife, crisis, mental health challenges, self-destruction and hardship. At every level. Each growth point represents the possibility of continued growth, permanent regression, or worse---self-destruction. Nothing is obvious and each person's path is unique. There are not always people to guide you.
Frequently, at times of stress or crisis, it's common to seek the familiar, and to ask loved ones for support. And frequently, instead of support you deserve from those you love, instead you get their anger, impatience, blame, misunderstanding, and cold shoulders. Those at the level of Primary Integration have no idea how much difficulty and stress you are carrying, or how isolated you are. They might even be--consciously or unconsciously-- trying to give you some form of tough love or pressure to get you back into the fold.
Whether you chose to grow beyond your family, or you chose a different life for yourself, or whether you were shunned and scapegoated and rejected by your family or community, and thus-- had this path foisted upon you--- once you start, you find you can never truly go home again.
This blog is my attempt to make sense of the mess and the life as the Party of One.
NOT!
Some people seem to go through life without having to think too much about growth. They are suited well enough to fit in at their schools, churches, neighborhoods and teams. They are satisfied enough with their grades, their jobs, their relationships. Their lives seem uncomplicated, except for the 'normally' hard events of life: losing loved ones, financial hardships, health challenges. Many people aspire to be 'normal' and uncomplicated, and for their lives to run smoothly and to feel a sense of belonging. Dabrowski would say these people are experiencing Primary Integration.
Then there are those with dream lives of all sorts: celebrities, authors, inventors, athletes, activists, world leaders. And we have the sense that they too have their lives all together and they're at the top of their game because they are so exceptional. These people seem to be high functioning and possess mysterious gifts and talents. These are the people that contribute their gifts and their work changes the world.
We can't always see the effort, struggle and hardship behind the scenes. Most people feel like this level of achievement is outside of their reach. Not all people in this league have achieved self-actualization and true self-determination, but these are where you might find those who've achieved Dabrowski's Secondary Integration. Some familiar names: Mathatma Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Buckminster Fuller, Stephen Hawking, Mother Theresa.
In between there is a lot of mess: stress, strife, crisis, mental health challenges, self-destruction and hardship. At every level. Each growth point represents the possibility of continued growth, permanent regression, or worse---self-destruction. Nothing is obvious and each person's path is unique. There are not always people to guide you.
Frequently, at times of stress or crisis, it's common to seek the familiar, and to ask loved ones for support. And frequently, instead of support you deserve from those you love, instead you get their anger, impatience, blame, misunderstanding, and cold shoulders. Those at the level of Primary Integration have no idea how much difficulty and stress you are carrying, or how isolated you are. They might even be--consciously or unconsciously-- trying to give you some form of tough love or pressure to get you back into the fold.
Whether you chose to grow beyond your family, or you chose a different life for yourself, or whether you were shunned and scapegoated and rejected by your family or community, and thus-- had this path foisted upon you--- once you start, you find you can never truly go home again.
This blog is my attempt to make sense of the mess and the life as the Party of One.
Chapters
Does your life arrange itself in chapters?
It's easy to see the beginnings and endings when we are young. School starts, we have our set of friends, maybe your family moves to a new city, we like certain sports or after school activities. So the chapters seem to align with growing up and progressing through life. We can make sense of changes with externals: we changed grades, or stopped a sport, so we lost touch with our friend. Our family moved or our friend moved away. We don't necessarily blame ourselves, even if we are sad about a chapter ending or a friendship ending.
When we grow up, there are still chapters that start and end because of externals. We move to a new city and get a new job where we meet new friends. Or we break up with a partner, and it seems like half of our friends go at the same time. Or we take up a new hobby or change careers, and the people we meet reflect more of who we are becoming.
So, going through all of those changes can be emotional. Sometimes fun and exhilarating, other times devastating and bewildering. But, there are always external reasons we can point to about why things happened the way they did, and this idea can lessen the blow.
Have you ever had chapters of your life seemingly start or end for no reason you can understand? Like life just sends down a lightning bolt, and everything catches on fire and it's gone overnight, while you're still trying to figure out what the BEEP just happened? (People who have lived this in real life with hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, wildfires or mudslides, please excuse my analogy, and I can not even begin to understand the devastation when an entire community is hit that hard all at the same time, so everyone is impacted and NGOs & FEMA must intervene).
That is a strong metaphor to describe the feeling that nothing is recognizable or familiar, and the grasping desperation we feel to connect and to make sense of things. I've had a few of these. A friendship group shifts for reasons I can't understand and suddenly all my friendships are awkward. College ends and my part-time retail job that was great during school suddenly makes me feel like my life is going nowhere fast. Or key long-term relationships I thought were going really great, suddenly, quickly end in betrayal, leaving me heartbroken. Sometimes changes have been even more extreme where the place I worked closed and no longer existed so there is no job to go back to even if I wanted to.Going thorough each of these experiences has involved me losing skills I needed to keep up at school or in my career, spending hours ruminating over relationships when I couldn't necessarily identify what I had done or said, or the moment when things got off track.
I think of those chapters as responses to internal changes. Sometimes we are unaware we are changing. Sometimes we'd prefer to not change, and stay with the familiarity and comfort of our old life--our jobs, our friends, our marriages. And yet, the world, and the people in our lives become a constant reflection that we have changed and they have stayed the same, or at least are not changing in the same direction as we are.
In these cases, so many parts of life change so suddenly, with no chance of going back to how things were, that we are forced to rebuild.
I've had a few of these very, very difficult chapters. As a teen, when I wanted a much bigger life than my friends were going for, but I was really scared and had no faith in myself. As a young person, when I wanted more emotional health and fulfillment, but that seemed to ruin all my friendships at the same time, for reasons I still don't fully understand. When I wanted a more fulfilling relationship with my spouse, and rather than therapy, we split up. And recently, when I wanted a lot more financial security for myself and my kids, and those around me were not as supportive or enthusiastic about my successful efforts in that direction, which resulted in overwhelming health challenges for me and major changes in all of my relationships.
All of those times, even if I desperately would've given anything to not have to go forward into the unknown, very much alone, and instead, I had to completely rebuild.
Has your life ever forced you into complete overhaul? How do you support yourself emotionally when you are going through tough chapters? Do you blame yourself and look for what you did wrong to cause the upheaval? How do you make sense of things and move on when it's not obvious what you did or didn't do to cause this?
Answering these questions has been my preoccupation for the last few years as I have sought to rebuild. I have learned a great deal about relationships in this search, and it will take a huge number of blog posts to explain. Some ideas we will explore:
~ Asynchronous growth in ourselves and others
~ Healthy and unhealthy responses to change
~ The life goals and 'debts' we inherit from our childhood family
~ Ways to understand life events when there is no information
It's easy to see the beginnings and endings when we are young. School starts, we have our set of friends, maybe your family moves to a new city, we like certain sports or after school activities. So the chapters seem to align with growing up and progressing through life. We can make sense of changes with externals: we changed grades, or stopped a sport, so we lost touch with our friend. Our family moved or our friend moved away. We don't necessarily blame ourselves, even if we are sad about a chapter ending or a friendship ending.
When we grow up, there are still chapters that start and end because of externals. We move to a new city and get a new job where we meet new friends. Or we break up with a partner, and it seems like half of our friends go at the same time. Or we take up a new hobby or change careers, and the people we meet reflect more of who we are becoming.
So, going through all of those changes can be emotional. Sometimes fun and exhilarating, other times devastating and bewildering. But, there are always external reasons we can point to about why things happened the way they did, and this idea can lessen the blow.
Have you ever had chapters of your life seemingly start or end for no reason you can understand? Like life just sends down a lightning bolt, and everything catches on fire and it's gone overnight, while you're still trying to figure out what the BEEP just happened? (People who have lived this in real life with hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, wildfires or mudslides, please excuse my analogy, and I can not even begin to understand the devastation when an entire community is hit that hard all at the same time, so everyone is impacted and NGOs & FEMA must intervene).
That is a strong metaphor to describe the feeling that nothing is recognizable or familiar, and the grasping desperation we feel to connect and to make sense of things. I've had a few of these. A friendship group shifts for reasons I can't understand and suddenly all my friendships are awkward. College ends and my part-time retail job that was great during school suddenly makes me feel like my life is going nowhere fast. Or key long-term relationships I thought were going really great, suddenly, quickly end in betrayal, leaving me heartbroken. Sometimes changes have been even more extreme where the place I worked closed and no longer existed so there is no job to go back to even if I wanted to.Going thorough each of these experiences has involved me losing skills I needed to keep up at school or in my career, spending hours ruminating over relationships when I couldn't necessarily identify what I had done or said, or the moment when things got off track.
I think of those chapters as responses to internal changes. Sometimes we are unaware we are changing. Sometimes we'd prefer to not change, and stay with the familiarity and comfort of our old life--our jobs, our friends, our marriages. And yet, the world, and the people in our lives become a constant reflection that we have changed and they have stayed the same, or at least are not changing in the same direction as we are.
In these cases, so many parts of life change so suddenly, with no chance of going back to how things were, that we are forced to rebuild.
I've had a few of these very, very difficult chapters. As a teen, when I wanted a much bigger life than my friends were going for, but I was really scared and had no faith in myself. As a young person, when I wanted more emotional health and fulfillment, but that seemed to ruin all my friendships at the same time, for reasons I still don't fully understand. When I wanted a more fulfilling relationship with my spouse, and rather than therapy, we split up. And recently, when I wanted a lot more financial security for myself and my kids, and those around me were not as supportive or enthusiastic about my successful efforts in that direction, which resulted in overwhelming health challenges for me and major changes in all of my relationships.
All of those times, even if I desperately would've given anything to not have to go forward into the unknown, very much alone, and instead, I had to completely rebuild.
Has your life ever forced you into complete overhaul? How do you support yourself emotionally when you are going through tough chapters? Do you blame yourself and look for what you did wrong to cause the upheaval? How do you make sense of things and move on when it's not obvious what you did or didn't do to cause this?
Answering these questions has been my preoccupation for the last few years as I have sought to rebuild. I have learned a great deal about relationships in this search, and it will take a huge number of blog posts to explain. Some ideas we will explore:
~ Asynchronous growth in ourselves and others
~ Healthy and unhealthy responses to change
~ The life goals and 'debts' we inherit from our childhood family
~ Ways to understand life events when there is no information
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