101) From Shitty-ness to Well-ness: Part 1 - Some Personal Thoughts on the Journey out of Hell
It doesn’t matter where you are or where you’ve been, in the sense that there is no value in judging yourself for that. It matters where you are heading, what direction you are pointing yourself in. If you’re pointing yourself towards wellness, honesty, healing, growth, then you deserve an inner standing ovation. Well done, hero-in-training! Well done.
98) The cure for The Dude's pain, is in The Dude's pain
You’re not special. Not any more than any other collection of atoms in the universe. Which is ok, because every single one is infinitely special. (And doesn’t actually exist as “an atom” anyway, but is indelibly interwoven into the whole Quantum enchilada.) So stop trying to convince yourself you’re “more special” than infinity.
Instead, feel. Everything. You’ll probably need help doing this. Which is, in some ways, exactly the point. Because “you” are not you, just like an atom isn’t an atom.
Embrace this. Your heart will open. And everything you once relied on for “coping” will seem so silly, when contrasted with Being itself.
This is not an idea. It’s as real as biting into an apple. Taking a shit. Moving your eyes back and forth to read these words.
You can do this.
97) Dear Abuser,
I once believed you were the Wizard, but behind the curtain, you are starving, sadly trying to subsist on mere illusions. As with all tyrants, I now see that you are a prisoner.
But long before I saw this, long before I had the intellectual scaffolding, the emotional distance, or the social validation to see that we both lived in a prison of your making, your words bathed me, held, soothed, formed, judged and condemned me.
96) Abuse, Trauma, Shame, and Healing
In an upcoming series of posts, I am going to explore the dynamics of the inner monster that seems to doom so many people to suffer lives of loneliness and limitation — Shame.
As we go through these posts, we’ll explore where Shame comes from, what it feels like, how it works, and how to heal and be transformed by it in a “positive” way.
Some of the posts will be experientially-written, poetic, descriptive or metaphoric. Some will be analytical and theoretical. Some will be practical, like a Wikihow article.
My goals/hopes are to touch your heart, sharpen your understanding, and help you build a skillset to heal from shame and free yourself.
94) The Day I Saw My Future Unfold
I read a love poem once. It was titled “The Day I Saw My Future Unfold.” It was about a walk in a forest. The vibrancy of life. Beauty. The ecstasy of truly trusting someone with your whole heart. It sounded so perfect.
I wonder if their future unfolded the way they saw it.
So often, it doesn’t.
But in any terrain, you choose your path.
93) How to Not Murder People, Stay Addicted, or Commit Suicide: Part 2 - The Representativeness Heuristic is Sus
Do you struggle with feelings of not being good enough? Do you know anyone who does? It seems pretty likely. Brené Brown’s TED talk on Shame has more than 50,000,000 views. That’s greater than the entire population of Canada. Shit, eh? There seems to be a lot of people who feel like they’re not good enough….
83) How the fuck can you manage stress when the whole world is going to shit?
So let’s not talk about healing right now. Let’s not worry about you being insecure, or having a difficult childhood, or having addictions, or having anger problems, or having trauma, or whatever your shitty stuff is, let’s not talk about THAT right now. We’re going to talk about that in future posts, when we talk about healing from trauma. But for now, let’s talk about laying the foundation — which is “basic functionality.” Laying THAT foundation is EXACTLY the same as trying to cope during a crisis.
76) Dances with Wolves, Part2: Relationship patterns with Gas-lighters, Narcissists and Spiritual Predators
WSCs, abusers, cult leaders, tyrannical leaders, toxic ‘friends’ — they want you all to themselves. They want to control your reality as much as they can. And because they know that other people might see through their bullshit and warn you, they do everything they can to convince you that THOSE PEOPLE are the untrustworthy ones. Only you and the WSC, in your nice little soul-mate bubble of trust, are the Good Ones.
75) Dances with Wolves, Part 1: Gas-lighters, Narcissists, and Spiritual Predators
I would like to explore some patterns of destructive behaviour that people far-too-often experience in their intimate relationships especially, and we’ll focus on three “types of people:” gas-lighters, narcissists, and spiritual predators. Although these are not exactly the same things, there’s a solid ‘family resemblance’ between them. So let’s call them Wolves In Sheeps’ Clothing (WSCs).
74) The Law of Attraction -- A Favourite Weapon of Abusers
Many people believe in the Law of Attraction. Itʼs practically a truism for many (not all, thank god) personal-growth devotees, spiritual practitioners, New Agey-types, go-getters and motivational coaches. Itʼs a truism for the people who write books and sell inspirational videos about….the Law of Attraction. They make tons of sweet, sweet cash off it. Thatʼs because they BELIEVE in it!
See? It works!
53) Dissociation, Part 2
These experiences pile up. They create anxiety. Depression. Embarrassment. Guilt. Despair. For me most of all, shame. You feel like a fucking failure. Not “someone who failed”, but A FAILURE, like it is actually who you are. Failure is your Essence.
52) Motherfuckin' Dissociation
I believe that inside every one us is a bad-ass motherfucker, just waiting to bust out and live our passion, and let our freak flag fly, and be awesome, and the world is your oyster, and all that awesome shit. But, so many people today — literally millions and millions and millions — are preventing themselves from doing so.
51) The strongest man I ever knew: A memorial
You taught me to ‘be strong.’ But ‘strong’ isn’t an impervious cocoon that only opens to the grave. A ‘strong’ is someone strong enough to be open in life, to be loved, to express sorrow, to forgive, to admit weakness, to say “I’m sorry,” and to set things right.
50) Dirty Feet (TW: suicide, sexual assault)
Thinking about suicide has been my main hobby for 14 years, 7 months and 16 days.
You were right about sexual assault, especially for kids.
“It makes you see yourself as a demon. So you check-out, dissociate, a lot of the time, because who wants to be a demon?”
I realize why I kept this fantasy alive for so long.
I believed the only worthy thing to do with my life was make sure my last act will be one of love.
34) Less than half, and none of the important ones: Part 4
I believe that healing starts with feeling.
Feeling the truth of your pain. Feeling the ache of loneliness that seems to open into infinite blackness in your heart. Feeling the guilt that eats away at you for the ways you know, deep down inside, that you have failed people, or yourself. Feeling your awfulness. Your grief. Your desperation. Your failures. If you don’t first stop and FEEL the soft, suffering animal that you are, then you will spend your life trying to hammer yourself into shape. This won’t make you stronger; it will just make you bruised and broken and exhausted. The “road to self-improvement” will become more like a hamster wheel, a treadmill that takes you nowhere.
33) Less than half, and none of the important ones: Part 3
“She said she had made a list of all the qualities she wanted in a partner. At the end, she concluded, “he has less than half. And none of the important ones.”
This was the end of my sanity, for a long time. I don’t know why. I just stopped being a person. I was a blank page. And anything written on me turned into invisible ink.
…..Less than half, and none of the important ones. I hate that phrase. It still haunts me, practically every day.”
32) Less than half, and none of the important ones: Part 2
Independence is a delusion. And it’s a dangerous one. Anyone who has been abused knows the deep truth of interdependence, right in their very bodies. The assaulted. The betrayed. The terrorized. The gas-lighted. But also the lonely. The invisible. The unwanted. The ridiculed and rejected.
People live out, in their consciousnesses, their bodies’ attempts to ‘process’ what has happened to them in life; we construct our entire ‘selves’ around this problem of body-world adaptation. It’s good to remember that.
31) Less than half, and none of the important ones: Part 1
Have you ever been on the receiving end of someone’s harshness? Criticism? Gas-lighting? Name-calling? Bullying? Shaming? Humiliating? Lying?
Well, “sticks and stones may break your bones but words….”
Just stop. Right there. Because “words can never hurt you” is absolute, dangerous, bullshit. Words can break your heart, poison your mind, even destroy your life.
9) Stop trying to hit me. And hit me!
But have I ever “really engaged”? Seen what I could really do? Rose to the challenges of my own desire for personal growth and authenticity? Or have I merely placated my desires with the fantasy of “that time in the future” — when I yell my battle cry, shake the dust out of my soul, and “really give ‘er”. And man, it’s gonna be GLORIOUS! I’m going to change EVERYTHING!
3) Unicorns, migraines, and chiropractors
I don’t believe in unicorns. I’d like to though. I mean, wouldn’t you? A world of magic, in which reality isn’t just dead matter heading towards thermodynamic equilibrium, is something I yearn for deeply, and have ever since I was that 5 year old, sitting on her blankie, willing it to fly, or that 10 year old trying to use the Force to move something with her mind.