Dear Jana:

No problem with the bold feature in your post. I don’t understand though why I can no longer use the feature in my posts, using my computer.

You make a very valid point, in regard to intent, something I became aware of only recently, when I remembered, for the first time in my life, that she enjoyed hurting me. I suppose such memory was too threatening to have earlier. I remembered that right after she sent some shaming “bullet” my way, she looked at me with this part-smile an excitement, waiting for her bullet to hit me, anticipating- with pleasure- to see the pain registering on my face.

“How do you feel about your relationship with your mother today? From your posts, it seems to me that you are at last free of her.”- I am in no contact whatsoever with her ever since Jan 2014 (11 years ago!) when In sent her a message- through my sister- that I love her. Last time I talked to her was on the phone, summer of 2013.

Am I free of her? Partly, significantly, yes. It’s a process that continues way after having no-contact, a process for which no-contact is necessary. It feels too traumatic to imagine contact with her. The extent and depth of damage she has cased me has been just.. too much. The image of her face, the sound of her voice would be enough to overwhelm me and make me very sick all over again.

In regard to your mother, I appreciate how you recognize that your mother’s actions were influenced by her nature rather than a desire or intent to hurt you. Your insight into the challenges of having a choleric, impulsive mother and your own sensitive, thoughtful nature highlights the difficulties you faced as a child.

Your acknowledgment of emotional neglect and its impact on your social phobia is significant. It’s brave of you to face these realizations and to understand that you deserved better care and support as a child.

I’m glad to read that our conversation has helped you with internal validation. It’s empowering to recognize that your kindness and sensitivity are strengths, not weaknesses. Your life is indeed a testament to your resilience and good heart.

Regarding your relationship with your mother today, it’s wonderful that you have reached a place where you have a nice relationship and don’t need validation from her. You found a way to coexist peacefully while acknowledging the past without letting it define you.

Your story and the way you process your experiences can inspire others to seek understanding and healing. Thank you for being open to sharing your journey.

anita

Dear Peter:

“In my old journal writings, I also noted that I would try to do no harm. Next to it was a thought that if wisdom teaching weren’t leading a person towards compassion they were on the wrong track. I feel we are on the good track”- the commitment to do no harm suggests an intention to lead a life guided by kindness, ethical behavior, and a desire to avoid causing pain or suffering to others.

Alongside your commitment to do no harm, you had the realization that true wisdom teachings should lead a person towards compassion. In other words, any philosophical or spiritual teachings that do not foster compassion and empathy are misguided or incomplete. For you, the essence of true wisdom involves nurturing a compassionate heart.

* An example of a philosophical teaching that does not foster compassion for others is Objectivism where compassion for others is not a primary ethical consideration, and acts of compassion are only encouraged if they align with one’s own rational self-interest.

I agree with you, Peter, and I am glad that we are on the right track.

“Over the last week I’ve falling into the shadows feeling stuck. Going over the post in this thread I wrote the following… A part of me still attached to the original shame that I’m bad… A shame reinforced by the retelling of old stories… One might wonder if I’m out to punish myself and so deserve even seek out the shadows… oh”-

– the retelling of these stories triggers a deep sense of shame that is still attached to the stories you tell about your past experiences. You reflect on the possibility that you might be unconsciously punishing yourself by continually revisiting these painful memories. You question whether you deserve to seek out the shadows, indicating a possible belief that you are somehow deserving of this suffering. In other words, by repeatedly telling yourself these negative stories, you might be perpetuating a cycle of self-punishment and keeping yourself stuck in a negative emotional state. You recognize the destructive nature of this cycle but is struggling to break free from it.

“Unskillful reasons I retell and hold onto my stories of hurt? I re-tell my stories in the hopes that by retelling them I can change them. I re-tell my stories with a thought that I need to hold onto the hurt to maintain boundaries. I re-tell my stories as away to imagine I’m hurting those that hurt me. I re-tell my stories to punish myself”-

– You believe that holding onto the hurt helps you maintain boundaries. This implies that the pain from past experiences serves as a protective mechanism, preventing you from getting too close to others and potentially being hurt again. However, this strategy also isolate you and hinders the formation of healthy relationships.

You imagine that by retelling your stories, you are somehow hurting those who hurt you. This reveals a desire for retribution or justice, that reliving the pain allows you to take back some power, but in reality, it perpetuates the cycle of suffering.

While the retelling of stories might provide temporary comfort or a sense of control, they ultimately keep you trapped in a cycle of pain and prevent healing and growth.

“As we have explored we have noticed, if only peripherally, the Eternal. Realizing the relationship between the temporal and eternal is the sense of life. This realization itself isn’t hope but that the realization is possible maybe…”- if you see Peter from the Eternal perspective”-

– From the Temporal viewpoint, your identity is heavily defined by your past actions and experiences, leading to a narrow and often harsh self-judgment. This perspective lacks a sense of compassion and forgiveness for yourself. From the Eternal perspective, your inherent worth and value as a human being is untouched by your past mistakes or experiences, and therefore, you are deserving of love and compassion.

From the Eternal viewpoint, your true essence is not defined by your temporal struggles but by timeless truths such as your capacity for growth, resilience, and transformation, healing and evolving beyond your past. The Eternal perspective is compassionate. It recognizes that everyone has flaws and makes mistakes, but these do not diminish our worth. It encourages self-forgiveness and a deeper connection to universal principles such as love, empathy, and interconnectedness. Embracing the Eternal perspective can help us move beyond self-judgment and shame, and towards a more balanced and loving understanding of ourselves.

“So, the question is. How do we go from ‘knowing’ to living and resting in what we have learned?”- knowing + self compassion and forgiveness = living and resting in what we have learned.

“I think I’m asking why do I continue to fall into shadow?”- I think that it is Shame who is tripping you, again and again, causing you to fall.

“How is it we see but do not see?”- There are moments when we see and rejoice, hopeful, in what we see. We see bright blue, open skies. But then Shame- like a dark cloud- obscures the sunlight and we can’t see.

“To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don’t grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead, you relax, and float.”― Alan Watts”-

– Just as trying to grab hold of the water while swimming can cause you to sink, clinging to Shame keeps you stuck in a cycle of negative emotions. Letting yourself to float can be a metaphor for releasing the grip of shame and trusting in your inherent worth. Overcoming shame involves trusting that you are enough as you are, without needing to prove your worth or relive past mistakes. It’s about allowing yourself to be carried by the current of self-compassion and acceptance. It’s about being gentle with yourself and accepting that you are human, deserving of love and forgiveness, leading to a sense of inner peace.

It’s about moving beyond the shadows of shame and finding lightness in self-acceptance.

After I started this post, Peter, I noticed that you submitted 2 new posts. I want to respond to them in this reply, connecting them to the topic of Shame:

(1) Your post before last: About Frodo and Sam: Frodo’s journey is marked by carrying a heavy burden—the One Ring. This burden parallels the weight of shame that you feel, seems to me. Just as the ring weighs on Frodo, shame weighs on you, affecting your ability to fully engage with life. Frodo’s inability to destroy the ring can be seen as a metaphor for the difficulty of overcoming deep-seated shame.

Frodo’s experiences, including the loss of his parents and the hardships of his quest, took a toll on his youthful innocence. Similarly, your past experiences and the shame attached to them eroded your sense of self-worth and innocence (the reason why it was difficult for you to accept the compliment “cute”, which implies youthful innocence).

“I think I saw Sam as the Hero because I wanted to be him. To emerge from the quest with the kind wise innocence needed to continue to engage in life after all the hardships. In hindsight it makes sense to me that I saw Frodo as failing and Sam as the hero. I wanted to be Sam and knew I wasn’t.”-

– It seems that your admiration for Sam and your perception of Frodo’s struggle resonate deeply with your own experiences. You see Sam as the hero because he embodies the qualities you aspire to: emerging from hardships with a kind and wise innocence, able to re-engage with life despite the challenges he faced.

Your wish to be like Sam reflects a longing to move beyond the weight of shame and fully embrace life. However, the acknowledgment that you see yourself more as Frodo, who carries a profound burden and finds it hard to re-engage with life, highlights the impact of your shame. This contrast between Sam and Frodo mirrors your inner struggle, as I see it: on one hand, you desire to be free from the shadows of shame and to engage with life as Sam does. On the other hand, you feel the persistent weight of shame, similar to Frodo’s burden, which hinders your ability to fully re-engage.

(2) Your most recent post: your references Krishnamurti’s argument, as I see it, expresses that a desire to overcome shame creates internal conflict, the shame becomes more entrenched as you try to force change.

You draw a parallel to Frodo’s inability to destroy the ring, suggesting that some burdens (like shame) are not for us to forcefully change or eliminate. Instead, they must be processed in their own time and space. This relates to the notion that overcoming shame requires patience, acceptance, and self-compassion rather than forceful action.

You note the theme of movement arising and returning to stillness, sound to silence, and time to the eternal. This cyclical nature reflects the process of healing from shame. Just as sound arises from silence and returns to it, your emotions (including shame) arise and can return to a state of peace.

“I feel I’m being asked to trust.”- I am going to connect this sentence to what I wrote to you yesterday. I wrote: “to create a lasting change, a person has to be rewarded along the way in the context of connecting to others. For example… if you let that affection reach deeper within you, if it made you smile and feel warm inside- that’s the kind of reward I am talking about. Without such rewards along the way, there’s nothing to motivate our social nature to continue the changing.”-

– to create a lasting change and to let it happen naturally, trust is crucial, trust in at least one person who tells you (as I do now): you are a good person, Peter. You deserve peace of mind. You deserve forgiveness- your own and others’. You made mistakes, you miscalculated, but who hasn’t. It’s human to make mistakes.

As I think about my mistakes, the most regrettable ones, the ones accompanied by the most intense shame and guilt, I still regret them just as much as I regretted them before. But I know that, being unable to go back in time and change things, the shame serves no purpose (I know-know it, I see- see it). Shame doesn’t help me; it doesn’t help anyone else. So, I let it go, the shame and guilt. I let them go rationally and naturally.

Shame and guilt (referring to your yesterday quote by Alan Watts) are still present in the water in which I swim, but I don’t grab hold of them, and therefore, I don’t sink.

Shame and guilt are still there in the shadow of my life, but (using your words from yesterday), I no longer “continue to fall into shadow”.

I suppose it’s about no longer sinking, no longing falling into shame and guilt. It takes trusting at least one person outside yourself who confidently tells you that you are a good person, peter, and that it is okay- for you personally- not to sink, but to RISE; not to fall, but to STAND STRONG.

anita

* one more thing before I return tomorrow: for the changing we’re talking about to last long enough to create a lasting change, a person has to be rewarded along the way in the context of connecting to others. For example, I referred to you earlier as “cute”. First you perceived it somewhat negatively, and then you applied the rule of charity and considered a positive motivation on my part. If next, you let the affection that I felt and expressed to you, if you let that affection reach deeper within you, if it made you smile and feel warm inside- that’s the kind of reward I am talking about. Without such rewards along the way, there’s nothing to motivate our social nature to continue the changing.

anita

Dear Peter:

“So, the question is. How do we go from ‘knowing’ to living and resting in what we have learned? How do we go from knowledge to wisdom, to making what we ‘know’ to be true to How we are? When does the seeker get to be also the one who has found? I think I’m asking why do I continue to fall into shadow?… How is it we see but do not see?”-

– the first answer that came to my mind as I read your questions was: we fall into the shadows for as long as we are in the habit of falling into the shadows.

The transformation from knowing => living and resting in what we have learned is about breaking multiple old mental-emotional-behavioral habits and forming new ones through consistent practice, mindfulness, endless patience and lots of self-compassion.

Understanding wisdom concepts intellectually can excite us and provide us with the emotional motivation to break old habits and to turn insights into behaviors. But the motivation often weakens during the long, difficult practice, and tired… we fall back into the shadows.

Problem is that as much as we want change, we also resist change and when tired, we find comfort in going back to the same. Same doesn’t require work.

I would like to add more Tues morning. Good to read from you again, Peter!

anita

Dear Jana:

You are welcome, as always.

You wrote (I am adding big case letters to this quote and the next quote): “I have been told all my life that I am THE BAD ONE, because I am the oversensitive one and that it is me who just can’t handle a normal life like others”.

I reread your posts this morning since Nov. You wrote back then in regard to your mother: “She is A GOOD PERSON, we had everything we needed – food, clothes, … and mostly what we wanted – toys etc… When I tried to tell her about what happened to me or my social phobia… she either got mad at me (‘Could you stop it?!’ … ‘Could you just leave me alone for a while?!’)… no discussion, no understanding, no words of comfort from her… I wonder why her words affected me more when my dad’s words were so kind. Why do we listen, hear those BAD PEOPLE more than the good ones in our lives?”-

– Isn’t it amazing that without noticing it (seems to me), you referred to your mother right above as a bad person (one of the “bad people”)?

Her emotional detachment, expressed moodiness and Irritability with you when you approached her for emotional support, her dismissive responses, her criticisms and belittling of your concerns, and her lack of empathy for you (failing to show empathy or understanding towards your struggles, both emotional and social)- all these, repeated and consistent, have caused you to suffer, added to your suffering, and/or didn’t take away from your suffering, so no wonder you’d think of her- without noticing that you did (I think)- as a bad person in this context.

In other contexts, you evaluate her as a good person: she worked hard to ensure that her children had food, clothes, toys, and other necessities despite significant challenges and personal struggles, had good intentions toward her children’s physical well-being, and showed some (limited) awareness of her shortcomings and sought forgiveness from you.

In some cultures or generations, there is a parental emphasis on providing for physical needs, while emotional needs are undervalued or overlooked. This can lead to parents believing that as long as they provide food, shelter, and education, they are fulfilling their parental duties. Parents often model their behavior on how they were raised. If their own parents did not provide emotional support, they may lack the awareness or skills to do so for their own children. Some parents struggle with their own emotional issues, such as depression, anxiety, or unresolved trauma, which can make it difficult for them to connect emotionally with their children.

Parents who are overwhelmed by their own responsibilities, such as work, financial stress, or raising multiple children, may find it difficult to provide emotional support: they may prioritize immediate physical needs over emotional nurturing due to time and energy constraints. In environments with financial hardship, parents are focused on ensuring basic survival needs are met, and emotional support may take a backseat.

Some parents are fully aware of the importance of physical nourishment but are not fully aware of the importance of emotional nourishment and its impact on a child’s development. There are parents who use denial as a defense mechanisms to cope with their own shortcomings: admitting they are failing to provide emotional support can be painful, so they choose to ignore or minimize the issue.

But all these explanations are of no use to a child who is suffering from.. emotional starvation, I’d call it. A child starves because of lack of empathy and emotional support, regardless of the reasons.

“I don’t even mention in front of my family that I feel spiritual connection to Buddhism because I would face a lot of criticism, rolling eyes and skeptical remarks… My mom usually chased away my spiritual imagination by saying that it was non sense… The only person who has ever told me he likes my personality is my boyfriend… It seems to me that our parents had kids… and then they were like ‘Okay… so go and live.’ Who cares. But… even cats teach their kittens how to hunt… I grew up alone, with no guidance, no support, no interest… and I was left that way for a very long time…

“Growing up, I felt that there was either a lack of interest or rejection/ belittling of my troubles. So, I gave up. I realized that I was simply alone… I remember my mom “growl” at me when she was annoyed by me. I wanted to try hypnosis (because I saw that once on TV – they treated people with phobias by hypnosis) and I was simply just chased off that it was nonsense… and no other discussion… as always. It was said and done. Period…

Today: “I never had any hatred towards her… I just knew I couldn’t rely on her. And I detached from her and got deeper into my inner world. But I feel that she has this conviction inside that it is our fault, that we are the ones causing her problems… as in your words ‘it’s easier (..) to ignore a child’s distress than it is to acknowledge and address it…’ I would only add here that it is also easier to deny being a part of a child’s problem than to admit it.”-

– like I said before, her reasons (her own childhood, her struggles) don’t matter when it comes to how she affected you, but what does matter in regard to her reasons is that you, Jana- you were not the reason for her lack of emotional support, criticisms, belittling, etc.

“I understand my brother’s frustration, anger and resentment towards our parents, but he chose to go down the wrong path. Although I don’t know if he consciously chose this path or if all the things in his life – childhood and forming years – led him there. How much can we really influence? … I was in the dark until recently”-

– When people are fueled by intense emotions like pain and anger, their decisions often resemble reactions rather than deliberate choices. Reactions are often automatic and driven by emotional triggers. They are immediate, impulsive, without fully considering the consequences of their actions. These impulsive actions are more reactive and less reflective of thoughtful decision-making.

Genuine choices involve a degree of awareness and reflection where the person considers various options and potential outcomes before deciding. When awareness is lacking, the line between a choice and a reaction becomes blurred. However, when individuals gain insight and reflect on their behaviors, they move closer to making conscious and intentional choices.

When emotions like pain and anger take over, the rational part of the brain is bypassed, leading to reactive behaviors. Destructive behaviors fueled by pain and anger often start as reactions— immediate and emotional responses to distressing stimuli. Over time, if these reactions become habitual, they may appear as choices, even though they lack the deliberate thought process associated with genuine choices.

“I remember that I used to be very annoyed by questions: ‘Why are you shaking?’ etc. People noticed of course, but they didn’t even think to address it gently or actively in helping me… rather they used it against me… children laughing at me, bullying me by imitating me, deliberately ignoring me… How did you deal with this?”- I can very much relate. I know I was made fun of, I was ignored, it felt terrible, but I don’t have memories of events and interactions from my childhood and adolescence. All of my childhood-adolescence memories, if I played them in my head like a movie, would last 10 minutes maybe (I didn’t time it, lol).

“Have you ever tried to ask your mother (or father… I don’t know if he lived with you, as you rarely mention him) for help?”- In regard to my father, I have only one memory of him before their divorce, and it was a traumatic memory. I was about 5 at the time, it was nighttime, they had a physical fight, my mother ran to the street right after threatening to kill herself, etc. After their divorce he visited but almost all of his time visiting, my mother was talking to him while I just sat there.

In regard to asking my mother for help, that would have been strange: to ask her to protect me from herself- because she was my main source of pain and trauma. No one, no person in my life (and there were selfish, bad people in my life) has hurt me as much as she did, not even close. For one, at 5 or 6 or (don’t remember) I stopped going out and spent my time either with her or alone(while she was working), so my social life was extremely limited.

I appreciate our conversation, Jana. because of you I understand myself better. We were both victims, as sadly, so many children are, but as I see it, our journeys are from Victims to Victors!

anita

Dear Jana:

* I wrote the following before you submitted the recent 4 posts. I will respond to the recent in a separate post.

You wrote yesterday: “It’s not easy to realize that I’m still broken”, and I responded: “you are Broken and Strong, both”.

“I’m still broken”, you wrote. The use of the word “still” implies that you’ve been on a healing journey but have not yet reached a place of complete emotional recovery.

This is how I personally experience these two things: being Broken and being Strong. I am talking about my experience and mine only, and I am curious as to what you think about it, Jana, and if you can relate in some ways:

I experienced significant to severe emotional trauma during my childhood, chronic and complex trauma= repeated and prolonged exposure to highly stressful events involving my mother’s behaviors, such as prolonged histrionic, vocal displays where she contemplated suicide out loud with lots of drama, as well as prolonged borderline vocal displays where she ragefully blamed me at length for her pain, disappointments and frustrations.

Those repeated stressful events with no correction (she never stopped, never expressed regret: it was just a matter of time before the next event) and with no help from the outside (no adult- such as an aunt, an uncle, or a neighbor, or a teacher- to talk to me about my very distressing experiences with my mother, no one to validate my feelings, to express empathy for me), these events broke me in several places and in several ways. For one, the Fight or Flight Response led my muscles to tense up (preparing to fight or run away) so much so, and for so long, that for over fifty years, the tension is still in my muscles today, this very moment. My muscles keep “running” with no where to go. I am referring to the motor tics (Tourette Syndrome) that are accompanied by great physical and emotional tension, every moment of every day.

Many, many times, countless times, I tried to stop the tics for good, all in vain. As I feel the tension in my shoulder right now, and I feel the muscle tensing, I can relax it momentarily, but the tension returns too soon and the muscle is contracting again.

What I am saying is that in this way (tics) I am broken, and complete repair (never again to experience muscular tension and tics) is not possible for me. Some improvement is possible, I am hoping, but not complete repair and recovery.

Strength and recovery are possible for me even though in some places, such as the tics, I am broken beyond repair. I am focusing not on where I am broken, but on the where I am not broken, or on where it is possible for me to repair. One such place is giving myself the validation and empathy that I wasn’t given growing up (growing-in, really): seeing myself no longer as a freak-of-nature, an abnormal and unacceptable creature, but => => => a normal, acceptable person who responded to abnormal, unacceptable real-life situations, such as my mother’s histrionic and borderline protracted and repeated displays.

I responded normally (the normal fight or flight Response) to an abnormal situation (danger that I wasn’t able to fight or run away from, aka being trapped). This is a shift of perspective that I am able to accomplish, a freeing perspective that is scientific and true to reality (not a wishful thinking).

anita

Dear Jana:

“It’s not easy to realize that I’m still broken”- you are Broken and Strong, both, not one or the other. it’s important to understand this distinction.

Strength doesn’t mean the absence of struggles or pain. It means that when you feel broken, you continue to push through challenges and make progress. Recognizing one’s brokenness in itself requires strength and courage.

Reaching out for support and allowing yourself to be vulnerable in front of (chosen) others is a sign of strength. It shows the willingness to connect and find solutions, rather than isolating yourself.

Weakness in brokenness manifests as avoiding or denying the issues which prevent healing and prolong suffering. Engaging in self-criticism and negative self-talk without recognizing one’s strengths perpetuates feelings of weakness, hindering progress and healing.

I wish you a nice weekend as well. Snow was expected here, but strangely- no rain and no snow and (unlike yesterday) no ice visible on the ground, from where I am sitting, indoors.

anita