A common response

[markdohle]

A common response

Since it is our past that forms us, I believe that in order for it not to control our lives, it is good to remember and to try to understand what happened. If we don’t, then the unconscious will take over and we will react in ways that aren’t understood, either by the one reacting, or those who get the full brunt of the response…”I don’t know what came over me”… is a common response to such an event….it is a reliving of a past situation or event and taking it out here in the present, which is often an act of injustice against those one lives with. Multiply that by billions and perhaps we can get a glimmer of why our world is in such a mess. Perhaps that is why mercy and forgiveness, is in the end, the most rational response of all, though admittedly the most difficult to accomplish.

[Beany]

I was just talking about this with a friend this morning, Mark. I call them Primal Laws, formed around early childhood events. It's not so much the events themselves that stay with us, it's the decisions & conclusions & beliefs we formed around those events that we take with us into adulthood. For instance, if a child is physically, verbally, or emotionally abused, they might conclude that they had no intrinsic value, or that they could gain value if they behaved in specific ways that brought approval. At five, this is a coping technique that worked, more or less. But to engage in the same behavior at 30, or 40 is inappropriate and unsuccessful because the situation in which it developed no longer exists. But these primal laws have been with us so long, are so deeply embedded, that they're difficult to identify. The laws are what we decided was true about ourselves and the world external to us, when we were very young and with the limited understanding that comes with childhood, that we have never re-examined, and they often run us, which results in childish behavior.

Anyhoo, that's my theory. I became much happier when I identified and put away the childish thinking, and the small child within me was very happy when I removed that burden from her. She was doing her best to help, but I decided the adult me was the one better able to handle the responsibility.

Edited June 9, 2012 by Beany

[markdohle]

I was just talking about this with a friend this morning, Mark. I call them Primal Laws, formed around early childhood events. It's not so much the events themselves that stay with us, it's the decisions & conclusions & beliefs we formed around those events that we take with us into adulthood. For instance, if a child is physically, verbally, or emotionally abused, they might conclude that they had no intrinsic value, or that they could gain value if they behaved in specific ways that brought approval. At five, this is a coping technique that worked, more or less. But to engage in the same behavior at 30, or 40 is inappropriate and unsuccessful because the situation in which it developed no longer exists. But these primal laws have been with us so long, are so deeply embedded, that they're difficult to identify. The laws are what we decided was true about ourselves and the world external to us, when we were very young and with the limited understanding that comes with childhood, that we have never re-examined, and they often run us, which results in childish behavior.

Anyhoo, that's my theory. I became much happier when I identified and put away the childish thinking, and the small child within me was very happy when I removed that burden from her. She was doing her best to help, but I decided the adult me was the one better able to handle the responsibility.

Wise words my friend, as usual you have given me more to think about.

peace

mark