My Tree was shaken empty and now I’m filling it with “the gifts” that traumatic change brings
I thought I’d write down some of my achievements and lessons, since my life was unexpectedly derailed.
I never asked for these lessons, I’m not glad this happened, but I have to look at them and look at my path and marvel at how much I’ve learned and I have to acknowledge that I am probably a better person for them.
They are my gifts, put into my experience truths, and therefore I have no expectations that they will be true for anyone else, but some of them rework how you experience life and change your behaviour
Some of them took some time to, acclimatise to. They were shocking and so radically different from how I used to think, and they managed successfully to damage some of my memories, and so it took some time to view them as gifts.
The label came from my IC, who has been calling them gifts all along.
I had to work really hard not to direct every bit of blame for the train smash inward, as apparently, I’m really hard on myself. I’ve identified this as part of my FOO.
The Lesson Gifts
codependency
This was the first gift my IC labelled. I learned how a codependent sees the world. I’ve learned that a relationship with a codependent has very little chance of success, because they play the Karpman Drama Triangle, without sharing anything but rescuer mode with you, so when the victim and persecuter modes emerge, it’s one hell of a shock!
I’ve learned that the codependent is not really capable of true intimacy, because most of their interactions with the world are aimed at protecting themselves and keeping people at arms length. They make you feel really good, though because they shower you with what you think is love and affection, to fuel their “codependent supply”. I’ve learned that the codependent has low self esteem and is EXTREMELY sensitive.
They also play the, “if it weren’t for you”, game of transactional analysis. They have NO CLUE, what healthy boundaries are and many won’t say, “no”.
I found this article to be particularly illuminating.
The wrong person leaves the relationship claiming to be the victim, but they are the victim of their own issues, behaviours and choices.
conflict avoidance
This is another way to trash a marriage predictably, before you say, “I do”. Conflict avoidants won’t bring to the discussion anything that needs to be addressed, so firstly, their partner gets zero opportunity to address any problems or self correct, and the avoidant personality starts festering inside, until one day they snap.
That’s also a surprise to their spouse, since nothing was on the table to begin with, so the sudden implosion appears to come out of the blue! The lack of any arguments in a marriage is the “tea leaves” that should have been the bright red flag shouting, “RUN AWAY!”
Conflict avoidance goes hand in hand with codependency and passive aggression.
nice guys, really aren’t nice at all
They will pad the truth, to protect your feelings, so you have no clue where you stand. They will make promises, that they have won’t keep, just to keep the peace.
The book, “no more Mr nice guy”, is informative. The rant’s about “Nice Guys” on the heartless-bitches website are eye opening. A google for the phrase “nice guy syndrome” contains about 3 million results.
passive aggression – A Form of Covert Abuse
Wow. How to abuse someone without either of you knowing that abuse has occurred! This one is a crazy maker.
There is too much to write about this, so I’ll refer to another article:-
Passive aggressive behavior stems from an inability to express anger in a healthy way.
Passive aggressives will say, “yes”, when you ask them to do things, but will intentionally not do what you asked. It’s a power game fought by people who’ve been taught that they have no voice and it’s played from the underdog position, the same position that the Martyr adopts.
It’s the person who stabs you in the back, while smiling at you. This is the cowards way of avoiding conflict.
Communication won’t save/protect a marriage
Hell, I remember having that discussion, when I got married. I sure as hell thought we both believed that communication was important, and that we were actually communicating. The joke was on me.
I’ll leave that there, and refer the topic of communication in marriage to Al Turtle and his excellent relationship wisdom at Al Turtle’s relationship Wisdom.
He has so many pearls on that site, validation, safety, mirroring, IMAGO, realiable membership….and how how it can be that even agreement is an illusion.
People don’t want happiness, they want safety!
gaslighting – another form of covert abuse
Sometimes you are even aware of it, because you can’t put your finger on the something that is bothering you. Ugh! Gaslighting doesn’t have to be intentional, but it’s just as crazy making either way.
I’ll leave this one to google, but in a nutshell this is when someone presents you with information that is skewed from the truth, making you doubt your own memory and then they often redirect the conversation with blame, to avert attention from the real matter at hand.
I’m reminded of the part in Roald Dahl’s, “The Twits”, where Mrs Twit keeps filing off bits of Mr Twit’s chair and then keeps telling him he is shrinking.
Transactional analysis
I explored this as part of my exploration in how to improve my communication with people.
If you do explore TA, be sure to explore 6 level TA, the three levels that are further split in two, so that 12 states are interacting at any time. Otherwise you miss the full model.
An example of those states here. Wikipedia explains the transactions that occur, without the further breakdown of the states.
So for example parent has a nurturing and critical subgroup. Child has natural, adaptive and rebellious.
TA teaches several things including the levels/Ego states on which people operate and the Games/dysfunctions within those states
It’s actually very interesting how you can influence a conversation when you switch to communicating on the same level as the person who you are talking with.
A person communicating on the child level is not going to compute, the response on the adult level.
Transactional analysis also taught me about stroking and why phrases like, “are you OK”, which have no logical component are actually really important to people. It is also the lesson that taught me to tell people that I love them, even though I think the word love is so nondescript, in that is has so many meanings.
I still cringe when I say it, but I’m working on that.
It’s also interesting, because I spend far too much time in adult and although I reject the child level, that is the level where we experience all our creativity and all our fun!!
It’s also the level where we hide from things that frighten us!
I spent a lot of time with someone who functioned often in nurturing parent mode, which kicked me into the fun creative child. An area where my creativity shines! I’m working at forcing myself into that mode by being my own nurturing parent, since I appear to be lacking on that level.
The self discovery gift and some of my faults
personality disorders
I’ve learned that I used to exhibit some narcissist behaviours, which I’ve addressed. I am not a Narc, as I don’t have some of the key elements that true Narcs possess, such as avoidance of true intimacy. I know that I am capable of true love, which is why I got hurt so badly.
If anything, my “narcissist supply”, was being loved and looked after, by someone other than me. Now I know that was out of balance, and I supply my own nurturing.
Al Turtle’s discussion on , “how to identify a bully by mastertalk”, was an eye opener and I am actively preventing myself from speaking that way.
Multiple people have identified that I am very hard on myself, so I am working on the techniques I have learned to improve my self nurturing.
I’ve learned that my personality type (INTP – myers briggs/type 5 eaneagram) loves operating in logical mode, but I’ve also learned, that apart from being entertaining, with it’s patterns and puzzles, that logic is useless and can be used to cloud your view of the world. I will have to completely discard all of these lessons, if I want to participate fully in life….. If I ever want to risk being in another relationship with anyone.
If you ever want to spice up how interesting life is and get out of a rut, then start to associate with people who make you feel uncomfortable, because they are the most likely to share concepts with you that you haven’t thought of trying to experience.
I have realised that I was too focused on driving towards goals, instead of enjoying the journey. I was maybe too perfectionist with myself and wouldn’t let me function at a suboptimal level. Thankfully I don’t expect this of others!!!
I am addressing this.
I love imagery. If I can paint images in my head, I can drive myself. Solutions Based Brief Therapy works really well for me. Questions like, “if you knew you couldn’t fail, what would you be doing?”, really set my vivid imagination flying!
How we are affected by FOO (Family of Origin) Issues
These are painful to learn and identify because when you do identify them your mental picture of your parents changes and it puts the emphasis on your inherited faults.
It’s interesting to see how you pick the familiar, even in a spouse. I’ve discussed IMAGO relationship counseling before, but I’ll mention briefly again that according to that theory people tend to marry the same characters again and again because their choices are based in their FOO.
Some spiritual gifts
A Shaman gave me an exercise I found useful. He told me that I think too much and that it is only one level of experience. The exercise was to pretend that I was sitting at a corner cafe and pretend that the passers by were my thoughts. The idea is that you don’t interact with strangers and it is interesting trying not to interact with or influence your thoughts. You just sit and watch them.
I could never do nothing before! Now I’ve learned to appreciate the experience.
I have a new definition of truth. Everyone has their own truth and it’s based on their recorded experiences. It therefore, since memories can be rewritten, change from one moment to the next.
I’ve learned that we taint our experience of the now with our “truths”. We project our experience onto the real experience and lose information in the process. (Much like Linear algebra can project onto one axis in the chosen basis).
Viktor Frankl’s Logotherapy and his idea of dimensional ontology describe parts of this idea. Fascinating stuff, and possibly the reason you can never really know someone else!
The Buddhists call this state of experiencing without projecting your view onto the current experience, “the philosophy of emptiness”. It’s also this projection of our truth onto the now that causes us pain! The idea repeats in many religions.
People need people. We are herd animals and we thrive off the chaotic input from others. When we don’t have it we get bored with our own ideas and seek more input.
Once you realise that there is no single truth, but that sharing is important, an interesting thing happens.
You share your truth, but you no longer declare it as ultimate fact, or try so emphatically to convince other people of yours! Another of my faults squashed!
Since I’ve learned that logic, taints your experience of the world I’ve had to also take it that emotion, with its illogicalness is another side of the multifaceted thing we call experience, and is no more or less superior.
intact…or not
My choice of morals are intact, but maybe reinterpreted. My belief in telling your truth, no matter what…but my definition of truth is somewhat altered. My belief in honesty first and foremost, now coloured with my understanding of humanities desire for safety, coloured with my understanding of personality disorders and badly placed boundaries!
My life motto of, “ahimsa”, “path of least harm” is still intact, but tainted with the knowledge of “nice guys”!
Things I am still working on
I still cry at the drop of a hat. I am trying to figure out why, but mostly just accepting that it is what it is and that I may just need more time. I mostly don’t do this in company anymore.
Maybe it is because I realise that I never had, what I thought I did, and after the lessons, I can never have it again.
That my mode of operating in the world was faulty…
I roller-coaster between appreciating the lessons and wishing I could have my Rose Coloured glasses back is still evident, but running slower.
I also don’t think I’ve touched the tip of the iceberg in trying to convey all my experiences and I no longer think that it can be solved or explained by logic and I most certainly don’t think it can be communicated, since it will be interpreted by everyone’s own experience!
There is no one single truth!
I’m also laughing because I just looked at my previous post and my roller-coaster is rather obvious!