Women, men and finding new ways of relating

Once in a while I encounter someone who I experience as setting no limits on who I might become for them. When this happens, I’ve always found it helpful to explain the limits I work within.

Here is an example, which began with a twitter conversation and has arrived at the following email:

Good morning, Danny 🙂

Arrggh – the ‘Abyss of Masculine Sexuality’ into which I could have fallen! Thank you so much for being a gentleman and helping me past it!

It might be worth explaining my gratitude in more detail because this is always an issue between women and men in danger of exploding in both our faces – if we can avoid this trap, all the better for us.

When I talk about this, remember I am not talking about you personally. I’m giving you an insight into my problems, not yours. Hopefully this may assist you elsewhere in your own work, especially when it comes to ‘women’s issues’ such as sexism and rape.

Firstly, my personal relationships with men (and women, for that matter) have always been fraught with problems. True; I’ve learned a lot and one of the lessons I’ve learned is that I get on much better with men, as people, when personal sexuality is excluded from the dynamic. I like men but life has left me extremely prickly around sex and sexuality. At 58 – and sans womb after a hysterectomy – I’m no longer driven by hormones into that region and, to be quite honest, I find that to be a relief because it leaves me free to be myself and to channel my desires into other energy.

I’m not the first woman to say that there is something about me that frightens some men. In the sexuality arena, this is because – on a psychic level – some of the harm I’ve experienced in the past has left unexploded minefields any serious suitor would have to cross. Because these unexploded bombs are emotional in nature – and many men have very real problems even hearing the emotional dimensions, let alone navigating them – it seems far more merciful for everyone to simply remove the entire subject from my agenda.

When ‘consent’ is removed, at the extremely early stage, we can see how sexual/gender politics affects the debate on the subject. For example; between us (and because my ‘energy’ contains this ‘No’ from the outset), it enables you to help me sidestep the masculine minefield by being the perfect gentleman – and I can explain to you why this is so helpful to all of us. Firstly because it strengthens trust. When men and women protect and guide each other safely through the minefields of personal relationships, we strengthen each other. Because sexuality and power dynamics are so heightened and corrupted generally at the moment, this is vital for building communities.

When I asked to be included in your web network, I was asking as a teacher and guide. I don’t know whether what I teach is useful or not – that is for you to decide, not me. What I do know is that I can’t function in that role if I’m bound within the limitations of current ideas on human sexuality. By removing that element – but not the minefield (funny how towers surrounded by thickets spring to mind) – I can see who is willing to put that aspect of themselves aside too. It is very clear that you can – which makes you an excellent role model and enhances what I am trying to teach. Thank you, young man. You are a credit to all those who raised you to manhood.

Our example enables me to teach lessons about love.

For example: the ancient Greeks had three words for Love: Eros, Philos and Agape.

Eros is the first expression of it – falling in love; being hit by cupid’s arrow. That kind of thing. There can be this element in a heterosexual man’s feelings for a woman included in his sexual expression. If it is there for both man and woman, then the chances of their love growing into Philos are excellent. Otherwise, Eros blows itself out in the end. It is not a lasting Love.

Philos is the Love that grows between friends. It lasts. It is the kind of Love that keeps couples together ‘forever’ in this world and the next – and it’s the kind of Love I seek to access with you by bypassing Eros altogether. When Philos is established between people (whoever they might be), Love continues to grow and becomes Agape.

Agape is to experience the ‘Oneness’ of the unified Universe – where nothing is excluded excepting those who, by personal choice, exclude themselves. (This is a Principle of Free Will – we all have a choice and if that choice removes us from creation, it must be respected and managed.) It is this experience I am interested in enabling other people to find because the information contained there affects what we believe about ourselves and others. It frees us from many of the limitations we are presently struggling against. What makes it different from all other routes is, in my experience, the fact that it is personal to each of us. Agape is to experience the universe with each one of us – exactly as we are with exactly our history – being perfectly placed to transform our planet and our lives for the better. It is to learn that each moment is a step on our journey and each choice we make opens the door to the next step.

We live in ‘interesting times’, as the old Chinese curse would say. One of the curses that affect us all is the systemic treatment of women globally. I’d suggest that a woman who doesn’t have a minefield around her is a rare bird, which can make life very difficult for men who do see us as people. In addition, the power-abuse dynamic (clearly illustrated in rise of BDSM pornography) seems to overwhelm everything to the point where some men are only interested in what they can get away with.

The advantage to all of us of ‘gentleman’ skills from the men is this. By behaving this way with each other by free choice (as opposed to some social ‘rules’), we can see who can’t behave this way and won’t be corrected. These are those whose free choice is to exclude themselves from Love and they do this by their behaviour. Who they are – or who we are, for that matter – is immaterial. Such issues belong to the relationship between individual and Agape and are none of our business. Our behaviour has to respect this relationship between individual and Divine (which includes Atheism too – it’s none of our business!) and we do this by treating our human relationships as if they are ‘sacred’ because they are!

When we understand this – Agape – we have a much clearer idea about the problems we are all facing as a community capable of experiencing this kind of Love. We care about this energy, so we behave in ways that minimise harm and accelerate healing. This is what I am interested in teaching to anyone who is interested in learning.

I don’t teach details; I teach Principles because these can be translated into our daily life in one way or another. Principles are tools anyone can use in their own way without loss – in fact, when we share how they work in our own life, we often give each other helpful ideas. For example, in my reality, I discipline myself around stealing other peoples’ ideas: the ‘property’ remains with the creatrix – I am only permitted to steal the idea if I can improve and return it in better shape than before. If I can’t improve on it, I must share it as it is, giving full credit to its originator. In a world of patents and copyright, I wonder if that works for others. Please bear in mind the pattern of our unhealthy system to thieve the ideas of women and claim them as their own. We are in the mine-field here, so let’s be careful of each other.

Finally, I’d like to say this. There are legends about crossing this minefield – it is part of the Monomyth. The Planet has nothing against male desire – She evolved it from the Passion of the Creator. The thing is that it is Sacred! You guys get a hard-on for God as well as women – it’s why the early Christian churches displayed you this way and why erections are sometimes called ‘godhead’. What has been forgotten by some is that you channel this energy, you don’t ‘own’ it. When you channel your desire to enthusiastically consenting women who also are friends, you will have a far better time than you have probably had up until now. Adult women have desires too and we can be friends to each other along the way to encountering the one woman who will leave you saying “Thanks but no thanks” to Allah’s offer of all those dark-eyed virgins. What I’d like to see is more gratitude to the women who do offer this to you especially because I don’t. If gentlemen are going to bed friends, remember she will be someone you will be able to easily introduce, without hiding your true relationship, to the woman who is sacred wife to your sacred husband.

This is how I would like us to love each other.

How does that sound to you?

 

Bear in mind that I do not expect these interpersonal boundaries to apply to anyone else but me. I share them because I suspect they might function as an example of  ‘good practice’ amongst those genuinely seeking to transform our troubled world.

 

 

Managing the Feeling of Gratitude

 

Glastonbury Abbey
(source unknown – am happy to credit)
Glastonbury is apparently considered to be the Heart Chakra of Mother Earth.

Do other people have problems accepting support and feeling gratitude because their feelings are so big?

This is how I’ve managed mine…

Email to a friend

It’s very hard to put this into words because your support is putting me into experiences I’ve not had before and I don’t know how to ‘behave’ properly. No-one has ‘invested’ in me in such a practical way this lifetime – not because they didn’t want to but because they couldn’t. I’m not complaining – experience has taught me the pitfalls and dangers of dependency as well as how to survive on my own.

Nevertheless, at present, I need this kind of help if I’m to recreate myself again. My therapy trainers would sometimes ‘work’ on my ability to accept such help in the past – I could give but had real problems receiving, as if it was somehow ‘wrong’. I don’t know about you, but my receiving ‘sphincter’ muscle has always needed help loosening from its ‘super-tight’ position. They would point out that, unless I loosened up, I could actually harm the energy coming in my direction – which spoiled it for both sides; giver and receiver.

Nevertheless, I’ve found that even when I’ve loosened up, receiving always generates a level of gratitude greater that often both sides can cope with comfortably. This is what I have learned to do with these feelings.

Firstly, there is my gratitude to you – the woman and friend. There is no way I can express it, so I’ve divvied my feelings up between the giving and receiving energies. In receiving (of which I have daily reminders) know this. Whatever you may believe about yourself in your own reality, in my Otherworld you will always have a friend and advocate. So if a part of you believes something bad or harmful about you, know that in my reality, I’m ready to stand by you with more than enough evidence to counter the harm. Remember I will only be using half the gratitude I’m experiencing to do this and I already know that it is going to be far more than will ever be necessary.

The other half of my gratitude will be channeled into giving to others the same kind of support you have given me. I know that, with your help, the quality of my giving will reflect my own experience of being given to; it will help me understand the very great problems some of us have in receiving this kind of support because we have learned to distrust it in the past. Nevertheless, I will continue to pass on the quality of your understanding, kindness and generosity in spirit as well as in kind. This is a permanent change – what you are giving me is an experience of being supported in an area of life where I have not received it before – this will change me to reflect that. Once changed, it cannot be unchanged – it becomes a part of who I am and will go with me when I die (storing treasures up in heaven).

Whatever may happen between us from now on, this exchange can never be completely undone. So know this – there exists, in this ‘universe of universes’, a soul who is forever grateful you exist. ‘You’ as in exactly who you are in this first moment of reading this and forever after. I don’t care about your history or any of the faults you may think you have – without them, you wouldn’t be you and this moment of gratitude wouldn’t exist. Having existed, it can never cease to exist – it will always be here in the akashic record – for you to access any time you need it. I especially recommend you access it whenever you are dealing with ideas that tell you you have no worth. I know you have a lot of them. So, whenever you remember to do it, remember how I fight on behalf of others and know that I am standing alongside you ready to prove these ideas wrong.

No-one – but no-one – can create what you have created not only for me but for others too – without belonging in our creative universe and I have reason to be profoundly grateful to the ‘U’ superstring and everything you have become since then. Any left-over gratitude between us, I give to the servants of the Earth Mother Goddess to share where it is most needed (which gives us a good excuse to make more, don’t you think? – you can loosen that sphincter muscle of yours too 😉 ).

It’s the only way I know how to manage these feelings.

How does that sound to you?

Because my friend is a private person whom I hold in the highest respect, I won’t share her response but she raised an interesting point, evoking this response from me.

More reasons to be grateful.

Yes – it is equally problematic to give as well. We are negotiating the walls and defences against receiving that others have.

I’ve learned most about this aspect from shamanism.

Each Soul I have ever encountered is a unique fractal – we can actually see the different structures in astrological birthcharts. What that means is that we each have places where we meet and where we don’t. Where we meet, we share what we are able to and where we don’t, we respect each others differences because they are what make us unique.

Sometimes, when we are ‘Blessed’ by the Creator Spirit, we encounter people where we can contribute to our mutual creativity. The Gratitude created by these encounters is what fuels the universe because we become role models for others to live by too. If its a big enough Gratitude, it sets off a chain-reaction in all those who come into contact with it because its the Love fractal that exists in all of us. I think of it as the superstring at the heart of who we are.

It is the most precious essence of the universe and to be ‘handled’ with exquisite care because each moment is evolutionary. We step on to new ground and expand our knowledge of the universe.

Thank you so much for evoking this in me so I could put it into words.

Would you mind if I tweaked my two emails into a blog? If we’ve got this right, these principles will apply universally for everyone who chooses Love.

For us, the worst we can ever do to each other is agree to disagree.

But I enjoy finding real agreement through our differences so much, I think l’m addicted to it 🙂 If I have to be addicted to anything (human nature), I think that’s a healthy one, don’t you?

So – are these good ways  of managing big gratitude and might they loosen our defences against giving and receiving?

Often, the problem with giving and receiving are the strings attached to the exchange. True giving attaches no strings other than those of personal respect. For those of us aware of the difficulties in honestly negotiating this highly corrupted minefield, is it easier to give/receive half-gratitude if the rest is shared with others? It certainly works for me 🙂

This has been written from an employer/employee perspective but its points can easily transfer to individuals dealing with other public authorities who are failing in their duties.

An absolutely wonderful blog – sharp-tongued yet impeccably polite. A true Master of the craft of getting it in writing 🙂

Wirral In It Together

 

Eight years later, it’s November 2019 and here is an updated version of this post…

Are you being bullied at work? Here’s some detailed advice that worked for me and helped me to retire, aged 50!

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The following passages may be useful for people in serious trouble in the workplace.  You may have blown the whistle on bad practice, or lodged a grievance, or been going through internal processes, hoping that the next particular meeting will be THE ONE to resolve it all.  But why is this NOT happening?  It’s about good will on both sides, but very often, you can be treated as a ‘troublemaker’ and have become ‘the problem’ and therefore, in the twisted logic of those who abuse their power, the one to be eliminated.

These passages consist of several carefully written phrases which you can lift and use immediately, or maybe adapt, chop and…

View original post 123 more words

The Heart of the Social Contract

 

We don’t hear much about the social contract these days but, growing up under Wilson and Callaghan’s Labour Governments, I used to hear it all the time. As I understand it, the social contract governs the relationship between government and people; it defines the responsibilities a government has to those who elected it in a fully functioning democracy of adults – we have to be 18 years old to vote. The electorate are adults. Within a healthy social contract, the government has the responsibility to act on behalf of the whole of the electorate. At least, that’s what I absorbed in my Guardian-reader family home. I didn’t take much notice of contracts or law at that time – those only came alive for me when I was the Staff Side Secretary (NALGO) for Westminster Council during the early 1980’s.

 

NALGO’s National Education Department ran three-day residentials on Employment Law, assisted by a very able National Legal Department, and I attended one of these in Motherwell. What I learned over those three days has stood me on good ground ever since and this was one of the things I learned.

 

A contract is made in ‘good faith’. It requires that both sides behave honourably. A Contract of Employment can be terminated by either side if the other can be shown to have breached the heart of a ‘good faith’ contract. Breaches were detailed in the negotiated and agreed disciplinary procedures and the worst ended the contract through dismissal, constructive or otherwise. How that would work with a Social Contract, I’ve no idea – best talk to a good lawyer about that. So I hope that I’m addressing intelligent people who don’t need me to start joining up the dots for them because you have your own minds and opinions. This works much better if we are all thinking for ourselves and coming to our own decisions.

 

One of the features of being both Convener of the Social Services Shop Stewards (awarded 50% secondment/TU during my tenure), followed by two years Staff Side Secretary (with 50% secondment /time-off for TU activities during my first year but which rose, on a personal basis only, to 100% for the rest of my stint) is I found myself ‘presiding’ over a great mix of people, working in different professions, under one ‘roof’. My job, as I saw it, was to make sure their voices got heard in the right places. It didn’t matter which department the person seeking help came from, or how many there were of them, it was my job to ensure that the points they were making were heard. Yes, it was a Tory Council just before Shirley Porter’s leadership. She ran the Highways & Works Committee when I was there. And, yes, there were the Tory and Labour wannabees but amongst other councillors were genuine hardworking people also doing their best to serve their constituents. I did a lot of business with them and, more often than not, we found that we had a shared concern. As Staff Side Secretary, I could enable real debate towards finding mutually acceptable solutions. Not always, but often enough for the Council to up my time off for trade union activities. I was told that I helped the good functioning of the Council and was easy to deal with. If I was dealing with a problem, it got solved using the Contract of Employment coupled with goodwill. Apparently I had this effect where everyone wanted to agree with me. When I went to run the in-house union at the Corporation of London, we rarely agreed and they lost because they didn’t know what they were doing. If I ever wanted to manifest such ability again, it is now.

 

One of the advantages of being a professional in a number of different fields is understanding the common ground between them.  Within each profession, there is a social contract because it is simply not possible to be any kind of professional without it – public or private. It may be worded in different ways, addressing specific address issues related to the work, but there is always the element of ‘good faith’. Until a professional can be shown to have demonstrated ‘bad faith’, we are obliged to believe what we are told. It’s called professional courtesy and it is a common element throughout. That’s the theory, anyway.

 

The problem with individual professions – like Council departments – is we can become myopic, seeing the problem from only our own point of view. It’s a Staff Side Secretary’s job to listen to as many of you as possible and then ‘shake’ you with the overall picture. As professionals, I ask you to take this bigger picture back to your ‘departments’ and talk to your ‘membership’

 

This week has been a revelation of behavioural standards amongst professional politicians in this country. For example:

Michael Mansfield on Human Rights in the hands of Grayling (who has since silenced Probation Officers in the Social Media) and May (Guilty of ‘Contempt of Court ‘). Would any professional care to come to an opinion about whether their idea about a social contract on Human Rights is anything like ours?

This is Latent Existence on the Parliamentary debate (or whateveryoucallit) on Ministerial refusals to meet with the Disability Activist Community group known as Spartacus. Does this qualify as professional behaviour?

This appears to have caught Ministers at the Department of Work and Pensions running a covert scheme to purposefully remove entitlements from those in need for purposes of statistics.

And this is the Labour Party supporting the Tories’ evasion of legal duty through a retrospective change of law. I give thanks to my God there were honest professionals in the House of Commons who could model good behaviour . And I thank Owen Jones for telling us Miliband’s real reason for sitting on his hands… again.

 

These are the issues I see… from this week alone!

 

From every professional viewpoint I can muster, I see persistent breaches to the Heart of the Social Contract between the UK government and the people of Britain to render it broken and beyond repair. I have consulted widely and have found agreement in surprising places.

 

What I want to know – from everyone who reads this – is what you intend to do about it? I don’t care who you are, if you understand the professional difference between right and wrong then you have a social duty to do something to correct social wrongs committed by those now unable to maintain any semblance of good faith in their public duties. THAT’S WHAT YOU ARE PAID FOR!

 

And I don’t know what it is you’re supposed to do. You’re a professional – I shouldn’t have to tell you. As the Personnel Manager at Westminster once said “We employ adults.” What I will tell you now is that if you don’t do something sharpish, and we leave these monstrosities in charge of the country, I’ll either be dead or destitute alongside thousands of others at the very moment when we all enter a famine. By that time, no-one will be safe, not even you.

 

On 1^st April 2013, Britain is going to be thrown into the Shock Doctrine. The problem with this doctrine is its predictability – use it too frequently and people start to throw off the affect. Understanding the Shock Doctrine immunises you and enables you to keep functioning when you were supposed to be immobilised.

 

I invite you to examine the evidence here and in your own experience, take up your professional social responsibility to ‘good faith’ by acting in the public interest.  This problem has never stopped of its own accord; it has always needed to be stopped! If there is any country on this planet that understands that, it’s Britain!

 

Now, what are we going to do about it?

 

 

 

Therapeutic Reflections: Weighing the Pro’s and Con’s

Mothers Day

What I’m about to express here needs to be weighed in the balance of fairness and truth because this information concerns two living human beings in opposition  – of which I am one. I was involved in the action, so we have to trust that I have made mistakes; I will be wrong; I have certainly been foolish; and I am probably guilty of any or all ‘accusations’ I may make about others despite how hard I strive not to be them myself – it happens unconsciously. I call it ‘being human’. Therefore the matter needs to be determined by those less self-interested observers. All I ask of my ‘judges’ is that I am not required to carry more than my own fair share of responsibility. Disputes between opposing factions need to be balanced in this way if we, as a species, are ever likely to find a way to live with each other peaceably, let alone continue our existence.

The opposition I speak of began here, continued here and was terminated yesterday, by me, when my opponent issued what I considered a threat. It is the reasons and intent underpinning my actions that I am interested in exploring here and this cannot be done without listening to my opponent first. But first I need to put some boundaries down.

You will see, from her blog, my opponent claims the right of confidentiality regarding the emails we exchanged. This was not discussed with me and, in fact, violates some ethical aspects of both my desistance and shamanic standards which require personal transparency. I experience such unspoken requirements as controlling because they operate in a way unsuited to me. Nevertheless, it is also true that I did not discuss my own position and it is customary to treat personal sharing as private between two people. When ‘confidentiality’ occurs between two therapeutic professionals, there is a requirement for supervision and it is this I am seeking. This ensures that mistakes and faults are identified in order to protect the most vulnerable within the dynamic and minimises potential abuses of controlling behaviour from either ‘side’. This blog meets my professional requirement for this. I am willing to meet my opponent’s need for confidentiality provided that she complies with her own rules. If the content of our emails finds its way into the social media, I will assume that she has consented to its release and will publish our exchanges because I believe they provide extremely useful consciousness-raising material for other women. In the event that the information arrives within the public-domain via some other source (ie: the release came from neither of us), then I am happy to discuss the matter with her but will assume that the shamanic spirit I aspire to emulate wanted it made public. This is my boundary.

It is not my intent to be the cause of any harm to my opponent, as she vividly reports herself. I have been harmed too often myself to have any wish to see it done to others, whether such harm comes from me, from others or from ourselves. My intervention, which she reports, is not unusual behaviour as I’m sure others can confirm if it ever became necessary. I believe it is important to confront harmful behaviour but it is equally important to protect the individual when doing so. No matter how I might feel personally about those who express personal differences so vast they appear alien, the Creator Spirit put them here on this Earth with me. If I have a right to be here so, too, do they and it is not for me to question the wisdom of creation. These are matters beyond my ability to understand – they are existential no matter how much I might struggle to accommodate this within my limited human awareness. In addition, I have my criminal offences to consider. I lost track of this understanding ten years ago – to remain within any rehabilitation process, I had better not lose track of it now!

So it was not the person that caused me to sever my contact with my opponent. What caused that was controlling behaviour.  Because I am bound by my confidentiality agreement, I cannot discuss my opponent here – so I have another example I can use to illustrate what I mean by ‘controlling’.

This example arose during my voluntary three month stay in a psychiatric unit following my first suicide attempt. It was my first experience of psychiatry and the ward was an example of the worst the profession can produce. One of the features of psychiatric illness is an absence of boundaries among patients. Given that this unboundaried experience is ‘in the field’ within psychiatric institutions, undifferentiated establishments are likely to be produce similar behaviour amongst the staff group too. A healthy establishment ensures properly therapeutically-supervised staff so such boundary breaches are identified and managed – nobody is perfect and everyone is learning. But this particular unit – in 2002 – was not managed well and the patients suffered serious over-prescribing of medication; unnecessary forceful restraint resulting in injury; ill-considered and punitive instructions; and, most of all, a failure to empathise with the needs of patients. The story of the psychiatrist who called me, as a patient, ‘You people’ did not come from this unit, but he could well have done. The level of unexplored prejudiced reporting by staff, in my case alone, was horrifying and I challenged it whenever it came to my attention. For a while, my fellow patients reported some improvements in their treatment but I doubt that these lasted, given the unwillingness of some staff to consider the points I was raising as having any validity.

At one point and after a series of abusive incidents by staff, I found myself in conversation with the Unit Manager and we explored her thinking when it came to patients – her approach being the ‘medical’ and mine, ‘therapeutic’. I encountered a ‘wall-against-learning’ when she informed me that she did not bring her heart into her work. Her heart, she told me, was firmly protected and professionally unavailable to patients. In other words, she confirmed my suspicions that her unit was professionally “heartless” and, in doing so, validated my experience as a patient.  Not all psychiatric units are managed in this way and the one I transferred to afterwards was much better because it used a therapeutic model where emotional intelligence could be accessed for everyone’s’ benefit.

When I reflect on that conversation, what I notice these days is the need for control. The difference between the Ward Manager and I is the difference between control and containment. We all have ‘containment’ needs – it is not healthy for any human being to be completely without boundaries because we are social animals. We need only look to crime or Parliament to see what occurs when humans become unboundaried, especially in our negative behaviour. There is, however, a universe of difference between containment and control.

Containment recognises that whilst harmful behaviour requires firm boundaries,  it is harmful to our individual soul-self to impose rules on who we are permitted to be. As humans, our internal experience of Life is grow to whatever size we are able to aspire to, usually with effort and support from others. Where natural boundaries enter the equations are in issues of manifestation. Manifest life is naturally boundaried when it is healthy. When manifestation, however, spins into unboundaried growth this is often referred to as some form of cancer. Uncontained cancer of the body results in death of the person – the same is true for uncontained human activity in the manifest world, especially when it is enacted on a global scale. For both, the issue concerns that which refuses to, or is unable, die. Cancer cells have lost the action of their ‘death instruction’ and, as far as I can see, the same is true for human societies – nothing and no-one lasts forever in manifestation. Physical life is boundaried by death. Only Spirit can claim access to a boundless eternity – the rest is subject to death and taxes (or karma, if you like) for anyone walking the human road.

The questions of where we place our containment boundaries are a matter for each individual and are governed by human cultural developmental processes. In culture of the West, we acquire this through use of our ego – our initial sense of “Me” – although we fail to teach the way of the Soul. The ego serves a developmental purpose in that it enables us to distinguish what is good for us from what is not-so-good. This is important for survival but to live requires a further step. When we are bound by our ego, our ability to set healthy boundaries, for ourselves or others, is low because we become fascinated by self, by me and mine. We depend upon good parenting to teach us how to live well. Regrettably, in the West, such teaching remains uncommon and we can see the global results in the news. We fail to mature, so as adults we perpetuate unhealthy narcissistic behaviour that  results in our seeking to control everything from people, usually via ‘rules’ which we apply to others (but frequently not to ourselves) and even the planet herself. Whilst our bodies may mature to adulthood, individuals and groups remain trapped in the illusions of ego and the ‘me-and mine-first’ mentality. Rules of Ego are highly restrictive, especially when imposed upon those who fail to fit the prevailing culture. Our ego-bound self passes negative judgment on everything that fails to conform with its own idea of ‘good’ and imprisons the other (not-Ego) within those thought-forms. It is the ego who determines and labels scroungers, skivers, cheats and liars. In an ego-ridden society, we act this out and people die because ego refuses to make way for any other life than that which falls within its own, highly limited perspective.

A child’s developing ego needs to experience being a part of our far greater living organism if they are to come into their heritage of  human psychological maturity. Our ego has to ‘die’ a natural, appropriate, death so our Soul can step forward to learn. Our ego needs to be shown these connections but our healthy Soul does not. Our Soul is already aware of our connectedness to Life in all its forms – all it requires is for our ego to get out of our way so we can explore this Gift more fully. We don’t ‘lose’ anything by it – all that occurs is the ego is relegated to its proper place. Nevertheless my experience tells me that no one can force another to relinquish their ego unwillingly because this is a matter of personal choice. All we can ever do is invite. It is a matter of Respect and Free Will.

To the best of my ability, I offered an invitation for my opponent to grow beyond the control of ego and step, more fully, into the experience of Soul. She declined my offer as she is free to do. As a former therapist, this is unsurprising – no Western ego I have ever met has ever relinquished its desire to control everything without some form of to-the-death battle because this is how the Western ego experiences it. To access the source energy of the Soul, the ego has to release its need for control and being “In Charge” and this is perceived as ego-death. What the ego fails to appreciate is that this death experience is a necessary developmental step in becoming a mature human. It is a life-death-life transformation where the individual resurrects into greater dimensions. These often manifest as increased selfless contributions to the health of their community rather than simple aggrandising the self. Without this, communities of all descriptions experience this never-ending war where selfish, greedy super-ego’s fight for control of what is not theirs to begin with and, quite literally, the body count rises exponentially. The problem I see with Western culture is that we seem to have established an entire social structure based upon the personal ego needs of the unformed and selfish psyche whilst refusing to take the very necessary steps to achieve human maturity. The difference between the two? A healthy adult does not require lessons in how to give to or share with others – an ego-bound child-adult  is the very manifestation of selfishness and refuses the lesson of sharing every time.

What I experienced with my opponent was, I believe, an encounter with an ego that did not want to ‘die’ – what others see is their own business; this is what I saw and I responded accordingly by withdrawing immediately and severing my connection. An ego ‘at bay’ is a highly dangerous criatura – it believes it is about to ‘die’ and is readying itself for a battle for ‘life’. I saw glimpses of this in remarks like:

“I do believe in the good of the whole and that will inevitably mean than some will be sacrificed along the way to achieve that.”

My dispute with my opponent is that those subject to this ‘sacrifice’ are already dying and her position suggests that more need to die too. An ego fighting for its life is perfectly capable of heartlessly destroying other people in its determination to exist on its own terms. I call this ego ‘it’ because it is clearly inhuman when it manifests in some. I have yet to meet a powerful ego whose opinion of themselves requires no further bolstering and which would suffer no real harm by being put on the starvation ‘diet’ it is busy prescribing for others over whom these egos have a public duty of care. The evidence of this is plain in the histories of the West. That my opponent’s ego claims that is it acceptable to be entirely  unboundaried in manifestation is also evident:

“I believe in freedom of the individual to be, have, do what they want as long as it’s legal  (my parenthesis) and it is not for anyone else to say it’s too much.”

The final nail in the coffin, however, was this tweet – send in response to a conversation I was having with someone else about the experience of engaging with my opponent.

In my own mind, it is clear that my opponent is getting ready to fight based upon the assumption that I was launching some kind of sneak attack against her (?). Actually, I was being an unhappy dickhead at the time (I reserve that right as a human being!) because I was struggling with my some of my responses to her private emails which, given the boundary of confidentiality, could only find expression via information contained in her public blog. I HATE being controlled into silence before I’ve even been asked! And her patronising attitude – it’s enough to do your head in. I was bound to act it out somewhere. Both Martin and Giles are forgiving people when it comes to locawoman. Others will have to make up their own minds whether I am assessing my actions and behaviour with any accuracy here. What I am absolutely certain of is that I have been on very best possible behaviour here and I am alarmed that she thinks she can treat me that way. I might even wonder if she was being intentionally provocative?

Since my actions seemed to have triggered my opponent’s ego defences sufficiently for her to issue threats, it is right and proper that I remove myself from the situation as quickly as possible, particularly given my history. Any kind of personal development can only be achieved by consent and it seemed plain to me that no further consent from my opponent was forthcoming. This is the understanding of the Soul. But consequences always accrue to any of our decisions and it helps to be clear about any change of intention at this stage.

My decision to sever contact on Twitter by blocking was based on following reasons:

• If I were to remain within the confrontation, I would be facing a ‘killing’ energy.
• I have faced killing energies before but, as a shaman, I am only permitted to act in the defence of another. If I don’t have to endure it, I leave asap.
• For the record, I may have been born into the Labour tribe but I am, in no way, a member of it now because I believe all party politics in my country are now riddled with corruption. I don’t need to be a member of a group to express my own opinion. A replay of the War between Labour and Tory could not disinterest me more. I was looking for something new. I have not found it which is disappointing.
• I have already faced this kind of killing energy from a woman and the consequence, to me, was a seven year prison sentence because I faced her down with her own energy. That was then. This is now and to remain in harmony with my adoptive community means I must walk away from such situations wherever possible. It is possible in this situation.
• To engage in such a challenge with a killing energy now would be the death of me. My heart-mind cannot withstand the strain anymore of facing down those who seek to kill those aspects of my self I most value. Whilst I might do this for welfare of my healthy community, it is certainly not appropriate with an unwilling and armed opponent. Better to let go and set my opponent free – her journey of Spirit is none of my business.
• Finally, my friends might forgive me dying in a confrontation if my intent was to benefit my community but I doubt it would be forthcoming for this purpose. It might also create serious problems for my opponent. I have no wish to be the source of any more unnecessary suffering than I already am responsible for.

What I can do is pause and reflect upon this experience and my reason for engaging in the first instance.

Certainly, it began when I stepped in to support a friend grappling with my opponent because I knew she was already vulnerable and in pain. My opponent was not aware of this and I would like to believe that, had she known, she might have dealt my friend a different set of cards.  Nevertheless, in more general terms, my opponent does not appear to have a problem inflicting pain on others because, she says, she is suffering too. I have no reason to disbelieve her but the problem with human-on-human-inflicted-suffering is that its depths – especially in an ego-driven society – know no boundaries and the outcomes are frequently harmful to life itself. Nor do comparisons between ‘my’ suffering and ‘yours’ offer any real solution unless the individuals concerned are seen holistically. In my opinion, my opponent appears to understand some of this but wants to restrict her understanding and, therefore, compassion to ego knowledge and not to the Wisdom of Soul. She is who she makes claim to be, then she might be on the right road for her – but she’s a long ways to travel yet before she catches up with me. This is true for myself too excepting my catching up is in different dimension altogether.

My opponent belongs to my past now.

In closing, I want to say this. I have yet to block my opponent’s access to my blog because I do not believe in discussing others behind their back as a general rule. There are exceptions but this is not one of them. I do however seek no further contact or engagement with her. I experience the standards she unconsciously imposes upon me by her politics as a violation of my integrity and the rules of respect. I want her to leave me alone. I want absolutely no further contact with the woman.

If she is to be believed, this should not be a problem.

“Us and Them”: #Tories, #Women, #CasualStigma, #Envy & #ESAEndGame

 

Whilst this is essentially an activist’s blog, I’d like to begin with a tribute to my cat (pictured above). His name was Jasper and he disappeared a few days ago. My intuition and local knowledge tells me he won’t be coming home again. Whilst I do my utmost to see the positive in others, I also have to face reality. The village I live in is cruel to cats. It’s a local thing – we have pigeon fanciers and other residents who poison or shoot them. In the past three years, I have lost three cats to this ‘final solution’. Jasper is the latest.

 

Cats have always found me if I have not been finding them first. We have an affinity to each other and like each other’s company. Jasper found me after my second cat vanished and my neighbour’s cat was poisoned. He was an opinionated criatura. He didn’t much take to the female cat I was asked to rescue or the kitten she produced but he never lost his affection for me. He would come to me in my distress and offer affection freely. My lap was his home and my bed was his next best choice. He took no nonsense from dogs and he made friends with all the local cat-lovers, visiting homes and seducing free meals out of each. And he was too young to have died naturally.

 

As an animal lover, we have to accept that our animal companions will leave us simply on the grounds of life-span. But they leave a hole in our souls when they do that is filled with grief. Now I have a Jasper-shaped hole in mine and it affects how I respond to human events. Yesterday was filled with those.

 

As some of my twitter follows are aware, I’ve been engaging with a Tory councillor recently. In truth, we have found we have a great deal in common, particularly when it comes to seeing trying to the best in people. Our difference – and it is a very great one – is that she can see the best in individuals but struggles to see any value in groups that are not her own. She is an intelligent, imaginative woman, who is committed to her local community – which is not mine (Tories are few and far between where I live). I can see the value of her chosen profession because I took a similar route out of my own problems when I was younger. Where we part company is in the matter of community.

 

From my perspective, the purpose of becoming an all-round ‘professional’ adult human being involves, at some point, a letting-go of personal ego for the ‘greater good’ of the community. It is a process of self-sacrifice which, if you happen to be the person inside the experience, teaches us that we are far more than just our ego. We learn that every time we do something, we affect and impact upon the entire living web around us. My own version now includes being willing to die for others like me – and I am not alone in this. Yesterday, whilst my Tory friend was explaining why she wanted me to learn how ‘not to envy’ those who are financially successful, another woman whom I really admire was putting her own life on the line for others in her position… again. If you want to understand why, check out #ESAEndGame on twitter. The voices there speak far more eloquently than I ever could about the depth and extent of the problems we are facing. I have made my own contribution but there are many others with similar tales who have been less fortunate than me. The fact that, following my GP’s intervention, Atos cancelled my WCA assessment and the DWP recategorised  my ESA claim (which, to my astonishment, means an increase in my benefits) was only made possible by the hard work of people like @Suey2y, the Black Triangle campaign and many other individuals, known and unknown, seen and unseen. Their work was done, not for personal gain – all the campaigners want is enough to live on – but for their community. All that effort, intelligence, wisdom and experience given freely to those in genuine need, without charge – to me, this is the best a human being can aspire to and I feel honoured to be in their company. The sad part is that I believe my Tory friend doesn’t understand this and I fear I cannot teach her. All I can say is that, on a personal level, if I had to emulate either woman, I would choose to be like @Suey2y everyday of the week and twice on Sundays. I have tried the route my Tory friend is on and, for me, it “grows no corn” – hers are the teachings of selfishness, as far as I am concerned, and I’ve done my best to leave those behind me. With all due respect to her, I aspire to become someone better than that. The rewards of selfishness do not interest me anymore.

 

Interestingly, at the same time, the #MHChat twitter community also took to the airwaves on the subject of #Envy but not before @MentalHealthCop had created the hashtag #CasualStigma. That a serving police officer dedicated to providing a professional service to the public could come up with something so thoughtful and compassionate is wondrous to me. That he can see the connections between the casual stigma directed at women ( #EverySexism ) and what he sees in his own job working with those who have mental health problems restores my personal faith in the police as a whole. He sees the overall problem this kind of stigmatisation causes and has done something to raise our awareness of it in his own field. He could have chosen selfishness – many police officers do – but instead he’s given voice to a largely silenced community, mislabelled and misunderstood, perhaps because he knows that we can change nothing for the better without listening to everyone involved, not just those with money, power or influence. Which leads neatly into the subject of envy.

 

Whilst I do know something about the subject of envy, last night’s #MHChat helped me clarify the distinction between an envy that is benign from that which is malicious. Envy is a feeling that arises from lack. We experience it when we see others with talents, skills, abilities or ‘stuff’ we do not have ourselves and everyone will have these feelings at some point or another in their lives. None of us are exempt. It’s what we do with those feelings when they arrive that makes the difference. Benign envy understands the feeling as an indicator of where we need to grow next. When we envy, it remains possible to look to see how the envied got that way. As one of my old therapists put it; “Take a look at what the person had to do to get to the point where you envy them. Then you can decide whether you are willing to make the same effort yourself. If you’re not, then be grateful that someone has so you can enjoy their expertise and, if you are willing to make a go of it, be grateful to them for showing where you need to grow.” Benign envy is open to envy’s cure: gratitude. I suspect it is this version of envy my Tory friend is referring to when she talks about Labour envying her party. Malicious envy, on the other hand, is a very different criatura altogether.

 

Malicious envy occurs when we see someone with something we believe we can never have. The sense of loss created in us by this realisation triggers a furious rage. Somewhere along the line, we decide that if we can’t have it, they can’t either and we launch an envious attack in order to destroy the ‘object’ that highlights our ‘loss’ (note the dehumanising that occurs here). We treat the envied as our enemy – even though all they are probably doing is getting on with their lives. The declaration of war comes from the envier long before the envied realises what is happening to them and the results are usually catastrophic. Envious attacks contain no mercy. To effectively destroy the quality we envy, we must destroy the human being who has this quality. To justify our actions, our total lack of mercy or compassion towards the envied and the bitter resentment of our envious attacks, we must reduce that whole person to someone despised. Our selfish self cannot permit them to exist in our world – we want them gone, removed, dead, obliterated. The very existence of the envied is offensive to us because they are reminders of our inadequacy. When such feelings run rampant through governments, we start to see genocide.

 

Is there a cure for this? I really don’t know – it’s a personal choice. Are we willing to acknowledge the appalling outcomes of our darkest feelings? Not everyone is, but if we’re willing to try then a good place to start is with our own experiences of being envied. We all have those too. We have all had experiences of being envied; where others take an unexplained but intense dislike to us and act on it. Remembering what that felt like is a route to having empathy for the object of our envious attack. When empathy finally arrives – which must include an acceptance of the darkest of our nastier emotions – envy shifts into benign mode where it can be therapeutically transformed into personal growth. However, if an envier refuses to learn and persists in such destructive behaviour, then their behaviour needs to be managed, usually by the police and courts, because uncontrolled envious attacks are, literally, crimes. There are no boundaries to a full-blown envious attack and people often die as a result. For those interested in these subjects, #MHChat is suggesting a causal link between envy and next week’s topic of #Bullying – why not join in!

 

There is one aspect of Envy Dynamic that is worthy of attention here. Those who have explored this in greater depth that I describe it thus: the relationship between envier and envied can be likened to a rope-bridge between two mountain peaks. Within the dynamic, the envier severs the bridge ropes on their mountain top but then blames the envied for the lack of bridge. It is the ultimate win/lose, where the envier ‘wins all’ and the envied ‘loses all’. This is why envious attacks are so destructive and it stems from profoundly deep level of selfishness that believes itself to be justified and our actions, justifiable. It is my own understanding of the deeper dynamics of envy that leave me despairing about my Tory friend.

 

On a personal level, my friend understands benign envy as a spur to personal growth but get her on the subject of money and, from my perspective, she espouses opinions that are very firmly based in malicious envy. From what I can understand (and I may be wrong), she believes that folk like me envy Tory wealth and what we really need is to learn how to get our own. Very little compassion exists for the human elements of this demand. If we don’t, then according to the Tory Party propaganda she uses, it becomes justifiable to inflict the casual stigma of skivers, scroungers and other personally destructive epithets to people like me in order to confirm our lack of any material worth to society. We become leeches to their material wealth and this must not be permitted. I suspect she regards me as the exception to this rule because I have stepped beyond her labelling and have become human to her. In doing so, I have surprised her because I don’t appear to envy those that have riches. She’s right. I don’t envy them at all. In fact, I look at their behaviour and find myself repulsed.

 

I have no problem with people making money. My problem resides with those, who I believe envy folk like me, for whom no amount of money is ever enough. When it spins out of control it looks like this. How does anyone need so much money? How many houses, islands, continents, planets, does one ego need in order to prove their ‘worth’? To me, this is a level of personal selfishness that knows no bounds and has no problem depriving countless others of their very real life needs – food, shelter and a valued place in society. There is no honour in stealing your ‘worth’ from the vulnerable, hungry, needy and destitute. Honour comes from what we can give to our community regardless of money. @Suey2y and @MentalHealthCop have honour because they give of themselves freely to the communities they serve. Even very wealthy people can have honour, as Joanne Rowling has already demonstrated by falling off the Forbes list by giving her wealth away to charity. In all these examples, the qualities of mercy and compassion are plain to the naked eye and they provide a sharp contrast to the merciless attitudes and actions of our Tory-led government.

 

In all things, I aim to be spiritual and I have learned this: where any form of Mercy and Compassion are absent, there evil dwells. Jesus – who lived the destitute’s life – teaches that we can serve Love or we can serve Money, but we can’t serve both. He is the one, so it is claimed, who said “The love of money is the root of all evil”. Each and every authentic Spirituality I am aware of teaches that true worth depends on the quality of the Spirit within each person, no matter who or where they are in the world. In Spiritual terms, how much money we have in the bank is irrelevant.  In fact, too much money has a corrosive impact upon the individual, because as their money grows so does their selfishness. Do I envy these rich people? Not a chance! My aspirations are rooted in my yearning to find acceptance and belonging in an inclusive community that recognises my value even as it sees my failings. If we have to use money, then let’s relegate it to its proper place – a simple means of energetic exchange within a healthy community. It is the same kind of exchange the planet shares freely with humanity and all other forms of life that dwell within Her. Only our narcissistic egos fail to see the value in this sharing and, like the tyrant Holdfast, seeks to gather it all to ourselves. But no individual ego is capable of experiencing this quality of sharing. Ego’s are too small, too limited, too selfish and, frequently, too lazy to make the effort to grow our Soul beyond the fascinations of self to the wonders of being part of a living planet. We learn these lessons when we dispense with our ego in favour of transcendence.

 

In reality, we are not separate from the planet we live in. We are an evolutionary miracle with, in my opinion, a far-too-high opinion of ourselves – especially in the West. The West’s Cult of Narcissism, however, severs us from this experience by destroying the rope bridge between self and soul by envious attacks upon anything that contains the Spirit of Life. Don’t believe me? Then it’s time you made the effort to research this yourself. Perhaps, in time, you may learn to be grateful for all those ‘valueless’ people who simply want a fairer distribution of this unearned and hoarded wealth. You see, when we understand community we realise that no single person is ever ‘more valuable’ than another and certainly not to the degree that current monetary wealth or corporate interests appear to be claiming. The endless destruction of people, habitats, environments and animal life, committed without mercy, bear all the hallmarks of an envious attack. I’m not interested in money for its own sake – God knows, money is finite because its influence ends with death. I’m interested in the kind of Spirit that will accompany me after death.

 

If, during life, I need to make use of money then what I seek is enough to meet my needs as a functioning and contributing adult member of my community; from people to work to cats. I, for one, need no more than that. In our present world, however, I take very strong issue with those who believe I should make do with less simply to satisfy their personal and misplaced narcissistic demands for something as ultimately meaningless as money. To them, I would say this:

 

I have not deprived you of anything. I don’t need to – you’ve done that all by yourself. If you envy my Spirit so much, why don’t you strive to find your own instead of seeking to destroy mine? And if you refuse the effort, who is lazy; you or me?  Discover your own capacity for mercy and compassion for all kinds of others instead of just you and yours! Learn the kind of humility you demand of me because, from where I stand, you don’t look humble at all! I may be no better than you but, beyond doubt, I am definitely no worse! Finally, if you want to fund the same level of Spirit I am exhibiting here, albeit imperfectly, then the end game will be to give away your money because you will no longer need it and the community can put it to better uses than you will ever find on your own.

 

If we must judge envy, then let’s judge the consequences rather than the feeling. If my assessment that current Tory Party policy is currently fuelled by malicious envy towards ‘outsiders’ has any basis in fact, then we ought to be able to know by looking at outcomes. Last night’s #ESAEndGame twitter storm – which trended as the UK’s No. 1 for a time –can provide all the evidence necessary. There are other examples: #EverydaySexism #CasualStigma #Racism #Bullying to name but a very few. When people suffer and die in such ways, the fingerprints of an envious attack are not hard to find, especially when accompanied by blaming, justification and mercilessness resentment. This dynamic appears at all levels; from government policy to, in my view, the selfish interests of pigeon-fanciers who have no problem killing their neighbour’s cats. Today, that last one is enough evidence to satisfy me.

 

Goodbye, my beautiful cat. I still love you, Jasper – you were my friend-in-need and I am grateful for all the time we did spend together.

 

As for my Tory friend, she will have to make up her own mind.

 

 

Cautious Optimism: “Women under a flag of Truce”

 

 

Every once in a while, life gives us something precious even though it might not appear that way at first.

 

A few days ago, I logged on to Twitter to discover a friend deep in a ‘heated’ exchange. My friend, like myself, was born into the Labour Party Tribe and I watched her struggling to communicate with an elected councillor from the Tory Party Tribe. As I have some experience of ‘doing business’ with elected Tory councillors, I joined in when my friend began to struggle and began my own exchange instead. This blog is one of the outcomes and, I’m hoping, will be one amongst many.

 

Party politics in the UK – and probably elsewhere – is a battle between the two major political tribes, Labour and Tory, which stem from two very different root systems. Loosely described, Tories traditionally represent successful individualism within society whereas Labour draws its power from the collective groups who are often employees of Tories if they are not working within what remains of our public services. Unless circumstance requires that members of the Labour and Tory tribes work together, the two often don’t have much contact with each other and this absence of relationship contributes much to the deepening divisions between the two. Please bear in mind that, presently, these are very real ideological battles and very real people are dying as a result.

 

What drew me to the struggling exchange between my friend and this Tory Councillor – Nadia Cenci – was her willingness to remain within the conversation. Here was a Tory genuinely engaging with people outside her own tribe. I have a great deal of respect for anyone willing to make such a move and did not want to see such a potentially valuable resource go to waste. What I wasn’t prepared to do was engage from within the traditional battle positions. I needed to find new ground where we could meet ‘under the flag of truce’. In the following days, Nadia and I negotiated ground where we could do this. For those who may be interested, the root of this truce is buried deep in good manners. Neither of us are going to have all the answers. Neither of us are perfect but both of us are deeply concerned with the ‘health’ of our respective communities and the very serious problems we, as a whole, are facing. As far as I can establish, we are both looking for genuine, workable solutions and are willing to learn from each other beyond the present frame of UK party politics.

 

The ground I use when I talk to Nadia belongs to women. The traditional politics of tribal power within the UK, regardless of allegiances, is male-oriented. In other words, it is designed primarily by and for men – of all political parties – which means that the needs and interests of women have been sorely neglected. As women, we are subject to the same kind of harassment and derision if we step outside the loosely defined ‘Rules of Acceptable Behaviour for Women in a Man’s World’ and we are going to face the same struggles to resolve the social problems now besetting us. This is common ground for any woman, in my experience, regardless of whatever might divide us in other ways. For my part, I know that I cannot creatively contribute to conflict resolution unless I feel safe enough and I bring this wisdom to our ‘kitchen table’. If I need to feel safe enough, then it is important to ensure that all those involved feel the same way too because, in my own mind, we are not likely to reveal the really important issues without it. And the really important issues? Amongst women, these are likely to dwell within our feelings because women draw on our knowledge of emotional intelligence in order to find resolutions.

 

To access the knowledge and wisdom of emotional intelligence requires safety and in human relationships, that is built upon mutual respect; the recognition that everyone brings something valuable to the discussion. At the beginning, when distrust is most likely to derail such truces, having good manners allows each individual to find their own safety in their own way. It reminds me of those first meetings with psychotherapy clients. Most people (who can afford therapy) only turn up in a therapeutic consulting room when everything else they have tried has failed to resolve their problems. A new client is frightened, confused, and desperate enough to choose to encounter a stranger who might be able to help them. One demand they place upon themselves is the expectation that they must trust the therapist from the very outset. Emotional intelligence says that they are asking too much of both themselves and the situation. Sometimes my clients would be able to articulate this ‘trust requirement’ and my response was to say this was not my expectation of them. Trust is earned, not given – what makes the real difference is a willingness to trust. In my experience, this awareness of earning trust, together with good manners and if appropriate, humour, are the basic tools to creative human interaction – bring them to a women’s truce and we may have a genuine opportunity to negotiate a big enough peace for everyone; women and men, children and elders.

 

Bear in mind that this blog is about creating boundaries of safety for two women of different tribes at war with each other. As one of the two, I believe it helps to be as clear as I can be about my own motivations and to ensure that, as a matter of mutual respect for the individual, Nadia feels safe enough to express her own self before we ever move off into exploring new directions. From my perspective, my new travelling companion has already surprised me and her willingness to explore our collective problems whilst remaining true to herself is a genuine delight. Without Nadia’s suggestion, this blog would not have been written – already we are creating new ways of interacting. This is mutual creativity where one inspires the other. Additionally, Nadia is as willing as I am to make this a public exploration via the social media as well as a personal relationship. This means we can invite other women to observe, to participate if they wish and to share their own wisdom, especially when we ourselves stumble or find ourselves caught in the leg-irons and traps of outdated thought-forms.

 

In a human world that places so much emphasis on death and destruction, that two women from warring tribes can come together and thrash out enough of an agreement to create a potential region of truce seems, to me, little short of a miracle. That Nadia is a woman who is open to the possibility of miracles suggests that, together, we might find more.

 

If that isn’t grounds for cautious optimism, then I don’t know what is.

“Tell Me Something Good About Me!”

My very dear Paul

(If I sound as if I’m off my rocker, check the Atos link in the PS – it’s because I am but in a strange/happy way)

I’m writing this as a blog because I know a few people who might might this technique useful.

(For those who don’t know Paul, he is my most excellent neighbour IRL. A man who understands vulnerability is naturally intelligent, no matter how dumb he believes himself to be… and he is busy self-torturing at the moment. I won’t collude with torture. I had to send him home because he didn’t know how to stop himself. I know this problem from the inside – I’ve had it too. And we often have to keep repeating the lesson.)

Paul: we live in a dualistic reality. Nobody and nothing is as bad as you seem to be telling yourself you are. You are aware of what you are doing and we agree it’s as if there is a face very close to your own busy telling you you are no good at anything. THIS FACE IS LYING TO YOU (it often ‘looks’ like someone you have known or know or  it’s ‘voice’ sounds familiar in some way or another).

In a dualistic universe, you can fairly demand to be told at least 50% Good about you. Demand it of this mask! Demand it to tell you some good things about you. If it can’t do that, you can refuse to listen. Send it on its way. Then you go round turning off all those voices in this world who are telling you the same thing.

Demand Truth with evidence. And if you won’t stand up for a man who can talk SuperString Theory and Shamanism with me, then I bloody well will. There’s an awful lot of Good in you and whoever that mask looks like was lying. The Mask is a tool of the Matrix.

To the Matrix Mask, I say “Expelliarmus”

Finally, Paul, the chances are you will find this blog uncomfortable or embarrassing and will want to dismiss it. Remember that we are only embarrassed when we are stepping on to new ground. With the Mask gone, that’s what you are doing now. So you’re not supposed to dismiss this – that’s why I’ve blogged it. This is a Teaching! It will help you until you get used to the new or have to deal with the old. When we are balanced we are OK / Not OK in equal measure. You were about 4% OK 96% Not good enough of your 50% entitlement of Good. You’ve got some catching up to do.

If I think I can prove I’m a good-enough woman then I ought to know who a good-enough man is.

With all my love

Dee

PS: Latest Atos News