I am a victim of incest – is it true?

NOTE:

Please read the previous post dated 7/18 “The Work of Byron Katie on Incest” before reading this one. It may make more sense to you, if you do.

Or not, of course. As I learned in a May 1985 Rebirther Training with Phil Laut and Loren Kyle, “Everything is optional.” Everything.

Thought:  I am a victim of incest. 

Instructions: Feel the answers. Let the answer arise. (per detailed instructions in previous post.)

Question #1 – Is it true?

No. I feel a tight contraction in my solar plexus, telling me this is not true.

Question #2 – Can you absolutely know that it’s true?

Still no. Same contraction.

Question #3 – How do you react when you believe this thought? (Make a list.)

I act like a victim. I act like I cannot take care of myself. I blame others, particularly my father and his friend, Ray. I carry a lot of tightness in my shoulders. I feel helpless. I want others to do things for me. I feel like my father, even the world “owe” me something. I cry a lot. I have trouble moving, walking, doing physical things. Sometimes I gain weight. I am afraid. I generalize my blame to all men. I am closed to others, shut down, in many ways. I show a false face. I am not myself, but a tight cariacature of myself. I hold myself back from things I like and things I would like to do, be and have.

Subquestion: Does that thought bring you peace or stress?

Answer: Stress. Unquestionably, stress.

Subquestion: Can you find a peaceful reason to keep that thought, and I am not asking you to drop it? If so, check. Is that reason truly peaceful?

Answer:  No, I can’t find anything peaceful in the thought “I am a victim of incest.”

Question #4 – Who would you be without that thought or that story, “I am a victim of incest?”

Reminder: Feel the answer. Let the answer arise. Just wait and be with the question.

I would be peaceful. I would be stronger. I would be doing, being and having things I’ve always wanted to do, be and have. I would treat myself better. I would be more relaxed around men. I would be more relaxed and more powerful around my father and other men. I would be much happier, much happier. I would have peace. I would move more spontaneously in the world, and through my life. I would hear and act on Spirit’s guidance more clearly.

Turn it around. (Simply find an opposite of the original thought. Turn arounds may be to self, other or an opposite word or quality.)

Turn Around #1: I am not the victim of incest.

Question: Is that thought as true or truer than the original thought?

Well, anything is as true or truer than an untrue thought, and in Questions 1 & 2, what came up in my bodily knowing was that the original thought was untrue.

No incest is happening at this moment. So, in this moment, I am not a victim of incest.

In fact, if I think of it that way, I have not been a victim of incest, couldn’t have been, except in my own mind, for 30 years. It all stopped in 1975. 

Turn Around #2 – I am a survivor of incest.

Question: Is that thought as true or truer than the original thought?

Answer: Well, as the original thought was untrue, yes.

But otherwise, there is just as much stress and lying in this thought as there is in the original thought. I can write out the whole worksheet on that, and I decided to cut to the chase and include it here. I will likely write it out next, as my reactions to being a “survivor” are a bit different.

Turn Around #3 – I have incest in my history.

Question:  Is that thought at least as true or truer?

Answer: Again, it is at least as true.

I read science fiction and practice meditation, so if I really look at it through those eyes, how do I really know what happened in the past? I don’t. Not ultimately. Maybe I don’t have incest in my history.

(Now, please, if you’re struggling to deal with newfound memories, don’t worry about this one. Your Mileage May Vary, at least for a “while.”)

Turn Around #4 – My thinking is a victim of incest.

Question: Is that thought as true or truer than the original thought?

Answer: I laugh when I do the “my thinking” turn arounds. It is so freeing to realize that my thinking is what seems to be a “victim” of something called incest. That is so much truer to me.

Turn Around #5 – I am the recipient of love.

Question: Is that thought at least as true or truer than the original thought?

Answer: Oh yes. My father loves me. He may have showed it in some funny ways. I have absolutely no doubt of this. We have a wonderful relationship now and he even apologized for the incest. He was doing what was done to him, acting on things he himself had not and could not yet heal.

Question for Advanced Study: How long did the incest last?

Answer: About 5 years give or take.

Question for Advanced Study: And how long have you been victimizing yourself with this thought “I am a victim of incest?”

Answer: That went on for about, oh, let’s say 25 years or so.

Good to notice the truth. People ask Katie if she is enlightened, and she is known to reply, “I am just someone who knows the difference between what hurts and what doesn’t.”

“If it hurts, you are lying,” says Byron Katie. Inquire. Turn around. Find the truth.

There’s a temptation to repeat that famous saying by some guy from Nazareth who told us 2000 years ago what the effects of truth would be. You know what he said. I don’t need to tell you. I’m living proof that He knew what He was saying, and so did every Teacher before and after him who examined their thoughts, whether it was under a bodhi tree or on a park bench or on the floor of a halfway house for eating disorders.

I bow to the floor, kneel in praise, of those who discovered Truth before me and were kind enough to talk and write about it.

Jesus, Siddhartha, Katie, Eckhardt, Steven, Saniel, CC, Topaz, Phil, Leonard, Donald, Lance, Kelly, Karen, Jeff, Lauren (both), Mallory, Laura, Mother, Visham, and so many, many others, that I can hardly make a comprehensive list. It’s impossible. Some of their names I never knew or cannot recall.

Just know that I bow in deep gratitude for showing me the Way, the Truth, the Life.

Amen, Namaste, Blessed Be, Jai Guru Dev!

Ann

The Work of Byron Katie on Incest

I am going to write out my answers to the 4 questions and turn around on several commonly held beliefs about incest. This will be an ongoing feature in this blog.

The best way to read this is to answer the questions for yourself while you read. My answers may not be yours.

One thing that is useful to know is what it feels like when you are lying. Can you remember a time you lied to someone you loved? Most of us can if we are honest about it.

Got one? Good.

How did that feel in your body?

We’re looking for physical sensations here. You might say “it feels like I betrayed someone.” That may be. Where do you feel that in your body? Name the body part where you feel it and name the feeling.

We are not naming emotions here. Naming emotions is very valuable. But right now we’re going for physical feelings. Maybe it felt wrong or sad or bad or something. Those are emotions. Good to notice.

Where did you physically feel those emotions?

Maybe your gut? Your shoulders? Where else?

Did it feel loose? Tight? Open? Heavy? Expansive? Contracted? Hot? Cold? Keep going… what is your feeeling like? and where?

I know that those of us with incest in our history may be disassociated from our bodies and our feelings. But they are there. You can find them. It’s okay to look. You’re an adult now. No one is standing over you. Most likely if you’re reading this the incest or abuse is in the past. It’s over. Let yourself feel your body’s signals. They are very important to your healing.

Alright, whatever you’ve got as far as bodily sensations, go with it.

Now. I’m going to start with 2 judgments most people have about incest. If you have another one you want to see The Work on, write it in Comments, and either ask me to do it, or do it yourself. All you have to do is ask the 4 questions:

1.  Is it true?

2. Can I absolutely know it’s true?

3. How do I react when I believe that thought?

4. Who would I be without that thought/story?

Turn it around. (To self, other or an opposite.)

Simple, really. And maybe you’ll find it as profound as I do.

There are sub-questions, particularly on question #3, that help flesh out the reactions, but these are the core of this powerful Inquiry.

Alright, here goes…

Meetings with Other Incest Survivors

Yesterday I called our local safehouse for women, our organization for sexual assault victims and our sliding scale counseling center to find an incest group meeting for a friend of mine who has never been in any counseling for incest, barely believes it happened, and barely wants to talk about it.

As I said in the FAQ page, talking about incest is mandatory, not optional, required, de riguer, however you want to put it. Why?

Because the lying and the secrecy is more damaging than any actual acts that occurred. It is even more damaging than the broken trust.

 Yes, all of those things have effects and we want to heal. Healing is impossible if you are lying to yourself or keeping secrets from yourself. Impossible.

Healing begins the minute we start to tell the Truth.

Meetings with other incest survivors who are beginning to tell the truth are absolutely invaluable to this process.

Think about it, if you’ve got to tell somebody, don’t you want to tell somebody who will understand a little and empathize and have some compassion? Of course. Now, sure, one person’s incest story can trigger reactions in another.

Talking with other survivors is not a bed of roses. Thoughts arise, as Katie says. We think, “Oh, their story is worse than mine.” or “They didn’t have it as bad as I did.” or “They have a worse problem than I do.” “I have a worse problem than they do.” And lots of details in between. None of that is true, but it helps to get together and discover that.

The truth is that our perception of pain, loss and grief is subjective. Therefore, your worst is your worst. I liken it to a cut on your finger. That may be the worst physical pain you’ve ever had. Someone else had a broken leg. That seems worse, right? Wrong. Subjectively, they are the same. Each one is that person’s “worst” and we cannot compare them.

I was apalled to find that none of these esteemed organizations had any listings of meetings for those with incest in their history to participate in this vital healing of sharing their stories, not to mention sharing their experience, strength and hope. Apalled. Outraged. Shocked.

Furthermore, I found a page on the net that described various types of sexual healing 12 step groups and claimed there were none for incest survivors meeting in our state at all. Oh my God.

What happened? When I was in Texas in the 80’s, there were several meetings, both 12 step and faciliated private groups with counselors. Where did they all go?

Finally, I found one person, the director of one of the agencies for 25 years, who dug up two phone numbers. I called. One was disconnected, but one was good. That call connected me to a woman who said she’d need to meet my friend before she can attend a meeting.

I can see that. They need to be sure only those sincerely interested in their healing showup. And probably they are afraid of perpetrators coming to meetings. I’d rather see the so-called victims and perpetrators meeting together in a safe environment. I have heard of it being done. But I understand that without good facilitation and a clean understanding that both types of people are simply there for healing, and some methods to help ensure that is what happens people wouldn’t know how to proceed in a healthy and safe way. (I’d suggest The Work of Byron Katie.)

So, 2 days later, I’m still waiting for a call from anyone from that group who will meet me and my friend so we can go to a meeting. So that she can begin to tell and to discover the Truth. I may have to start one myself. 

If I Could Show You the Way

That’s a song by Shim Shai (www.shimshai.com)

The chorus is:

“If I could show you the way,
I would shine like the Sun in your eyes.
If I could find the way to say,
The way I feel is beyond me sometimes.”

Again, I wish I could post music here.  Maybe I’m not healed enough to show anyone the way.

There is definitely a difference between being fully awake and where I am. I do get whole days of feeling wide awake and connected. I think I have something to share or I wouldn’t be here.

One of my friends said I sounded like I was trying too hard.

Could be.

At the same time, some of this might just be my style. I can’t tell. I’m in it. I do know that I’m a preacher and a teacher. Some people don’t like that.

Have you ever read “Jitterbug Perfume?” by Tom Robbins?

It’s in my Top 5, along with, yes, Sean, “Celestine Prophecy” by James Redfield, “Illusions” by Richard Bach, “A Course in Miracles,” and “Loving What Is” by Byron Katie. And I could keep going. “Tell No Man” by Adela Rogers St. John is phenomenal, too. And the only reason I didn’t mention Spider Robinson is because he’d take up 10 books on my 5 Top Favorites list, and that without breaking a sweat.

But back to “Jitterbug Perfume.” Even people who love Tom Robbins and love the book sometimes take exception to the preachy parts. There are 4 monologues in which Wiggs Dannyboy expounds on Earth, Air, Fire and Water. They are definitely preachy. Wiggs aka Tom, must have studied with some of the same teachers I have. There’s more than a hint of Leonard Orr in his writing, or maybe Sondra Ray, but definitely one of the Rebirthers. There’s also the American Indian flavor to his philosophy.

And he’s preachy.

He’s doing it in fiction, though, so maybe that softens it?

An astrologer recently suggested that I write fiction to tell my story. I’m afraid that would come out really forced, really thin. I am not sure of any storytelling ability in me. I just write from who I am.

I could write and then call it fiction, even when it’s not. That might work.

What do you think?

If I could show you the way, how could I best reach you? What do you want to hear? What are you willing to consider?

I’m going to take you out of your comfort zone just by telling you I’m grateful for my past and that I wouldn’t change a bit of it. With incest back there, that’s going to trigger 99% of the world.

What’s a Grateful Girl to do?

Please post your suggestions in Comments.

Love, Ann

Grateful?

Aubrey just put it really succinctly.

We were talking about some feedback I got on this site. I truly didn’t understand where a couple of people were coming from. I decided it to run it by Aubrey. She got it and translated beautifully. Thank you, Aubrey, you are some of the best support I’ve had.

So, she reminded me that she used to struggle with who I am and what I have been through and how I see my history and myself.

The way she puts it is that it was hard at first for her to grasp, first of all, that I like myself.

In fact, she just sat there and went through some probabilities on this.

She says, “How many people like themselves? Maybe 25%” 

Then she says, “And of those 25% who like themselves how many have been through some kind of trauma like you have? Maybe 25% of that 25%”

“That leaves us with about 6% of the population. And of that percentage who do like themselves and who have gone through a trauma, how many of them have completed the thought process that “I like who I am. I am who I am because of my past; therefore, I like my past?”

“Not many,” she says.

Well, I agree, and at the same time, I don’t think I’m anything or anyone special. Anyone can come to these conclusions. They are there for the taking.

Give me an hour and some willingness and I can ask 4 simple questions about things you’re thinking and you might have your own internal experience of as deep and profound a gratitude as I have. Just be willing to ask. No expectations here. No goal. Just ask a few questions.

Oh, and we changed the banner name of the site. One of my reviewers said she wasn’t clear on the purpose of the blog. I think this title makes it a little clearer. Let me know.

Blessings, Ann

Gradient (Skipping Steps)

I learned a new word yesterday: gradient.

Well, I already knew the word, but not in the context my friend, Ralph, used it. We were discussing his customer service seminar. He was talking about how you have to build understanding. Give the class the basics, the language, and some experiences, and then lead them along to the conclusions and experiences that you are teaching.

Makes sense, right?

Well, in the middle of it, I got irritated and totally skipped gradients in speaking with him. he told me he had a second date with a woman. Describing their first date, he said they went for a walk, played cards for a while, and then made out. Based on this, he feels positive about the “relationship.”

Without explaining, and from my irritation, I simply said, “That relationship won’t last.”

No gradient. None.

He asked for an explanation, wondered who died and made me God, and restrained himself from kicking me out of his house. Ralph and I have been through a lot, so I got lucky there. He knows my relationship experience is vast, that I’ve studied it, and really run the whole thing through the wringer a thousand times both personally and professionally. So, he cut me a little slack. Thank you, Ralph.

So, here’s some of the missing gradient, the smooth slope of understanding that make the seeming leap from “we made out on the first date” to “that relationship won’t last” a little clearer.

What happened on that first date was a consensual boundary violation. These two met online. You can call me old-fashioned, but we all know that the minute hormones are engaged, our logic tends to take a backseat. As my friend, Brittany, says, “You lose IQ points rapidly.”

That’s my point.

Even if these two are a match made in Heaven, they’ve skipped steps. Yes, people do this all the time. Yes, sometimes they even get married. Yes, sometimes the relationship lasts 3 – 5 years. I’d say most relationships that begin with this kind of boundary violation are doomed within the first year, and I give it no more than 3 years for the novelty of “trying to make it work” to wear off.

Why?

They don’t know each other.

Plain and simple.

What really makes a relationship work usually has something to do with common ground, common values, and a committment to support each other on their chosen paths.

I, personally, find it preferable to be on the *same* path. I once had a relationship I described this way: He lived on the top floor, I lived on the bottom floor and we met in the middle for dinner.

But because sex entered the picture so fast and hard – we met in a singles club – it took me weeks and months to notice that he was always going one way while I was going another.

When did it finally dawn on me that we were not really sharing a relationship?

Two years later.

We were sitting in a theater watching a play about Mary Magdalene. I am fascinated with her. I identify with her and if I were Catholic, I’d take her as my patron saint. No, wait. She’s not a saint in the Catholic church just yet. (though in the 60’s they took back their lies about her being a whore) She is however a saint in the Episcopalian church! Almost makes me want to join. . . almost.

Anyway, here I am, having a religious experience. Chills, truth tears, insights and aha’s at every turn as I come to a deeper understanding of Mary Magdalene.

And what is my lover doing?

Cracking jokes.

I will grant that he stopped as soon as I asked him to, but there was nothing left to be said. I knew we were finished. We were no more on the same page than Dubya and Ralph Nader. Totally separate views of reality. Totally separate ways of living, values, choices, interests.

Oh sure, we had a little sex in common. And even that was because we both made concessions to the others’ preferences. I don’t mean in small ways. Being with him put me in a dominant, masculine role, because he preferred a more submissive feminine role.

Still, I’m grateful for the contrast. Grateful for the experience. As Edward Lueders said, in “Your Poem, Man,” “unless one thing is seen against another, a parsnip sprouting for a President, nothing really happens.” Great poem. Should look it up. Haven’t thought of it since the 70’s.

Anyway, Ralph’s relationship skipped the gradient and went straight to making out, guaranteeing that no one will be thinking clearly, no one will truly notice the others’ differences. They are already enmeshed sexually. And that is powerful stuff.

Some of my friends are now following a 10 date rule. No sex until after at least 10 dates.

And remember that notorious book, “The Rules?” I admit they could have presented it better, but there was most definitely some much needed truth in that book. I rarely admit it in public, and here I am admitting it in print, but honestly? I’m a Rules Girl.

Rules Girls don’t skip the gradient. We wait for sex, so that we can see our dates less clouded. Not clearly. Who sees anyone clearly? But why muddy the waters so much with sex?

I apologized to Ralph for skipping the gradient and pissing him off. Honestly, I’m more annoyed with myself for the decades during which I skipped the gradient, than I am with him. He can do whatever he feels is best. Why would I care so much unless I was annoyed at myself? (Thank you to Byron Katie and Steven Sashen!)

So, please, at least consider that there is a natural gradient we need in order to truly become intimate with another person. What if my father had practiced that? What if you and all your exes had?

I want to come to my relationships, all kinds, with as much Presence and Awareness as I can muster.

Blessed be, Ann

Paradox, Or Life Is & Isn’t Suffering

Paradox is one of my favorite subjects.

I’m in the habit of proposing marriage to attractive men who understand it and live it like I do. Of course, I won’t actually marry any of those. It’s the one who beats me to it that I’ll finally marry.

My friend and sometimes lover, Terry, believes that “Life is suffering” or, in his words, “Life’s not fair. And it’s not fair that life’s not fair.”

For him, it is suffering, and it isn’t fair. 

I don’t live in that place, though. Not most of the time. I definitely go through things that would be called suffering. I most certainly have a 10 year period in my life, 7 of which I was married to Marvin, that we both would have called suffering at the time.

Marianne Williamson, author of “A Return to Love,” (read it, and when you’re done, read it again) reminds us that “Suffering originally meant ‘to undergo.’” There’s no particularly painful or negative charge to the idea of undergoing something. It’s a fairly neutral concept, isn’t it?

I was emailing my friend and teacher, Steven Sashen, (and when he finally has a book or two published that I can recommend, that will be a red letter day! Until then, www.quantumwealth.com ) I asked him about something he talked about in his Advanced Meditation class a couple of years ago. He talked about level confusion.

When I asked him about the levels in my email, I was thinking mainly of two levels, which I was calling duality and non-duality or maybe unity. His reply, though, told me that a Kabbalistic view includes 4 levels. Basically, he said, there is a level at which, yes, “life is suffering.” Then there is a level at which we seem to have a choice about whether to consider things suffering or not. There is a third level at which there is no suffering. And finally, a level where the question of suffering and choice have no meaning at all.

Did you get all of that?

Neither did I, at first. I read and re-read it, and wrote it in my notebook so that I could internalize it enough to talk to you about it.

I really wanted to understand this well enough to know which “level” I’m relating on, and which level others are relating to me on. I use that word, “level,” totally for lack of a better one. In some ways, especially at the level at which the question of suffering and choice has no meaning, neither does the word, “level” have any meaning.

In Steven’s Quantum Wealth class, he says, “we do the inner work, that allows the outer work, which takes us back to the inner work” or some close approximation of that.

Yes, that’s what it seems like to me.

I forgive my father, that’s inner work, and then in some way, I am “un-stuck” in my thinking, and I can no longer use events of 30 years ago as an excuse for my unhappiness.

Now, please, don’t just read that and run.

That would be a level confusion.

Yes, there is a level at which what happened was bad and wrong and horrific and traumatizing and all of that. Trust me, I have not forgotten this. I can access that level any time I want to. Nowadays, I really only do that sometimes. I encounter it a little bit when I relate to others who still believe that’s the only level there is. I run into it when I find someplace that I’m still blaming my father and events of 30 years ago for something I experience now. At the time, it seems very real to me. Blame seems reasonable. In a way, from that level, from that point of view, it kind of is.

Then I do something analogous to what Abraham/Esther Hicks and Ken Keyes say about such things. Abraham would say I “move up the emotional scale.” Ken Keyes would say I “uplevel my addictions until they are preferences.” Both true and valid understandings from my experience.

A Course in Miracles talks about a similar concept. It says that the mind is the creative level and the body is the level of effect. That, too, is supported by my experience. My body doesn’t seem all that creative. Oh, sure, it can make a baby, but I really have very little to do with that. That is due to some Creation on the part of Another before me.

What do all of these paradigms have in common?

Well, I’ll tell you. They all say that “there is another way of looking at this” to quote A Course in Miracles. It is a matter of perspective.

What is perspective?

It’s a matter of which “level” I’m seeing things from.

Can I choose which level to see things on? Well, it seems like it when I’m at that second level I mentioned, the one where we feel like we have a choice. It doesn’t feel like it at all when I’m at the level where it seems I have no choice but suffering. It also doesn’t seem like I have any choice when I’m at that level where everything is fair and everything is a choice. Of course. . . why would I need a choice from that level? And then there’s that level where the question has no meaning at all. It’s hard to put words to that one. It’s a pretty “wor(ld)less” place.

“Wor(ld)less” is Steven’s creation, too. Write him and ask him about that. Ask when he’s going to teach Advanced Meditation again. In that class he gave us about 6 or 7 different experiences that, for me, had the direct and immediate effect of shifting me at a minimum to that place where “It’s all good.” Everything was Grace. Everything was Fair. Everything was blissful. And then into that wor(ld)less place where the question of suffering or bliss just didn’t mean a thing.

Seriously, are you getting this?

If not, try meditation. That’s how I get there most of the time.

If meditation doesn’t give you a sense of this, try breathwork or yoga or singing or . . . . Jesus . . . . just keep living, you’ll find it.

It seems sort of inevitable. We all seem to find this place. It’s a place from which thoughts arise, from which Creation is created, where all is right with the world. Hey, this is beginning to sound like Heaven, isn’t it? *grin* Yeah, heaven is in your mind. Truly.

This isn’t airy fairy stuff, either.

This is what Christ meant when he said “Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven, and all else shall be added unto you.” We find that place beyond words, beyond the world, and we rest there. Then, seemingly, we are anchored in something that defies explanations, and works like a charm. (Really, all of these puns are just showing up.)

Things work.

I’ll give you a silly example. I was at a workshop last weekend, helping the presenter set things up. People were coming in a door that was actually the back door, and not the entrance, so I wanted to tape a sign up that said the entry was around the corner. I had a flyer. I wrote a note on it. Then I wished for some tape to hang the sign with. I literally looked down at the ground where I was standing and there was a roll of tape!

I picked it up and used it.

Sure, it didn’t materialize out of nowhere. In fact, I think someone was taping something out there and just forgot to pick up their tape. But it felt miraculous. Want tape. Tape appears.

The more I practice feeling into those non-dual, unified places in myself, the more these things just happen.

What does this have to do with incest? Or gratitude for it?

Well, think about it. I know what it is to be in the place where it all feels like suffering and I feel like a victim. I lived a fair number of years there. I also know that the next thing I did was to learn that I had a choice. Sure, I didn’t believe it all the time, but I practiced it. I played with the ideas that were given to me. Eventually, it felt like incest was one of the greatest gifts I had ever been given.

Once you’ve experienced that place, life will never be the same again.

And please, please, please. . . do not under any circumstances “believe me.” Even if I happen to write, “Believe me . . . ” You can’t. Go find your own experiences. It’s fine to have a little curiosity, a little trust to get you started, but for God’s sake don’t just stop there. You’ll end up sounding like some fundamentalist (fill in the blank with the dogma of your choice), all form and no content. Go experience it for yourself. I can’t give you that. I can tell you it’s there. I can suggest ways to feel it for yourself, but I cannot do it for you. No one can. Ever.

Then there is another place where there is no question of fair/unfair, blame/innocence, truth/lie, a place where the question just has no meaning at all. It just is. Everything just is.

That’s the paradox place.

Or, as Deepak Chopra quotes Rumi as saying, “Out in the place beyond wrong doing and right doing, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.”

Love, Ann