Beyond Broken

Trauma

Real But Not True

 

According to Tsoknyi Rinpoche,  a most beloved contemporary Tibetan Buddhist meditation masters, to have an open heart and open mind we must develop a deeper understanding of the patterns that drive our thoughts, feelings and behaviors.  Then we will not so easily surrender to the impulse to blindly follow them.

I happened to be reading his book, Open Heart, Open Mind: Awakening the Power of the Essence Love, as I was crossing the International Dateline around the Bering Straits on my way to Tokyo to teach a class on Images. (The Pathwork terms for false beliefs and conclusions formed in early childhood.)

Tsoknyi Rinpoche continues to say that patterns are hard to change, especially the ones that are embedded in our unconscious or even our pre-verbal nervous systems.   This reminds me of Pathwork Lecture #201, which I am preparing to teach. It talks about the negative force field that images create as they go unexamined. The lectures defines images as a “force field of distorted ideas”.  “… it is like a deeply imprinted motor mechanism set in motion with great energy.  Thus a stronger energy is required to deactivate this motor force and change the negative force field into a positive one.”

After going through the hard work of uncovering your patterns or images, Rinpoche suggests a mantra, which is a time honored method of talking to your thoughts and feelings.  Sometimes called prayer, it is a means of opening up a conversation between the heart and the mind.   His mantra is a simple four word phrase: Real, But Not True.

What I love about this prayer is that it acknowledges the young one in us who came up with this group of distorted ideas and conclusions.  To this young one our conclusion about ourselves, about life, about God are absolutely real.  But as we shine a light on them with our adult consciousness they are also absolutely not true.

To find images we have to look back on our lives, the ways we define ourselves, the pressures that were applied by the people around us and the culture in which we were raised.

In the process of teaching Images in Japan my husband and I find our intertwined images, which are always at work in relationships.  My image:  “If I am sick and suffering then I will get the attention I need.”  This comes from my young one who watched my mother, sick and suffering and sucking all the attention and energy out of our household, leaving none left for me.  It seems so clear to my little one if I can be sick like my mother then all that attention will be mine.  Of course the attention I want the most is from my husband.  His image: “My attention does not matter or will be used by others to manipulate me”  I try desperately to get his attention and he tries desperately to avoid being manipulated by me by withholding it.  And round and round the negative force field we go.

This is a spectacular example of the truism: we teach what we most need to learn!

Sometimes images or patterns help us avoid feelings like being alone and neglected in my case or being invaded and used in my husband’s.  But I also learned while teaching that sometimes images are put in place as a sacrifice to try and save our families.  One student took the blame for everything that ever happened in his family.  He sacrificed his need for fairness and justice.  This was a huge sacrifice. When he realized what he had done he wailed with grief.  We all know how important fairness is to children.

Tara Brach has more to say about Real, but not true. “What this means is that, while thoughts are really happening and there is a real biochemistry that accompanies them, they are only representations in our mind. They are not the experience of this living moment. We can begin to identify and challenge limiting beliefs by starting with the simple question: What am I believing right now? And then: Is this true? Is it possible that this is real but not true? Our beliefs fuel our sense of separateness. Uninvestigated, they are a veil between us and reality; they actually prevent us from seeing truth.”

 

 

 

 

Stand Your Ground

This summer our 5 year old is venturing out into the ocean but he needs to hold hands for support when the big waves hit.  When the big wave approaches I say to him, “stand your ground, buddy” over and over again. My wish is that he remember this as metaphor for the rest of his life.  As I say it to him over and over again, I am learning to stand my ground.

Boundaries are something that did not exist in many chaotic households, or they were held inconsistently.  And I am finding that many of the people I work with have never experienced healthy, safe, flexible boundaries.  As one person put it recently, “I either shut down completely behind my wall or I am wide open with my heart fully exposed”.  The first approach is not a boundary but a defense and the second approach is a merging which is unhealthy and leads to co-dependency and loss of self.

Brene Brown has done the most beautiful work around boundaries that I have discovered.  It came out of extensive research that she did.  She wanted to know what qualities contributed to the most compassionate people.  She began by interview clergy and other known types of compassionate people.  Her hypothesis was that compassionate people were also spiritual people and that spirituality contributed to compassion.  What she found out was very shocking to her and it might be to you too.  She found that the most compassionate people are the people who have the best boundaries.

She uses the acronym BIG for her boundary discussion.  BIG becomes an amazing question.  Here is how it goes:

What Boundaries do I need so that I can be in my Integrity and be most Generous towards you?

As one friend pointed out, we often try and do GIB, and that doesn’t work.  We often think we should be generous.  Aren’t good people generous?  And then we find we have gotten out of alignment with our integrity and wonder what boundaries we might need or should have put in place and didn’t.

As I have worked with this notion of boundaries and generosity with myself and others I find this miraculous thing happens.  Let’s say there is a conflict with another person.  We are considering having it out with them.  Hashing out what is wrong, all our hurt feelings, etc.  And then we consider maybe a boundary would help.  When we energetically feel a boundary — like a transparent cloth over our hearts or a piece of lucite (letting light in and out but a boundary none the less) — everything changes.  We feel the boundary.  We are inside and the other is outside.  We have a parameter around us, there is a border between us and the other.  In this act of protection  and self designation, we instantly can feel more generous towards the other person.  The grievances or issues seem to vanish as we feel secure and unharmed inside ourselves.

I spoke to a friend about BIG yesterday and as she carefully took in what I was saying she said she felt I was talking about creating order.  Boundaries do create order where otherwise there is the potential for chaos.

Try standing your ground first with a simple boundary based on your own integrity and watch your generosity and true compassion grow.  It is straightforward and easy and works instantly.

 

 

 

“I know I am imperfect, but I make believe I am not”

A collaboration of various authors on the subject of the Idealized Self Image, the damage it does and the promise of recovery  – into our sacred humanness.  Our true nature.  Thank you to all you brave souls who contributed. 

Image Above – The Idealized Self Image as Constructed by Susan G. — variegated cardboard is material she visualized, flimsy and inadequate for supporting all the structures she puts on top.  She adorns it with various ornamentation – random, without coherence.  This is a beautiful portrayal of the idealized self.  Individually each piece representing a belief about life and ourselves, makes sense but the overall construction … well draw your own conclusions!

A Pathwork Lecture says, “As a child, regardless of what your particular circumstances were, you were indoctrinated with admonitions on the importance of being good, holy, perfect.  When you were not, you were often punished in one way or another.  Perhaps the worst punishment was that your parents withdrew their affection from you; they were angry, and you had the impression you were no longer loved.  No wonder “badness” associated itself with punishment and unhappiness, “goodness” with reward and happiness.  Hence to be “good” and “perfect” became an absolute must; it became a question of life or death for you.  Still you knew perfectly well that you were not as good and as perfect as the world seemed to expect you to be.  This truth had to be hidden; it became a guilty secret, and you started to build a false self.” PWL #83

I am working with several people who are doing the sacred work of deconstructing the mask of the Idealized Self that they have constructed over so many years.  The Idealized Self Image is what the Pathwork calls the perfectionist standards that we hold ourselves to and present to the world.  The ISI is made of many images  (beliefs about the world and ourselves that we formed during our sorting and categorizing stage of our brain development.  My four year old grandchild is doing this now.  “I have a penis, Daddy has a penis  – you and Mommy do not have penises”.  The conclusions he will draw about men and women will form a lasting image that will become unconscious because of his young age.  Many images also contain conclusions about cause and effect.  The young one trying to make order and sense out of the world.  If I do this _______ then that ________ will always happen.  We have a myth is our family – if you wear your pajamas inside out it will snow when you wake up the next morning.  Some of our unconscious images can be just as magical or erroneous as this one and make little sense in the light of day of our grown up psyches.

Here is one example.  It begins with her belief  that, “I am  special and therefore inoculated against anything bad happening to me.”  (We can smile at the magical thinking of her little one). “Next, something bad does happen.  Then I decides I better hide and make myself  small.” (This plays out in adulthood with eating disorders and other issues). ” But then I am hungry, and so lonely and so afraid.  If I keep making myself a better (special) person maybe that will help. But then I fail at my expectations and bad things keep happening and I hide and get small again.  The world feels like a very unsafe place.”  This is something that all Idealized Self Images have in common.  The world does not feel safe.

Someone else has a different cascade of images that leads him to loneliness and often severe depression.  Here is how his goes:

“I cannot feel support, If I were to feel support then it would not be enough.  If the support  is not enough then I am alone.  If I am all alone then I am not enough.  If I am not enough then life is hopeless (here is where the depression begins).  “If life is hopeless than I have to try harder.  If I try harder then it is never enough.  I give up any hope of relationship.  Then I am really alone.”  This one is a bit trickier.  His Idealized Self Image rests in not needing support, in being able to do it all by himself. and with an arrogance that he will do it better than anyone anyway.  But it does leave him frightened and alone.  Because deep down inside we do not believe the story of  our ISI’s.  We present it to the world but we know it are false.

In these two cases you can see two tendencies of the ISI  combined:  over-exacting moral standards – impossible to live up – and pride in being invulnerable, aloof, and superior.  The co-existence of these mutually exclusive strategies presents a particular hardship for the psyche.

Another person is very accomplished in her field.  Yet she cannot relax into all her accomplishments because, though they are true and well earned, she also has these over-exacting standards that she knows in her heart of hearts she cannot live up to.  This makes her constantly vigilant that she will be discovered as a fraud – exposed.

“A further and drastic result of this problem is the constantly increasing estrangement from the real self.  The idealized self is a falsity.  It is a rigid, artificially constructed imitation of a live human being.” PWL 83

 It can be hard work to excavate the real self amidst this life long construction project of the false self.   Another person  writes, “Yes, it (the ISI) needs to somehow, at some point, be replaced. Talk about being disoriented!!  Sometimes love just seems so much like the lack of it.  So imperfect.  And yet in its imperfection, stronger, more pure, more meaningful.  Sacredly human.  It feels so scary to trust this imperfection.”

Another person writes:

“My mask of love was so thick and layered with the mask of power and then surrender if all else failed.  I was aware of this for decades before I could find a way out.  These days I am risking it all to live authentically – with my flaws and the truth that I will always be in recovery and wishing to find underneath it all what of the joy, love, giving and effort I launched into life which is actually real. Today I pray – to be real, to feel and sense and speak truth – and to stay close to me.  A me I never sensed, while in the frenzy to flee and function.”

There is so much creativity. hard work and hope in these examples of deep excavation, art work and writing.  I hope you will feel the hope too and join us in embarking on trusting your imperfect, human self.  Staying close to yourself – who you really are – makes the world a much safer place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“

 

 

Honoring The Effects Of Trauma In Our Lives – a few spaces left register by April 10th!

Download the full workshop flyer here.

Releasing the Grip of Trauma Using Structures Work, Personal Stories and Group Work

“It is one thing to process memories of trauma, but it an entirely different matter to confront the inner void – the holes in the soul that result from not having been wanted, not having been seen, and not having been allowed to speak the truth. Structures fill in these holes.”
—Bessel Van Der Kolk, M.D.

Class Format —
Pre-course On Line Class — Saturday April 20th 3-5
In Person One Day Class — Saturday April 27th 10-6
Post course On Line Class — Saturday May 4th 3-5
Cost — $150.00

A workshop participant:
“Wendy, when I am with you, I feel that you understand and are able to hold a space that most people are unaware exists. This is powerfully magnetic and comforting.”

Structures enable a person to go back safely into the traumatic memory with crucial support that was missing then, and it offers fresh options – an alternative memory – a different outcome in which your basic human needs are met and your longing for love and protection are fulfilled.
This reconstructs inner implicit memories maps in the brain and helps people become viscerally acquainted with feelings that were lacking early in their lives.

Limited to 12 Participants so register early. To register or for more information contact Wendy Hubbard – whubbard0@gmail.com

Larry Goldstein is a group facilitator that utilizes psychodrama, playback theater, the therapeutic spiral method, theater direction and coaching in his group work. Larry has trained with Kate Hudgins, Jonathan Fox, the Coaches Training Institute and worked in day hospitals, private practice with individuals, couples, families and groups. He often leads retreats for non-profit boards and other work groups.

Wendy Hubbard is a Pathwork Helper. She has studied and practiced the Pathwork for 25 years. She teaches the Advanced Levels of Pathwork, leads groups and individual sessions. She is also certified in Hellinger Family Constellation Work and trained in Attachment and Trauma Work. This rich mix of modalities and trainings informs her work and enables her to bring hope and healing to her clients. Her website and business is
www.beyondbroken.org.

Attachment Hell

What is Attachment and why is it Hell when things go wrong?

attachment

If you had an ideal childhood where your consistent parents celebrated your uniqueness and each of your achievements as you moved through your developmental stages, then this blog does not apply to you.

“However, most of us had a childhood that was far from this ideal. Our young, vulnerable nervous systems were not protected and regulated by ideal parents. We often felt overwhelmed and alone, and to buffer ourselves from these recurring feelings of overwhelm, we developed survival patterns”, says Steven Kessler in The 5 Personality Patterns.

These survival patterns can stay with us our whole lives and we identify them as ‘us’.  However they are a series of defensive postures that help us regulate energy and events from the outside world. The real ‘us’ of us — our essence — is lost, since it was not activated by attunement when were were young. The good news is we can recover our truest selves, but it takes work.  We have to begin the process of attuning to ourselves, attending to those overwhelmed and lonely parts within.

If your parent or parents were there, but not consistently, you will believe that if you ramp up your nervous system and attention to others, maybe that will make them stay with you longer.  You live a very vigilant, anxious life in a terrible quandary: your need for others is so large, but your capacity to take it in is so small (since it was not there sufficiently when you were young). To heal and find your way back to your real self you will need to practice receiving and containing.  You have what you need now to fill up your system and regulate yourself but you will have to work at it.  You also have to pay special attention to letting in the goodness that comes your way, letting it land in you. You will have to reverse your focus from outward to inward. You will feel whole and settled as if you have finally come home.

A testimony to this work –

“So first, I would say I am healing from my attachment wound.  Part of this process is knowing my vulnerability to the story/feelings of being left, especially in my closest relationships.  When I am getting pulled to the old pattern of relating, I know I need to slow down and hold myself with love and compassion so I don’t abandon me.  This allows me to be intimate with myself and my real needs while creating opportunity for intimacy with the other. I risk asking for what I need.  I am clear about what is a true request versus a whiny demand or manipulation.  If I’m feeling whiny energy, this needs to be held and explored. And surprise to my younger self:  My requests are usually met with a yes!  And when they are not, it allows me to open to other paths to getting my desires met.”  Anonymous

If your parents were not available especially emotionally, you will stop expecting anything from others. You will live life in your own bubble. You will overrate your opinions and views of the world and discredit others. You will not allow yourself to have any needs since they will not be met, but your quandary is that, to do this, you must make yourself numb. This numbness helps you regulate difficult, overwhelming experiences but you will also be numb to joy and much of the pleasure that life offers. To heal you will need to take the risk to slowly step our of your bubble and notice that there is nourishment for you there. You will have to slowly let your body feel again and risk having your needs. You will feel more of everything: love, joy, pain and your old drab life will take on unbelievable colors.

A testimony to this work –

“Understanding my attachment style has allowed me to accept actions and beliefs that I previously thought were an unchangeable part of ‘who I was’. Not accepting them kept these patterns of behavior in place and created a profound sense of isolation and personal failure. As I have grown to accept these patterns as legitimate outcomes of my childhood experiences, new possibilities are opening up to choose differently; choosing connection rather than isolation and hopelessness. I now have a loving partner who both understands me and yet is available for a deep intimacy that I have never previously known. An inner gate has opened and although my old responses and patterns occasionally show themselves, I recognize them for what they are: ghosts that no longer have power to bind me to past vows. I have a real choice now and I choose love more and more often. True and justified hope is now mine. ” Jack Bodger

If your parents, who you needed to love you, also hurt you — well then you are really in trouble.  Your quandary is the belief that love = harm or hurt. This will make it very challenging for you to form healthy lasting relationships as an adult. You will be drawn to the love and repelled by the harm. You are like a magnet turning towards the attraction of love and then flipping over and repelling that connection out of fear. Unfortunately, some of us in this category experienced child abuse in the form of physical and emotional harm. Others of us experienced neglect which creates tremendous hurt in a young child.

This is what happened to one dear little one who was subjected to treatment by heartless immigration tactics, separated from his parents with no warning for 73 days. He experiences this as extreme neglect. His mother is there one moment and then gone the next. His master regulator of all those overwhelming and lonely feelings is suddenly gone. He becomes extremely dis-regulated, and this may last throughout his life. You see this dramatically in the news video of his reunion with his mother. He will repeat this in every relationship for the rest of his life. This clip, from the CBS New “60 Minutes” program, includes commentary from two psychiatrists.

To heal this pattern it will be necessary to begin to de-couple the hurt and harm from the love.  The body needs to experience them as two separate streams of energy and not all muddled together.  (You may also have to do the work of the previous two patterns because you have used all the patterns to cope with so much distress.)

A testimony to this work –

“What shifts when moving from a perspective of enduring or surviving life to a perspective of thriving and moving with life, being in mutuality with life?  When in survival mode, the body feels tense and painful and is always on guard for danger. Emotionally, there is a feeling of needing to protect against hostile outside forces (which could be anything or anyone). Spiritually, there is a sense of hopelessness and despair that anything will ever change and that there is nowhere to turn for help. 

When a sense of thriving is available, everything changes. The body sinks into a grounded calm, with soft belly and easy breath. Emotionally, there is a sense of curiosity about life, which spurs playfulness and vulnerability to anything or anyone that is currently present. Each moment feels like an opportunity to experience the precious gift of life, whatever it brings. Spiritually, there is a joy, an outward facing energy, an embracing energy that enfolds everything and everyone in my sphere.” Ann Rebera

All these patterns or adaptations influence how we see ourselves and the world. They become our reality — not actual life itself.

As you read the testimonies I hope you feel a profound sense that healing is possible for you.  Each of these people are dismantling their patterns and it is working!  This takes time.  It is not a quick fix.  But this can be our healing task in this life time. I hope our three year old friend Emmers finds the help he needs.