Dear Peter:

I am (!) Looking forward to read, process and and reply Thurs morning.

Anita

Hi Peter

Sorry for the late reply. The kiddo started walking and I’m exhausted.

Haha I can believe it! 😊 I hate when that happens.

I think I was just lost in my own thoughts and memories to be honest. That quote reminded me of an old friend who used to believe that people were not meant to be happy. It makes sense that you would perceive it in a different way.

I guess it depends on how you define joy? Or maybe people just experience it differently? I’m a quiet simple person. I would perhaps describe it as contentment, peace or serenity.

And from the perspective of Traditional Chinese Medicine, the goal is to simply be calm. Strong emotions good and bad are both seen as harmful.

I’m curious about your experience of joy, if you would like to describe it?

For me, it was just a side effect of meditation. My thoughts slowed down until there were gaps between them, and within that space I noticed all of the beauty in the world I had missed before.

I do think that personal development is really important though. It is good to like yourself and it reduces suffering.

I believe it is possible to be still and content with a busy life. I think that as a parent, it’s teaching me a lot about patience. The amount of self control that is needed to raise a child in a healthy way is wild. Even under the most extreme circumstances. You learn to let go of stressors until you see something of actual consequence.

Today my son learned to walk and with that came absolute chaos. Rolling with it is important. But sometimes you just need to stop and breathe for a bit.

What happens to the moment when the sun sets? I don’t think I understand the question, I will take a stab at it though. Some moments are forgotten (lost to the sands of time), some are preserved in pictures, some are burned into our memories. But every day the moment repeats itself whether we watch it or not.

Yes, I would agree, in the moment there is no need to label these things.

Thank you for letting me ramble!

Love, peace and forgiveness! ❤️🙏

Dear Peter:

I want to review our valuable communication on this thread before I reply to your recent posts, so to better integrate what I processed so far before moving forward with the conversation. I expect to do it by Monday. I remember that you said that you take a break from the computer on weekends. I wish you a good Friday and a restful weekend!

anita

Dear Peter:

I intend to dedicate all of Mon morning to your thread, but for now, in regard to this part of your recent post: “As it comes to hope as a child I doubt I gave it much thought. Life happens so fast at that age that memory hasn’t had enough time to get its hold into you”-

– from my experience, life in childhood happens so fast only in the context of an adult looking back at it, remembering it. In childhood, time has a different quality, a timeless quality, and when tragedy hits, there’s a forever feel to it.

We forget how it really was when remembering as it truly was is overwhelming.

anita

Dear Peter:

I asked you: “If you ask peter the young boy: ‘what do you hope for?’ What will he say?”, and you answered: “Funny Sad that just reading that question I feel a tightness in my lower abdomen as my hope as a young boy came from a place of fear and anxiety or you might say discomfort and the Hope was for comfort because discomfort was not only bad but ‘sin’. I’m afraid my Hope was not for Life but to change what cannot be changed. In other words as a young boy I was unknowingly saying a big NO to Life while believing I could fix it by being good and following all the rules”-

– Processing: you described your childhood hope as stemming from fear and anxiety. This implies that your primary motivation for hope was to escape and prevent discomfort (fear, anxiety) rather than to seek positive experiences.

You linked discomfort with being “bad” or even “sinful.” The use of these terms implies a moral judgment. It indicates that you viewed discomfort not just as an unpleasant experience but as a sign of personal failing or moral inadequacy, believing perhaps that any discomfort you felt was a reflection of your own shortcomings or wrongdoings.

Generally, these beliefs in children are shaped by external expectations or teachings by caregivers, authority figures, or cultural and religious norms. Examples of how such a message is sent to a child by a caregiver: (1) the caregiver dismisses the child’s fear or anxiety by saying things like, “Stop being a baby”, “There’s nothing to be afraid of”, or “Why are you always so scared? You’re such a coward”. This can make the child feel that their emotions are invalid, that experiencing them is wrong, and that feeling fear is a personal failing.

(2) the caregiver rolling their eyes, sighing, or showing impatience when the child expresses fear, sending the message that the child’s emotions are unwelcome or bothersome.

(3) the caregiver Ignores the child’s expressions of fear or anxiety, making the child feel that their emotions are not worthy of attention or support.

Some religious teachings emphasize the idea that fear is a lack of faith or trust in a higher power. For example, messages like, “If you truly had faith, you wouldn’t be afraid”, associating fear and anxiety with sinfulness or moral weakness, leading the child to feel guilty and a failure for feeling fear.

In cultures that value emotional restraint, children are taught that showing fear or anxiety is a sign of weakness. Phrases like, “Real men don’t cry” or “You need to toughen up” reinforce the idea that fear is unacceptable.

Cultures that emphasize success and perfection convey the message that fear and anxiety are obstacles to achievement and should be overcome or hidden to maintain an image of competence.

Portrayals of fearless heroes in movies, TV shows, and books create an ideal that fearlessness is a desirable trait, leading children to feel inadequate for experiencing fear.

Role models, such as parents, teachers, or public figures, who emphasize courage and downplay fear, may inadvertently make children feel that their own fears are unacceptable.

Back to your words, Peter, your reflected that your hope as a child was not directed towards embracing life but rather towards changing what could not be changed, and that you believed that by being good and following all the rules, you could “fix” your discomfort. For you, following rules became a control mechanism, believing perhaps that if you behaved perfectly and met all expectations, you would avoid negative emotions such as fear, anxiety, or guilt.

Generally, rigid conformity involves a lack of flexibility in behavior and thinking. It means strictly following rules without considering context or personal needs. This mindset leads to suppressing one’s true self and emotions to fit into a mold of what is perceived as “good” or acceptable, and it reflects a misunderstanding of the nature of emotions, which cannot always be controlled through external behaviors. Over time, this suppression can lead to resentment and frustration, as the individual’s authentic self is not being acknowledged or expressed.

Believing that one’s worth is tied to rule-following leads to conditional self-worth. This means feeling worthy only when meeting certain standards or expectations. Failure to meet these standards can result in harsh self-criticism.

Using rule-following as a coping mechanism is ineffective for managing emotions in the long term. It does not address the root causes of fear and anxiety and can prevent the development of healthier emotional regulation strategies. It can also lead to avoidance of situations that might evoke negative emotions, limiting personal growth and experiences.

“Krishnamurti made an argument that most of our hope really represented a fear. And that one hoped when one was in despair… Years ago I determined that if one was to hope unskillfully it was best not to hope at all, which I still think, only I didn’t give up on the notion of learning to hope skillfully. It’s why I want to revisit my relationship with Hope – Krishnamurti not wrong but surprising myself, my gut says there is a Hope that, yes, we might turn to in times of trouble, but isn’t about fixing that trouble, or comparing, or even becoming… Though I feel such a hope would bring one closer to a ‘true self’. Kind of the Joy and sorrow relationship? Maybe? Language is going to get in the way, but think I’m in a space to explore it.”-

-Processing: Krishnamurti argues that hope often stems from a place of fear and despair. When individuals are in despair, they look for hope as a way to alleviate their suffering. This aligns with your earlier reflection, Peter, on your childhood hope being rooted in fear and anxiety.

You acknowledge that unskillful hope, which is rooted in fear and the desire to fix external circumstances can be unhelpful, and you now seek to explore a different kind of hope— one that isn’t about fixing trouble, comparing, or achieving. Your desire to revisit his relationship with hope indicates a shift towards acceptance and finding meaning in life’s experiences without the need to control or fix them. This aligns with the idea of moving away from rigid conformity and towards a more authentic and self-accepting approach.

“As a young boy I was unknowingly saying a big NO to Life while believing I could fix it by being good and following all the rules. (I think you had a similar experience with taking on the label of bad, if for different reasons? I wonder if most children do?)”-

– a lot of people can relate to this, and so can I. I believed that if I followed all the rules, I would become good and worthy of a good life. For a long time after I started my first quality psychotherapy in 2011, I was still compelled to make rules for myself. I used to type rules and print them on papers titled “Rules 4 Life”, then sign them. I believed, every time I typed, printed and signed 10-20 rules, or more, that I would follow them perfectly and that I just started a good life, being a good person worthy of a good life. Each such time ended with a new Rules 4 Life, a new effort. Talking about the futility of Rigid Conformity.

My Hope now is to say YES to me being me, a person who is no longer primarily suppressed and repressed, but expressed according to the values I believe in (do-no-harm is one), to undo the difficulty in processing my own feelings of conflict and despair: to let life live through me, as Hokusai Says (the poem)- to let my emotions (energy in-motion) flow through me, unrestricted by labels or rules.

My whole life I wanted to be good and worthy of that peace of mind that evaded me. As a way of life (a non-life), I was holding my breath literally (restricted inhaling & exhaling) and figuratively, following rules (and breaking them) until such time that I can breathe again, inhale, exhale, all the way, comfortably.

I wrote above: “Using rule-following as a coping mechanism is ineffective for managing emotions in the long term. It does not address the root causes of fear and anxiety”- the root cause of my ongoing anxiety has always been the devastating belief that I was a bad person waiting to be good.

Yesterday, I wrote to you: “In childhood, time has a different quality, a timeless quality, and when tragedy hits, there’s a forever feel to it”- the tragedy that hit me and stayed persistently for decades, is the accusation that I was a bad person, and that I was a bad person from a time before I had a chance to have a say about it: a chance to correct any (what?) bad deeds. The accusation just fell from the skies (my mother= god) and crushed me for so very long.

I will go over your thread from the beginning and connect it to Hope- in a later post.

anita

Dear Peter: we submitted posts 5 min apart. Maybe you didn’t notice my recent post.