Dear Peter,

I found in my own crossing of rivers, a tendency to linger by the shores, clinging to the raft, trying to take it with me and not trusting my ability to build another. Perhaps that is what I was responding to in this thread.

If you’re willing, you can give an example of how in your own life you were “clinging to the raft”, and what in this thread you find similar to your own experience.

Dear Felix,

I appreciate you sharing some more, and telling us more about your family. I understand your love and loyalty to your family. I love my parents too, and they help me whenever I need it. However it doesn’t mean that their style of parenting, specially that of my mother’s, didn’t affect me and my life even as an adult. Because we all carry the wounds from our childhood with us into our adulthood, and we employ various defense mechanisms to protect us from pain. Whether we like it or not, we’re directly impacted, even programmed, by our childhood experiences. So when you say “It’s big boy time“, it’s not completely true, because the little boy is still inside of you. You may try to make it work without tending to him, but it will be very very hard, and there will be always something missing.

You seem like an independent, capable man, who’s been through a lot, and came on the other side. You also know what your values are, and you don’t want to sell your soul for profit. Excellent! But still, you’re suffering because it’s so damn hard. You feel lonely, and on top of that, the universe is throwing you curve balls. You’re trying to let go, to not expect anything, to toughen up even more…  but as you say, it’s exhausting. You’re tired, you can hardly take it any more.

What if the way is not in toughening up even more and not hoping for anything, but instead, to soften? To connect to the vulnerable, fragile side of you, that needs help, needs company, needs respite from the constant struggle? That dares to hope in providence, in good things to come, in love… To change the approach and allow yourself to be vulnerable, and yet not weak (because the two are not the same)?

• This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Tee.
• This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Tee.

Hi Felic
I relate to a lot of the things your saying.  My parents recently passed away and I had to work/re-work my way through the memories. Family can be difficult to navigate and it accrued to me after reading Frederic Beckman’s novel – Anxious People the role that disappointment play. The inevitable experience of being disappointed but more so the fear of disappointing, also inevitable. Like you I realized that everyone was trying their best to be “reasonable good person to those we cared about’ and that we were all ‘idiots’ because as Beckman noted it can be so idiotically difficult to be human.

These realizations allowed me to say to myself to move on. It was enough that my parents tried, that I tried.  I found that if I clung to the memories it was because I was wishing things could have been different, that maybe I and my parents had done better.   If only…. As you noted their is no time machine and such ‘wishing’ to change things is about us, not our parents.

I was talking to a therapist about this as she asked me how I might free my parents and how I might free myself. The realization that I was attempting to carry my parents. That I felt it was my responsibility to carry them and in that way honor them  might be keeping them from being ‘free’… My parents grew up in the 40’s and 50’s were it was  parents calling to do the “carrying”. I knew they would be horrified to have me “carry” them.  Letting go of that was something I could do for them. That was the realization. I might not have been able to let go for myself but I could for them. That was what they needed from me, even while they were alive, and that was how I could, would, honor them including the disappointments and hurt we gave each other.

For that wounded inner child that still exists. I still see him standing alone on the school ground vowing never to let others get to close to hurt him, hurt me.  He didn’t know what he was doing. He was trying to be a reasonably good person and didn’t understand that path… he didn’t understand why he failed so often or why others failed him so often.  Its hard to separate, this failing others and others failing us… ‘Forgive us our failings as we forgive those who fail us’ is I think a healthy boundary…  ‘

So what changed after this letting go? Everything… nothing… The ‘mountain is back to being a mountain’. There is temptation  to go back and climb it again.. the moment of letting go can be intoxicating, and what if I forget…  ‘Lead us not into temptation, deliver us from fear…’ Time to leave the raft behind, the river was crossed the realization real/true, and see what happens next.  As for the exhausted soul, a little lighter a work in progress.

Here is a riddle

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope, For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith, But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing – TS Eliot

The exhausted soul needs space to be still and wait. (waiting the forgotten practice) This is not a passive waiting but active, eyes open, related I think to the Zen idea of ‘non-doing’.   You are, I am,  are ‘it’, as we are,  but not that either… Waiting, darkness is light, stillness dancing… words fade… silence…. Time to “make the bed and take out the trash”, life has needs.  🙂

Dear Peter,

I am sorry that both your parents passed away. What I am reading from your words is that you felt guilty for disappointing them (“The inevitable experience of being disappointed but more so the fear of disappointing”, and “honor them including the disappointments and hurt we gave each other”).

It appears you couldn’t let go of the feeling of guilt for them “carrying you”, but then with the help of therapy, you managed to let go. Am I understanding this right? Could you talk a bit more about your guilt for not “carrying them” – is it that you didn’t help them enough, you weren’t there for them when they needed you?

This feeling of guilt sounds like the central theme for you. You say the disappointments were mutual, and that you were all “idiots”, even though you – both you and your parents – tried your best to be “reasonable good person to those we cared about”.

So they tried their best, and you tried too, but it didn’t work. Although you understand it and have forgiven yourself and them somewhat, the injury has nevertheless happened and needs to be processed. That’s the wound on the foot we were talking about…

For that wounded inner child that still exists. I still see him standing alone on the school ground vowing never to let others get to close to hurt him, hurt me.

This is the protector part in you vowing to never allow your wounded inner child to be hurt again. You closing your heart is a consequence of that original wound – of not having received the love and care you needed. And perhaps that’s why you later closed your heart for your parents too. Now this wound needs to be healed…

• This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Tee.

Dear Peter,

My 12 year old self would not have been able to understand that or articulate that tension of being disappointed and hurt by those that cared for him and suspecting he was also disappointing and hurting them.

So yes there was guilt and the dread of not being enough.

The child always blames themselves if they don’t receive love and appreciation from their parents. The child feels unlovable, and not being good enough. That’s the first wound and the first, unconscious conclusion that the child makes about themselves: “I am not good enough, something’s wrong with me.” Then later, as we’re getting a little older, we start blaming our parents for not giving us what we need. That’s why since you teens, it appears you were blaming both yourself and them: “Its hard to separate, this failing others and others failing us.”

That this is a realty of all relationships would not have been understood. My parents were wonderful providers for my physicals needs however we struggled with communicating and expressing our emotional needs. Not uncommon for many families.

Yes indeed. Quite a few of us on this forum have a similar experience of having been given everything materially, but the emotional part was lacking. Your parents weren’t worse than others, they were doing the best they could. And yet, what I am saying, is that each child has certain emotional needs, which if not met, cause problems in our adult life. It doesn’t mean we should keep blaming our parents for having been deprived, but it does mean we need to heal those emotional wounds, if we want to have a happy and fulfilling life.

I’m not sure why you assume the experiences hasn’t been processed?

Well, if you want my honest answer, it’s because of the way you express yourself. You’re expressing yourself in philosophical, lofty terms, which are sometimes hard to follow. I’ve checked your two threads from 4 years ago, and they sounded much more down to earth and easier to follow. At that time you felt disillusioned about people’s ability to change. But you sounded more present, expressing your honest resignation, or disappointment. Since then, it appears you’ve become more philosophical and “esoteric”,  and it’s usually a sign of going into the intellect to try to explain away one’s problems and soothe the pain. I believe that the pain is still there, but now you’re trying to rationalize it. But this is just my observation, it doesn’t mean I am right.

TeaK

San is correct. Its difficult to put into words a realization that leads to letting go thus the change to the ‘philosophical’ or ‘mystical’ where words are intended to be experienced as the symbols that they are, symbols that point past themselves.

I was once involved in a debate about weather a person was truly capable of of performing a selfless act. It seamed that any example of a selfless act could be dissected were it was eventually ‘proved’ that the act was not selfless. The selfless act it seemed could only exist when expressed in words.  Similar to the experience of happiness becoming something else in the act of measuring and labeling happiness.  Better I think to “treasured up all these things and pondered them in ones heart”. Some experiences shouldn’t be shared, and or their is a time to share and a time to treasure and ponder.

The inner child exists as part of me but I am not not that child. His experience of quilt and disappointment are no longer mine, thought the experience still needs to be honored . Buddhism teaches that we have experiences and emotions.. but we are not our experiences and emotions. We are not a moment in time, We can allow them to flow

Hi TeaK

I hope I didn’t come across as ungrateful. I like being challenged and know I can move to the abstract when expressing myself.

Our dialog does beg the question. How do you know if you have really forgiven, let go, moved forward…? What is the point when a ‘seeker’ gets to be a ‘finder’?

Earlier I was talking about the temptation of going back, re-crossing the river, over and over again to make sure, make perfect, to recreate the ‘high’ and or peace of that moment of ‘knowing’ that is beyond knowing.  A Temptation to to carry the raft after it has done its job and not trust the learning that took place in its building.  I have gotten trapped in that cycle which has seldom been helpful.