I felt angry at what I perceived that persons attitude to be and I wondered how anyone could think that way. Over the next few years, I certainly came to understand them better as I learned about my own attitudes, values and beliefs. I had always considered myself very open minded and non judgmental and I had prided myself on those qualities, boasting often and trying to make others see the errors of their ways.
What I know now is that all was not what it appeared even then and I was seeing what I saw, hearing what I heard and experiencing what I experienced through a very distorted filter that was so clogged up with toxic debris (trauma) that there was very little way anything good could possibly come through it.
I haven't learned this about myself by just thinking about things in my head. I have had the challenging, difficult, and very humbling, healing honour of massive triggers and 8 years of regular counselling and attending self development workshops and support groups, reading copious books and articles to rip up the old foundations of me and create a new, healthier me to build on. Maybe it was chipping away the hardened, fear-based shell that had enveloped me for most of my life. Whatever I was I doing, I'm glad I've done it because these days, I am much more able to look at everything from many different angles and to try and see things from another persons perspective without my old need to control everything and be right! I had such an attachment to being right that I was almost always wrong :-)
I once attended a workshop where 15 of us, who did not know each other longer than a workshop, were shown a blob of paint. Each of us were asked to quietly write down what we each saw and not talk while we did it. We then went round and shared, in turn, what we each had seen. We all expressed surprise to learn that only 2 people in the group had seen the same thing as each other-all 13 of the rest of us had seen something entirely different from everyone else in the room!! It was a blob of paint they prepared while we all watched. It was totally random and yet, we all saw something different. It really made me think about how many assumptions I'd made about others and about the belief I'd had to that point that everyone knew what I knew and everyone heard, saw, felt, etc what I did. No one else experiences what I experience, exactly the way I experience things and vice versa.
I used to think everyone (yes, the child in me exaggerated it to me that much I believed it was everyone) picked on me. It was only as my perception changed and I healed thetrauma that I began to see that wasn't even remotely true. Not EVEROYONE did, it was a few. There were some really nice people along the way too but I forgot the really nice ones and was convinced the plain nice ones were all in on "it" too. My fear had totally blackened my lenses to the point that I could only see fear! I could not have cleaned my lenses by myself without lots of time, support, courage and without people who were brave enough to challenge me because they cared enough to try and help me realise I was not always right.
I was not kind, I yelled at them and even mocked them for what I saw as their naïveté and lack of knowledge, even accused them of not caring or trying to hurt me more. I tried to tell myself they were horrible too, now they were the ones trying to hurt me, but you know what, eventually I had to stop blaming them for what I refused to see - that I was wrong and, that I was the common denominator in all of my painful experiences - not them, me.
Over time, with lots of stumbles, I finally came to the point where I started to believe that every person in my life is a reflection, either of something I need to learn about me or something I need to learn about others - both so I can be more me and be more loving to myself and everyone else. Today, if I start to think someone is doing something to me, I try to stop myself as quickly as I become aware of it and turn it back to me with no blame ("if there was no blame June, what would this look like then?"). Sometimes it takes a while to get there but I work towards it anyway because I always fell much better when I can get to that within myself. I want to be that person.
I no longer believe there is anyone trying to hurt me. If their behaviour hurts me, they must be in pain coz only hurting people hurt people and I know that hurt so I want to help if I can or leave them to work it out alone (their choice which one).
I no longer need anyone to experience what I experience because I am able to more fully experience my own self and my own being in my own way. I aim to get to a point where I don't ever NEED to be right, be heard, be noticed, be believed, be seen and I might not achieve that but I aspire to it because each step closer to that goal I get, the easier everything is becoming.
I hope others get the chance to get what I've got from my prayer since I first prayed it. I got pain, heartache, wonder, miracles and joy and I'm getting clarity. For me, nothing in this world has or will ever change except the way that I look at it - my perception and that is a positive to me.
Onwards and upwards
xxjxx
