Showing posts with label family violence. Show all posts
Showing posts with label family violence. Show all posts

Friday, August 9, 2013

Day 346: Parenthood and Corporal Punishment - Scarring/Scaring Tin Soldiers to Death





As I wrote my blog yesterday I was amazed at how many memories I have of Corporal Punishment, even though I was never inflicted the kind of corporal punishment some of my friends had to go through, which left them with blue hand marks on their arms or tied to the table legs in a dining room that had blood marks on the walls from their heads smashed against it.

My mother used to just mainly slap me in the face, hard, I remember specifically the aftertaste feeling of humiliation immediately suppressed and followed by huge waves of hatred and desire for retaliation.

In my experience nothing compared to that feeling, it was intense, I can still recall it vividly as I write.

I am not sure what parents are going for when they hit their children, what I found out among parents with a 'fast hand' is that they excuse their behavior because they opted to do it LESS than it was done to them, this point seems to bring home the desired justification that it's all right, they survived Much Worse and they 'turned out alright' and so you should be what, grateful?

In my neighborhood, a poor neighborhood where parents worked like dogs, corporal punishment was the order of the day, we could hear children screaming and the beatings going on from my balcony as we shared a common courtyard, I have lost touch with many of my childhood friends, the last time I saw them, none of them had turned out as an overachiever, I guess I became one out of my desire to move on, to move out, the fear of having to go under the rule of my mother ever again was so intense that I shone at every job I did, I developed an extensive attention for details in fear of retort ion, of having to face humiliation ever again in my life, my life became a striving for perfection so that I would safely move beyond that lurking danger, the potential for humiliation in any way, shape or form.

Since I am one odd case out of hundreds I can safely say that if parents hope that beatings will mold children into perfectionist or overachievers they are just wrong, I lived in a constant state of tension, when I finished any job I would review it in my mind meticulously, walking all the steps looking for any possible mistake I may have made before anyone else would/could find out about it.
Living with my mother had been hellish, I have once read about how governments and their secret agencies would pick kids to raise them for remote viewing in the military and I found that I fit the profile perfectly, the best kids were from homes like mine, with crazy schizophrenic parents, I developed the ability to see the invisible in my mother's mannerism and behavior, to hear the inaudible in her tone of voice, to see the one gesture out of place in a pattern to always be in the know about her being either on a normal or on a crazy day, so I could adjust myself accordingly, the invisible became visible to me, twitching eye lids, a specific shake in her hands, I was not aware of the sequence of thoughts but was aware of the accumulation signs, she always surprised me with her 'reasoning', she could go from something absolutely irrelevant, like me smiling while watching a movie and turn it into something about herself, something that she claimed I did to spite her, to provoke her, my life became a walking on eggshells in utmost constant -paranoid- awareness.

In my first jobs I became so good that the stress of keeping up with a zero mistake rate was so great that I could never shake it off, even when I went home and the only way I would stop the fear that I may have done something wrong was to numb myself with pot until the next day when I would wear my professional clothes and personality over the wreck I really was and go to work. I almost never missed out on a day of work, I never cut corners, I was the perfect corporate slave and I was willing to enslave others to the same Fear that drove me to perfection, because it worked.

Only many beatings after, one day I slapped my mother back, the ironic thing about that moment was the shock in her face, she became paralyzed and when she regained her voice it was just to tell me how That was inconceivable, how horrible I was, that it was a taboo to hit your parents back, that she had never hit her mother back -whom never hit her by the way except much later in life when she was off once on one of her crazy all-over-the-place ranting and grandma hit her to bring her back here-, normal kids never even thought about it, this specific point was raised many other times in the future when she tried to show me that I was in fact really bad, I even HIT her (she never used the word BACK, because that was Not the point, the point was that she was the only one with Legal Authority to Harm Me and I did not have any, by Law or by God, to try and stop it) what was wrong with me?

By that time though my life was already a mess, I lived on the edge of insanity in a Cirque du Soleil balancing act, I had run away from home at 17, jumped on a train and went to Ireland with the equivalent of 50 USD in my pocket, I cried for most of the trip but when i got there I found out that I could breathe again and when I came back to live with my mother again one year later, that was when I slapped her back during one of episodes while she unwisely insisted on saying 'you want to push me out of the window don't you and laughed while slapping me-, and I did want to, a thought even crossed my mind that unless I did throw her out of that window my misery would never end but I didn't, I just slapped her back instead, it was my 19th birthday, she left the room and came back to throw my bank saving booklet in my face and told me to leave, I took all my birthday flowers, packed my bags and left for real.

There were other issues after this, they escalated into physical violence only twice, once she threw me down the stairs with one of my Hong Kong colleagues following up, for raising the objection that for someone who had so much hatred for a mother that left her as a kid, she was no Snowwhite either, that DID not sit well with her, specifically because it brought up something that she did that she could never blame on me, no matter how hard she tried. 
Still abusive parents have to be told when it's enough, physical violence is a form of (mis) communication, it's the last resort out of frustration, it's empowering and rekindles the sense of ownership parents live in fear to lose - it's a hard one to give up, plus children develop all sorts of copying mechanism to square things out and grow up disfunctional adults as they accept abuse in the name of the 'Loving' Promise of a chance to Survive.

So, this is how we start the life of the children in the world, if they don't bend, we beat them into submission, because we can, because apparently we are their Parents, their Masters, their Owners, without seeing, realizing and understanding that we are just creating armies of submissive weaklings, of tin soldiers who will make Money their God, because after All it was Money that took them out of the Hell that FamiLies really are for the most part, and gave them the Independence and ''Free Choice' to continue Abuse themselves in the name of the Family Construct, because we Honor our Families and this is why we have not yet put an end to our Self Abuse inside and World Abuse outside.

A different Life is possible for All, it's a Lie that we have to learn through suffering or that the best lessons we had came through suffering, I don't remember one good lesson from my suffering if not that I should stop it and that I should never pass it on, but I believed I was scarred for Life, for sure I was scared before meeting Desteni, so much so that I would not allow myself to see that my story was a very common one, that the Abuses of our Parents end up in the Adults that Abuse and that we'll have to Parent Ourselves back into something decent to bring about a world that works for All - to not end up as the jailed/jailers of all others that cross our Path.




Bringing it all Back to Self - Self Forgiveness

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to hold on to the memories of my mother's beatings because that gave me a credit, something I could write on my side under all my apparent Wrongs while my mothers had all the Rights given to her by Money and her power to support me or not, and for failing to see, realize and understand that within holding on to my rights(eousness) within my relationship with my mother, I jailed her back instead of freeing myself and her from the past so that a new future beyond abuse could be created for all

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to remember the physical sensation of being slapped in the face as humiliation, as a diminishment of myself at my mother's hands instead of seeing, realizing and understanding that I was not diminished by the beating, but by embracing humiliation as who I was, by believing that the action of my mother were related to me and not to her, by taking things personally as if I were personally faulty vs admitting that there was something not normal with my mother for fear of being the offspring of someone insane

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to believe that I was one and equal to the feeling of humiliation that I hang on to when my mother hit at me because it made me feel righteous no matter the wrongs that my mother would come up with about me, and for provoking my mother to the point of beating me so I could at least be right about One Point, that she was Wrong about hitting me and within this develop a pattern in which I would push people to punish me when I would deliberately cross lines with my words, so they could be wrong too instead of me being the only wrong one within a relationship equation

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to hold the times when my mother beat me against her as a way to get my own Rights so I would even out with the Rights my mum held on me all the way apparently to deleting me from existence - and for suppressing the negative feelings I connected to those times instead of releasing myself from them, in fear I would no longer hold a credit, be a creditor and in that would become a debtor, because I saw that the world is based on Money and credits and debts and I decided I would not be on the Debtor side, I would make money so I could be on the Right side of this Polarity Equation and this is why I rose from the ashes of a perceived broken self just long enough to go out in the world and make money, to guarantee myself Immunity and buy myself the Rights that parents teach children they don't have and make them long for, until they long for Money as the God that gives the Rights in this existence and deletes All Wrongs

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to be ashamed of my mother beating me because we were not the kind of family where beatings should take place as my mum was educated and played the piano and within this for believing I was one and equal to the shame of being beaten

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to feel proud about keeping my mouth shut about my mother's beatings because it gave me a leverage over her and proved I was better than her because even though she was crazy I covered up for her, which made me good while she was bad instead of seeing realizing and understanding I covered up with the same intent of accumulating credits and ammunition for when I would have to shoot her out of my life, for when I would bring up all her Wrongdoings and in one single swoop even out all my perceived wrongdoings until we would be squared and I would be out of her home

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to believe that there was something wrong with me when my mum would beat me and state that she knew it was not 'me' but the 'devil in me' asking me to do the things she did not approve of, and for splitting myself up in personalities that carefully selected what she approved of from the devilish ones, according to her desires, losing touch with my own accountability for my own actions that could be blamed on the devil first and then on the environment, on external forces and ultimately on my parents so I would not have to be accountable for my words, thoughts and deeds if I accepted the split my mother offered as an excuse, instead of learning about consequences within a timeline so I could make informed decisions about my behavior and the consequences I was willing to live
I forgive myself that I failed to see, realize and understand that I led myself from abuse to self abuse and from self abuse to World abuse through Money and my participation within it and within my unwillingness to see that unless we live in HarMony Money will do Harm and within this for not stopping myself and investigating why and how we gave Money the Power to Harm, so we could feel safe in the dysfunctional world we were born and become a part of


I commit myself to let go of all memories that are related to my mother's corporal punishment and to investigate if and where I am still invested in my own victim-hood, so I can release myself, take my power back and stand as a Self Responsible part of this world to become Part of the Solution for MySelf and All of Existence, Equal and One.


to be continued with how this intertwined with my participation within and as the World System.
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Monday, December 24, 2012

Day 228: Gang Rapes and Violence, how is it working for you?








It's not working for me.
Last night I read the article about what is going on in Delhi and the demonstrations that have taken to the streets, I breathed through reading it but I could feel the Rage, I'm sick and tired of this world of violence and I am especially reactive to blatant acts of abuse against women, I have been beaten once in my life and all the beliefs I had about standing up and giving him some, pow pow, a good uppercut, kick in the balls etc, flew out of the window at the first slap he gave me which made me fly over the bed and in a moment I realized how much bullshit we hold in our minds about reality and who we are, would be in a situation we have never faced, gotta live it to know it.
I should be equally outraged for all violence and learn to breathe through it all because we have a lot coming still before we can put some common sense in out little heads that this is no way to live, but violence against women and Rapes still hits a chord, it's the point that we are not a match in strength, I know for a fact, that makes me angry and brings up the same anger I felt for myself when I got beaten up, as if it was my fault that I did not see it coming and how I let myself down, not being the hero I imagined I was and would be.
So thoughts of how to harm those people came up, they must PAY, we don't have an Equal Money System for reeducation yet, an Eye for an Eye seemed to work quite fine within my mind last night, get them, hang them, obliterate them, whatever, just delete them from existence. Make an example out of them.
I woke up this morning and the Delhi incident was still in my Mind, so here I am writing about it to clear some of the fog and the suppressed and poorly disguised rage.

I have been to India a few years ago on a trip to an Ayurvedic centre, down in the southern province of Kerala, I was told to bring conservative clothes, and in my mind I chose the most conservative clothes I had, jeans and tee shirts, no skirts or sleeveless tops, but on my arrival I was told that 'I couldn't go out dressed that way', because it was not about how much skin you show, it's the shape, the shape is enough to arouse men, the resort owners assigned me a bodyguard to walk to the shops after my first outing on a bike turned out to be quite a stressful experience as men surrounded me in flocks and asked 'Please, what's your name?' in a choir of indistinguishable scary voices and I feared for my safety.
In 2 days I already hated being there, I was told I could not rent a car and drive around -Lady, you are not in London-, that I would have to have a driver AND a chaperon to guarantee for MY behaviour, the chaperon to guarantee I was not fucking the driver at any time, it was for my own reputation -please understand-.

I adapted and wore the traditional Indian attire of trousers and a long dress on top, long sleeved, I only took baths in the resort in a one piece white swimming suit, we were on the border of a lake so dirty that my swimming suit was never white again but a hue of slimy grey, who knows what they threw in the lake, who cared as well, in a country where the levels of poverty are so high it's hard to not notice.
The Patriarch of the place where I staid was a Muslim gentleman, his granddaughter asked me to teach her to swim and I said fine, but the grandfather said "ONLY in her dress", she would never be allowed in a swimming suit, I declined the teaching as I told him no one can learn to swim in a lake where the water is 'heavier' than sea water and doesn't help buoyancy in a long dress that when wet would weight more than her body weight, to which he replied that then it was a no go, no decent Indian woman would wear a swimming suit, this was the reason why there was no Indian Female Olympic teams, until that day I never noticed.

I am Italian, no one is possibly more famous than Italian men for bothering women, but it was not even close to what I experienced in India, the ganging up was especially unsettling, on my arrival the son of the patriarch as he walked me into my room and put my bags down, closed the door and pushed me against the wall and tried to kiss me, it took me a moment to realize What he was trying to do my mind lacked any reference to such behaviour and I could not read his intentions until I was against the wall and had to fight him off, I told him I would tell his Father and he better never come close to me again, his reply was to not act so 'innocent', that he lived in Dubai for 2 years and watched lots of 'Blue Movies' and he KNEW, for a FACT, that THIS was what Western women wanted, ALL OF THEM.

I am not sure if there is something going on between the culture of suppression/repression and those sexual assaults in India, what I know is that the whole culture is geared toward teaching women to Not Get Raped, as IF, as IF it was in their hands, because any excuse would do, 'you looked at me, you had your hair down, your ankle was showing,' basically quite plainly 'you wanted it'.

As I come myself from a culture of repression in which men's behavior is mostly justified, a blatant example was in 2008 when a 15 years old girl was gang raped by 8 boys, ranging from 15 to 23 years of age, in a village and the major put up the money for the boys' defense until Italy's women took to the streets and forced him to withdraw his offer under public outrage. But the interviews that followed to the elder women of the village talked about how this girl 'deserved it' how she was not a good girl because she had already had sex prior to this incident -whore- that was consensual though did not make a difference, she had already been 'used', was not 'new' so to speak, and yet the women of the village stood up for the boys, all coming from good families, those things could happen to anybody, good boys overall, really,  gentlemen rapists.
The country divided on the issue which ended in no accountability for the boys, the village reaching out to them offering jobs and support, and the girl shunned and forgotten for having brought shame to the village, dirty clothes should be washed at home, how did she dare go public and turn this into a national case?
It was obviously her fault, she should have kept her mouth shut, where is HER decency?

This just to say that India has just been brought to the limelight in the wake of the last recent event, as women felt a line had been crossed when a woman who had to be operated and her intestines had to be removed due to the ferocious attack and penetration with rods, should not go unpunished.

I am enraged, as a woman and as a member of this society, where sex has turned into just another weapon to harm, diminish, overpower, humiliate each other and it is not about sex anymore because it's all a gender Mind Game that we are playing for an apparent supremacy, looking at who can do the most harm and get away with it and we go back to what we teach to women, to not get raped, to not expose themselves to this risk, to keep their place, cover up, walk unattractively possibly loop sided, cover the hairs, the ankles, the arms, do what you have to do to not arouse men, even though nobody knows for certain how THAT happens since any man has its own kinks, as no one wants to take responsibility for what goes on in our individual minds that justify such acts, that justify the gentlemen rapists who had the misfortune to find themselves in such situations and not ask ourselves why and how we breed these people and then defend them because if we didn't we'd have to ask ourselves tough questions about what are we doing, how are we educating children and young boys to hatred, because Rape is an act of hatred and not a sexual act, and we must stop excusing our hatred and our desire to harm each other, take a good hard look at what we have become and STOP.

This world is not working, it will continue this way unless the whole system changes, women have done  enough being victims, when I read that women in Delhi celebrated their being recognized as Victims I wondered if we even understand what that means, as while we win our right to our own victim-hood we accept that this will go on, as Victims need Abusers to exist, instead of standing up to no longer be victims, choosing a system that supports Life and that it will make sure everyone will be reeducated into supporting each other to crate a New World, where violence ends for good and that will only be possible within a system of accountability, which is not Capitalism as the abdication of our self responsibility, but a system of Equals standing as self responsibility for what goes on inside of us that spills over in our World and in tragedies such as this.

So, to the Women of this world, stand up, we are victims of our own acceptances and allowances, we don't have to live this way, asking 'off with their heads' after crimes have been committed is too late, no one will give the intestines back to the last girl that was attacked, some consequences are irreversible and we have to live with them until we say til here no further and stand for a Global Change.

And to the men of this World, the rapists, the gentlemen rapists, the rapist in denial, the women beaters, the ones who think to throw acid on women's faces or have already done so, pull yourselves together, this is no way to live, no one can have self respect that harms others because we are One and what we do to another we do to ourselves, it's time to STOP, get help, support yourself to stop the Self Hatred, the Hatred, we Can Change one breath at the time.

Prevention is the Best Cure, check out Equal Money for a world of Equals to put an end to all violence and all crimes of Hatred once and for all so we may create a world that works for All and manifest Heaven on earth for everyone, instead of this sorry excuse for an existence we have to endure each and every day. 
SAY STOP by casting your Vote for Life






I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to react to the Delhi incident as if it was more or less important than any of the violence that goes on every day in the world, just because I am a woman

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to feel righteously outraged and for indulging in the desire to harm the perpetrators just as much as the harm they have inflicted on this girl whose intestines had to be removed as a consequence of their gang raping her

I forgive myself that I accepted and allowed myself to get angry at myself for when I did not stand up for myself, victimizing myself into a position of worthlessness for not having been able to defend myself and for harboring hatred for men who harm women because we are not even in strength and they abuse the physical advantage that they have and for this hatred I held on to, I forgive myself

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not see, realize and understand that violent men are a product of our violent society and that we are walking the consequences of what we sowed and that the whole world will have to change for us to realign to Oneness and Equality and what is best for all and all hatred be forsaken as we learn to forgive ourselves and each other for what we have done against Life in our pursuit of self interest and self gratification, no matter what


I commit myself to, when I read news about violence against women, to stop and breathe, do not participate in reactions that underline our victimization but to learn to stand as a stable point in and as Breathe as Change will only come for All as we move beyond reactions through forgiveness of our past, our own and and each other's abuses, to create a world that works for All and supports Life and all Living beings in all its forms.






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