I remain in a state of semi-shock. Last night was grueling and exhausting. The unexpected surfacing of toxic anger had caught me completely off guard. Much of the boiling pressure has been drained away using meridian pressure points – but the vastness of this buried reservoir of childhood emotion continues to frighten and astound me.
I faced a dragon last night, and now I am about to burst through another unknown gate on a new quest of self-exploration. As I sit quietly on Keith’s magical porch, awaiting the beginning of a Friday afternoon chocolate ceremony, on the day before Christmas Eve, I nervously ponder just what type of new dragon now awaits me in the shadows.
An Unusual Message
“Brenda,” Keith shares with me even before beginning the glow meditation, “I am being guided to tell you that there is some very sweet energy waiting for you if you can just receive it today.”
Smiling at this unusual pre-ceremony guidance, I immediately close my eyes in meditation, hoping to get out of my own way, to allow myself to allow and receive the gift that I so desperately crave. I so need such beautiful energy in my life right now. I focus all of my heart on trying to locate and receive it.
A Slamming Perception
After the glow meditation concludes, I ask Keith for assistance in finding this coveted sweet energy.
Almost immediately, after Keith begins to guide me, I perceive his responding words as if an alien is speaking to me. Keith’s guidance confuses me. I feel as if my memory and ability to understand were wiped clean – his words leave my head spinning in frustration.
“Can you please tell me again what you just told me?” I beg Keith for clarification.
I am in such a state of confusion as I hear his subsequent response that I cannot remember what he says. As I attempt to explain myself, to talk about what is going on in my head, and about why I would like more clarity, I perceive that I am badgered and slammed.
Childhood Confusion
“Brenda,” Keith firmly responds, “you’re not listening … you’re being resistant.”
“But I’m just confused and simply want you to repeat and clarify.” I beg for understanding.
After what I feel is “ragging on me” for a few minutes, Keith turns to a friend of mine and asks for her perceptions of what is going on. To my shock, she agrees with Keith that I am being difficult and rebellious. I am baffled.
With all of my genuine heart, I am simply begging to be heard … just wanting my feelings to be validated … just wanting a chance to explain myself before further instructions are given. I feel so misunderstood and attacked.
As Keith again comes down hard on me, I immediately smile in rebellion and call his bluff.
“You’re just back in that ‘domineering parent’ role for me again, aren’t you?”
Crazy-Making Confusion
Keith immediately backs down as his eyes light up in seeming agreement. He knows exactly what I am talking about, and I perceive by the look on his face that I caught him red-handed. I am proud of myself for being so aware that Keith was playing an old role for me.
On April 15, 2011, during a very bizarre and confusion-filled afternoon, Keith had felt guided to play the domineering parent role for almost an entire chocolate ceremony. It was not until the very end that we both figured out the magic in what Keith had been guided to do. In the midst of that crazy-making role-play (I did not know it was role-play at the time), I was given a first-hand, deep and personal understanding of what had frequently happened to me as a child. I wrote details about this experience in a May 26, 2011 blog titled “A Question of Sanity.”
“Keith,” I had confidently declared at the end of that April 15 ceremony, “I feel like you are crazy-making with me, and that I am the only sane one here.”
“Brenda,” Keith had eagerly responded with a grin after admitting that he was role-playing. “Apply that statement to your inner child.”
“Apply that statement to mean that your little child was the only sane one,” Keith had clarified, “and that everyone else doing the bombarding, programming, and crazy-making of that child were themselves the insane ones, trying to program the sanity out of the child.”
That strange experience had given me a completely new perspective on my childhood. Yes, I continue to slip into confusing confusion at times, and still do not fully understand why.
Resistance Was Futile
“I was the only sane one as a child.” I blurt out in this Dec 23 ceremony, as I reflect on the powerful lessons from last April.
“Everyone did crazy-making on me when I tried to defend myself – to express my genuine heart. In my honest and sincere attempts to be heard and understood, I was repeatedly told I was being rebellious, defiant, uncooperative, and refusing to listen.”
In reality, my heart did not understand or agree with what was being fed to me as “conditioning and teaching” and, under the guidance of loving and well-meaning parents, my attempts to protect myself from such conditioning were futile.
Repeating A Pattern
But to my shock, Keith does not fully back down in this Friday afternoon ceremony.
“Brenda,” Keith insists. “What you are doing right now is a pattern from childhood. It is a pattern that you need to find and recognize … a pattern where you refuse and reject the help that you desperately crave.”
“Can you please not use the ‘you’ word, and instead refer to me in parts?” I beg Keith for clarity. “I can accept that a stronger part of me is subconsciously running this pattern, being difficult and refusing the help, but my conscious mind absolutely wants to accept this help. When you refer to me as a conglomerate whole, I feel somewhat attacked and find it confusing to figure out what part of me you are talking to.”
Keith explains that it is a pattern that short-circuits me into confusion and resistance every time that real genuine help is offered.
I still believe Keith to be crazy making with me, and I express my feelings confidently … but based on the feedback of my friends, I begin to trust that I might really be doing what they say I am doing. Perhaps it is something so deeply engrained in my behavior that I am completely blind to it.
In this painful moment, I am unable to see how I am sabotaging the very thing I want – guidance in connecting to the sweet energy that Keith earlier mentioned. It is only weeks later that I am able to clearly see that this entire situation was a setup created by my own higher energies. I needed to want something really bad – I needed to want the divine higher energy assistance that a part of me would simply not allow – I needed that subconscious part of me to rear its ugly dragonhead in utter blatant self-sabotage.
An Unknowing Instigator
As I listen to Keith’s words, I ponder a lifelong dilemma.
For years I have struggled to explain myself to others (especially family members), to be understood, and to have my genuine feelings validated. Yet, to my complete bafflement, in certain circumstances, no matter how hard I sincerely attempt to explain myself, the process only gets me into more confusing trouble and resistance with those to whom I am simply trying to clarify my genuine heart – with those from whom I desperately seek love and understanding.
This is exactly what happened just a few minutes ago. I feel that this craziness was done TO me. I am defensive and unable to see my participation in the loop, yet Keith insists that he was not role-playing, that I am the instigator of the resistance and of diverting the help that he genuinely offered.
Perceived Attack
“Keith,” I beg, “can you please help me understand what I am doing?”
“This understanding will not come from rational mind.” Keith frustrates me with his response, implying that he will not discuss the issue in normal logical conversation.
I respectfully disagree. I feel attacked, rebellious, and cannot understand why Keith will not explain what I am doing in a way that I can understand. In my perception, I had simply been confused, asking him to pause and to clarify a few things before continuing with his guidance. For the life of me, I cannot understand how being confused and asking for clarity can be misinterpreted as refusing to be helped – I cannot understand why we cannot discuss it with logical mind.
“Brenda,” Keith bluntly says what I then perceive as an attack. “If you were serious about going into this, and understanding what you do, then you would….”
“Keith,” I cut him off in confused frustration, “If I wasn’t serious about looking inside, I would have walked off this porch five minutes ago. You just re-awoke my childhood anger at how my parents (loving parents that did the best they knew how) used rational mind to attack and confuse me. If I did not know and trust you … If I did not want your help … I would not still be sitting here right now.”
Surrender To Trust
I do trust Keith, and I begin to wonder if perhaps he might still be role-playing with me in that parental role, but I believe he is actually speaking as Keith, trying to help me understand something that I simply cannot grasp.
I know Keith would never deceive me in such a matter … and I also know that, for whatever reason, I repeatedly struggle with the fact that no matter how hard I work, no matter what techniques I try, a subconscious part of me absolutely and stubbornly refuses to allow higher energy assistance to help me.
As I surrender to Keith’s guidance, I try to meditate into some type of non-rational mind understanding.
“I suggest you work with your little inner child.” Keith lovingly encourages. “Ask her to help you understand what you do, how you do it, and why you do it.”
An Impermeable Wall
As I meditate, I intuitively feel Sharon, my little three-year-old inner child, standing behind a huge wall. It is a thick wall of resistance that refuses to allow any type of outside help.
Sharon is emotionally wounded, and is extremely apprehensive about people trying to invalidate and fix her. She does not know who or how to trust. She has been bombarded by adults professing to represent God – adults who tried to heal what they saw as her craziness, making her own genuine feelings wrong. But none of those people really understood her heart – none even tried to see things through her magical eyes. Instead, those adults insisted that she submit and conform to a version of truth that did not fully make sense to her, lovingly pressuring her to destroy her own personal heart connection to the divine.
Finally, in frustration, Sharon erected an impermeable energetic wall in a desperate attempt to keep out that invalidating fixing energy – to reject anyone or anything that would invalidate and make-wrong the feelings of her heart.
A Fixing Paradox
“The rational-mind conscious part of me desperately wants help,” I ponder to myself. “In fact, I would love for true divine energies, or someone representing those energies, to literally ‘fix’ me – to just show me what is wrong and to make it all better.”
“But this subconscious little-child part of me remains terrified.” I further ponder. “She is walled off and holed up in her reality of protection and absolute isolation.”
I know Sharon is a lonely child who has isolated herself because of past pain. I am an adult who has struggled to understand her pain – an adult that desperately wants her to receive the help from me that she continues to block.
I wish I could reach inside and bring her to her senses, to fix her – but I know this is the exact recipe for further withdrawal and rebellion. Part of her still sees me as the enemy, as her oppressor.
She is a part of me, my equal, a real energy with whom I must earn trust. My trying to fix her is the last thing she needs.
An Unconditional Ultimatum
“But if I just love her unconditionally, while trying to build her trust,” I begin to panic, “what if she never responds? What if she refuses to do what I need?”
Part of me wants to be angry at a stubborn little brat that would throw a tantrum and prevent the help that we both crave. Another part of me knows that unconditional love is the only answer. This frightened little child only needs what I have never allowed myself to receive – she needs unconditional love – she needs unconditional validation and understanding – she needs exactly what I wanted from Keith earlier this afternoon before I would allow him to continue guiding me.
“That is what my little girl demands.” I ponder with clarity. “She wants unconditional love and validation from me before she will allow help of any kind.”
Heartfelt Conversations
“Keith” can I briefly interrupt you?” I beg for clarity a while later. “I’m trying to understand if I should be angry or loving with this little inner child … or perhaps some combination of the two. Right now, I am feeling both angry and fearful, yet I know that the only thing she actually needs is unconditional love.”
“How about if you do both?” Keith suggests. He then spends the next several minutes explaining, via a sample conversation, how I could meditatively sit with this little inner child, expressing my anger and frustration, my doubts and my fears, my love and confusion, my emotional healing journey, my desire to work together and to cooperate, and my unfolding understanding of why she continues to deny us the opportunity to receive divine help.
“Ask her to help you understand what she needs from you before she can learn to trust you enough to allow the help in.” Keith guides me before again moving on.
Distraction Dilemma
Soon, I am back in meditation with my little inner child, but begin to feel totally distracted. I am unable to focus more than a second or two at any given time. A few minutes later, Keith turns back to me, and I explain my distraction dilemma.
“This distraction is part of your ‘confusion and not allowing help’ loop.” Keith points out.
“And that is not necessarily the little girl’s role … it could be your own.” Keith adds with blunt honesty.
“Who is the one running this resistance?” I question myself. “Is it her, or is it now me? Am I the only one who is confused and distracted here … or is she doing it too me?”
I am driving myself bonkers with confusion and distraction.
Suppressed Projections Revisited
As Keith continues to work with me, I am suddenly being driven crazy by additional judgmental projections onto my little projection buddy – the beautiful man I call Paul.
As I try to focus on Keith, Paul is acting like a distracted little boy, giggling, moving and swaying around in his energy, not paying any attention to what is happening on the porch. I am feeling so much projected annoyance that I actually ask Keith to move over so that I do not need to see Paul behind him.
While doing this work with Keith, I suddenly realize that in observing Paul, I am watching a real, live, happy, bouncing, empowered young boy playing in his own little detached world. I perceive his energy as intentionally focused on me, trying to send playful child energy my way. But this perception causes me to resist and fill with additional projected judgment – all of which I desperately attempt to suppress and reject.
Sharon’s Other Half
Finally, profound insights flash through my heart. Last year, I had a dear friend named Sharon. Her stubborn, refusal to conform, her profound creativity, and her “don’t get in my way” personality literally drove me crazy. This all happened in the same timeframe when I suddenly realized that Sharon represented my dear little inner child – something I compared to the “Maria” energy from “The Sound of Music.” She was a magical being who refused to obey the stodgy old rules of the convent. Details of that heart-opening experience can be found in a Dec 19, 2010 blog titled “Sharonski.”
“Paul is the masculine equivalent of Sharon!” I suddenly recognize with clarifying agony. “I am projecting hate onto his very existence because he is a magical little boy that refuses to be suppressed, that refuses to follow someone else’s rules, and who reminds me of exactly what once drove me crazy with Sharon.”
A Perfect Trigger
I am in a feud-like standoff with this little inner child. We each have something the other needs. We are on the same team. We need to cooperate with each other. But we are projecting so much frustration onto each other that neither of us will lower our defenses.
“My job is to learn how to love both of my inner children – both Sharon and Bobby.” I ponder to myself. “It is in their best interest to receive divine help, and I simply need to trust that when they feel validated and loved, that they will then cooperate and allow what they too desperately crave.”
Yes, it is obvious to me that Paul is indeed playing a profound script for me … that his presence on the porch, no matter how much it agonizingly raises my blood pressure, is exactly what I need – exactly what will trigger the painful inner issues that I so wish I could run away from and avoid.
My Worst Nightmare
As the ceremony concludes, I remain behind, hoping for five minutes of Keith’s alone time. To my frustration, Paul also remains behind, not budging an inch – and to make matters worse, Keith goes into his house without saying a word, leaving Paul and I alone together.
“Keith, can I get five minutes alone with you before I go home?” I call out, hoping that Paul will take the hint and leave.
“Yeah, I’ll walk with you into town in a few minutes.” Keith responds.
Paul remains behind, and Keith stays inside of his house – for the next hour.
As much as I have suddenly achieved newfound gratitude for Paul’s presence, a huge part of me continues to react with judgmental and angry projections. I literally find myself in my worst nightmare, awkwardly alone with the beautiful young man onto whom I continue to project judgment and downright hatred.
I think about leaving – about literally running away – but the little Jedi voices inside tell me to stay right here, right now. I can only imagine that Keith is inside giggling, having set this all up.
Difficult Truth
The nightmare only gets worse when Paul opens his mouth and innocently begins to ask why I was reacting to him the way I did today.
For the next awkward hour, I try to converse openly and honestly … repeatedly pointing out all of the annoying and downright rude things he has done and said to me over the last month.
With each statement, Paul turns it around, pointing out that he only did or said what his heart guided him to do or say.
With agonizing humility, I force myself to admit, that as much as each event triggered me deeply, that in a strange and bizarre way each had served me. I am unable to come up with one single criticism where I can find real justification for blaming him – for pointing the finger outside of myself.
I hate this “inside job” and “create my own reality” stuff. It sucks when your own internal truth meter will not allow you to project blame onto someone else. As much as my insides scream that they want to be right, I repeatedly end up eating humble pie.
Somehow, when I am alone or in a group, I find it easy to project. But when I am sitting face to face with the target of my wrath, I have to admit that everything that has happened between us, no matter how annoying and aggravating I may have found it, has indeed served me in some painful way.
No Satisfaction
Finally, Keith steps out of his kitchen and announces he is ready to walk into town. In the ten minutes that we spend chatting, Keith again validates some of my perceptions and feelings about Paul’s behavior, but again reminds me that we are playing a profound script for each other, that all is perfect.
“Brenda, it is not about Paul, It is not about what it is about, and nothing changes until you do.” Keith bluntly rubs it in.
When we stop at the bottom of the steps leading to my apartment, I make a quick attempt to engage Keith in a brief rational mind discussion about my “confusion/domineering parent” loop – but Keith has other commitments and suggests that maybe we can talk some other time.
I desperately want to discuss my crazy childhood loop at a rational-mind level – one where I can maybe understand what I am doing. A huge part of me just does not trust that I can fully understand what I do in any other way.
As Keith walks away, I again feel rejected, dejected, and annoyed that he will not give me that satisfaction.
Why?
As I finish my notes after this long and difficult day, I ponder a little poem that for some reason, Keith felt guided to send me this morning. I can only guess that he composed or channeled it, tailored just for me.
“Full of pain and fear
In all the confusion and craziness
The child finally could take it no more
Gave up, submitted to the onslaught
Allowed the magic to die … killed it
Be there with the child in that place
And with the spiritual adult in witness consciousness
And in inviting the light/ love
To allow some transmutation”
This has truly been a confusing and crazy day. It is only now that I recognize how this little poem is indeed the theme for the quest I began today. I once again lost myself in that confusion and craziness, feeling the unexpected emotional trauma of a magical child growing up in a loving religious home.
I tried to defend my magic from the loving onslaught of adults, but those who would make my heart wrong caused me to simply give up and allow my heart connection to die.
“But why can’t I be there with that child in that place?” I ponder with frustration. “Why can’t I allow in that light and love that I so desperately crave? I need answers.”
Sleepless Thoughts
After going to bed, my mind will not quit. I am obsessed with this process. I am repeatedly forced by my head to get up and take notes. Following are things I write down before falling asleep.
“If I feel unjustly accused or misunderstood, my rational mind rebels, driving me into defense and confusion.”
“The act of blindly following others has caused me repeated heartache throughout my life. My heart demands understanding before I will blindly comply with someone else’s wishes.”
“This loop of confusion and rebellion is my child’s only means of survival, my only way to protect – to protect from a false judgmental God, from parents and teachers who do not understand me – it is survival.”
“It is about survival from adults who do not understand and who will not give me the courtesy of explaining myself if I have any doubts.”
“I want the truth, but it WILL NOT BE FORCED on me by man or God. I require understanding and buy-in before allowing my wall to be lowered.”
“I will not allow that which I do not understand.”
A Foolproof Paradox
With those last two statements, I think I am finally getting closer. For my own protection, my rational mind will not allow anything to come in if I do not first understand at a logical level. Throughout my life, logic has been used to hammer me into compliance, and it seems that my inner child will do everything she can to prevent that from ever happening again.
It seems that I am very stuck in a foolproof paradox … a three-part loop with no way out when it comes to working with higher energies.
“I will not allow help from higher energies until I understand.
I will not understand until I have the actual experience.
I will not have the actual experience until I allow the help.”
With these words recorded, I am determined to talk to Keith and get some rational mind understanding. I want to break out of this loop, but do not believe I can until I get enough understanding to get my mind out of the way enough to allow me to move forward.
I send a quick email to Keith, begging for a private appointment tomorrow on Christmas Eve, explaining my deep desire to simply talk at a head level.
The Ultimate Lie
Saturday morning, December 24, I awake at 1:30 a.m., again being overwhelmed with feelings of anger and resentment. Within seconds, I launch into another coughing fit as new droplets of fluid spew out of my lungs for much of the next hour.
I am feeling scared and alone.
Shortly after 3:00 a.m., still wide-awake, I begin to take more notes about my process.
“No one can or ever will be able to help me, not even Keith.” I write in painful frustration. “I am on my own, abandoned, and stranded once again to try to figure out my own spiritual path all by myself.”
It seems that my God/ Deity/ separation drama is back. A very real part of me is angry that God has once again abandoned me, leaving me to fend for myself.
I know this to be the ultimate lie of Ego, but right now it feels very real.
Unmet Needs
Finally, after very sketchy sleep for the remainder of the night, I drag myself out of bed at around 8:30 a.m.. I am tired and deeply connected to the process of working with my little inner child.
“What that little girl really needed was to be heard and validated.” I remind myself. “She needed to be allowed to interrupt adults, and to be honored for her need for clarification. She deserved to be seen as a genuine soul … to be heard … to be understood.”
“How F#cking dare they not do that for her!” I lash out as I allow myself to directly access my little inner child’s perceived pain.
(Remember, I love and honor my parents. They were beautiful, loving parents who always did the best they knew how. In this writing I am doing deep inner child processing that requires accessing the pain of that child – regardless of how victimized and unreasonable it may seem to a loving and forgiving adult.)
Finally, a few hours later, after consciously allowing myself to deeply experience the emotions of this little inner child, I retire to my bedroom and give her the voice that she never had.
A Trusted Fallback
Back in 2003-2005, I worked extensively with an amazing therapist, both as a participant and as an assistant. While working for several years in these amazing forty-hour weekend workshops, I learned to do profound experiential psychological work – work that involved accessing buried trauma in the right-brain rather than simply ‘talking about it’ in the left-brain – work that involved various techniques that allow one to re-experience and heal psychological trauma in a very real and safe way where the traumatic emotions can be released. The therapist I worked with was deeply intuitive and always helped people to then fill up the emptied emotional space with loving healing. In many ways, it was exactly the same thing I now do with Keith, only at a physical and psychological level, rather than at a spiritual, subconscious, and divine higher-energy level.
This type of work, when done properly, with love, is something that I very much trust – something that in my logical mind I believe in deeply.
Trusting The Process
For several hours, I hide out in my bedroom, engaging in my own self-made solo version of this type of experiential therapy. I become my little child and speak out to my visualized parents, expressing emotions and feelings that I was never allowed to express.
Deep tears pour from my eyes as I experientially explore the heartbreak of a genuine child who was not heard, but was instead conditioned, programmed like a computer, lovingly broken like a horse, and coerced to comply and conform to the worldview of my loving parents. I feel all of the emotions of a child who had no choice but to sacrifice her heart and to simply obey.
As I work thorough this painful process, I achieve more understanding about my buried sadness and anger than ever before. But in the midst of deep tears, my lungs again become extremely congested, causing me to experience real physical fear.
As the process ends a few hours later, I meditate with myself as a newborn, metaphorically holding that innocent child, showering that child with unconditional love and acceptance.
Together, we understand how we chose our beautiful parents, how being shutdown and programmed by society and religion was a necessary part of our learning path. The process is powerful, bringing clarity and release – but somewhat unsatisfying doing it completely by myself.
Dragon Fire
Meanwhile, Keith has responded to my email request for an appointment with the statement:
“I feel for you. I am listening and hearing … however your need to be in control of the situation is quite strong. It isn’t mind not allowing. It can’t be fixed at that level as it is not on that level. So do come over and talk. Perhaps we can take a walk into the place where these issues are.”
As I now write and integrate, I can clearly see the beautiful wisdom and understanding in Keith’s inspired response. But on Christmas Eve, in the moment of my confusion, I feel quite resistant about what I perceive as Keith’s continued resistance to simply talk at a mind level with me.
Unbeknownst to me, I remain subconsciously immersed in my childhood loop. I feel invalidated and not understood in my desire to simply talk things over. I want to chat, regroup, and rebuild a level of head trust before I will go any further. I want to take personal control of my process, just this once. I want my insights, fears, and doubts to be heard and validated. I want to do a form of trusted experiential emotional release involving Keith, but doing it my way.
Just before 3:00 p.m., as I walk through the metaphorical gate on my way to Keith’s home, the fiery dragon hides in the shadows, perched and ready to let out his first roaring breath of flames.
… to be continued …
Copyright © 2012 by Brenda Larsen, All Rights Reserved