"He Did It First!": Perpetuating Abuse and Re-Victimization - Day 151

"He did it first!" That's the number one excuse I hear at the school where I work. Like as if another person doing something makes it okay for you to do the same thing.

Yesterday I was having kind of a hard time figuring out how to support a student who was basically just being grumpy and irritable and only wanted her way, which was sort of no way at all.

I didn't really know what to say to her, so I just sat with her. But then I thought -- why am I sometimes mean to people? Why do I sometimes think it's okay to be mean?

Well, because others have been mean to me. So it seems like it's okay, or it's the most easily referenced example of how I could behave.

So then I pay it forward. I'm not even always mean to the person or people who were mean to me in the first place, but days, weeks, months, even years later, I pay it forward because I've normalized it as okay, and as acceptable, because it happened to me. I mean not even "okay" in the sense of "it's okay to be mean," but more just, that behavior is "okay" -- not even categorized as mean. Especially if I didn't see any consequences play out for the person who was mean to me.

I mean what we experience tends to become what we see as normal. And so if we see being mean as normal, because others have been mean to us, then we go and be mean to others, because we think it is normal, okay, and acceptable, and then we are just perpetuating this cycle of meanness.

What if everyone was nice?

In simple terms obviously.

What if everyone did what was best for all?

What if everyone treated everyone else the way that they themselves would like to be treated?

I like being treated with kindness. I like being treated with compassion. I like being treated with respect. I like being understood.

So what if I did all those things for others? What if I helped make that normal? What if I gave others that experience, so they could also make it normal?

What if we didn't always respond in kind? What if we turned around and stood up? What if we each faced ourselves and all others as one and equal as life? What if we didn't just allow ourselves to perpetuate cycles of abuse? What if we didn't just allow ourselves to perpetuate cycles of victimization and re-victimization, and abused becoming abusers?

The victimization part is especially interesting, I think. Because if others have been mean to me, and especially if I haven't seen any consequences for those others, then I see myself as a victim. And as a victim, I feel powerless. And here I am again, in this same powerless dynamic. How can I have power? It seemed like the person who was mean to me had power. So I can be mean to another. Then I have "power," then I have "control."

But my student seemed to respond to what I was saying. I think she saw the power in changing herself. I think she saw that she doesn't have to be a victim and just go along with the cycle of abuse. I think she saw that power and control actually comes in every moment, as participants in creating this world, and so -- why not create it as best for all? That is what I saw, anyway.


These are questions we are all asking ourselves with Desteni, and many other people all over the world are asking the same. Desteni provides tools for answering these questions and directing self to be the change we all really want to see in this world where we live. Turn around and stand up: http://lite.desteniiprocess.com/



I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to, when I encounter an opportunity to interact with another person, reference past memories of other people treating me poorly to use as my guides of how to engage in this new situation, so that I guide and direct myself by my experiences of normalized abuse.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to meet each moment and each person with respect as doing unto another as I would want done unto me -- not as what I can easily remember and reference as what has been done unto me in the past.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to use my memories of particularly negative interactions with others as my reference point for guiding myself now, so that it's as if as long as I do behave "as badly" as the people in my past behaved toward me, per my perception, then I am "okay" and it is "normal."

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to reference memories and instances of exemplary treatment as my guiding reference point for how to treat others, also referencing myself in self honesty and self respect to direct myself in treating others with respect.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to create myself as one with and equal to abuse, and my past experiences of abuse, perpetuating cycles of abuse and victimization in this world through my participation as a life here.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not only tolerate but in fact participate within and as the perpetuation of cycles of abuse.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to take a stand and say no more!


I commit myself to question myself in every moment, to ask myself what my reference point is for my behavior, and ask myself how I would like to be treated in this interaction, and to put myself in the other person's shoes as best I can. I commit myself to breathe through this process with patience and compassion. I commit myself to stopping my participation in the perpetuation of the cycle of abuse, and starting my participation in the perpetuation of the cycle of Life. I commit myself to be one among many who stand and change the world, as ourselves, as our examples, and as the impact of our behaviors.

Crushes & Grudges - Day 133

In my last post I realized the energetic similarity between crushes and grudges in terms of how both seem to really possess me. I am really taken over by the experience in a way that is exhausting and makes me feel quite out of control... Probably because within both, I am trying to control something I simply cannot control.

I reflected on past periods / stretches of time when I have realized that I have not had a crush or a grudge on anyone, and it was like "a breath of fresh air" in a way. Maybe a little "boring," sure, but a sense of freedom to finally "get my life going" in a way, realizing thus that I allow myself to get stuck when I participate in crushes or grudges, because I make these experiences central to who I am.

So now having walked the most recent grudge as far as I have -- a grudge which formed immediately after the cessation of a crush / overlapping with a crush -- I see that kind of "nothingness" or "emptiness" experience in me again where I am not holding onto either of those kinds of energies in my body or in the back (or forefront) of my mind. And now, having the tools of Desteni, I am intrigued to see where this goes and how I can support myself during this stretch. Can this be permanent, even? Can I stop my participation in crushes and grudges?

I also gave myself the warning: I've not yet walked this point of a grudge to completion. And in fact there are historical grudges, especially a familial one, that I've yet to face. So it's not over and done with, not at all. But the intense energy seems to be passing, and so now I have to do what I can to not just suppress whatever remains with a belief that I am "over it," because here I know that actually I am still afraid, and I am still somewhat angry, and it's still here within and as me. I'll not know until I have the opportunity to test it for myself in real-time. And so I continue to prepare and support myself.

I will repaste the quote from Bernard because it is so poignant and assisted me in finding this warning for myself:

"Now, because you did not do self correction immediately when it happened - even with doing self correction now, it's going to happen again - until you correct yourself in real time when it happen. Only real-time Correction, when you Move while you have the discomfort and you correct it until the discomfort is no longer there - is the actual, Real, point of Change." Bernard Poolman

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to be possessed and taken over by the experiences of a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to feel out of control within the experience of a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to realize that I cannot control that which I am trying to control within the experience of a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to see, realize, and understand why the experiences of crushes and grudges is so torturous for me -- I am attempting something I cannot do, I am expecting myself to be able to control something I cannot control.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to be moved further into possession of the experience of a crush or a grudge precisely because I feel out of control, and so I hold on even tighter, not realizing that my control comes with letting go.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to support myself and show up for myself by letting go of that which is not-me but is only the me I have created myself to be in my experience of a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to make my experiences of a crush or a grudge central to "who I am" during those periods / stretches of time.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself therefore to fear letting go of the experience of the crush or the grudge because I fear having nothing or being empty, because I believe that experience is who or all that I am.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to see, realize, and understand that I am still here, even without those experiences. I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to see, realize, and understand that those experiences in fact change me and make me not-here, but instead existing within my mind. I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to abandon myself through and as my experiences within and as a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself that I have sometimes accepted and allowed myself to actually seek out a crush or a grudge, because they provide me with entertainment through energetic experience.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to feed the experience of the crush or the grudge through my participation, through and as my imagination, thoughts, beliefs, projections, feelings, and emotions.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to identify my life during periods / stretches of time between crushes and grudges as "boring."

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to feed, engage, and participate within and as any experiences of fear that come with the experience of a "lack" of a crush or grudge, so that the fear that starts out small as a newness or a nothingness, rather than investigated, becomes bigger.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to fully investigate the experience of myself that occurs during the periods / stretches of time between a crush or a grudge.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to recognize and identify these stretches as more "peaceful" and "better" for me, but to not really look at why, and to have definitely not looked at how I can maintain this connection with myself through not participating in a crush or a grudge, instead simply "hoping" that another crush / grudge will not re-emerge, and simply believing / saying to myself that I will not let it get "so bad" "next time," but not giving myself any actual practical courses of action to follow in order to assist and support myself to not let it get "so bad" next time.

Here I commit myself to use what I have learned through Desteni to assist and support myself in this point of finding myself as stability in the periods / stretches between crushes ad grudges.

And when and as I see myself first beginning to participate in a crush or a grudge, I stop and I breathe. I do my best here to recognize what is happening, and I remind myself of the consequences. I reflect on my past experiences within crushes and grudges, and I refer also to whatever I have yet to learn about the period / stretch now coming upon me wherein I will be without these experiences. I commit myself to see what it is I am seeking or avoiding through engaging / participating in these experiences. I commit myself to writing, and to aligning myself within the principle of oneness and equality as what is best for all. I commit myself to self honesty, self responsibility, and self support, always, and through these points.

I commit myself also to seeing what other energies I try to use to fill these voids. Depression is a likely culprit. Participation within and as depression during these "boring" stretches of what could otherwise be stability if I allow it. I commit myself to watching myself and to when and as I see myself cultivating any kind of long-term energetic experience, to stop and breathe and see and write.

I commit myself really to breathe, to fill the void with myself as my breath. 

I commit myself to walk the next step and every step thereafter within the realization that these are the first steps of me in this process without a crush or a grudge. I commit myself to always be aware of this so that I can be aware of what subtle energies I am trying to create to replace the experiences I have participated within and as for months. I commit myself to seeing who I am by myself, without these experiences, and supporting myself to be simply me in self honesty.

And when and as I see myself believing this is "over" and feeling "safe" within a belief that I have already walked this point of the grudge, I stop and I breathe. I realize it is not over. I realize this particular grudge still has more to be walked, and myself as grudge-holder is bigger than just this one grudge. I realize I am free in my breath, but I am not free yet from my own prisons. There is still more to be done, and so I will do it, I will not allow myself to lie to myself that it is already done.

A First Step in Continuing On - Day 115

http://creationsjourneytolife.blogspot.com/2013/08/my-dad-devil.html

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to not believe what I was reading, to think perhaps it was a trick, it couldn't possibly be true.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to perseverate on the thought, "I will never meet him," where within this thought and my repetition of this thought I am getting myself stuck in a moment in time as the moment of this shift / change in physical reality and this new information, rather than integrating this change into and as myself, existent anew in every new moment of the here and now as what is here in physical reality. I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to repeat this thought in my mind as like a brick-by-brick thought-by-thought imprisonment of myself within the past of this morning of the moment I read those words and reacted, realizing that if I allow myself to repeat this thought, there in that moment in that reaction I will remain.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to wonder then, "What's next? What now?"

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to think about the dissolution of the group, how things might crumble or fall apart, not realizing within this thought that here I am only really thinking about myself -- my own dissolution as my participation in this group, where here I am looking for an excuse or an out, a reason to stop, because here I believe that the group will not continue, the support will not continue, and/or the direction inasmuch as there has been a kind of "leader" will not continue, within this an energetic thought of like, "well, so much for that."

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself thus to be my own self directive principle within these thoughts of myself and my continued self education, direction, expansion, where within the thoughts above I am giving myself as my direction of myself over to the circumstances which have come to pass and my reaction to those circumstances, allowing myself to establish beliefs within my reactions, beliefs by which I will then direct myself, rather than continuing to direct myself within, as, by, and through my breath, in the physical, in self honesty and self responsibility, in honor of myself and all as life.

I forgive myself for not accepting or allowing myself to see, realize, and understand how the "group," just like all of humanity, is made up of individuals, and the individual direction determines the direction of the "group," just as of humanity, which is what we have been doing here all along, each changing our individual selves so as to contribute to and change the entirety of life. We are the group. We are humanity. I am the group. I am humanity.

So here now I commit myself to letting go of reactions to continue on into the next moment and all moments thereafter. I commit myself to continue to walk moment by moment, breath by breath, in each moment and breath in the physical of the here and now, as one individual for change, continuing my own self education, self direction, and self expansion, continuing in self honesty, self support, and self responsibility, continuing simply because it is what is best for all and I cannot deny that as the epitome of any life's purpose.



Thanks, Bernard. Thanks, every one.