On demand, I post my reply to Shanti in the forum.
Hi Shweta,
Thank you for bringing the subject up in forum! I have mentioned very breifly in another post that I also have experiences of sexual abuse. That is why I started to do research on it, and have been studying the subject for 12 years. I have interviewed 152 women who experienced incest, and they all had very similar thought patterns. So I am a bit sceptical about Katies viewpoint that you "cannot know what another person is thinking". It is true that I cannot know exactly, but one can often make pretty good guesses. That is the base of human relations - that we can feel a certain togetherness from knowing "others think like me". Different traumas leaves different thought patterns. They are so alike between persons that you can write books about it and form therapy treatments specially designed for different problems. That's also why self-help groups are so effective - people recognize themselves in other's stories, whether it is about getting cancer, a child with Down's syndrome, being a drug addict or having been sexually abused.
Psychology is the realm of knowing the most usual mind-patterns and following feelings and behaviors. It is no contrast between that and then realizing from a spiritual point of view that the mind is merely a "thought machine", as Yogani says. I'd say that if you have gone to therapy and started to take a deep look at yourself you have started the self-inquiry part of the purification process, which can bring you a bit forward before even knowing anything about spiritual matters. That is how it was for me.
The mind-identity is formed in childhood from experiences and OTHERS PROJECTIONS! We become who others believe us to be. If a child is abused it gets its identity from that. The projection is: "You are not worthy of respect, your will is of no importance, you are here for my pleasure only". Children are suckers for love! We all are, we long to get out of the state of separation, but children are REALLY suckers for love! They do anything for attention, closeness and love. Children are more vulnerable than adults. They are quick to comply in order to get some attention from adults. Neglected children without good relationships to their parents are extra vulnerable - they go along with anyone or anything. Pedofiles knows this - they can stand by kindergartens and watch children play - then they choose the lonliest child and start manipulating that one to get close - the easiest pray. It sounds as if you did your best to find some kind of closeness and love through your uncle. You did your best to survive in an environment where this love was not given to you enough in any other way. You needed that at the time. Many defines that as a "survival strategy".
Another thing with children: They are totally DEPENDENT on the adults for their survival. In order to get housing, food and clothing they have to be obedient and do what adults tell them. They are in the hands of the adults around. You could almost see the child as a hostage - where would it go to escape the abuse that happens in its own home? Not much choice there... If they tell about the abuse they risk a lot. They are often afraid that it would break up the whole family and that they would be blamed for it. Where you afraid of what your mum and dad would think about you if they knew? Did you trust your parents to be on your side if you would have told, or would they have been on your uncle's side? Children are AFRAID and feel they are left with the responsability for the whole family - their loyalty is infinite!
If you look at a seven year old girl today - would you put the responsability on her to stop un uncle molesting her? Go out and look how childish a seven year old is, how innocent, how unaware of the world... and so longing for love... Would a child dare to take the risk to tell about abuse? Research and clinical experience says: NO!
I don't know if you have read anything about abuse, but the most common reports from victims is that:
- They think they are the only one in the world being victims of abuse. It is so tabu and shameful so it becomes important to keep it a secret. Victims feel lonely and that it must be something wrong and special WITH THEM, since nobody else seems to have been experiencing what they have. When the women's movement started more and more women chose to go public with their truth. No wonder you thought you were odd having positive experiences of abuse... it is a subject you just don't talk about! Sexual abuse have been called "the biggest secret". The children do not tell, the perpetrators do not tell (even more tabu to admit you are abusing a child), the professionals do not take it seriously if told... Now it is a more open climate, but when you were a child - who would you have told? So... further:
- They do not tell! Victims keep silent. In my study, 1/3 of the women told someone close in childhood, the rest waited until adulthood, up to 40 years after the abuse. A majority got a negative response. Children are not believed, they are blamed, they are silenced - told not to tell anyone... Of those who told during a period of ongoing abuse not even half of them managed to stop the abuse by telling. They were continuously abused. The environment were so dysfunctional that they could not respond adequately to the cry of help. If a child have tried to tell once without a positive result... do you think it tries again? No. They keep silent, they learn to shut up! And they blame themselves. They fall into a "learned helplessness" and turn all the negative emotions inwards.
- They "know" it is something wrong with the abuse. Even if it is "nice". Why is that? Well, the main reason is that you feel it is a non-loving act, that is, an act that is not meant to be pleasant for the child in the first place. It is the needs of the adult that is in focus. The child is USED for another persons needs. And human beings can sense the aim or intention from another person very adequately. You directly feel if a person is selfish, don't you? For example, there is a habit in some african tribes - mothers stimulate their children's sex organs in the evenings to make them go asleep. The children does not seem to take any harm, and it is accepted in the society. They feel that the mothers do not do it for personal sexual pleasure - it is just a means to get the child to fall asleep.
- They feel that the abuse got to be a "normal" part of life that they had to put up with. Children do not have reference frames. Their experiences are their whole world. I did not know that what I had been exposed to was "sexual abuse" until I was 23. I thought it was something that just happened and had to happen, because that's how it was in our family. Did it have a name? Humans can get accustomed to anything! And here is a very lurky human psychological law: If you have said YES to something once it will be VERY DIFFICULT to suddenly say NO to the very same thing again. If we have made some sort of committment, we will feel an inner and outer pressure to go along with it. If we have said yes two or more times... well, you can just imagine how much more difficult it will be to say no after that... You will find yourself stuck in a HABIT suddenly... Something radical must happen to break the habit. Can you figure out what made you stop it after a few years? Something must have happened...
Shame and guilt is the most profound feelings along with grief and a feeling of being different than others. It comes from secrecy, betrayal of trust and a lost childhood. A child should not have to GIVE sexual services in order to get loved. A child should be protected in its own home. A child should be able to trust adults. A child should be given the chance to be a child and not grow up too quickly. Being sexually abused is getting robbed of all that. It is sad. Children ARE VICTIMS. So Katie's words to that abused woman is somewhat awkward, I think. The trick in rehabilitation and overcoming the abuse is to get out of the victim role. To acknowledge that you actually were a victim, to acknowledge the sorrow of it, but as an adult the responsability is to not get stuck in the victim role. To accept, to forgive if possible, and to focus on NOW and what you have instead of what you don't have.
Our souls take on many roles, and you (and I) chose the victim role in this life. To say you had a choice as a child is not helping much... I'd say from what you have written, that you have blockages when it comes to the guilt and sorrow parts. Let it all out, so that you become aware of the feelings you still unconcsiously carry with you. The meditation work à la Yogani is surely burning the blockages as well, but why not also help it with a bit of emotional work??? I certainly wont do more harm! Contact your inner child, who still is carrying the pain. One easy practice is this:
Sit down, close your eyes, go down into deep breathing and see yourself walking on a small road in a landscape. The sun is shining, fields are all around, birds fly in the sky. Walk there for a while until you feel at ease. You walk along the road and far away you see someone coming. You see them getting closer and closer but the picture is blurry. When they get close enough you see it is a child or some children coming towards you. Notice what state the child/children are in. What is the expression on their faces? What are they doing? When you have them there in front of you, you can ask them whatever you want, depending on what you see. I promise they will all have important things to tell you! They will reveal what you still carry around. And you can chose to listen to them, feel with them, and then if necessary comfort them in anyway you want. One possible sentence is "You do not have to carry that anymore. I now know how you feel, and I can carry it for you". This has been a very powerful tool for me to get to know myself. It is awareness SEEING WHAT IS, and then it burnes away more easily.
Some emotional knots will take many rounds to purify. Child sexual abuse is known to be one of the most difficult psychological traumas to take care of, but it is definitely possible! I saw that someone was very sceptical towards therapy in the forum thread, but I'd like to claim that psychotherapy, self-help groups and the like have increased life quality for many victims! Many live their lives afterwards with joy and thankfulness for the experiences they have had.
For me, the spiritual knowledge I now have, has made it easier for me to understand WHY I was abused, and Katies tool is great to work with the negative thought patterns. The aim of both psychotherapy and spiritual development is to losen up emotional ties to the past. The pitfall is to believe you are done emotionally only because you have understood the "theory" of it. If the negative patterns continue, as they do for you (and me too), it is only a sign that unconscious thoughts/feelings are still there, waiting to be seen. The feelings are suppressed, making you confused and sad.
Another brief meditation you can do is to just sit down in deep breathing and concentrate on the spot right under the bones where the ribs divide on the chest. And just ask - "What is in my heart right now?" And wait for an answer. When I do this I meet sorrow. Oceans of sorrow.
You know, it is not only YOUR sorrow you are healing when you do this! You connect with the collective pain and your healing helps others to heal. If you heal, you make it easier for those who come after you! I have all my life felt the "weltschmerz" - the world pain - and when I go into my sorrow I feel I cry for all my sisters in all times that have been abused. It is a great job you are doing!!!! =) Don't forget that!
I have now only written some of the basics about abuse. I don't know if it is of any help, but I hope so. Please write back if you have more questions or just want to share!
With love,
emc
