Personal power

[Gopi]

Hello everyone!

I am writing this here in the hopes of getting some help. I will try to keep this as short and coherent as possible. Not sure where or how to start. But here goes...

Even though I have several people who love me, I am not sure if I have ever 'felt' loved. It's like a kid watching all that delicious candy behind the glass. You see it's there. But constantly feel like can't reach or taste it. I believe this is as concise as I can be in describing my issue at the moment. This issue gets manifested in multiple ways. Over the years I have observed and tried to deal with the symptoms. But I guess I am being shown the underneath layers a little bit more now. In trying to trace it to its 'roots', I have three childhood memories. I believe they are interconnected. I don't know how though.

Memory #1: My parents had a bad marriage. They fought constantly. And it definitely had a toll on me. I was shown this memory in a dream recently. In the dream, I was a child. Not sure how old. And I saw my mom and dad fighting. And then it was like a Matrix time freeze. Everything froze and all I could hear was the child screaming, terrified, and crying - 'But I need you both!' I also saw my mom crying with me. I woke up crying. It was a very intense dream since I woke up screaming and heart thumping.

Memory #2: Both my parents used corporal punishment to discipline me as a child. I remember my dad hitting me with a belt when I was 5 because I refused to get ready to go to school. One day I just turned back to him with wide open arms and said 'Come. Beat me. Isn't this what you want?' They did not know how to handle it. May be they thought it was cute because I remember them joking about it to someone later. On a similar vein, in another childhood incident, my mom used a hot metal rod on my hands to teach me a lesson. Again, I just grabbed the rod from her hand and pressed it deep into my flesh. The first 22 years of my life I spent living with my parents, I would very often not eat food whenever I got hurt, pissed, or annoyed at them. In other words, I hurt myself to hurt them. There was an immense amount of shame, anger, and feeling of helplessness that I felt then. It is still very much here.

Memory #3: I have a younger brother with whom I have a very strained relationship. For a long time, I have felt that we don't need to be in touch since we are adults now. But now it has surfaced again. I felt extremely jealous when my brother came along since my parents' attention and affection seemed to be on the baby. Plus my dad complained about me to my brother and about my brother to me and continues to do so till date. This definitely did not help. When I asked myself 'Why do you get insecure or jealous?' this was brought to my attention. There is an immense fear that I will not be loved or valued if the new person is better than me. I really don't want to feel this way. Because it makes me feel like I always need to be on the top of my game else no one will love me. And because I really don't want to see the other person as a threat or competition. I am just too tired of running to stay ahead and has burnt me on several levels.

I am tired of hankering for fleeting attention from others. It never satisfies and always leaves me feeling more stressed out after the initial 'feel-good' factor. And I end up feeling more lonely than before. Which I think is also the reason why I don't know how to take compliments. I literally feel like a 'deer caught in headlights'. That glass wall between me and the candy surfaces here. Several people have told me that I am kind. I sincerely do not know how to take it because there is still a part of me that remains doubtful about my own love. There is still this idea that I need to do something or become something to experience love. I don't know how to convince that angry, scared, lonely, hurt, and ashamed child to let love in. I really just wanna reach in and hug him. And I don't know how. 

Whenever I fantasize about my future, it somehow is always me being some sort of a martyr. Self harm as an attempt at gaining love and acceptance. The same way the child refused food. I have tried very hard to imagine a future life for myself where I am happy and I can't get any clear picture. I am very reluctant and afraid to take up my own personal power. For example, I am at a point in my own work where I know that if I put in the effort, the results will be favorable. Yet, there is an immense reluctance - not in terms of the effort. The possibility that I can actually be happy, experience love, and take up my own personal power is a very alien feeling. This state of being stuck makes me feel like I am cut off from the life force. Helpless. Angry. Self-harm. Rinse. Lather. Repeat.

As an adult, anger of that child has also become cynicism. Every time I make even a small mistake, there is that voice - 'Once again a failure!' When it gets out of control, it becomes very suicidal. No matter what problem, instead of trying to engage with the situation, suicide keeps coming up. (Note: The suicidal feeling is more like an existential angst. A painful flash of thought that shows me how much I hate myself. So please do not be worried about personal physical harming such as cutting. ). It is not so much as the actual physical act of killing myself. But rather the existential feeling of not wanting to exist anymore. A refusal to engage with life. It is more like a very acute awareness of my own inability to participate in life. In those moments, I wish I was never born. In those moments, I feel like I do not have anything to contribute to life (including my love) and nothing about life interests me. All I feel is an immense sense of frustration and of being stuck.

I do not want to feel isolated, insecure, or unlovable anymore.
I do not want to feel broken and fractured anymore.
I want to break my patterns of self-harm and be happy.
I want to experience love as Goddess intended me to.
I want to grow and blossom into my own path - the one that Goddess chose for me.

Goddess... Please help me!

[astoe]

Hi Gopi,

your story is very touching. I pray that you find peace inside and the love that is available for every being. Obviously it will need effort and time to heal these deeps scars, but then I think this course gives us tools to do so. Then again, I sometimes think about words by C.G. Jung who says something like we never completely solve our big issues, but we can learn to better live with it.

If you don't already do, it may be good to do physical exercise to get a positive feeling of your body. Running and weights helps me a lot to feel grounded and see my body in a positive way - others like swimming. If you can afford, try to get a good masseur.

A tibetan master once said: People in the west all want to be out-of-body, but what they really need is to be more IN the body.

Of course this is just the tip of the iceberg, but then I think one should start with the obvious before venturing into the arcane.

Good luck & love to you,

astoe

[Gopi]

Thank you astoe for your kind words.

I have started doing yoga again and that is helping me.

Love,
Gopi

[Mystress]

   Some years ago I was getting a friend to give me a reading on my beloved pet snake, who was dying. He told me she did not understand why I did not accept her love for me.  I was astonished, I knew I loved her but had never thought about her love for me. I have known people whose pet boa would greet them when they got home, like a dog.. mine was more reserved.  My friend was surprised, said I don't let in love from anybody, he thought it was deliberate.

 I went into the light at the age of 2, experienced the overwhelming bliss of unconditional love. Goddess saying "you are My child" and when I came back to earth, I guess at some point I decided the conditional love we get from other people just was not good enough and I blocked it out. It is always such a mixed bag, isn't it? There is love but also expectations, judgements, the whole mess of what people project along with the love. Then parents who say "I do this because I love you" and its all abuse and torment, get to thinking "if that's love I don't want any."

 Modified it after I understood.  Still funny to think I lived most of my life without it and never noticed.

[Gopi]

Thank you Mystress.
I am still working on opening myself up to all forms of love. I am not sure what you mean by 'modify it'.