Breaking Trauma Down

Since I started my practice and began working with clients, doing interviews, and talking with people, many have asked me how do you know if someone has been traumatized?  What does it look like?  What are the ways in which people cope with the traumas in their lives and how does this affect them in their relationships, at work, and in social situations?  I knew from my own experience what I did to cope with the traumas that I experienced:  I drank a lot and did drugs to medicate myself from the pain; I stopped doing things I once loved; I became very reticent and withdrawn from people; I was chronically depressed;  I escaped by watching tv, or reading books, or depriving myself of things like money or good food because I had a core belief of unworthiness.  All these things and more were the ways in which I unconsciously and consciously dealt with the traumas I was experiencing or had experienced in my life because I didn't have the courage to seek help, face the painful emotions brought on by these traumatic events, and find a way to transform and integrate them into the fabric of my life in a healthy, positive way.  Now that I have, I can't believe I allowed myself to remain in that state of quiet desperation for so long, as though I didn't deserve to live or feel good about myself again.  But as I've stated before, traumas change the way our brains function, it alters the chemicals and hormones released into the body, and therefore, one's life is significantly detoured because the way we are processing life has become damaged.  Traumas get lodged in our bodies as well as in the painful recollection of the memories of our past.  It's like a part of us gets frozen in time, trapped in that original traumatic experience, and unless we do something about it to heal our minds and bodies from the effects of the trauma, we become unconscious victims of our own coping strategies as we try to resolve these issues within us and eliminate the pain.  Unfortunately, because we haven't yet learned the tools to effectively heal from these wounds, we make matters worse by falling into destructive coping strategies that only compound and complicate the problem.

All stress becomes traumatic whenever there is danger, fear, anxiety, or risk involved.  Your body mobilizes its defenses, everything goes on high alert, and there is a heightened state of alertness and vigilance.  The electrochemical reactions between the synapses in your brain accelerate; it's like you are driving your car at it's maximum speed.  Everything is being pushed to its limits, and pretty soon everything breaks down.  Our minds and bodies can only take so much, we all have our breaking point, and often these traumas have residual effects, meaning they don't show up until much later in life.  Now some traumas have an immediate effect, they only happen once or a few times, but the impact is so great, it immediately affects our lives.  Examples of this are combat, rape, assault or physical abuse, or accidents.  Other types of traumas are much smaller, and happen little by little every single day, but the cumulative effect of these relatively minor traumas can have just as significant effect on a person as a major event.  Little acts of degradation, humiliation, or shame on a daily basis take their toll on a victim until one day they just fall apart.  We often make compromises to trauma which deaden us over time.  We lose the sensitivity we once had, the joy, the sense of well-being, and our lives seem filled with dread, sadness, or depression.  It is only when we remove ourselves from a situation, heal ourselves from the pains of our past, does our sensitivity and joy return.  But so often we are caught up in the cycles of trauma that continue to act on us long after the event has happened that we can't seem to find our way out.  If only we knew what the signs were that indicated to us we had been traumatized and need to heal our wounds.  If we knew what they were, then maybe we could recognize these coping behaviors in our own lives, and if present, seek the help out there to change these coping strategies into healthy ones.

Well, Patrick J. Carnes, Ph.D. has broken down the ways that traumas continue to affect people over time in his book, The Betrayal Bond.  Dr. Carnes is an expert in the fields of addiction, recovery, and compulsivity, and his book elucidates the profound impact traumas have on people.  His book breaks down trauma into eight different ways in which people cope:  trauma reaction; trauma arousal; trauma blocking; trauma splitting; trauma abstinence; trauma shame; trauma repetition, and trauma bonds.  For the purposes of this blog post, I will focus on the first seven, and if you would like to know and understand the eighth, I suggest you purchase and read Dr. Carnes' book.  It's well worth the read and explains how and why we get involved with exploitative relationships.  However, I want you to understand what people do to cope with their traumas, and Dr. Carnes has listed all the characteristic for each one, which I will share with you after I explain each one specifically.  I am very grateful for the work Dr. Carnes has done in putting all of this together in such a simple and easily understandable way.

Trauma Reaction

A man has horrifying nightmares as he recalls hearing the battle sounds of war all around him - the exploding bombs from the air, the chattering of machine guns, the thud of mortar rounds being fired, the cries of men wounded and dying.  He's suddenly aroused by his wife whose being attacked by him while he is sleeping.  He finally comes back to reality.  It was all so real.  So vivid.  He has no idea how to get rid of these terrible dreams, and so to cope, he drinks, which only complicates the problem, because then his guard is down and he is easily provoked into rage.

This is just one example of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Now, as I've stated in previous posts, PTSD is not limited to just combat veterans.  People who've experienced physically or emotionally abusive relationships, accidents, disasters, or any kind of traumatic event where there was an overwhelming sense of fear and danger can get PTSD.  Please look at my previous posts to learn how one can get PTSD.  One of the problematic issues with PTSD is how the alarm system in the brain is activated.  An overwhelming sense of fear and danger causes extraordinary changes in your neurological system and your organs - in particular your brain.  These changes in your body, especially in your brain, alters how you perceive and relate to the world around you.  Most people whose flight or fight response is working properly, react and respond to an emergency or crisis, and then, return to normal.  Those who suffer from PTSD have experienced trauma that is so overwhelming and sustained, the entire body's ability to stay in an hyper-vigilant state is enhanced.  The body adjusts as does the mind.  You can't slow down.  The accelerator is down, you are on full-throttle, and the result is a highly reactive, difficult person who is a challenge to be around and who doesn't want to be like this.

Characteristics of PTSD reactivity:

• recurrent and unwanted (intrusive) recollections and experiences
• periods of sleeplessness
• sudden "real" memories (vivid, distracting)
• extremely cautious of surroundings
• startled more easily than others
• distressing dreams about experiences
• flashback episodes - acting or feeling as if the experience is happening in the present
• distress when exposed to reminders of experiences like anniversaries, places, or symbols
• outburst of anger and irritability
• distrustful of others
• physical reactions to reminders of experiences (breaking out in cold sweat, trouble breathing, etc.)

If you see yourself or someone you love exhibit some or most of these characteristics, chances are you or your loved one suffers from PTSD.

Trauma Arousal

Some people after experiencing trauma in their lives only feel alive when they are dealing with crisis or taking high risks.  Soldiers coming back from war often engage in high-risk sexual behavior because it stimulates the system and helps them to dull the pain they experienced from the war.  Women who were sexually abused or raped when they were young, often when they become adults, can only become orgasmic when a man is hurting them.  They will find partners who will re-victimize them over and over again because the behavior is now supercharged and addictive.

As Dr. Carnes points out, "Stimulation and pleasure compensate for pain and emptiness." [1]  With sex alone the possibilities for arousal based on fear or danger is endless.  There is highly addictive sex, violence, dramatic exits, passionate reconciliation, threats of leaving, seeking sex outside the relationship through prostitution or anonymous sex, this and more constitute just one of the pathways people who've been traumatized use to seek stimulation and pleasure, especially in the presence of fear, danger, violence, or shame.

Characteristics of its presence are:

• engaging in high-risk, thrill-seeking behaviors such as skydiving or race-car driving
• seeking more risk because the last jolt of excitement was not enough
• difficulty being alone, calm or in low-stress environments
• using drugs like cocaine or amphetamines to speed things up or to heighten high-risk activities
• feeling sexual when frightened or when violence occurs
• seeking high-risk sex
• loving to gamble on outcomes
• difficulty completing sustained, steady tasks
• seeking danger
• constant searching for all-or-nothing situations
• associating with people who are dangerous to you

Arousal can become very addictive.  Those who have been traumatized may need the heightened stimulation and high-risk pleasure seeking just to feel normal.  And when your brain adjusts to this way of living, it can severely disrupt your life and cause you and those you love a lot of pain.

Trauma Blocking

Blocking is an effort by the survivor to numb, block out, or reduce the residual negative feelings associated with trauma.  You will do anything to obliterate the painful memories and feelings of the interior world.  It is about anxiety reduction, and you will do behaviors and substances that induce a state of calm, of relaxation, of comfort.  You basically are anesthetizing yourself from the fear and pain of your past, you want to avoid reality because reality is too painful, but again, as the body and mind adjust, you will need to do these things compulsively in order to feel normal.

Characteristics of trauma blocking are:

• excessive drinking
• use of depressant drugs or "downers"
• using TV, reading or hobbies as a way to numb out
• compulsive eating
• excessive sleeping
• compulsive working, especially at unrewarding jobs
• compulsive exercise
• bingeing (with any of the above) when things are difficult

Any kind of trauma can create this kind of response in order to cope.  But, by choosing to act out in these ways, you are changing the neuropathways in your brain, and your ability to function normally is impaired.  And often many survivors of trauma use a combination of these strategies to cope, which only compounds the problem and makes it more difficult to break free from the painful past.

Trauma Splitting

Sometimes the reality you are living in is just too painful to bear and you want to go to another one.  You want to escape.  Therapists call this splitting - where the victims of trauma split off from the uncomfortable reality, dissociate from the experience, and live in another reality or fantasy.  This can take many forms: amnesia - the survivor doesn't remember significant facts about the event; sometimes survivors find themselves in places and have no idea how they got there; sometimes they feel detached from their bodies while in reality; or "the lights are on but nobody is home" because they have completely detached themselves from the reality of their world.  This living in 'fantasyland' becomes addictive, because the survivor's fantasies are often accompanied by arousal and obsession.  Sex addicts will have a pattern of falling in love.  And when the romance subsides, they'll seek another to fulfill the thrill of romance and believe this is the one who will take all my pain away.  An alcoholic will think he is a wine connoisseur to cover up his alcoholism.  Both of these examples illustrate how one dissociates from their painful realities.

Thus, trauma splitting is when you ignore traumatic realities by splitting off the experiences (escaping) and not integrating them into your personality or daily life.

Characteristics of trauma splitting:

• fantasizing or "spacing out" during plays and movies that generate intense feelings or are reminders of painful experiences
• experience confusion, absentmindedness and forgetfulness because of preoccupation
• living in a fantasy world when things get tough
• feeling separate from body as a reaction to a flashback
• experiencing amnesia about what you are doing or where you are
• being preoccupied with something else than what needs to be attended to
• having a life of "compartments" that others do not know about
• living a double life
• daydreaming, living in an unreal world
• obsessing around addictive behavior
• losing yourself in romantic fantasies
• the use of marijuana or psychedelic drugs

We all want to space out sometimes.  The problem is when we want to stay there.

Trauma Abstinence

Sometimes survivors of trauma will engage in compulsive deprivation or abstinence as a way to control and manage their fears, anxieties, and stresses about their lives.  This type of response as a solution to a trauma experience occurs especially around memories of success, high stress, shame or anxiety.  Most important, is this response is driven by terror and fear.  When a person deprives themselves of good things - spending money for themselves, avoiding eating healthy foods, sabotaging opportunities for success - it's a way of reinforcing the core belief that you are unworthy.  For example, people can use debt as a form of impoverishment and self-fulfillment.  They cannot seem to get ahead or make any moves to improve their lives because of the overwhelming debt burden resting on their shoulders.  This becomes a poverty obsession where you deny yourself basic needs and avoid taking risks on opportunities that might lift you from the financial constraints you find yourself in.  However, this constantly depriving yourself of the good things in life has a counter-force as the individual reaches a point where they can't stand it any longer, and suddenly go out of control with spending or drinking.  Then, the individual feels guilty for doing this, and returns to the state of mind of needing to deprive themselves in order to feel good again.  It becomes a vicious cycle of being in control and then, being out-of-control.  It is very common in our society, especially among professionals, who are so overworked and struggling to make ends meet, or who are working in jobs where they feel unappreciated, to have these excessive, out-of-control aspects of their lives which are rooted in compulsive deprivation.  As Dr. Carnes points out, "Wherever addiction is, there will also be deprivation.  If not addictive in its own right, the deprivation becomes a life pattern that, in part, is a solution to traumatic experience." [1]

Characteristics of trauma deprivation:

• deny themselves basic needs like groceries, shoes, books, medical care, rent or heat
• avoid any sexual pleasure or feel extreme remorse over any sexual activity
• hoard money and avoid spending money on legitimate needs
• perform "underachieving" jobs compulsively and make consistently extreme or unwarranted sacrifices for work
• spoil success opportunities
• have periods of no interest in eating and attempt diets repeatedly
• see comfort, luxuries and play activities as frivolous
• routinely skip vacations because of dedication to an unrewarding task
• avoid normal activities because of fears
• have difficulty with play
• be underemployed
• vomit food or use diuretics to avoid weight gain  

Trauma Shame

As I've discussed before with regards to shame, it is the profound sense that you are unworthy of love and belonging.  You feel defective, or even worse, responsible for the trauma which happened, and therefore, the shame is coupled with a deep and corrosive self-hatred.  A person who is shame-based has as their core belief that they are unlovable, and that if people knew who they really were behind the facade they present to them, they would leave in disgust.  There is a fundamental break in trust.  The person doesn't believe anyone will truly care about them based on their own merits, will only exploit and magnify their unforgivable faults, and hold them hostage to their failures in the past.  Survivors will often try to overcompensate for this by doing everything within their power to meet the unreachable standards of others and who they want them to be, in order to gain their love and acceptance, only to fail miserably, which only adds to their existing shame.  The whole binge/purge phenomenon associated with addictive behavior which often follows after a person has experienced trauma is deeply rooted in the shameful feelings one has about oneself.  At its worst, the shame-based person can be filled with so much self-hatred, that the person feels they are worthless, totally unforgivable for what they may have done, been a part of, or had done to them, and the only solution to this merciless stance is suicide.  This stance is far beyond depression, and is often marked with a preoccupation and acting out of self-destructive behaviors.

Characteristics of trauma shame:

• feeling ashamed because you believe trauma experiences were your fault
• feeling lonely and estranged from others because of traumatic experiences
• engaging in self-mutilating behaviors (cutting yourself, burning yourself, etc.)
• engaging in self-destructive behaviors
• enduring physical or emotional pain that most people would not accept
• avoiding mistakes "at all cost"
• feeling that you should be punished for the trauma event and being unable to forgive yourself
• feeling bad when something good happens
• having suicidal thoughts, threats and attempts
• possessing no ability to experience normal emotions such as sadness, anger, love and happiness
• having a deep fear of depending on people
• feeling unworthy, unlovable, immoral or sinful because of trauma experiences
• perceiving others always as better, happier and more competent
• having a dim outlook on the future
• avoiding experiences that feel good, have no risk and that are self-nurturing

You cannot numb your feelings of unworthiness into submission.  Whether you use alcohol, drugs, or another person, these coping strategies will make you vulnerable to addiction, co-dependency, and exploitation.  And whatever the addiction may be, or whatever you use to bury the pain, pretty soon, it will no longer be able to keep you from feeling those toxic emotions, and you will become desperate to find a solution.  Better to face what needs to be faced, and develop healthy coping strategies to deal with the trauma and pain of your past, instead of ignoring the problem until it ultimately and inevitably puts you in a life threatening situation.

Trauma Repetition

This is something I've spoken about before in that we repeat behaviors or re-create situations in our lives over and over again until we transform them.  Trauma repetition is about re-enactment.  We are living out our present lives in the unremembered past.  We continue to re-live a story from our painful history over and over again as we vainly try to bring some resolution to our pain and heal it.  But, instead, we keep re-creating the same situations, finding ourselves with the same type of people, without ever realizing we're stuck in a pattern of repetition.  Or, another form of reenactment is to abuse others the way others had abused you.  You were victimized and now you take on the role of perpetrator.  Or, you can play the role of rescuer, coming in to save the person from the trauma they are experiencing.  The hero who saves the day, who rescues the damsel in distress, or the wounded warrior.  Whether you are playing the victim, the perpetrator, or the rescuer,  you are attempting to bring resolution, healing, and a way to eliminate this deeply held fear that traumatized you somewhere in your past.  But instead of healing the original traumatic wound, you deepen it, and make it worse, because you've added traumas on top of each other.  Suddenly, you are wrapped up in an endless cycle of unconscious programs playing out in your mind and your life that spans lifetimes.  Yes, I said lifetimes.  These traumas are carried with you, in your soul, lifetime after lifetime, and you will continue to re-create these traumatic experiences on some level until you finally decide to heal it within yourself.

Characteristics of trauma repetition:

• doing something self-destructive over and over again, usually something that took place in childhood and started with a trauma
• reliving a "story" from the past
• engaging in abusive relationships repeatedly
• repeating painful experiences, including specific behaviors, scenes, persons and feelings
• doing something to others that you experienced as an early life trauma 

Steps you can take to get on the path of recovery

If you recognize yourself in any or all of the above categories of trauma, you can take steps right now to interrupt this pattern and put yourself on the path of recovery.  When I looked at these lists, I found I'd used a combination of all these coping strategies to deal with the traumas I experienced, and I was humbled by what I learned about myself.  I took a hard inventory about the kinds of behaviors that continued to bring me pain, what I call 'left turns', and discovered that if I behaved in a certain way, or responded in a way that was opposed to the person I wanted to be, this would inevitably feed into the self-loathing and shame I'd felt about my life and who I'd become.  When I finally made the choice to stop this, to end this cycle of pain, although it was difficult at first, the end result is miraculous.  I found me.  Underneath all that pain and trauma, was me, this beautiful, incredible man who had such love for his family, for his loved ones, for his friends, and for all people on this earth.  That's why I want to share with you my program.  I know it works, if you follow the steps.

Instead of repeating the same behaviors and getting the same results, you need to develop other coping strategies that are healthy.  You want to create a plan of action, one that we agree to, where you will have a mentor who will hold you accountable to the plan so you will not fall back into old compulsive coping strategies that have been destructive to the quality of your life.  After we've reconnected to who you truly are, we examine the traumas that have plagued you in your life, we re-frame them, putting them in the larger context of your life, the big picture, and learn to get the good that came from those experiences.  These stories you tell cannot survive the empathy and unconditional love from someone trusted with the goal of your healing.  You reclaim your connection to life, and to another human being.  This begins the total dismantling of the past, and soon, the shackles are unlocked, and the past holds you down no more.  Then, we build new skill sets to bring out the person you already are who just got buried underneath all that trauma.  We are going to re-build you based on the work we do in re-connecting to who you truly are.

Below are some immediate actions from Dr. Carnes's book that you can take based on the trauma categories described above:

Trauma reaction recovery plan:
Learn to manage your reactivity by listing the ways you underreact or overreact. Describe what the reaction is, what the feeling is like, and what the behavior that results from it.  Describe a specific event in which this reaction happened.  Then describe what the appropriate response would have been and the probable result that would have happened if you did that.  Your objective is to find the balanced response.

Arousal recovery plan:
First, take notice what "arousal" addictions you have in your life that you use to bring relief to the trauma and pain you've experienced.  Then look at the intensity these arousal coping strategies had on your life.  Did it truly bring you relief or did it just add more problems?  How did it affect your relationships with your family, friends, loved ones, and co-workers?  What were the sources of your intensity?  Make a list.  Once you've done that, write a plan of action for distancing yourself  from the addiction to the intensity.  Be very specific.        

Blocking recovery plan:
In this plan, you need to look at what satiation addictions you use to sooth and calm yourself.  Anything you do to relax, medicate, or anesthetize anxiety to block out the trauma and pain.  Make a list.  Then write a plan for soothing and calming yourself in healthy ways.

Splitting recovery plan:
Look and examine the areas in your life where preoccupation and obsession is used to escape from reality.  List this all out clearly without hiding anything from yourself.  Separate illusion from reality.  Be very honest with yourself.  Then, once you've done that, compose a brief statement of "Ten Rules to Stay in Reality."  These are your new rules to live by.

Deprivation recovery plan:
In this plan, you want to look at the areas where you have gone far beyond neglect of yourself.  You want to identify and list the forms of compulsive deprivation or self-harm that exist in your life.  Then, after reviewing your list, you want to make a list of what a healthy, thoughtful, caring human being would do for his or herself.  Then pick from the list 3 things you can do in the next week, and 3 more you can do in the next month.

Shame recovery plan:
Here you want to begin the process of self-restoration.  Begin by making a list of the sources of shame in your life, whether it was from an event, a relationship, or an error on your part.  Think of all the times you felt unworthy, ashamed, embarrassed, or flawed.  Write it down.  Jot down your feelings associated with each entry, and then ask your life coach or therapist or group what you need to do to re-build support for yourself.

Repetition recovery plan:
Dr. Carnes offers a wonderful exercise in his book to understand repetition compulsion and how to change it.  Unfortunately it is far too lengthy for me to condense in this blog.  However, my whole program is designed to liberate you from repeating the traumas over and over again by transforming them.

Thanks to the work of Dr. Carnes, we have a greater understanding of trauma and what it does to people, and I am very grateful for the work he has done to bring greater awareness to this issue.  Here's the bottom line: most of you have experienced trauma in your lives or you wouldn't be reading this blog.  And just because you can now define it so you can understand it more, instead of repeating these behaviors, you develop other coping strategies that are healthy.  That's what I am an expert at.  I've already got it in this system, and you are going to learn even more when you start working with me.

Instead of having these problems repeatedly, I've decoded them for you.  I've broken it down simply so it's easy for you to digest, and to understand.  We'll be covering this in future teleseminars and future gatherings.

Let's not repeat this pattern for yourself or for humanity, let's let it go; I've got the tools.

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1.  Carnes, Patrick J., Ph.D.  The Betrayal Bond: Breaking Free of Exploitative Relationships.  Health Communications, Inc., Deerfield Beach, Florida.  1997
 

Copy of Conference Call from Reclaim the Life You were meant to Live! Teleconference Series, June 13th, 2013

Thank you for following me on this blog.  Here is a free copy of the recording from last night's teleconference on Reclaiming the life you were meant to Live! for all to listen to who were not able to participate. Please enjoy the recording and feel free to pass it along to anyone you think would benefit from it. I love you all. Thank you for all your feedback. Click or press on the link below to receive the mp3 or on the phone, call the free conference play back number: (605) 475-4099 Access code: 520966#. When prompted for the reference number hit 8, then press #, and it should get you to the most recent recording. If you have any problems with the download, please let me know.
The next teleconference seminar is scheduled for July 11th, at 6PM PST. We will be talking about guilt, shame, and vulnerability.  Please send me an email if you would like to join and participate.

www.freeconferencecall.com

rs0796.freeconferencecall.com

Conference# 6054754000 - AccessCode: 520966

Evidence that Traumas Get Passed Down

Some people look at the world as it is and say 'why'? and some people look at the world and say 'why not?' for the way they imagine life could be.

Imagine a world where there is no war between nations and between families, no PTSD, no cause for violence in any form, where people from all walks of life and from all cultures and traditions can be clear, truthful, transparent, authentic, real, honest, and loving towards each other and themselves.  John Lennon imagined this in his song, 'Imagine':

Imagine there's no heaven

It's easy if you try

No hell below us

Above us only sky

Imagine all the people living for today

Imagine there's no countries

It isn't hard to do

Nothing to kill or die for

And no religion too

Imagine all the people living life in peace

You, you may say

I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one

I hope some day you'll join us

And the world will be as one

Science and research are catching up and validating something we've known for centuries:  the Sins of the Father are visited upon the generations below.  Now, some people look at the world we're living in and really question why all this is happening and other people are looking at the world and what they want to create and say, 'why can't we make that happen?'  The way I see it happening is when you heal yourself, every generation moving forward heals.

"We are affected by the seven generations that come before us and affect the seven generations that will follow," prescient words of wisdom and warning from a great Shoshone Elder, Francesca M. Boring.  Think about that for a moment.  Everything our ancestors did, on both sides, seven generations back, affects us today.  And what we do today, how we live our lives, what we do with the events that happen during our lifetimes, will affect the seven generations after us.  A powerful message bearing a call to take responsibility for all of our lives, to heal the wounds inside so that we don't pass this down to others to heal for us; all the unconscious, undigested emotions, pains, sufferings, horrors, and secrets that we unknowingly, unintentionally pass down when we don't take the time to heal ourselves from our own pain, which includes individual, familial, and the collective pain of humanity.  I've got the evidence below to show you that traumas from your parents, and their parents, get passed down.  So, as you read this remember: what you're doing affects everyone on the planet, especially the generations below.

Epigentic Transmission of the Impact of Early Stress Across Generations

A 2010 study conducted by Dr. Isabel Mansuy, a neurobiologist from the University of Zurich, published in the journal Biological Psychiatry, discovered that some impacts of traumas cross generations and cause genes to change which are then passed down to the offspring.  They raised male mice, and frequently separated them from their mothers inducing stress.  This was done for about 14 days, at which time, the mice  were cared for normally.  As the males became adults, they began to exhibit PTSD like symptoms -jumpiness, isolation, hyper-alertness.  They also noticed their genes functioned differently than other mice, most notably, the gene that helps regulate the stress hormone CRF and the gene that regulates the release of seratonin, and what they discovered was that these genes were either overreactive or underreactive.  These mice are equivalent to those who experience combat, or the Holocaust, or some intensely traumatic event.  Then, they bred these male mice with females to see what, if anything, occurred in their offspring.  Once they fathered pups, the males were removed, and the offspring were raised by their mothers with no trauma separation.  What they discovered was that as these males grew into adults, they exhibited the same anxious and jumpy behavior of their fathers and had the same gene changes! [2,1]

Here's what John H. Krystal, M.D., Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine, and the editor of Biological Psychiatry had to say about these results:

"The idea that traumatic stress responses may alter the regulation of genes in the germline cells in males means that these stress effects may be passed across generations.  It is distressing to think that the negative consequences of exposure to horrible life events could cross generations," says Krystal. 

"However, one could imagine that these types of responses might prepare the offspring to cope with hostile environments.  Further, if environmental events can produce negative effects, one wonders whether the opposite pattern of DNA methylation emerges when offspring are reared in supportive environments." [1]

Lost in Transmission: Studies of Trauma Across Generations.

The subject of this book by M. Gerard Fromm, published by Karnac Books (2012), is that all the traumas that are so overwhelming and too unbearable to even discuss are passed down to those who are closest and dearest to us.  Our loved ones end up carrying what we are unable to carry, and we do the same.  For time, I will print the synopsis of the book as it is written.

"A central thesis of this volume is that what human beings cannot contain of their experience - what has been traumatically overwhelming, unbearable, unthinkable - falls out of social discourse, but very often onto and into the next generation, as an affective sensitivity or a chaotic urgency.  What appears to be a person's symptom may turn out to be a symbol - in the context of this book, a symbol of an unconscious mission - to repair a parent or avenge a humiliation - assigned by the preceding generation.  These tasks may be more or less idiosyncratic to a given family, suffering its own personal trauma, or collective in response to societal trauma.
This book attempts to address the heritage of trauma - the way that the truly traumatic, that which cannot be contained by one generation, necessarily and largely unconsciously plays itself out through the next generation..." [3]

Here's what some leading psychologists and scholars are saying about this book:

"...The more "unmentalized" the trauma of parents, the greater the likelihood of its suppressed whispers finding their echoes in children's lives.  To render the unthinkable aspects of a trauma into a cogent, if fumbling, narrative, therefore, goes a long way to minimizing its long-term adverse effects..."
     -Salman Akhtar, MD, Professor of Psychiatry, Jefferson Medical College; Training and Supervising Analyst, Psychoanalytic of Philadelphia [3]

"'Lost in Transmission is not simply about how traumatic psychological injury is passed down to the children and grandchildren of those who originally experienced it.  Even more, the insightful and personal essays in this collection are about finding the shared humanity in families, in psychotherapy, in society, and in memories of the past that repairs the damage people do to one another.  A moving and inspiring book."
    -Thomas A. Kohut, Sue and Edgar Wachenheim III Professor of History, Williams College, USA [3]

"...Lost in Transmission teaches us how the unacknowledged terrors of one generation can lead to the neglect of the next...; how historical traumas can be used to mobilize hate and violence; how the shame of previous generations can be stealthily imprinted on children's psyches - leading them to avenge historical humiliations or assuage historical pain they may not even know of.  These wise healers unlock the code.  A critically important contribution to healing history's lasting wounds."
    -Jessica Stern, Former Erik Erikson Scholar; Advanced Academic Candidate, Mass. Inst. of Psychoanalysis;  author of Denial: A Memoir of Terror and Terror in the Name of God: Why Religious Militants Kill [3]

As Molly Castelloe, Ph.D. writes in her article in Psychology Today about Lost in Transmission:

"Transmission is the giving of a task.  The next generation must grapple with the trauma, find ways of representing it and spare transmitting the experience of hell back to one's parents.  A main task of transmission is to resist disassociating from the family heritage and "bring its full, tragic story into social discourse." (Fromm, xxi) 

She goes on to write: "How does one discharge this mission?  It is a precarious terrain of finding one's way through a web of family loyalties to which one has been intensely faithful.  The working through of transmission entails a painful, seemingly unbearable, process of separation.  It can become an identity crisis, the breaking of an emotional chain.  As Fromm puts it, "something life defining and deeply intimate is over."  The child speaks what their parent could not.  He or she recognizes how their own experience has been authored, how one has been authorized, if unconsciously, to carry their parents' injury into the future.  In rising above the remnants of one's ancestors' trauma, one helps to heal future generations." [4]

That's just some of the supporting evidence of how traumas get passed down that I've compiled.  I haven't even mentioned all the studies they've done on the survivors of the Holocaust and the effects of the trauma experienced and passed down to the second and third generations.  This information is all very recent, too.  Now, before you start accusing and blaming others, specifically your parents for what happened to you or someone else in your family (I want to remind you it's important to take responsibility for all of your life - all your choices, decisions, and errors -being the author of the totality of your whole life), remember, they were doing the best they could under the conditions and circumstances of their lives.  And they were traumatized too.  These things, as I've pointed out above, get passed down.  We know it now, we have scientific evidence to support it, and for men, we need that, (I know I do), we need to see the evidence, the logic and science, before we take action to do something.  We are not as intuitive as women, at least not yet, we have to develop that ability.  Nonetheless, what I'm saying is there is no one to blame.  It doesn't serve you to be upset with someone when they didn't even know themselves the value of cleaning up their inner life.  It doesn't serve you to accuse, blame, or shame someone for what may have happened to you.  It also doesn't serve you to live in guilt, shame, or self-loathing.  That just keeps you stuck in the past, shackled to the events that traumatized you.  It keeps you there, and not in the present moment where life is happening.  To open up your present, you've got to clean up your past, even if it includes the past of your parents and ancestors.  What you don't clean up, you give to your future generations to clean up for you.  I really want the men out there who are reading this to get this.  We will pass it in our genes if we don't heal this within ourselves first.  Now that you know this, the next step is what do you do with this new information in your life.  Are you going to stop it from being passed down?  It's is your choice, and what you choose, has consequences.

I also want to point out that there's no "fixing" anything.  You're not broken and need to be fixed.  The idea is when you are already perfect and whole, you just have to remember your wholeness.  Transparency and truth equals healed.  Being able to share whatever has occurred, heals it.  It's different from fixing it.

Imagine no possessions

I wonder if you can

No need for greed or hunger

A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people sharing all the world

You, you may say

I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one

I hope some day you'll join us

And the world will live as one

What a beautiful and inspiring vision of what this life could be and will be, based on all of us doing our part.  

Do honor to your ancestors, do honor to your parents, do honor to your future generations and get this healed within yourself.  Be the one who stops the pain and heals it.  Be the one who finds the courage to speak the truth of your experience, without blame, guilt, anger or shame, and find the miraculous release that comes with transparency.  You're a beautiful child of God.  Every single one of you.  No exceptions.

References:
1.  www.ts-si.org/healthcare/26795-do-psychological-trauma-impacts-cross-generations
2.  www.helphealingtrauma.com/2011/04/15/genetic-trauma/
3.  www.karnacbooks.com/Product.asp?PID=30112
4.  www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-me-in-we/201205/how-trauma-is-carried-across-generations



 Thank you for following me on this blog.  I wanted to share with all of you a free gift: Reclaiming the Life you were meant to LIVE! Teleconference. Please enjoy the recording and share it with anyone who you think might benefit from it.  I want to share with you my story so that you know you are not alone, and that you can be healed from this.  I love you all. Thank you for all your feedback. Click or press on the link below to receive the mp3 or on the phone, call the free conference play back number: (605) 475-4099 Access code: 520966#.   Hit # for the most recent recording when prompted.

The next teleconference is scheduled for June 13th, at 6PM PST. 

www.freeconferencecall.com

Conference# 6054754000 - AccessCode: 520966 - Unknown

  

Your PTSD can be healed!

Thank you for following me on this blog.  I wanted to share with all of you a free gift: Reclaiming the Life you were meant to LIVE! Teleconference. Please enjoy the recording.  I want to share with you my story so that you know you are not alone, and that you can be healed from this.  I love you all. Thank you for all your feedback. Click or press on the link below to receive the mp3 or on the phone, call the free conference play back number: (605) 475-4099 Access code: 520966#. 

The next teleconference is scheduled for June 13th, at 6PM PST. 

www.freeconferencecall.com

Conference# 6054754000 - AccessCode: 520966 - Unknown

Shadow Work - A Tribute to Debbie Ford

What we create in this life will help the world move forward.  Just look at what Debbie Ford did with her work on the Shadow.  After dealing with years of addiction, Debbie turned those dark years into something great, brought about a total shift in awareness and understanding of the dark, repressed emotions and unconscious behavioral patterns that intrude on people's lives.  She taught people how to overcome them, find the gold within the dark, and recover the lost side of them hidden beneath the coverings of the shadow.  Her work has helped inspire millions to look at themselves and their shadows with compassion, unravel the origins of these disruptive and unconscious behaviors and belief systems, and helped them to replace their self-loathing with self-love and forgiveness.  Once you are able to face your own truth, face everything you are hiding from the world to see, you will discover it was these fears that kept you from being the person you are capable of being.  As the I Ching states:

It is only when we have the courage to face things exactly as they are, without self-deception or illusion, that a light will develop out of the events by which the path to success may be recognized.

Her work continues to inspire and is still moving forward, and this blog post is a tribute to the work she brought to the world.

What is the shadow?  The shadow is everything we try to hide from the world, it's everything we don't want other people to see or know about us.  The shadow is secretive, dark, and sometimes, very dangerous.  The term, "The Shadow", I believe, was originally labeled as such by the great psychologist Carl Jung, who defined it in these terms: "On the civilized level, it is regarded as "a personal "gaffe," "slip," "faux pas," etc., which are then chalked up as defects of the conscious personality." [1]  These defects of the conscious personality are then suppressed into the unconscious because it is so disagreeable to our ego-consciousness and represents all that we dislike and/or fear about ourselves, and then, we build up facades around us to keep these defects from appearing.  When they do appear, they show up as projections in the outside world, and what we hate in someone else, is truly what we hate about ourselves.  The shadow side must be integrated within our consciousness in order for us to move towards full individuation of the individual.  We can not disown any part of ourselves.  When we do, troubles arise, the shadow hides until it finds the right situation and circumstances to rear its head and demand to be seen and heard.  But if we don't heed its warnings and accept its truth, we will continue to endure the various effects it produces in our lives.

How does the shadow show up in our lives?  Debbie Ford made a movie about this called "The Shadow Effect."  I highly encourage all of you to watch it, and much of what I'm writing about in this blog post comes from that movie.  In the movie, Debbie explains how it shows up: it shows up as writing bad checks; a man cheating on his wife or girlfriend; drinking too much; doing drugs to escape the pain in one's life; cheating on your tax returns; screaming at your kids; emotionally abusing your partner after you've been the nice person all day long to your friends; surfing the internet and visiting porn sites while your wife is cooking dinner for you in the next room; eating disorders; narcissistic personality disorders; eating chocolate cake in the middle of the night after 3 days of dieting; cheating on our boyfriends or husbands while they are working hard to provide a place to live; taking other people's ideas and making them are own.  These are just some examples of how the shadow shows up.  Where the shadow becomes dangerous is when these repressed thoughts, emotions, and impulses become violent, and this manifests itself as rape, domestic abuse, terrorism, war, evil, and radical injustices both economically and socially.  In the film, Deepak Chopra stated some shocking statistics about the economic injustices in the world.  Did you know that 50% of the world is living on less than 2 dollars a day, and 20% are living on less than 1 dollar a day!  In a world with so much abundance, how can this be accepted and tolerated?  But we do, because we don't want our lives to be affected by the change this might impose on us to change the way we live, or to be more responsible in how we utilize the resources available to us that benefits all rather than just the few.  How lucky are we to be on the other end of the spectrum.  A flip of a coin, and we might have been one of the 50%.

The birth of the shadow begins when we are very young.  Debbie explained that what happens is "we were shamed for certain behaviors and these messages got ingrained in our subconscious like a compute virus altering our sense of self and wounding our healthy egos."  Our minds at that very delicate age are not equipped to filter out things that would be able to protect us from these unhealthy belief systems.  The rational, logical part of our minds had not developed yet, and thus, these viruses entered without even our knowing, and as we get older, they begin to shape how we see ourselves in the world.  The parts we don't like about ourselves, (I'm not handsome; I'm the problem; no one will like me if they really knew me; I'm not lovable; I'm stupid; I'm never going to amount to anything: it's my fault; I'm worthless; I'm bad, etc.,) gets repressed, and then we try to prove not only to ourselves, but the rest of the world that we are not that which we hate about ourselves.  So, we build masks, to protect our wounded egos and "to prove to others we are not as defective, inferior, worthless, and bad as we might fear we are."  The masks we construct hide our flaws and insecurities and create a persona which we believe will get us what we truly want: love, acceptance, attention, and a sense of belonging.

The problem is the masks become our prisons.  Many of us have a public life and a private life.  I certainly did at one time.  I was trying to fit in in certain groups because I wanted to belong, to feel loved, admired, and desired, and yet, inside, I felt guilty for abandoning the man who I really was to impress all these others around me.  And what did that lead me to do?  Self-destructive behaviors because I hated who I'd become. All that stuff I felt was wrong about me, that had been influenced or deemed wrong by others, was now the guard standing outside the prison of my own making.  These parts of ourselves that we have deemed wrong are screaming to come out, they want to be set free, accepted, loved, and integrated into who you are.  Look at life.  It exists in contradiction: light and shadow; up and down; hard and soft; and if life is these things, and we are part of life, then every quality we see in another individual, exists in us as well.  We are the totality of it all, whether it is active or dormant, conscious or unconscious, if the good qualities exists in us, so do the "bad" qualities.

Instead of confronting our own shadows, we disown it, and project out all these unwanted qualities on to others.  What does that look like?  It sounds like this: "He is such a jerk; she is so self-absorbed; He is such an arrogant asshole; these people are all losers; you're such an idiot; she's a bitch."  We are so afraid of our own unworthiness, and as Debbie points out, simultaneously afraid of our own greatness, we unconsciously project these unwanted qualities onto others.  But, she says, "Those we project on own the qualities of our unclaimed darkness as well as pieces of our unclaimed light.  Until we claim back all that we have projected away, what we can't be with, won't let us be."

This is why we want to deal with the shadow.  What happens if you ignore it?  You self-destruct.  You implode rather than explode.  Your life collapses in on itself.  And this is what often happens to people who have experienced some kind of trauma in their lives that has not been processed and is instead, buried deep within the unconscious.  Trauma changes how our brains function, which in turn, changes the chemicals and hormones released in the body.  If you've experienced prolonged periods of trauma in your life, whether through combat or emotionally abusive relationships or intense family dramas or rape or being bullied for years and years, whatever it may have been, the way your brain functions has dramatically changed, and this is not a good thing.  As the movie points out to the viewers, "It's important to express any kind of pain.  Without that, it stays with us, it gets lodged in the body, it causes us to react and live unconsciously."  All the things which have not been processed, the undigested emotions and feelings and our thoughts about it, are toxins to our bodies, and without proper treatment, "lead to all the physical, emotional, and psychological impairments that show up later in life."

When we repress our shadows, it can lead to destructive behavior, towards oneself and/or towards others.  Examples of how this shows up:  alcohol and drug abuse; domestic violence (every day 3 women die in the U.S. as a result of domestic violence and more than half of them knew their attackers); rape; violent assaults by co-workers; murder; mass murder; genocide.  As Debbie Ford so eloquently points out, "We have to resolve the undigested emotions that are in our bodies and dislodge the stress in our minds.  We have to unearth, own, and embrace the very parts of ourselves that have caused us the most pain.  And the moment we do, the light of our awareness will begin the process of transforming them."  All of us have gone through some kind of trauma in our lives.  It's what we do with it that counts.  If we ignore it and bury it away into our unconscious, though we may think it no longer exists, the moment the right situation or circumstances show themselves, the shadow will come out, and we become caught in the maelstrom of its destructive forces.  However, if we stop, take the time to look at it, own it as part of us, there is gold to be found.

All the bad experiences we've ever had can be experiences which bring about the greatest of gifts because they help us to be who we are.  Those experiences transformed, can help us to be more loving, compassionate, and forgiving.  When we embrace all that we are -the light and the dark- we experience freedom.  We are no longer chained to the memories or traumas of the past that kept us from being all that we were capable of being.  And, as Debbie Ford states, "As we move through our shadows, we can reclaim our light."

As I stated in a previous blog post, shame destroys.  But shame cannot survive empathy.  We can use the pain of our past to become the greatest expression of ourselves, if we are willing to do the work.  You don't have to carry this shame alone.  You have to climb your way out of the darkness.  There are people out there who are willing to hold a light for you, to see you as you truly are, through your shadow, so that you can reclaim your light.  I honor people in my work and in my program in that way, where you can be your most vulnerable without ever having to feel ashamed about it.  All that pain and trauma is just covering up the gold that is underneath, and when you chip away at all the dirt covering it up, it shines as bright as ever.

Debbie Ford recently passed away, but her legacy endures.  Her pioneering work with the shadow has brought forth new and innovative ways to overcoming the pain and traumas of our past, helped to heal millions from the effects of their own shadows, and helped them to reclaim the light that was always theirs to begin with.  She was truly a blessing for all of humanity.  Why would one want to do shadow work?  It sets you free to be who you were always meant to be.  It gets you to the point where you forgive, yourself and others, and when you forgive, your heart is set free again to truly enjoy all that life has to offer.  You get to be who you always were, and become all that you are capable of becoming.  It allows you to live life with freedom, joy, and love in your heart for all of life.

When we are no longer under the influence of the shadow, we get to stand in our own light, and that, my friends, is the redemption we seek.


References:
1.  Jung, Carl.  The Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious, 'On the Psychology of the Trickster-Figure'.  Bollingen Series, Princeton University Press.  Tenth Printing, 1990.
2.  www.theshadoweffect.com
3.  www.debbieford.com


 

A Gift on May 16th

I have a gift for you coming up on May 16th.  I will be sharing with you some pearls of wisdom from my program, 'Lt. Pacello's Life Training Program, PTSD Recovery.'  This program and teleconference isn't for everyone.

• Have you suffered emotional trauma?
• Do you have difficulty letting go of the past?

Can you say yes to one of these:

• I have an emotional trauma that I have a hard time letting go of?
• I have physical stress in my body when I think about the past, a specific traumatic event?
• I have a lot of stress in my life every single day?

To receive this gift, simply email me at charlespacello@gmail.com.  This gift is a teleconference where I reveal what you should know about PTSD and how you can heal from PTSD.  I am a PTSD and Healing Trauma Expert.

Join me May 16th, 6PM PST/9PM EST

Thank you for being sociable and sharing this with your friends.

Healing Guilt, Shame, and Self-Hatred

I just saw two weeks ago Brene Brown talking with Oprah Winfrey on Super Soul Sunday about shame and guilt, and I wrote the piece below some time ago, but it just felt right to share it now.  On the show, Brene Brown talked about how shame is lethal and deadly, and the less you talk about it, the more you got it.  Shame, as Brown describes it, is an "intensely painful feeling that we are unworthy of love and belonging."  Shame destroys your life.  Shame is the lowest energy of the universe and it drags you to the very bottom of the abyss.  That's why you've got to speak your shame, because shame can't survive empathy.  However, she warns to be careful who you share your shame with.  You want to find a person who will love you for your shame, for your weaknesses, frailties, and the darkness you hold within.  You only share your story with people who've earned the right to hear your story, who understand the pain, and who look beyond to see the beauty that is inherently you.

I share this piece that I wrote because I felt it was the right time to share my own shadow, the things that I was guilty of, ashamed, and which filled me with such self-loathing.  This self-evaluation is part of the work that I ask clients to do in part II of my 12 session program, and it is the very same process I used to unlock myself from the past.  Friends, I'm not asking you to do anything that I haven't already done.  I've gone down there, I dug deep, and I unearthed all that had troubled me and my mind for all my life, and brought the light to the darkness.  We often wonder what that work is really like.  Well, this piece will show you what it was like for me, what it really entailed.  Sometimes it's messy.  Sometimes it's ugly and painful.  And sometimes, it's uncomfortable, because I was going into some extremely vulnerable territory.  And yet, we are only as liberated as the secrets we tell.  I'm going to tell you many of my secrets and past sufferings.  I hope it inspires you to be able to look within at your own shadow, confront it with compassion and love, and learn one of the steps as to how one is able to overcome their past.  You must learn how to make peace with your past, so that it doesn't destroy your present and future happiness.  What will happen is, as you do this work, the past let's go of you.

One last thing.  This blog is being read by people from all over the world.  Here's a list of the countries: United States; Germany; United Kingdom; Russia; India; France; Belgium; Czech Republic; Ireland; Ukraine; South Korea; Pakistan; Poland; Israel; Canada; and Australia.  I am so blessed and honored by all those many people who've read my words.  It also brings me a greater awareness of the problem with PTSD.  This is not an "American" problem; this is a world problem.  PTSD has no religion, no creed, no allegiances to countries.  It can happen to anyone, anywhere, and I sincerely hope to all those who've read this blog, that in some way my writings have helped you.  As I get my program out to the world, it is my deepest desire that it will heal you from the effects of PTSD no matter where you live or how you got it.  As you read the piece below, remember, my spiritual foundation for the program is grounded in the principles of Gandhi (non-violence) and A Course in Miracles.  I re-built my belief system based on the text and workbook of ACIM.  For those of you around the world who do not follow this particular spiritual practice, the program still works for you.  Truth has no religion.  Thus, when one hears the truth, no matter where it came from, our souls know it.  It bridges cultural divides, customs, traditions, and all religious doctrines.  There are many roads to the truth, and this is the path that resonated with me.  This is the baseline of the program.  It will never fall below this line of universal spiritual truth.  That said, it may not resonate with you.  That's fine.  If you decide to work with me or take the program when it becomes online, we will fashion something that is workable for the spiritual traditions you come from.  It's about your healing, not mine.  I've healed this, and this program came about from my years long work.  As long as the spiritual principles with which you re-build your own belief system are rooted and based in love, forgiveness, non-violence, and peace, universal spiritual truths found in all the major religious doctrines around the world throughout time, this program will work for you.

Here's the piece I wrote (22 Jun 2012):

Judgement, Guilt, and the Belief in Sin

Am I a judgmental person?  I have been, although, if you would have asked me this question a few weeks ago, I might have avoided the self-honesty required to examine this process within me.  I probably would have blamed outside factors and influences that caused me to judge someone or some occurrence the way I did, but that, had those things not occurred, I would have remained neutral or at peace.  Perhaps I would have even denied I am judgmental, that I look on all things equally and without judgment, seeing things only as they are in reality.  Perhaps this is how I want to see myself, this is my ideal, and yet, with closer inspection, deeply embedded within me is a harsh critic who has been merciless to me, exploited my perceived 'failures', and held me down at the mercy of the world.  This essay is intended to understand why this is true; where did it originate within me; what effects has it produced in my life; and most importantly, why I no longer see it as true and the value system I will use to replace the old one.

Last week, I looked at the statement that irritated me.  It was as follows: 'Someone who has lots of money and doesn't use some of it to help those in need.'  In this statement I've made two judgments:  1. People who have money should spend some of it to help those in need.  If they don't, I look at them harshly - as selfish, uncaring people who could do more to help but chose not to, and this I look down upon.  By doing this, I have made me superior and these 'others' inferior.  If I had money, I would do this, and therefore, I am superior to them, in my mind.  I have judged them as 'less' than me.  But, there is a second judgment in there directed towards me and that is:  2. I judge against myself because they have something that I want (money, wealth, and abundance) and because I don't have it, I'm angry, and therefore, must find fault with those who do in order to make myself feel better and look better in my eyes.  Their success and wealth upsets me because my life does not reflect that, and thus, my judgment is a mask over the anger I feel towards myself, the wound I have for not having met with success and wealth in my life through my endeavors.

In A Course in Miracles (ACIM) (Chapter 3, Section VIII  Judgment and the Authority Problem) it states: "When the Bible says "Judge not that ye be not judged." it merely means that if you judge the reality of others at all, you will be unable to avoid judging your own.  The choice to judge rather than to know was the cause of the loss of peace.  Judgment is the process on which perception, but not cognition, rests."  When I have judged others, I am really judging against myself, and I have found myself wanting.  ACIM goes on to say, "Judgment always involves rejection...what has been perceived and rejected - or judged and found wanting - remains in the unconscious because it has been perceived.  One of the illusions from which man suffers is the belief that what he judged against has no effect.  This cannot be true unless he also believes that what he judged against does not exist.  He evidently does not believe this, or he would not have judged against it."  In essence, I have rejected the parts of me I have found wanting - because I presently do not have the wealth and prosperity in my life I desire, I project my lack or failure onto others who do, and condemn it in some way or form, and thus, I prevent it, block, the very thing I want from entering my life.  It keeps it at bay, and thus, I get to hold onto my illusion that I am a failure in life.  And why am I a failure?  Because I must have done something so horribly wrong in my past that God, the Universe, has judged against me, I am guilty of sin, and therefore, deserving of punishment.  And this is my punishment: to watch others have what I want, while I must serve my sentence until God's grace grants me a reprieve from the things I had done.  Until then, suffer I must.

Allen Watson, who works for the Circle of Atonement, wrote a beautiful article titled 'Why Do We Judge People?'  In it, he states, "Judgment is innately, and fairly obviously, an act of playing God.  When we don our robe, take up our gavel, and sit in the judgment seat, we have taken God's place.  Reality is now up to us."  By judging so harshly against myself, I have usurped God's authority, and made myself the author of my life.  When I judge others, for whatever reason, I end up feeling guilty, and then, I turn my outward rage and indignation upon myself, and I have been unmerciful towards me and my 'sins'.  In my position as author of my life, I have overvalued and overestimated my failures and undervalued and underestimated my successes as my identity.  Why did I do this?  I judged by keeping me focused on my failures and my guilt, this would keep me humble and penitent, while a focus on my successes could lead to arrogance, pride, and an over-inflated ego.  God, Life, would punish me for my pride, and I did not want to offend Him.  But, what I ended up doing while seated there in the Seat of Judgment was make guilt, shame, and sin idols that my ego secretly worshiped.  My guilt was excessive and debilitating, paralyzed me from moving forward, and kept me in a constant state of regret and remorse.  It was really a disguised form of egotism, the very thing I was so afraid of becoming by over-inflating my successes.  David Hawkins describes this form of guilt very well in his book Transcending the Levels of Consciousness.  He writes, "Excessive guilt and remorse are a disguised form of egotism in which the self becomes blown up, exaggerated, and the hero of the tragedy, the negativity of which feeds the ego.  Therefore, release from guilt requires surrender of this basic egotism because the ego re-energizes itself through the negativity." (p.52).  I was a guilt-ridden sinner who was addicted to guilt and sin, and my ego was strengthened and fortified in its position of authority by this idea.

Where did this idea originate?  Why would I adopt a value system that over time would judge me so harshly and cruelly that I felt I was unworthy, unlovable, and undeserving of the joys of this world, much less salvation?  That my actions and behaviors were unforgivable, irredeemable, and beyond hope?  Well, it began very innocently.  I was brought up Catholic, and guilt is a binding principle that guides many of the Church's doctrines.  I'm not going to blame the Church though.  A healthy form of guilt can be used as a learning tool to teach someone how to live a better life when looked at as an error, so as not to repeat the same mistake again.  I am responsible for my excessive attraction to guilt and sin, not the Church.  Nonetheless, I learned that man was guilty of 'original sin' and that the only way he could be redeemed was through God's Grace and living a good life and doing good works.  All very noble, but not practical, in the sense that we are human beings, and because of our imperfect nature, chances are, through the course of one's life, one was apt to make mistakes, which of course I did.  However, instead of using my mistakes as lessons to be learned, I (because I so wanted to be perfect and unsullied - I had actually asked the priest one time during confession how I could become a saint, and even wanted to become the 1st American Pope), started to wallow in my guilt and never let it go.  It became habitual, unconscious, and self-indulgent.  And the more failures I had in my life only increased in direct proportion my self-indulgence in guilt and shame.  As I look back on my life, a pattern shows itself in which I've been self-indulgent by wallowing in excessive guilt.  Guilt, like chocolate, has been my spiritual indulgence.

Where has this indulgence been reflected in my life?  There are two areas where I have judged myself a failure in life - my failure with women (which represents love) and my failure to achieve success (which represents power in this world).  In regards to women, I was considered the 'nice' guy, I felt very uncomfortable around them, couldn't talk to them, and because of my insecurities within myself, I didn't have much success in having relationships with women.  I felt like I was unattractive and undesirable to women because I was too nice, so, to change my luck, I went 'bad', became the party guy, had wild parties, did lots of drugs, because I wanted the girls other guys had, and I convinced myself that I had to change who I was in order to attract them.  It worked for awhile, but I was so filled with guilt for what I'd done and become, and I still didn't have the woman I wanted, and the results were the same - now the girls didn't want to be with me because I was the party guy.  I was so desperate to feel love from a woman that I turned to prostitutes to get any kind of physical contact and affection, but this only made matters worse because I was filled with so much self-hatred, guilt, and shame for what I'd done to myself.  Then, I'd look back at the girls I did pass up who liked me but at the time I wouldn't give the time of day to because I was looking for these wild women, which only made me feel more guilty because now I could see that I had passed up on what was more substantive than what I'd been chasing after.  'You could've had _______!' my judge would say, and yet it was this same judge, my ego, who got me into this mess in the first place.  When I met Angela (her name is changed) for the first time, I was in a place where my past didn't exist and I could be and act like I wanted to be and act, and for the first time, I felt real love.  And yet, I felt God wanted to punish me for my licentious behavior of my past by preventing the two of us from having children, and thus, I judged myself harshly once again.  There's no reason to go over the relationship I had with her (I wrote a separate essay on the experience of my relationship), but when she left abruptly, there's no question I felt I had failed at love.  I judged me a failure.  So much second guessing and what if's, my mind was a living hell and tormented me relentlessly with memories and images from our past.

The other area where I have judged and condemned myself is in my failure to achieve success and power in the world.  I started off fine, graduated from a prestigious university, the US Air Force Academy, and was well on my way to achieving success.  However, because I was dissatisfied with my life, (I felt like I was wasting my life away, and my life had lost all meaning and hope), I turned to drugs as a coping mechanism to escape the dullness of my life, and the lack of love.  The guilt I felt for doing so, though, compelled me to confess my 'sins' to the authorities (Air Force OSI - Office of Special Investigations).  As an unintended consequence, although I was finally getting the help I needed, they sought to prosecute me for conduct unbecoming of an officer, and had they been able to corroborate the confession I made with witness accounts or physical evidence during their investigation, there's a good chance I'd have gone to Leavenworth.  Instead, I was dismissed from the Air Force with a misconduct charge, and an Under Other Than Honorable Conditions discharge.  I had brought about my own fall from grace.  I had brought disgrace and shame to my family's name, and I could no longer pursue employment with companies associated with the Air Force.  I remember being offered a part-time job for $60,000 when I first got out and started studying acting at the Stella Adler Academy of Acting, but they wouldn't hire me because of what happened.  I had systematically and deliberately destroyed every opportunity available to me then outside of the Air Force, and I had no idea where to turn to next to support myself.  My disgraced dismissal from the Air Force led to the greatest traumatic event in my family's life, the night when my parents found out.  That night changed my life, and my family's life forever.  We even labeled it as "The Event".  It was the night my family was destroyed.  It took ten years for it to complete its course, but that night changed everything, and I was the cause, I was responsible for the pain, the irreparable damage done, and I never fully recovered from that night.  The guilt I felt was so deep and profound as the horrors of that night reverberated in my mind constantly.  This night affected every choice I made, every decision I made, both consciously and unconsciously, for the next 12 years.  The 12 year odyssey to find my way back home through PTSD began.

I refused to go back to Denver because I couldn't face the shame and disgrace I'd brought to my family, and so, my father, coming to the rescue, helped support me while I chartered a new path in the arts.  I had failed my family, but more painfully, I'd failed myself.  For several years, I engaged in many drug-induced activities to numb the pain of the guilt and shame I felt.  I was a drug addict.  It was the only way at that time for me to feel good.  It was difficult to find sustainable employment during these 12 years as well, the cloud of the past hanging over me with every resume I'd send out.  Not being able to support oneself in life is a terrible feeling, and I felt like an exile.  My dependency grew as I trudged along, hoping acting would break through for me and I could live a better life, but any hopes I had were constantly met with disappointment.  I felt powerless and helpless to the world around me and at its mercy.  My inability to support myself and create any wealth complicated and put a strain on my former relationship, and I felt such shame because I couldn't or didn't know how to do more to improve our situation without drastically changing our circumstances, for instance, moving to Colorado and using my family connections to get a job.  As I watched others start to accumulate wealth and achievement in their lives, I was riddled with guilt for the things I'd done, and judged myself a horrible failure as a man.  I'd imprisoned myself in the mad house of sin, guilt, and shame - I, who wanted to be a saint as a child, was now evil, impure, and corrupted.  I felt like a speck of dust, left to fend for myself, cut off from the source of life, cut off from love, cut off from my joy and happiness.  My life reflected the judgments I'd made upon myself which I projected on to God and hated Him for abandoning me, and not giving me any hope for redemption. Angela, for awhile, offered that redemption, but when it fell apart, it brought me to my lowest point, and that's when I turned to God for help on bend-ed knee.

Before I move on, let me surmise some things that I am now aware of.  I had judged myself as if God had already judged me.  I passed the sentence of guilt before God could pass sentence on me.  I usurped God's position, placed my ego as authority over myself, gave sentence, found myself guilty on multiple accounts over the years, and condemned myself to the just punishment God would have proclaimed on me if He had judged.  I peremptorily made the decision before God could, thus showing God I knew I'd sinned, I wasn't running from them, and I was punishing myself accordingly.  Perhaps I thought God would show mercy upon me when He finally did judge me for my sins because He witnessed how much I suffered and punished myself for the sins I committed.  I was exacting the justice I thought I deserved for my unforgivable sins.

Why is this no longer true?  I have come to learn through my studies of ACIM and other spiritual books that mind is the cause: the world of perception is the effect.  By placing my ego as the Judge in my life, rather than God, I condemned myself for the 'sins' I made, which were really errors that needed to be corrected.  Sin is actually an archery term which means 'you missed the mark.'  By judging myself so harshly, my ego condemned me to hell, and then, tyrannized over me as I plodded through the suffering.  My ego's goal was to strip me from my joy, and send me to my death.  And, of course, I believed it's condemnations and recriminations, and guilt, shame, and self-hatred lorded over me.  Well, I no longer believe I should live in hell while others get to experience bliss in their lives.  ACIM says, "If guilt is hell, what is it's opposite?"  Well, it's opposite must be the Son of God (we're all sons and daughters of God) is guiltless and in Heaven, which is where I want to be.  I've suffered enough for my 'sins'(errors), whatever penance I thought I needed to pay, if it needed to be paid, has been, and then some.  I will no longer allow myself to be secretly ruled by a tyrant who strengthens its hold upon me, and gets pleasure from, me wallowing in guilt, shame, and self-hatred for past mistakes.  I have re-contextualized my errors to learn and grow from them, no longer to be unmercifully punished by them.  I deserve to be happy, free, and in love with all things and all life.  I recognize that some degree of remorse and regret over the past is inevitable, even healthy, as one can learn from one's mistakes in order to do better, and that human error is to be expected as I evolve, and others too.  And I also recognize the world is better served and benefits from the wisdom I have gained through my experiences and not from the guilt, self-hatred, and shame I've used in the past to crucify myself to the cross. I'm off the cross now, resurrected, and better than ever before.  I have grow in compassion and love for myself for choosing the path I did because I thought I lacked love and power.  Underneath, was just someone who wanted to feel loved, appreciated, of value, and powerful.  Because I saw those things outside of myself, I made choices and decisions based on this information (the information I had at the time), how I was feeling about myself, and how I perceived the world.  Many of the decisions I made regarding drugs and women was because I saw love and happiness outside of me.  I thought by changing my self-image, I would attract to me what I thought I lacked.  That didn't quite happen the way I thought it would, and today, I have such love and compassion for this man who was just trying to find something he already had.  Now, today, I feel very comfortable around women, I'm not intimidated, I have overcome the mother-destroyer principle with my gentle heart, and I am at ease and myself in their presence.  Most importantly, I realize and know love is not outside of me, but who I am, and that knowledge allows me to come from a place of wholeness, instead of lack.

As far as success in this world is concerned, my power is now rooted in God, my Source, where it should always have been.  I am not the author of my life, God is, and I gladly relinquish my ego's authority and give it back to Him.  I will let God judge my life, not me, and let Him lead the way.  It's amazing to me how much I was able to succeed in recent years in spite of the Judge/Critic in me who, like a scavenger dog, searched out all my 'sins' (errors), exploited them, and then punished me unmercifully.  With God now in charge, all things are possible, and whatever problems I may have had in the past in regards to my career, money, wealth, and abundance, God will show me the way.

I am willing my salvation and redemption from the hell I made.  I made it with my thoughts, and then I passed judgment on others who had what I wanted, and then, turned it around and condemned myself as unworthy and undeserving of these experiences because of my sins and subsequent guilt, shame, and self-hatred.  The past is over, it can touch me not.  The game of sin, guilt, shame, and self-hatred is over.  At my core, the very core of my being, I know I am innocent and worthy of all the joys of this life and of Heaven.