existential abreaction: April 2012

I wish to introduce the concept of dysfunctional shame, as it contrasts from functional shame. In functional shame a person realizes that it is okay to make mistakes, that we are not perfect and that if we fall down, we get back up. Dysfunctional shame, on the other hand, can destroy a person. And dysfunctional shame always stems from alienation and avoidance.
The cycle is thus: As a person alienates himself from the society around him, the response to that alienation from others is avoidance, which engenders a feeling of abandonment within the person who alienated himself (a self-fulfilling prophecy).
The second stage of the above graph, “abandonment,” can also stem from other sources than alienation. For instance, abuse of any kind increases feelings of abandonment. When a child is physically, emotionally or sexually abused, that child negatively detaches from the world around her. Feelings of abandonment are feelings of isolation from human contact. Feelings of abandonment are also feelings of betrayal, which feelings inevitably lead to apathy—which emotion is quintessentially tied to alienation.
These feelings of abandonment can also stem from a perception of loss. For instance, a child’s father could have been cold and aloof. This father could have also been authoritarian in parenting style—a type of “drill sergeant” parent. This child may then perceive a loss of a father who “could have, should have, and ought to have been” (distortions of thought) a warm and affirming father. This loss has a natural outcome of emotions tied to abandonment.
This abandonment then creates a false self-identity, or an identity fraught with distorted perceptions of “who am I.” This is the “dysfunctional shadow identity.” And when a person finds herself living through this identity, the perception of self is one of destruction. Persons with this identity may say to themselves, “I am worthless all of the time,” or “I am wicked and am not worth God’s time…or for that matter anybody else’s time.” This dysfunctional shadow identity is directed by unhealthy shame, which tears a person down and inhibits emotional growth.
When someone has developed a dysfunctional shadow identity, this someone then begins to live through this identity—their thoughts and beliefs become skewed and distorted—they develop a “shadow belief.” For example, a person might begin to believe that nothing ever works out for them, or that no one will ever love them. These shadow beliefs are wrought with non-meaningful pain and suffering, which a person inevitably feels compelled to rid themselves of.
The strong negative emotions which result from the shadow belief lead to the compulsive and addictive actions of the “shadow behaviors.” Drug addiction, gambling, overeating, overspending, other deviant addictions and compulsions come with a high price to pay. When the “shadow consequences” occur resulting from negative choices, the results of these choices feed back into the dysfunctional shadow identity, which lead to a self-fulfilling prophecy, “See I knew it, I am worthless, and the proof of this is the fact that I am in jail for a DUI.”
Functional shame is closely related to our authentic selves. To perpetuate and reinforce the authentic self, one must accomplish a few necessary steps. The following acronym “REAL SELF” are a few steps needed in progressing towards an authentic self:

(R)ely on God
(E)xpress emotion
(A)ccept sources of shame
(L)et go

(S)elf-disclosure
(E)voke accountability
(L)ove yourself
(F)orgiveness of self and others

Rely on God

Relying on God is essential to heal from any malady. As it will be highlighted in discussion 11, my belief is that in any relationship, spirituality must be highlighted for the relationship to grow. And concerning therapy: a person’s spiritual side must be addressed before ending that therapeutic relationship. The spiritual core values are what lead to lasting change… they make all of the behavioral skills and introspection processed through the therapy sessions take on meaning and purpose, which will lead to lasting change. If there is no why, how long will the how last?
Of course this is something very personal, and can only truly be obtained by communion with deity—through prayer or meditation. Praying and receiving from communion with God is essential.

Express emotion

Expressing emotion is also very necessary in obtaining a healing experience. If you have ever had the experience of attending therapy, you realize that more often than not the therapist asks this question, “How are you feeling” or “Would you identify your mood for me,” etc. Why is it that these specialists are so interested in moods? For one thing, an exploration of emotions is something that is neglected in our society, to not experience your mood is a good way to develop lasting mental abnormalities. To identify your mood is the gateway to managing your mood. And managing your mood leads to emotional maturity and mental wellness. I have discovered in my practice of psychotherapy that most mental disorders have a root cause in abnormal emotion maintenance. For both children and adults, I have seen great gains made in therapy by having participants in therapy simply identify their moods frequently. Many times, I have seen participants connect many psychological patterns and unlock unresolved trauma or grief by opening up emotionally. Your emotions are the gateway to the unconscious mysteries that may have been plaguing you for years. Alice Miller essentially stated that exposure to a trauma doesn’t cause a mental illness, but the inability to express emotion about the trauma causes the dysfunction.
One technique that I have used to obtain the emotional goals I have for myself is to keep a journal and write down the moods that I am experiencing everyday. Another technique I have used (especially with children) is to use a “cheat sheet” which has a list of moods. I will have the person take the cheat sheet home with them and identify a mood off the list often during the day. This activity will increase exposure to emotion identification, which is the first step in emotional management.

Accept sources of shame

For many people this is one of the most difficult steps, because many individuals’ sources of shame can be found within their family of origin. Mother and father are our greatest models and sources of love and self-identity. However, when a family becomes dysfunctional, these models of attachment can wreak havoc on our sensitive and developing sense of self. But it must be understood, if our parents were toxic, there was probably a good chance that their parents were toxic as well. We must come to understand that there is a good chance that even abusive people are doing the best they know how. If as a child a person was beaten for bad behavior, what other model did he or she have of parenting than that of an abusive example received from his/her parents? This toxicity becomes multigenerational, but of course, this is not an excuse—our agency dictates that we must choose to break this cycle, or we will be as responsible as those who abused us. And to break this cycle, we must accept our past, focus on today, and influence our future. If you have had serious abuse in your past, you must get therapy if you are to ever get to the point of acceptance. And acceptance will lead to breaking the cycle. Note: Acceptance and approval are different. Acceptance is tied to forgiveness, understanding and letting go. Approval is related to condoning.

Let Go
Tied to Relying on God is letting go. A common AA phrase is “Let go and let God.” Surrendering control is what letting go is all about. One of the most powerful aspects of any 12-step group is the recitation of the Serenity Prayer. This prayer has already been cited in this work, however it is such a powerful concept, it is worth quoting again.

God grant me the Serenity
To Accept the things I cannot change
The Courage to change the things I can
And the Wisdom to Know the difference

Acceptance of things that are out of our control is often one of the most difficult things to perceive when we are attempting to overcome love-destroying shame. Another key element which ties to these concepts of letting go and accepting is the idea of detaching.
Detachment doesn’t mean that we don’t care. It does mean that we are involved, but within healthy self boundaries. With detachment comes serenity, because we reach a state of being in which we can observe the environment around us, but we don’t have to control the environment. We are in the world, but not of the world.
For example, I had a client who would obsess and worry about seemingly everything, but specifically her teenage son. The son was severely addicted to narcotics. When her son turned 18, he went to jail on drug charges, and my client was immediately present to bail him out. She attempted to do everything for him, and she wondered why her son would continue to get into trouble. She would rescue and he would rebel. Finally, my client came to the realization that her son needed to be “his own man.” Again he was sent to jail, but she did not bail him out. She told him that she loved him, but that he needed to take responsibility for himself—she detached, but was still involved and loving towards him. To her surprise, her crippling depression, anxiety and anger issues slowly faded and she then no longer needed to see me for therapy.

Self-Disclosure
To overcome the shadow identity and dysfunction shame, a person must self-disclose to others. Self-disclosure is essential—it leads to a corrective emotional experience, which is a healing process of overcoming the damage done from earlier dysfunctional relationships. This is the power behind recovery and therapy groups—when we come out of hiding and reveal pain to a supportive group of people, we overcome our shadow identity and come closer and nearer to our authentic self. This leads to developing healthy relationships, which also adds to the corrective emotional experience.

Evoke Accountability
The majority of people I see in therapy are there because they do not want to make a decision—they want me (their therapist) to make a decision for them. When I think of almost every mental or relational problem I have helped people with, there inevitably is a responsibility issue at the core of the matter. This is what the defense mechanisms of projections, displacement, splitting (triangulation), and others are defending against—personal accountability!
The following is a list of defense mechanisms as identified and provided by Wikipedia.com: (notice how many of them deal with responsibility avoidance at an unconscious, preconscious and conscious level).
Level 1 Defence Mechanisms
The mechanisms on this level, when predominating, almost always are severely pathological. These three defences, in conjunction, permit one to effectively rearrange external reality and eliminate the need to cope with reality. The pathological users of these mechanisms frequently appear crazy or insane to others. These are the "psychotic" defences, common in overt psychosis. However, they are found in dreams and throughout childhood as healthy mechanisms.
They include:
· Denial: Refusal to accept external reality because it is too threatening; arguing against an anxiety-provoking stimuli by stating it doesn't exist; resolution of emotional conflict and reduce anxiety by refusing to perceive or consciously acknowledge the more unpleasant aspects of external reality.
· Distortion: A gross reshaping of external reality to meet internal needs.
· Delusional Projection: Grossly frank delusions about external reality, usually of a persecutory nature.
Level 2 Defence Mechanisms
These mechanisms are often present in adults and more commonly present in adolescence. These mechanisms lessen distress and anxiety provoked by threatening people or by uncomfortable reality. People who excessively use such defences are seen as socially undesirable in that they are immature, difficult to deal with and seriously out of touch with reality. These are the so-called "immature" defences and overuse almost always lead to serious problems in a person's ability to cope effectively. These defences are often seen in severe depression and personality disorders. In adolescence, the occurrence of all of these defences is normal.
These include:
· Fantasy: Tendency to retreat into fantasy in order to resolve inner and outer conflicts.
· Projection: Projection is a primitive form of paranoia. Projection also reduces anxiety by allowing the expression of the undesirable impulses or desires without becoming consciously aware of them; attributing one's own unacknowledged unacceptable/unwanted thoughts and emotions to another; includes severe prejudice, severe jealousy, hypervigilance to external danger, and "injustice collecting.” It is shifting one's unacceptable thoughts, feelings and impulses within oneself onto someone else, such that those same thoughts, feelings, beliefs and motivations as perceived as being possessed by the other.
· Hypochondriasis (a.k.a. somatization): The transformation of negative feelings towards others into negative feelings toward self, pain, illness and anxiety.
· Passive aggression: Aggression towards others expressed indirectly or passively.
· Acting out: Direct expression of an unconscious wish or impulse without conscious awareness of the emotion that drives that expressive behavior.
Level 3 Defence Mechanisms
These mechanisms are considered neurotic, but fairly common in adults. Such defences have short-term advantages in coping, but can often cause long-term problems in relationships, work and in enjoying life when used as one's primary style of coping with the world.
These include:
· Displacement: Defence mechanism that shifts sexual or aggressive impulses to a more acceptable or less threatening target; redirecting emotion to a safer outlet; separation of emotion from its real object and redirection of the intense emotion toward someone or something that is less offensive or threatening in order to avoid dealing directly with what is frightening or threatening.
· Dissociation: Temporary drastic modification of one's personal identity or character to avoid emotional distress; separation or postponement of a feeling that normally would accompany a situation or thought.
· Intellectualization: A form of isolation; concentrating on the intellectual components of a situation so as to distance oneself from the associated anxiety-provoking emotions; separation of emotion from ideas; thinking about wishes in formal, affectively bland terms and not acting on them; avoiding unacceptable emotions by focusing on the intellectual aspects.
· Reaction Formation: Converting unconscious wishes or impulses that are perceived to be dangerous into their opposites; behavior that is completely the opposite of what one really wants or feels; taking the opposite belief because the true belief causes anxiety. This defence can work effectively for coping in the short term, but will eventually break down.
· Repression: Process of pulling thoughts into the unconscious and preventing painful or dangerous thoughts from entering consciousness; seemingly unexplainable naiveté, memory lapse or lack of awareness of one's own situation and condition; the emotion is conscious, but the idea behind it is absent.
Level 4 Defence Mechanisms
These are commonly found among emotionally healthy adults and are considered the most mature, even though many have their origins in the immature level. However, these have been adapted through the years so as to optimize success in life and relationships. The use of these defences enhances user pleasure and feelings of mastery. These defences help the users to integrate conflicting emotions and thoughts while still remaining effective. Persons who use these mechanisms are viewed as having virtues.
These include:
· Altruism: Constructive service to others that brings pleasure and personal satisfaction.
· Anticipation: Realistic planning for future discomfort.
· Humour: Overt expression of ideas and feelings (especially those that are unpleasant to focus on or too terrible to talk about) that gives pleasure to others. Humour enables someone to call a spade a spade, while "wit" is a form of displacement (see above under Category 3).
· Identification: The unconscious modelling of one's self upon another person's character and behavior.
· Introjection: Identifying with some idea or object so deeply that it becomes a part of that person.
· Sublimation: Transformation of negative emotions or instincts into positive actions, behavior, or emotion.
· Suppression: The conscious process of pushing thoughts into the preconscious; the conscious decision to delay paying attention to an emotion or need in order to cope with the present reality; able to later access uncomfortable or distressing emotions and accept them.

Defense mechanisms protect us from being consciously aware of a thought or feeling which we cannot tolerate. The defense only allows the unconscious thought or feeling to be expressed indirectly in a disguised form. When these defenses become dysfunctional, dangerous, deviant or distressing, a person needs to seek treatment; however, it is essential to know that many of these defenses operate within all of us. These defenses are not inherently negative, some may be quite positive, like sublimation. However and indeed, many of these defenses can contribute to responsibility avoidance. For example, I once worked with an individual who was in extreme denial surrounding his extreme heroin addiction. He had convinced himself that it was natural and even healthy for him. He felt that everyone was out to get him and as long as he could maintain his job and his relationships, there was no reason to change. In a therapy group for substance abuse, many of the group members tried to “break him.” They would challenge and confront him until they were blue in the face (literally). However, none of their efforts worked. Yet one day he presented the group with a very depressed affect which was unlike his usual bravado. He stated, “My girlfriend left me and I think I am going to get fired, all because of my drug use.” Now, the defenses were down and the group could get some real work done. He was now ready, willing and somewhat able to grow out of this dysfunction… so we thought. As the group gave him suggestions, and praised him on “seeing through the pink haze,” he began to become a little bit stoic. He then began to follow the group’s lead by asking for advice, which they in turn were eager to give. Over the next week, he practiced the behaviors that the group told him to do, began a 12-step program as they had advised, and he attempted to be as honest as he could with others, also as the group had advised. During the next group, he was absent, and he never returned. “What happened… he was doing so well?,” group members asked. On a private phone call I had with him some weeks later, he told me that the 12-step group was full of “self-righteous do-gooders,” the people he attempted to be honest with rejected him, and all the advice the group had given him had “blown up in his face.” He has made the group accountable for his failed attempts of sobriety.
How do we evoke accountability within ourselves when we may be in a state of defensiveness? It has much to do with our relationships with others and how they respond to us. Good feedback from those who care does not include advice, this will only perpetuate responsibility avoidance. Good listening is key to evoke accountability.
Thomas Gordon described some roadblocks to listening:
• Asking questions
• Agreeing, approving, or praising
• Advising, suggesting, providing solutions
• Arguing, persuading with logic, lecturing
• Analyzing or interpreting
• Assuring, sympathizing, or consoling
• Ordering, directing, or commanding
• Warning, cautioning, or threatening
• Moralizing, telling what they “should” do
• Disagreeing, judging, criticizing, or blaming
• Shaming, ridiculing, or labeling
• Withdrawing, distracting, humoring, or changing the subject
“Why are they roadblocks?” Gordon continues:
“They get in the speaker’s way. In order to keep moving, the speaker has to go around them… They have the effect of blocking, stopping, diverting, or changing direction… They insert the listener’s ‘stuff’… They communicate: One-up role: `Listen to me! I’m the expert.’ And they put-down (subtle, or not-so-subtle).”
Certainly, it is a difficult, if not an impossible job to evoke accountability in others, and very often it is difficult to evoke accountability in ourselves. The first step is to realize that there are many aspects of our lives that we do not want to investigate. The second step is to become aware of the fact that we are responsible for those aspects; we are even responsible for things outside of ourselves. In a strange way, it can be liberating to know that we are responsible for everything in our environment—we are not to blame—but we are responsible. It is also key to remember that freedom is found in two simple actions: repenting and forgiving (we will discuss more of this in the next section).

Love Yourself
This is a very powerful principle. Loving yourself will be described throughout this book as one of the quintessential achievements to overcome most mental dysfunctions. The first step is to become familiar with positive affirmations. There is power in intently looking into your eyes in a mirror and saying “I love you… You mean a lot to me… etc.” So often, we do just the opposite. If a person attempts to give himself positive affirmations continuously for two weeks, that person will notice a drastic change in the way he perceives himself and his environment.
When a lawyer asked Jesus, “Master, which is the great commandment in the law?” he answered, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” (Matt. 22:36–39.) Notice that Jesus said you are to love your neighbor as yourself. God wants you to love yourself just as much as he wants you to love others. Dr. Clark Swain stated, “If you truly love yourself, you will remember that you are a physical, mental, and spiritual being. Loving yourself as God wants you to means that you use wisdom in protecting your life and conserving your health.”
Loving yourself also means to be grateful for yourself and your abilities, and to be grateful to God. It has been shown in research that attitude of gratitude can significantly increase a lasting sense of well-being. In an experimental comparison, those who kept gratitude journals on a weekly basis exercised more regularly, reported fewer physical symptoms, felt better about their lives as a whole, and were more optimistic about the upcoming week compared to those who recorded hassles or neutral life events (Emmons & McCullough, 2003). Also, it has been shown that a related benefit of the attitude of gratitude was observed in the realm of personal goal attainment: Participants who kept gratitude lists were more likely to have made progress toward important personal goals (academic, interpersonal and health-based) over a two-month period compared to subjects in the other experimental conditions. Moreover, daily gratitude interventions (self-guided exercises) with young adults resulted in higher reported levels of the positive states of alertness, enthusiasm, determination, attentiveness and energy compared to a focus on hassles or a downward social comparison (ways in which participants thought they were better off than others). There was no difference in levels of unpleasant emotions reported in the three groups. It was also found by Drs. Robert A. Emmons and Michael E. McCullough that in a sample of adults with neuromuscular disease, a 21-day gratitude intervention resulted in greater amounts of high-energy positive moods, a greater sense of feeling connected to others, more optimistic ratings of one’s life, and better sleep duration and sleep quality, relative to a control group.

Forgiveness of self and others
This section is a little longer than the former, because this concept is essential to healing. There are two principles all people need to learn to overcome the shadow identity. These are repenting and forgiving. Repenting is essential, because this action leads to an understanding that we make mistakes, we are not perfect, and that we are “okay.” When we do something wrong, say sorry and make restitution. Asking God for forgiveness is liberating and evokes healthy shame and guilt, which as John Bradshaw states “safeguards the soul” because we will conceptualize that we have limits and boundaries, and truly we are good people who perform badly at times. Again, it is “okay,” we must not be so hard on ourselves. The danger of the shadow identity is that an individual can become dichotomous in thought, action and belief. On one extreme a person may need to be “perfect,” achieving extremely in everything. They also are compelled to show little-to-no emotions, because this is weakness. These people “have to” and “have no choice” in their need to achieve. On the other side of the spectrum of the shadow identity, an individual sees himself as a “no-good sinner” not worthy of “redemption.” Both sides of the spectrum are toxic and can lead to personal destruction.
The Greek word for which the English term “repentance” was derived denotes a change of mind, or in effect, a fresh view about God (Bible Dictionary, p. 760). This idea is truly at odds with the notions of punishment and pain, with which many people associate the term of repentance.
Forgiveness of ourselves is important and forgiveness of others is essential for our healing. Anyone who has ever been victimized—and that includes survivors of crime, accidents, childhood abuse, political imprisonment, warfare, and so on—must decide whether or not to forgive those who made the violation, even if that person is not repentant. There can be no way around this choice: either you decide to forgive the person who hurt you, or you hold on to bitterness and anger until it consumes you. Holding on to bitterness and anger can perpetuate further bitterness and anger. One example I witnessed was an individual who had been molested by a grandfather, who had passed away without ever acknowledging his wrongdoing. The survivor’s anger and desire for revenge became an obsession. She so focused on the crime that she completely missed the opportunity she had been given to learn about real love, forgiveness and letting go. In its place, she seemed to believe that hatred would satisfy her thirst for vengeance and would somehow bring healing. As a result, this individual repeated over and over, “I’ll never forgive.” One of my favorite examples to use with children and adults of a character who didn’t forgive was that of Darth Vader. He was so preoccupied with those who trespassed against him that his hatred and revenge turned him literally into a machine. What a powerful archetype Darth Vader is of vengeance.
To forgive can be a problem for some to conceptualize because it can be a concept that is obscure, especially to our Western perspective, simply because we have been bombarded by the ideas of “getting even” and “mercy is for the weak.” And many times, the concept of forgiveness gets confused with the concept of reconciliation, which is related to forgiveness. Tangentially, reconciliation and restitution are even more closely related than forgiveness and reconciliation, although all three terms are orbital. Restitution “denotes a return of something once present, but has been taken away or lost.” (Bible Dictionary. P. 761) Reconciliation comes from the Latin words re-, meaning “again,” and conciliare, which means “to bring together.”
Again, the difficulty surrounding forgiveness is an understanding of the difference between reconciliation and forgiveness. And in many instances persons who have wronged another do not “own up” to their mistakes, especially when pride is involved, thus restitution does not happen and reconciliation doesn’t take place. And when reconciliation is not present, then what is the victim to do? Most victims don’t realize that forgiveness is a choice on their part, no matter what the victimizer does, or does not, do. Furthermore, if the victimizer seeks reconciliation, that action and healing can only occur if the victim is willing and able to forgive. Forgiveness is always the victim’s, or the survivor’s, decision. Again and in addition, reconciliation is impossible except the victim/survivor is willing and able to forgive and the victimizer apologizes or restores that which has been taken or was lost. Now I have been using the verbs “willing and able” because there is something problematic concerning forgiveness—you can’t fully forgive until you can allow yourself to feel the pain you were caused. And in our Western society, it seems that everyone attempts to avoid pain, or any other emotion for that matter. This is why forgiveness can be tricky. And if we don’t feel that pain, something much more toxic will take its place—anger and revenge! This occurs because a person who does not allow the expression of pain unconsciously builds resentment. This resentment, as it builds, needs to find an outlet. This outlet may be a physical one, such as hypertension or headaches, but usually the outlet is a more psychological one, such as depression or anger (turned outward or inward towards one’s self).
I once worked with a gentleman who, after twenty years of work, was fired because of office politics. He came in to see me because of an addiction to pain pills. He was a very sophisticated individual and saw himself as an enlightened and intellectual individual. In groups, this man would make many wonderful insights into other group members. He revealed one day that he felt he was addicted to anger. Anger began to fill the void that drugs had occupied. He began to say in group, “Those bastards who took away my job… I did nothing wrong, they were intimidated by me and because of their power issues they fired me.” Of course, his former employer made no restitution, so therefore he could “never forgive them,” although at the time of his firing he had said to his wife, “Oh well, it’s not that big of a deal, I’m just going to forget about it.” He had prematurely forgiven his employer, which leads to resentment, which led him to become addicted to pain pills. Psychologically, the concept of “forget” is called “repressed.” And when something is repressed, it hangs around, under the surface, needing expression somehow, physically or emotionally. When pain is repressed, it drags down all the emotions associated with that pain, thus making forgiveness impossible, because on some level you are just “keeping score.” Forgiveness is not the same thing as forgetting. To forgive is simply to stop wishing for revenge or to stop wanting to see the other person suffer in some way. But forgiveness is not blind. Because trust has been violated you cannot just forget what happened or else the same thing might happen again.

The authentic self cycle is the antithesis to the shadow cycle. And as oil and water repel each other, so do the shadow and the light. As one increases in light, the shadow diminishes.
As a negative self-fulfilling prophecy occurred in the dysfunctional shadow identity cycle (negative beliefs lead to negative shadow behaviors, and negative shadow behaviors lead to negative shadow consequences that continuously feed the dysfunctional shadow identity), in the authentic self cycle, light beliefs, such as “I am a good person” lead to light behaviors, such as serving others, which lead to light consequences, which create a positive self-fulfilling prophecy, which in turn feed the authentic self.

existential abreaction

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Being and Eternal One-ness

Friday, April 13, 2012

Love Destroying Shame

Which issue runs in your family?