Cultivateyourlife’s Weblog

Ever noticed the meaning you assign to people, their actions, their words, even the way they “look” at you? As humans, we believe that we just ‘know’ what a simple expression another person makes means. We are certain that our interpretation of the world is not only correct, it is the only one!

I offer up this question: how do we know?

The meaning we assign to all aspects of our lives is not random. In fact, it is not even a choice until we begin to consider what it means to be responsible for the experience we know as human life span. This meaning-making is a phenomenon first described by the brilliant Swiss psychiatrist and founder of the school of analytical psychology, Carl Jung. It is the phenomenon of projection. We assign meaning not based on what another person says, but upon what we choose to hear through a filter that has been in place from the moment we began to develop a personality. Jung referred to it as ego, the illusory self, who we believe ourselves to be.

“We don’t see others as they are, we see others as we are, ” (paraphrased Anais Nin.) We cause ourselves and others a great deal of pain because we are constantly making meaning, extrapalting tiny threads of a conversation and weaving them into great meaning that supports who we think we are. It’s a woulded ego thing that is fueled by our shadow selves (see Jung).

An example of this would be if we worked very hard on a project and instead of receiving the feedback we desire, as in “what a great job you did!” we are told that the project is lacking, flawed or less that perfect somehow. From a shadow-self, wounded ego perspective, what we would hear is we are lacking, flawed, imperfect. The wounded ego cannot separate itself from the world. To the wounded ego, everything is about it.

The thing to pay attention to is when this happens to us. In the above example, the idea, not the person was lacking, but the ego could not make that leap. You can see how this creates untold suffering. The rememdy to this is to practice self-awareness and observation. 

Take the time to observe what reactions you have when you or your work is criticized. Notice how  you identify with what’s wrong rather than what’s right. Notice how you willingly take create and take on negative meaning. 

The old warning that instructs, don’t take things so personally, is born from this same concept. Much to the ego’s dismay, everything is not about us. 

So, I began today like any other. I had a 7:30 a.m. coaching call. I coached my client ( and dear friend) about how transient life is. I discuss the fact that the height of arrogance is to believe that we know…that we know anything at all about the future.

I complete the call.

The phone rings. It is my husband. He tells me that he is with one of our daughters. Her 10 year old yellow lab has been shot and killed by a neighbor. Her other two dogs are injured, one seriously.

The contents of this incident are insignificant, although brutal. The process is the thing. What do I do with this information? What are my choices and what does this mean? And, most importantly, how can I support my daughter?

Emotionally, I am flattened. This brings up all of my unprocessed grief. My dad…whose name the dang dog shared, my deceased husband and only God knows what else. I have nothing else to offer today beyond the reality I began today with: we do not know what the next moment holds. Our lives can change in a moment.

Today, my unprocessed pain is projected onto a dog who was a part of our family. And while I comprehend that the loss of a dog at the hand of another who is armed with a shotgun is not considered murder, I must assert that the loss is cathartic for me and my daughter.

What I know for sure? This, too, shall pass.

Eventually.

God speed.

As I write, I witness my mind in rewind x8. Just today I went to see my mother in my old hometown. I didn’t really “see” her, I brought her most recent batch of laundry and a few new spring outfits I thought she might enjoy. I didn’t have time to visit.  It was strange to travel those old roads of my childhood while practicing “presence.”
As I drove down the old “drag” I couldn’t help but consider the strained and oppressed life I had lived as a child and teenager. I passed an old friend’s house and recalled the lie I told my parents so that I could attend a sleep over. Normal. Normal. That’s what attracted me most. It just seemed so peaceful and uncomplicated at my friend’s house.  But, what do I know? I have no clue as to what went on when I wasn’t there. Yet, I still believe that it was more normal than my home. Evidence? They had company over! That is something I dared not ever do. My family life was too unpredictable. Anything could happen at any moment.
Today, I can say that this is most probably true of any family. I offer the movie, Friendly Persuasion, as evidence. I won’t digress into a synopsis of this movie now, but suffice it to say that we are all damaged. We all evolve and grow within the limitations of our unique family history.
I have lived in the shadow of my story, my fears, my illusion of who I am and from whom I came, and it is with great respect and honor that I can finally say that I am at peace with my life. I am at peace with my family, my self righteous positions and I have arrived at a place of sincere compassion for the heavy burden my sister carried.

The end of this part of my  story is that I learned extremely early on to seek and identify the One who would help me survive. That was my sister. She never asked for the job, but what choice could she have had? She was set up by life, serendipitously it seems, to be both my savior and my demon. With her approval, I survived to be the woman I am today. Without it, she became the target of all my childish blame, excuses and judgments that kept me small and minimized all the ways our souls needed to collide for the benefit of countless people.
I cannot say, at this moment, how relieved I feel to finally and forever be free of my emotional and innocent need to have my sister’s approval. Maybe in the near future we can actually be authentic with each other and  be sisters, not just by blood, but by choice.
What I have written here and chosen to share is a raw and unedited version of my growing awareness of the fragile line I…we all…walk between what is possible in Awareness and the heavy cost of steady sleep.
My self-righteous position that my sister is/was a sanctimonious, self-righteous bitch has become the perfect mirror for me to see my own self-righteousness.
My sister is a very, very brave woman who has loved me as well as I would allow. Not perfect…no she is not that, but she is human and she did protect me and she was hated for it by all who had their toxic guilt to contend with.
I grant all of us absolution from the past and I embrace, with all of my heart, the gifts I have received from the human foibles of those who went before me.
What a relief.

The personal history that my sister and I share is rich with fodder for a dysfunctional relationship. It’s been rife with opportunities to love, hate and misunderstand each other. I’m not placing blame when I say that our home was filled with frightening uncertainty that had a lasting imprint on my own personal narrative as well as that of my sister. I can’t speak for her, but I can tell you what my experience was. This is the personal account of the birth of a self-righteous position.

I was born in 1955 to a World War II US Navy veteran and a strikingly beautiful and intelligent woman. I was the second, last and not planned for child. My mom doesn’t think I know, but I was the surprise. My sister had been born just a little over seven years earlier and she was destined to be an only child. Mother was of frail health and was under doctors orders not to have any other children. By looking at the old family photos, it becomes almost painfully obvious that my arrival was not on anyone’s radar. The photos tell the story that my sister was a doted on child who was given all the attention and love my parents, aunt, uncle and grandparents could offer her. The years before my birth were golden. With hindsight, I can say that I am happy she shared in the golden days of my parent’s Camelot. The years ahead would not prove to be happy ones.

By the time of my birth, my paternal grandmother, for whom I would be named, had suffered a massive and fatal coronary attack as she waited in the car for my grandfather to close his barbershop. My mother’s health had been further compromised and my father’s alcoholism was becoming apparent along with its catastrophic consequences.

Still, my birth was, by all accounts, uneventful. I was wrapped in swaddling blankets and brought home, a new life to celebrate in the wake of such a loss, the sudden and disappointing death of my grandmother. The few photographs of the days surrounding my birth were taken with a Polaroid, clear evidence of the classical post WWII, abundant lifestyle to which I was born. I was precious, they looked happy, my sister looked concerned.

In 1960, I began my first year of school, kindergarten. My first memories begin at about the same time.  They appear to me as fragments, bits and pieces that don’t always make sense. The substance of dreams, flashes of recall when the world and everything in it was huge and I was not. I was not.

Somewhere in between the time I was born and the time that my brain began to record retrievable memory, I already knew that my survival depended on my sister. I knew at some very basal and organic place within me that she was my protector and savior.

This is the moment that the seed of my self righteous position was planted. It germinated and then thrived as a growing dependency on my sister for my survival. In a world in which I was dwarfed by alcoholism, combat flashbacks, serious family illness that took my mother from the home and deeper family dynamics that cannot be expressed now, I understood well, instinctively that my survival depended upon a 12 year old.  Her approval of me meant my life. I did whatever it took to ensure I was on her good side,did what she asked to remain under the protection of her good humor.

I’ve only recently come to understand the life-long impact this conclusion would have on both of us separately and together.

That will be the subject of part III.