Signs & effects of hypervigilance in the COVID age

In almost every part of the world there is some region where the menace of COVID is full blown to the point where it never feels far away.  Even in comparatively safe quarters, perhaps a state or two away from an epicentre, we get the distinct impression that the second or third wave is only a matter of time away.  This can have either a very disconcerting affect, or lingers in the background, and either way there is the ever-present possibility that we become hypervigilant about the future, and in doing so the present moment is forever interrupted.

COVID is part of the ambient environment.  It is part of the climate within the psyche of humanity wherever we go.  And though we may joke about how woeful 2020 is in comparison to 2019, what we cannot escape is an inescapable reality. With every day that passes we come to the realisation that our world is not only changing, as in present tense, but that it has changed.  Those 2019 nostalgias are gone forever, and this can only leave us in the state of grief, unless it is that we insist there are possibilities and opportunities in our midst.  There enters faith.

Amid all the problems we face in this present day — the medical, or threat thereof, the social, and the insurgent financial — and all the effects that spinoff of these, there is a myriad of attack upon our peace.  Hope can become invisibly constrained, and we hardly recognise that hypervigilance leads to anxiety, which bleeds into depression, leaving us feeling relentlessly assailed.

The signs and effects of hypervigilance in this COVID age should seem obvious, certainly from the signs of the ever-present nature of the media overwhelm, but the signs and effects are not always immediately detected or discerned.

Signs can include:

§     reading up about conspiracy theories and, worse, propagating them 

§     giving into temptation to imbibe unreliable sources of information

§     becoming political about it all, and not seeing the enemy in conflict

§     reading and listening to too much media

§     getting involved in too many discussions about COVID

§     discussing it too much with children

The fact is we all need a little bit of peace from this relentless barrage that sends us quickly into overwhelm.  We are facing a marathon, and we will not go the distance or survive at all well if we are sprinting all the way.

The effects of taking too much on board are:

§     getting overly concerned about those things we cannot control – if we cannot control something, what is the use in becoming befuddled about it?

§     insisting others come to our side of arguments on any issue (notice the emphasis I’m placing on the word ‘insisting’) – even if our views are right, we can quickly put people off by how stubbornly passionate we are in demanding they adopt our view

§     others are noticing you’re a little erratic and you may feel you’re losing friends

§     when we enquire on our thinking, and find that we are overly negative the majority of the time – it’s so good to notice these inner trends

§     situations where the simple things in life can no longer be appreciated – if anything, we may be able to appreciate the simple things in life all the more now

Of course, the common denominator in all of this is a life that’s swinging more and more wildly out of balance, and we all have times when our lives need balance restored.

More now than ever we need balance to stay in balance.

Photo by Belinda Fewings on Unsplash

The slow and awkward ascent out of depression

It may be fair to say that everyone who has suffered depression would prefer not to have suffered from it, even if depression can open the eyes of our heart and teach us compassion, grace, acceptance, patience, kindness and empathy.

It may also be fair to say that everyone who has suffered depression has tried, at least minimally, to claw their way out of it.  This is where faith sets us up on a quest to overcome the prevalence or depth of the bond we have come to have with the black dog.  Without faith, we can plummet further and further down the sinkhole of despair.  With faith at least there is hope for a better day ahead, or at least better days more often, and something of a purpose from the suffering.  And yet, with faith there are still experiences of anguish that are beyond our ability to bear.  Faith helps, and it is best to be relied upon, but it is no silver bullet in solving the immediate concerns of depression.

The slow, awkward, gradual ascent out of depression, firstly, is possible in many cases, but not in every case; management of the illness depends heavily on the vagaries of the person, the circumstances, the case overall, assisted by many forms of help.

For some, it is a case of meds for a prolonged period, even over a lifetime in some cases, which is not a bad thing in and of itself, if it allows the person to function and to gain more enjoyment of and control over their life.  Many of these people we would not have a clue about, as they keep their private struggle as a closely held truth.  Others are more transparent.  Neither is right nor wrong.  The slow and awkward ascent out of depression for these looks like a satisfaction within what cannot be changed, and I think you will agree that takes enormous strength of character, and faith, to do.

For others, depression is something that we suffered for years, before some intervention or bunch of interventions brings miraculous light into their darkness; the tangible circumstances change or one’s outlook changes to cope with what is (which is the bigger miracle of a gracious acceptance; a revelation that comes from God).  All of these are incredible stories, and until we get to know some of these people, we don’t realise how much this does happen.  There are walking miracles around us everywhere.  They deserve to be encouraged because of the encouragement they are, that there is a power of God that can heal.  But we must stop short of legislating that God heals all in this way — because that simply isn’t how life is.  We must accept that this is a mystery we cannot comprehend.

Then there is the depression caused by loss, felt in the horror of grief.  Whilst this is not classic depression, it does mimic clinical depression, and the full assortment of depressive signs and symptoms is experienced by the person in their grief, together with anxiety in many.  Whilst the passage of tumultuous grief may last between a few months and a year, typically, there will still be an enduring modality of occasional depression that the sufferer will continue to sink into for years to come — the pattern is, a day here, a day there.  This can be redeemed by faith in that we can perceive that we are being taught something we are otherwise wouldn’t have a clue about.  The world needs many more teachers who have experienced this suffering firsthand.  There is something definitely ethereal about those who keep in safe and productive contact with their depression.  These often become wounded healers.

The slow and awkward ascent out of depression is, therefore, a very complex thing to chart.  The main thing is that we have a hope for a better day overall, and better days in the immediate and medium-term.  Faith carries us in the meantime, especially when life is at its hardest, when humility will have us surrender enough to reach out for help to get through the darkest of days.

The ascent out of depression is necessarily slow and awkward — one day forward, one day back, back and forth for weeks or months — as much for gaining a precious respect for the complexities of our being and of our mental health, which we may otherwise take for granted.

Ascending out of depression gives us a fresh appreciation for what we previously did not know, and an empathy for those who have been on or will go on such a journey.

And, finally, if we have not yet ascended out of our depression, hearing accounts from those who have are the encouragements we need, so we can believe that we, too, will one day soon ascend, in what will become our own testimony of ascension.

We are all on this journey of life, and while we all have some of the answers, none of us has all the answers.  Especially with depression, there are copious exceptions to the ‘rules’ we have come to believe in, and it is best that we throw the rule book out if we genuinely want to understand each unique sufferer.

One thing we just have to appreciate in anyone who has recovered from depression, is that there is usually years of learning, of life experience, of suffering many would not have a clue about, of being beaten and rebounding, of profound overcoming, that can only be unequivocally respected.

Photo by Alex Wigan on Unsplash

Do you ever wonder if forgiving yourself is most of the battle?

In acknowledging the presence of conscience, knowing we would’ve done things differently had we known better, even if we know better now, and having made or being willing to make amends, we can rest easy, forgiven.  Reconciliation within is necessary before we can offer it to others.  But it’s still a struggle, and it can be exhausting — forgiving ourselves.  Because we crave to be at peace, forgiving ourselves is but the first step on our healing journey.

You didn’t know what you were doing.  You do now.  Retrospect can be the cruellest of judge.  You didn’t know what you were accepting was going to lead where it did.  You know now.  You didn’t know what a course of action would inevitably cost you or your loved ones.  You didn’t know.  Should have known?  But how?  And you do know now.  And even in situations where we did plunge into things where angels may have feared to tread, we got to experience some unintended consequences and unanticipated things, and these events have become part of our personal learning journey.

The point is about reconciling these matters, making peace with ourselves.  Regret can rip us apart when we allow retrospect to be a judging voice rather than a kind voice.

Retrospect is a funny thing.  We are so wise through the eyes of retrospect, through the vision of 20/20 hindsight.  Of course, we are!  We see everything as it panned out, all the while forgetting the complicating, confusing and confounding things that compromised us in the first place.

Seeing from retrospect, you see the fullest array of vision, from several angles, even in super slow-mo.  Every angle can be analysed, critiqued, criticised.  Yet, beforehand we had no idea and, how could we? We must forgive ourselves because we need to forgive ourselves, just as much because it would be unfair not to.  Just another application of Jesus saying, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they’re doing.”

Why is it that it’s sometimes easier to forgive somebody else, yet we may struggle to forgive ourselves?  Or, perhaps we can see now that we cannot forgive the other person until we can first forgive ourselves?

We go back into our mind’s eye and ask ourselves over and over again why we allowed ourselves to endure what we did, why we stayed, why we listened to certain people, why we let ourselves be pressured, why we didn’t back out earlier.  Yet, we can stop this anytime we want.  Yes, it may return and plague us.  But we have the opportunity to develop a new habit.

If we went right back into that situation all over again, knowing what we only knew back then, given our lack of life experience in that kind of situation, we can understand why we decided to do what we did.

We can go back to that version of ourselves and say, “I know you did your best – and we learned something, didn’t we? – I shouldn’t have judged you – thank you.”

Photo by Micah Tindell on Unsplash

Repentance, when Truth is a Sphere

The Lord showed me this about a month ago, and I’ve been praying about it ever since.  As God is inscrutable, as humility is unfathomable, as love is voluminous, as much as pride is vexing, and as much as sin is unavoidable, truth is so full of information that none of us can see all of it — only God can.

But we live as if we see it all — just like we ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

The Lord showed me that when I look at the truth, I see one surface on the sphere, and as far as my vision takes me on the horizons of it.  What I cannot see is the truth on the other side of the sphere.  No matter how hard I try, I cannot see it with my own eyes.  I need others who are positioned with a different viewpoint to tell me what I cannot see.  (This takes humility to ask, to listen, to accept the truth I cannot see — and I’m not always humble!)  Of course, others need to ask me what I can see as well.  And we can have 10 people around the sphere, and all will see something of the truth.  We all need each other.  And we all need to be able to listen.  We need to listen to not only those who tend to agree with us, but also to those who disagree with us, for those who agree with us see very similarly from the similar vantage points, and therefore see similar areas of the sphere — we of like mind do not see what those 180° away see.

Oh yeah, we yell our barbs.  “They have no idea!”  “What fools!”  Only it’s they who see what we cannot who are tempted to say the same thing about us.  From their viewpoint, our viewpoint looks ridiculous.  Hence many of the struggles that happen in all sorts of relationship situations.  He-said-she-said-he-said; all were speaking the truth, yet all had a different story.  At the extremes, it’s war.

Yes, of course there is abuse, and there are many situations where people honour their own truth as well as the other person’s truth — absorbing far too much of the burden of the relationship — and the other person owns nothing of the truth — getting off scot-free every time.  But by and large, as the truth would have it, which is not a very popular message these days, we all tend to be a little (okay, a lot) self-righteous — “I’m right (can’t you see?) and you’re wrong (for I can’t see, and don’t want to see, where you’re right).”

The truth has just as many dimensions as every degree in the three-dimensional phenomena that is the sphere.  How many degrees?  We could say 360° by 360°.  If only we carved the sphere up into little pieces in every plane.  I guess a mathematician could tell us, but I think you see the point.  It’s not physics, it’s a concept.  If I can see about 30% of the surface of the sphere, I cannot see the other 70% of the surface, and I certainly cannot see inside the sphere.

What on earth am I going on about?  If ever we test ourselves when we feel we are most right, we quickly find it’s the shortest route to a desperate sense of frustration.  Nobody ever exercised gratitude through being self-righteous, just a self-righteousness is no way to joy.  Whenever we are camped in our version of the truth, which is definitely part of the truth, but not all the truth because we cannot see it all, we find God’s Kingdom ever elusive.

How many times do we need to read Jesus? — those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted.  That’s such a stark truth.  So why do we stay in our version of the truth and refuse to be open to seeing another person’s version.  That’s because it crucifies our flesh.  It is the most loathsome feeling.  But the Christian life is about following Jesus — not ourselves.

When we comprehend that truth is a sphere, recognising that only God can see it all, and that we need others to educate us about what we cannot see, we begin to see that the only way forward is through repentance.  We do something remarkable. This thing is the thing that brought us to salvation in the first place.  So why have we gotten out of the habit of doing it?  Because of course we have become blinded to being right, to being deceived, to believing that we see as God sees.  When I put it like that, it’s pretty damning isn’t it?

I don’t expect that this article will be shared very much, liked or commented on.  Our times have bred even more the need to be right than at any other time, and our social media is the perfect platform to say it as it is — us in our rightness.

Trouble is, that’s not where God is.  And builds absolutely no cooperative effort — the very stuff of the Kingdom!  The only way we can be on God’s side is through repentance, returning back, again and again, agreeing that we need very much more than our own viewpoint.  If we lead by always being critical of others — and I’m learning how much of a hypocrite I can be — we are blind guides, no matter what stripe we wear.

COVID-19 and the great mask crisis

Earlier in the year it was the fact that there weren’t enough masks to go around, now is more the issue that people won’t wear them.  In my former career, as a safety and health advisor, we always trained people to accept things like masks, gloves and goggles — barriers against hazards — as the very last line of defence; when you had to rely on PPE your plight was pretty desperate and it was best that you wore it diligently.

Why is it that humanity is so vigilantly negligent to reject the last barrier to sickness and possible death?  Some cite their freedom.  I certainly understand others having a problem because it may trigger them.  That’s a hard one.  But it really seems such an easy thing for everyone who can to wear a mask, for their own safety and health, and for the health and safety of others.

If only we knew just how vital it was to wear a mask, especially when it is literally a piece of material between the coronavirus and infection.  The last line of defence.  The only barrier against the hazard, especially where we are at close quarters with others, especially when the virus is still rampant, and governments are scrambling to get economies back up and running.  It could well be a false economy!  Imagine now that we don’t know the full impact of illness to this virus.  We don’t know what the medium and long-term effects of it are, especially on our young people.

I believe that our human divisiveness is going to be the death knell of these times. When you have national leaders of entire countries downplaying the medical crisis because the economic crisis is overwhelming, it truly is a case that you’re damned if you do and your damned if you don’t; but at least leaders should take the medical impacts of COVID seriously.  They should wear masks and lead by example.

The great mass crisis has gone from non-availability to non-acceptability.  When it is the only thing that could protect us from the smallest particle of the infectious material, it is the only thing we can count on; that and the distance we can afford.  So now they are available, they need to be accepted and worn.  It is our personal and civic duty.

Under the control of, ‘I know what you need... just trust me!’

A most problematic abuse of power is anyone assuming they know what is best for the other person — particularly someone who assumes leadership in/over someone’s life.  This is most noticeable when, by hook or by crook, they insist on having their way; and the person is therefore beholden to take advice and to implement what is being demanded of them.

If someone demands you do something, and they have no legal or moral authority to do so, and their demand isn’t for some legal or moral reason, some pushback is certainly within your grasp and opportunity to do, and it is wise to do so — though it does involve courage and risk in terms of facing off with someone who is possibly very forceful.

In all reality, there are few situations where anyone could truly know what you need.  Only God will truly know what you need, though there are people we trust who have also our best interests in mind.  Remember trust is earned.  Nobody can force you to trust them.

Sometimes we can be tempted to go with advice we’re given because we, ourselves, are unsure how to do something, or why, or what to do.  Just because you’re uncertain is no reason to be bullied into taking a course of action that you’ll ultimately be responsible for; that’s like driving a vehicle with your eyes closed.

When people are uncompromising with you — where they demand something of you through coercion or manipulation or blackmail — a slippery slope of threat is being encountered.  You agree to submit at your peril, but you also face a clear and present danger in resisting them.  From both situations, escape is difficult, but at least if you take courage to resist, you forecast your truth even if it’s scarier.  To not forecast your truth leaves you liable for, “How come you trusted me and now you don’t?”  It leaves you wide open for any number of accusations — “You’re untrustworthy,” “You don’t know what you want or what’s good for you,” etc.

If you face a tyranny where it’s an authority misusing their power — where you may be unsure if you’re being seditious of not — it’s best to get some wiser, impartial others around you in an attempt to understand the intricacies of the situation, to unravel right from wrong, as a means of finding a way forward to safety.  Nobody ought to make matters worse by ignoring a legal or moral requirement, but just the same, nobody should be forced to kowtow to belligerent control.

None of this is about not taking good advice.  But good advice is inherently positioned as a choice. When people give us the choice to do something wise or not, it’s up to us.  There is a nuance to this that needs to be understood though: if someone gives us a choice where one choice carries with it a threat, there is still a veiled demand there; (unless, by clear example, of breaking the law or moral code).  The best advice we can receive is, “This is what I think, and it is up to you whether you listen to it or not; whether you listen or not won’t affect our relationship, but now that you know I won’t feel responsible for not telling you.  It’s up to you.  And I won’t even say, ‘I told you so’.”

What I’m forecasting here is the nature of some relationships that are wholly contingent on doing something.  “Do this or I won’t be your friend any more...”  The exception to this, however, is, “If you don’t do this [thing to keep me safe] I will leave you.”  So, it’s not my intent here to make it easy for an abuser to gaslight someone by saying, “You can’t ‘threaten’ me like that,” when they’re not really being threatened, but they’re being appropriately warned.  Everyone has the right to be treated with respect, to be listened to, to seek to be understood.

It is a red flag for anyone to presume to know what you need without taking your thoughts into account, without listening to you, by rejecting your own thoughts about your own life.  And this is where you enter gaslighting territory; when the person continues the attack to the point where you feel you must justify your position about your own life — especially watch for them going in for the kill if you show one sign of buckling to their ‘reason’.

Love, on the other hand, seeks to convey truth, always recognising each life is its own life.  Love also recognises that it fails to love whenever it demands control.

When a gaslighting narcissist attempts to dupe the therapist

Not many therapists will admit they’ve been tried on, but it’s all part of the territory I’m afraid. Narcissists come in so many different shapes and sizes, from the outright convincing types to the humorous, charming types to the belligerent types to the wearing down, false-repentance types.

It’s not always easy for counsellors, pastors and therapists to detect what’s ‘going on in the room’ even if their psychopathy antenna is fully extended in discernment.  Sometimes it takes a few sessions to add up the all the stimuli of manipulation because of the subtleties involved, especially as the narcissist is adept to groom the one they weaponise — yes, the professional who ought to see it coming — against the partner they’re actively though perhaps are covertly abusing.

Many counsellors, pastors and therapists assume the best of both parties, especially as they’re there to advocate for both, even to the extent of calling both into the realm of challenge and growth.  The only problem is, in the dynamics of psychopathy in one, there will always be the wearing of blame, incompetence, failure, etc, in only one; the other getting away scot-free two minutes to midnight.  It is amazing how late the phoenix rises from the ashes at times, especially when the therapist thinks they’ve had it all under control until just before the session closes.

This is a warning for anyone who’s eventually had their partner submit to the process of ‘getting help’ only to find it backfire on them.  The other scenario of course is when the gaslighter insists they’re the ones being constantly maligned, and despite every effort made under the sun, the one who is abused psychologically in so many ways is under the tyranny of not only the partner, but the therapist who’s being duped.

One thing I’ve come to appreciate is that therapy completely doesn’t work with some people.  They will never submit for the betterment of their relationship.  It must always go their way, even if they make ‘elegant’ concessions that look like they’re fully invested.  It’s like the half-dozen or dozen sessions and there isn’t a skerrick of a shift.  It’s a waste of time because it’s a deeply conflicted relationship — both blame the other — or one is genuine and doing too much and the other is skating along, seemingly doing their work but ultimately there is no fruit of change; zero repentance.  This is such a tragedy for the other person who is fully invested.

Counsellors, pastors and therapists need to be wary of:

§     falling for compliments, politeness, and even reverence that are based in jelly flattery – being worked over is a very common ploy, and the confirmation of this is achieved in the the pushback of, “I see you,” which meets with the response of, “Gee, I was only being polite!”

§     demonstrative performances of dismay, disgust, non-acceptance of process, and anything that reeks of pride OR excessively expressed sorrow that doesn’t remain – whilst everyone is allowed to overreact occasionally, patterns of behaviour are indicative, and observations should be trusted

§     use of the Bible and theological principles to ‘school’ the pastor or counsellor about how bad the partner is (“Look how bad she is”) OR the use of the same principles to hide within self-righteousness (“Look how good I am”) OR to feign a wrong and practice/demonstrate a fake repentance in order to ‘lead’ the pastor or counsellor toward coming down hard on the other person to repent in response – therapist: “Look how sorry they are; why are you not forgiving them?” – so much spiritual abuse is possible in a so-called therapeutic session

§     compliance in one by silence – the less they say, the less they incriminate themselves – in other words, the therapist may unfortunately impute good behaviour (and worse, good motives) in the one who silently hides within their silence

§     compliance in one by silence where the therapist does the opposite – “Oh, I see, they’re not saying much because they’re not trying/full of resentment (etc)!” – then we have the possibility of abuse occurring if the therapist or counsellor or pastor senses an affront to their role, and hence, because of indignant pride or fear, they endeavour to take control (therapists, counsellors and pastors must be beyond personal affront or offence)

§     out and in the clear gaslighting takes place and the counsellor, pastor or therapist fails to see how their own reality caves in OR they fail to detect the presence of the act of gaslighting right there in the room!  Again, this can be so subtle it’s occurred to the counsellor at 2 AM the next morning when they wake up in a cold sweat and know they’ve been had – and it is ever more tragic when the non-abusing partner knows what’s being done in the room and the professional is clueless!

I could go on, but for the purposes of brevity I want to herald the warning that these are very real and common dynamics that all counsellors, pastors and therapists encounter frequently.  It has to be called.  If it is called and the person who’s trying the manipulations on recognises it and responds by getting onto the agenda of the shared goal, all well and good, but very often they don’t.  If they appear to be repeat offenders, where it’s discerned right there in the room, the process should be paused — and a moratorium implemented.

Quite frankly, narcissistic gaslighters will either attempt to control the dynamic or they will.  Most often they succeed, because they expect to succeed and by their character, they’re relentless.  There are no winners.

Photo by Aman Shrestha on Unsplash

Picked up winsomely & either dropped without a care or held by threat

Many romances start one way and end the opposite way.  But it’s not just romances.  The pattern of being picked up as if you were the most special prize on the planet, yet you are unceremoniously dumped when you’re of no use anymore, highlights something of a learning experience.  Hopefully we don’t need to learn the hard way again.

There are two equal but opposite problems within relationships with narcissists — you’ll either not be able to extract yourself or you will find yourself no longer of use to them in a very sudden way.  Both of these outcomes are tormenting realities for the person who fell for the charm that the narcissist had in spades in the early stages of the relationship.

Charm is one of the ploys.  So are the dynamics of ending the relationship.  Could I be so crude as to say that there would be a 50/50 split between narcissists on the one end who imprison their partners, holding them by threat, and those at the other end who abandon their partners, dropping them without a care.  Either way you have a situation that leaves you confounded for response.  You’re left picking up pieces or unable to move.

There truly is little wonder that the destruction caused may leave the injured party maimed for some time, and in some cases for the rest of their lives.  This is because such a situation feels impossible to reconcile.  The innocent party is left high and dry.  They were conned.  There is no correspondence to be entered into for the narcissist.  They have no account to make.  And no amount of asking them to apologise will get you what you want.  There is only one who will despair and it isn’t the narcissist.

The thing we need to do is to train our empathic young people, and empathic people of all ages, about the snares of these people who pick up people with such skill of charm, which is a big red flag, only to abandon or imprison.

Like any deal that seems too good to be true, a relationship is just the same.  If it feels too good to be true, watch out, for there may be a peril to be faced once the veneer of charm wears off.  And that peril could be something that has the power to change the course of your life.

Photo by Radu Florin on Unsplash

The unacknowledged trauma in a narcissistic abuser

It is amazing to get to work with men who have been brought through calamitous circumstances to a precipice of great loss.  The ones who succeed embark on a searching and fearless moral inventory, and they battle with the perils of fear even as they face truths that have previously been beyond them; truths that shackled them to lies, secrets, deceptions, and other dark things that wrought havoc in the closest relationships, and very often left a trail of destruction strewn through the valley of their wake.

For one hundred that do face their demons, so many either don’t go the journey or completely baulk at the first glimpse of pain.  I say ‘men’ because I’ve worked with men.  I also want to discuss men, because it’s us masculine beings who tend to most commonly carry the darker secrets that hold us cavernously apart from healing.

The narcissistic abuser has unacknowledged trauma in the past that emerges in the stress of the present which paves for present and future consequences.  They cannot bear the pain of rejection, abandonment, parental ambivalence — whatever you want to call it — or, just as much, the pressure to succeed, because, of course, they’ve been coached incessantly about how ‘special’ they are.  The covert narcissist is someone given to the insecurity of shame — and that pain is too humiliating.  The overt narcissist is someone given to the insecurity of a mirage — they cannot see their abysmal flaws.  Both live in ‘the other’ so much because the self is an empty shell.  All of this is due to the only thing they cannot do.  They cannot and will not enter their pain.  You just don’t see them committing to wrestling with their brokenness.

The unacknowledged trauma could be healed if only they’d enter the vulnerable space and journey with both: 1) where they were met with disdain or were nurtured to be entitled in their development, and 2) the secrets, the lies, the deceptions, and the manipulations they’ve engaged in, very often as a direct cover for how they were missed in their developmental years.

There’s nothing wrong with being missed in our development.  Any of us who have been parents, if we are honest, know how much we contributed to the brokenness in our own children — and that’s for children who had a normal upbringing that didn’t feature any abuse.  Children who face abuse have so much more to process, but recovery isn’t beyond anyone.  Certainly those who roll up to therapy sessions for months and years, being honest about their pain, can attest to the slow process but positive trajectory of recovery.

But the narcissistic abuser cannot and will not go there.  Some of them by intention, and others because they plainly cannot see any weakness, or any propensity that they are inherently malevolent, at all.  So instead of healing, they go on and continue doing heinous deeds.

But the man who commits to a process of entering his pain, who may have denied it all his life, who rejected the pain of rejection instead of entering into it, has an immortal hope.  What I mean by that is this.  This man’s love ones had no idea that he would be open to transformation.  That he is, that’s a massive answer to prayer.  And little by little he scratches his way through his past, debunking the guilt of his upbringing and the shame of his deeds since.  He does this because he is on a quest to make amends — unless where to do so would injure.  Facing truth for the very first time, he is astounded by the temerity of the pain he must endure.  It takes him to a rock bottom emotionally every single time, but he quickly learns that God is there, and that because ‘this, too, shall pass’, he finds that God is faithful.  Little by little, hour after day after week after month, he makes progress.  Progress, not perfection.  He and his family rest satisfied.  They are rewarded for his humble submission.  Less lies, less deceit, less manipulation, less entitlement.  More truth, more reliance on God, more repentance, more sincere apologies.

The only thing that stands in our way in our healing journey, is the capacity to be honest.  For honesty, we please God because we love others, purely for the fact that we can see our wrong, and we avoid self-righteousness, because we have been honest about our capacity to sin.

Who would have thought that God could and would heal us if only we were honest about our shortcomings?  God is indeed faithful.

Photo by Alfred Kenneally on Unsplash