Hi JW,
First of all, again thank you for reading my book and for writing to me to let me know your thoughts on it. It meant a lot to me.
Yes, you told me about your parents a little bit before, but not as detailed as this time. I am so sorry you had a mother so obsessive with cleanness, every obsession is a flight to escape from having to face and feel the fears of the repressed child we once were. I am glad you were able to find understanding for yourself and your parents and connect with them as an autonomous adult, and you able to let them know how you felt as a child before they passed.
“My new understanding and the positive regard I now have for them makes me think that Alice Miller might give a real "talking to" if I told her my story. What do you think? I trust you utterly to be a close relationship with Alice and her life's journey...”
I am a little confused by the words above. Who do you mean you like to tell your story to? Alice Miller? Are you aware that Alice Miller passed away on April 14, 2010?
No, I don’t know any clinicians or experts who are carrying on Alice Miller’s work. I think you are referring to Dr. Gabor Maté. I quote him in my book on page 36 -- he understands well the reasons for mental illness, addictions and chronic illnesses that are linked to childhood loss and trauma. I quote him once in my book to prove that are other professionals saying what Alice says. He does a good analysis of the causes but recommends the same old tools, like yoga and meditation. These tools only it does, is manipulate people feelings, giving the illusion that it helps, but is just a temporary and superficial fix, because at the end strengthens people repression and making it harder to resolve, and as long people go on repressing their authentic feelings, they will be driven by them into repetition compulsion sooner or later in one form or another. Here is were most professionals get stuck and keep their patients stuck. Feeling the full range of the repressed feelings of the child they once were is too scary for most people.
I hope my book will be a valuable kick-starter for others that are looking to really understand themselves and others. The fact that the IQ scores are increasing doesn’t give me much hope, because from my experience the smarter people are, the more they use their sharp intellect to come up with rationalizations and seductive theories to evade and run by creating a smokescreen to cover up and hide the facts and evidence from themselves and others. It takes courage to face and feel our repression, intelligence alone is not enough, but it rather helps create pretty seductive lies and illusions.
I agree with you that the world is a big beehive and any disturbance in the periphery and with the aid of technology can affect the entire hive nearly instantaneously. If society doesn’t wake up from the effects of childhood repression soon, we will destroy ourselves much faster with the aid of technology. Like Alice Miller said in her letter to you with title We all are the crew “I agree with you. But to become aware of the fact that our obedience learned in childhood doesn't allow us to think freely needs probably more than many hundred years. I am not sure if the tortured planet leaves us the necessary time to understand this fact, to protest against it, and to become a conscious, responsible member of the crew.”
Take good care my friend and feel free to write to me with any more questions you might have.
Much love,Sylvie
Comments on Facebook from the sharing of this post
Monica Chelagat Awake deep in the night here with my smartphone in bed (bad habit! 😕). Just saw this comment. After the recent attacks in France, the concept of destruction feel so real. This is of course exacerbated by my geographical location here in Italy and the daily arrival of several hundreds of refugees from the middle east and Africa. I am afraid to say that if Alice Miller were alive today she would probably be catastrophic. It is too late it is only a question of time. The middle east and Africans of the Islamic religion are so brainwashed by religion and see no hope in the two cultures integrating. Forced integration now is further repression delaying individual evolution. What is happening in many Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia is shocking like stoning women circumcisions lashing in public... The bees are already out of control.
Sylvie Imelda Shene Yes, Monica. The bees are out of control and religions are nothing, but a big distraction and tools to keep people’s repression intact, making things worse, because religion is debated instead of the real
issue -- childhood repression -- and as long the real issue is avoided, it will just keep getting worse until it destroys everything in its path. It’s like there is a huge elephant is in the room and everyone is avoiding it, pretending it’s not there because it’s just too painful for most people to face and feel the painful truth that they are children of parents that could not love. And they just go on masquerading with this illusion of love deceiving themselves and others, just like their parents deceived them when they were defenseless little children.
“We cannot really love if we are forbidden to know our truth, the truth about our parents and caregivers as well as about ourselves. We can only try to behave as if we were loving, but this hypocritical behavior is the opposite of love. It is confusing and deceptive, and it produces much helpless rage in the deceived person. This rage must be repressed in the presence of the pretended “love,” especially if one is dependent, as a child is, on the person who is masquerading in this illusion of love.” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 23
“MY MAIN CONCERN in this present book is with the effects the denial of our true and strong emotions have on our bodies. Such denial is demanded of us not least by morality and religion. On the basis of what I know about psychotherapy, both from personal experience and from accounts I have been given by very many people, I have come to the conclusion that individuals abused in childhood can attempt to obey the Forth Commandment* only by recourse to a massive repression and detachment of their true emotions. They cannot love and honor their parents because unconsciously they still fear them. However much they want to, they cannot build up a relaxed and trusting relationship. Instead, what usually materializes is a pathological attachment, a mixture of fear and dutiful obedience that hardly deserves the name of love in the genuine sense of the word. I call this a sham, a façade. In addition, people abused in childhood frequently hope all their lives that someday they will experience the love they have been denied. These expectations reinforce their attachment to their parents, an attachment that religion creeds refer to as love and praise as a virtue. Unfortunately, the same thing happens in most therapies, as most people are still dominated by traditional morality. There is a price to be paid for this morality, a price paid by the body. Individuals who believe that they feel what they ought to feel and constantly do their best not to feel what they forbid themselves to feel will ultimately fall ill---unless, that is, they leave it to their children to pick up the check by projections onto them the emotions they cannot admit to themselves."
From the Preface, the Body Nerve Lies, page 14, 15
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