On the spot not to spank

"A child cannot be raised to be loving---neither by being beaten nor by well-meaning words; no reprimands, sermons, explanations, good examples, threats, or prohibitions can make a child capable of love. A child who is preached to learns only to preach and a child who is beaten learns to beat others. A person can be raised to be a good citizen, a brave soldier, a devout Jew, Catholic, Protestant, or atheist, even to be a devout psychoanalyst, but not to be a vital and free human being. And only vitality and freedom, not the compulsions of child-rearing, open the wellspring of a genuine capacity to love."

--Alice Miller

In 2003 I went to Portugal to inform people of the dangers of spanking children. Of course, I encountered much resistance, even from the children! One day I was babysitting my niece’s little 4-year-old girl. We played a game that she was the mother and I was her daughter. She spanked me because I did not do what she wanted.

“Why are you spanking me?” I asked her.

She said: “You are a bad girl, you are not doing what you were told.”

“Do your parents tell you that? Do they spank you?”

She said yes.

I tried to explain to her that spanking is not OK and that the reason she is being spanked is that her parents when they were little, were spanked by their parents. This upset her and she told me, with tears in her eyes: “you don’t understand, sometimes I am a very bad girl.”

I told her: “you are not a bad girl, you are just a little child, and it’s not your fault.”

She was very hyper because of the abuse she lived with and the constant fear.

Later we were walking in a very busy street on the way to my sister’s house near Porto. Testing me to see how I would handle her if she misbehaved, she refused to hold my hand and wanted to walk alone. This was a very dangerous street with extremely narrow sidewalks; if she fell into the street she could be run over by a car. But she kept letting go of my hand.

Of course, my first impulse was to spank her, because that’s what was done to me when I was a child. But I witnessed my impulse and why it was there and I resisted it. I looked for a nonviolent way to solve the problem. So I held her and sat on the step of a store and I told her: “I am not moving until you hold my hand” and I explained to her why. We sat there for a while and she kept wanting to go. I said: “I am only moving from this step if you promise to hold my hand until we get to Elza’s house.”

After a while, she got tired of sitting and promised to hold my hand and we enjoyed walking and talking the rest of the way, without having to resort to any violence.

Another day, I was at my nephew’s office with his three-year-old boy. The little boy grabbed one of the employee’s calculators and wanted to take it with him. I could feel everyone tensing up, wanting to grab the calculator from the little boy and give him a slap on the hand. But they restrained themselves because I had been telling everyone the dangers of hitting children.

The employee told my nephew he could take it home and bring it the next day. But this wasn’t an honest solution either. The calculator was his, not the little boy’s, and it was not a toy for children.

I took charge, sitting on the floor with the little boy holding the calculator in his hands. I told him: “I know this is going to be painful not to be able to take the calculator that you like so much, but it is not yours and we will not leave here until you give it back.”

I told him: “we cannot always have what we want and I also feel disappointed when I don’t get what I want and it’s ok to feel this way.”

I helped him accept his feelings and after about 20 to 30 minutes he understood what I said. Tears ran down his face and again I told him that I understood his pain and that it’s ok to feel sad, and then he gave the calculator back.

I accomplished all that without violence. Of course, I could have grabbed the calculator out of his hands, but that would have not taught the real lesson. Instead, it would have taught him the lesson of violence to pass to the next generation. The circle of violence is hard to break because the compulsion to repeat is great. But I was able to break it and this is the achievement in my life I am most proud of.

That day in my nephew’s office, I gave everyone there an example how to solve a problem with a child without violence. Of course to accomplish this took time. It would have been much faster to do it the old way with violence, but that would not have helped the little boy to learn to be and feel his own painful feelings when disappointed.

The Word "Safety" with Regard to Women

No, I don't want safety if it means losing myself and my freedom. I will risk it any day!

Since I can remember has been a constant fight for my freedom, independence, and autonomy. People trying to repress me always say is to keep me safe and to protect me! The sociopaths at my job of nine and half years, when they came up with the messy abusive package procedure, they also said to me that was for my protection! I was offended that they were too emotionally blind to see that I could see clearly that the package procedure they came up with was to set me up for failure so they would have something to pin me down with and put the little woman in her place.  As you can see by the words I wrote in an email  to another resident and I published in my blog Sunday, July 5, 2015 "I Guess the Shoe Fits Him":

Mr. K, the resident in the chair of security that I shared with the article about sociopaths, thinking he might help me. The security company said in the letter that he assumed I was calling him a sociopath. I guess the shoe fits him! Because as we NOW know, he was in on the plotting too. Once while back, he came to the gate and I had the TV on, it was on the CNN channel that was talking about the terrorism in the Middle East and he mentioned to me that the terrorism is solved by bombing all the Middle East, including women and children, kill everybody! And I told him: They think the same thing about us -- unless the whole society deals with the roots of what breeds terrorism here and aboard, always will be terrorism no matter how many wars we create and how many people we kill. Isn't this the talk of a sociopath?!  When they created the abusive and messy package receiving procedure, Mr. K came to the gate and I tried to explain to him how flawed their system was and he says to me: I am trying to protect you! Trying to protect me my ass. I knew he was lying then and now there is proof that he was lying. Every time someone tells me they are trying to protect me, it really means: I am trying to control you and repress you to manage my own fears. Just like I said in my blog They are Allergic to my Aliveness:  “And like my family they are using the same tactics by saying that is to protect me, but what they want to do is to put me in my place and show me who is in charge to manage their own fears and keep their own image, repression and little illusions intact. Just as Alice Miller says: “Conditioning and manipulation of others are always weapons and instruments in the hands of those in power even if these weapons are disguised with the terms education and therapeutic treatment.” For Your Own Good, P. 278

I share the same article with another resident and this person didn’t assume I was calling her a sociopath, as you Know XX was not part on the plotting to destroy me. As you see by XX’s words below, she thanked me for sharing the article about sociopaths with her.

“This [article] is very interesting and thank you.  I started to tell you this morning that when she told ME who she would distribute, that irritated me… …I may also mention that in the 25 years I've been a S resident, we have never had our guard gate run as efficiently as it is at the present time.  I will ask him if the evidence of package abuse supports the severe response by the board  --- how many requests for a tighter process has he received from residents -- etc.  I will also suggest that since this action defies sanity, could there possibly be another motive somewhere lurking in the shadows?  It simply makes no sense unless they have info I've not rec'd!  Well, we'll see -- hugs, X”

Also, the words I wrote below in another e-mail  and i published in my blog, February 14, 2015  "Cowards always get Others to do the Dirty Work for Them" -- talking about  the property manager that was really the one that started the very well methodical orchestrated smear campaign came to mind:

Reading the quote above, the property manager at the community where I worked comes to mind. She was very jealous of me and she and the board manipulated by her came up with a messy packages abusive procedure, but then I came up with a package procedure that was really efficient and she comes up to me saying: I heard you created a very efficient package procedure and I just ignored her, because I knew she was full of it and then she says: I am trying to give you a compliment! She was trying to give me a compliment my ass, she was seeing what else she could come up with to bring me down. She has everyone fooled, but she never had me fooled from day one, I knew I could not trust her. These words from an article I just read could not be truer: "13. Suspect Flattery

Flattery and compliments are different, and you should learn to tell them apart. Sociopaths use flattery as a tool for manipulation." Read more HERE 

Yes, I can tell when someone is genuine and authentic or when someone is trying to create a smoke screen to blind me and manipulate me.  

The quote below also articulates exactly what the property manager did. Totally she wanted to destroy me! And she got the new guy and the Security Company to finished the job she started, she is talented!!! 

Yes, they were very sneaky and very good at hiding, doing their evil acts behind closed doors.

To read more about my experiences with the mob of sociopaths or narcissists at my last job read my blog Experienced Knowledge  

Translation of the words "I don't agree with you"

Sylvie Imelda Shene shared a memory.

September 11, 2014

Translation of the words "I don't agree with you". I am a person that sticks to the facts and evidence, so when someone says to me: I don't agree with you, it means that the person can’t handle facing the facts and evidence at the moment. If necessary I have learned to walk away from anyone that don’t have the courage to open their eyes to see and feel the facts and evidence. I am done hitting my head against walls. Life is too short to waste with people that lack the courage to open their eyes to see and feel. Free at last!

Roger W.: True, intelligence can hide lots of faults, but only being close to people who always agree with you keeps you insulated. Being insulated from other points of view isn't healthy either.

Sylvie Imelda Shene It's not about agreeing about ideas. It's about being a seeing and feeling person. I have wasted enough time with unfeeling people in my life. Sorry but I am not wasting another minute of my life with unfeeling people. You either are a seeing and feeling person and emotionally honest and an authentic person or not.

Roger W.: Your original post seemed to indicate if someone didn't agree with you then they were a "person who can’t handle the facts and evidence"...

Sylvie Imelda Shene Usually when people say to me: I don't agree with you, they mean: the facts and evidence you are putting in front of me are too painful for me to face and feel. I totally understand because I know how hard it is to feel, but I don't have time for people that lack the courage to face and feel their own painful truth. People that are not capable of genuine feelings, they deceive themselves and others and they can become dangerous and that's why we live in world of lies and is a dangerous world because very few people are capable of feeling and seeing.