Guruism

Open Letter to the Participants in the Forum
May 2001

To Steven and all the others: I'm not a guru

Hi Steven, thank you so much for having raised the issue of "guruism" and your mistrust that I share with you. To be a guru-believer and wanting to grow is in my opinion a contradiction in itself because a guru sells his "wisdom" at the price of people's authenticity. I hope that nobody here will need to see in me a guru, especially if you make them aware of this danger to them, as you convincingly did in your letter of May 16 to Anna.
You wonder about my childhood. Like you I was a stranger to everybody in my family. Today, I know for sure that I was unwanted, rejected from the conception on, never loved, emotionally completely neglected, and used for the needs of others. But above all I was lied to, I grew up with a perfect hypocrisy. My parents, both absolutely unconscious of their true feelings, pretended to love me very much, and I believed this (because I so much needed this illusion) for more than 40 years of my life until I started to suspect the truth hidden behind their pretensions, hidden probably to them too.
Suspecting is not yet as much as knowing for sure but it was the start. It took me 20 years more to get rid of my denial because I was so alone with the knowledge of my body and my dreams, and a wall of denial surrounded me wherever I opened my mouth. Writing and painting were the only ways to continue with my search without being offended and "punished" for being the troublemaker.
The reactions to my writing showed me that what I discovered for me was true also for some others. I felt then less alone. I began to work with groups of young parents and found again and again the same pattern, the emotional blindness of parents who were afraid of confronting their past traumas and inflicting them unconsciously on their children. And now we are finding it together on this forum. Thus, for the first time in my life I no longer feel like a stranger, I feel belonging to a group of people who think like me, whom I don't need to convince, to inform, to shake, to wake up. I am here with people who are not scared by what I am saying, who understand me because they have known the same terror, who say so many things that move me profoundly and with whom I can openly communicate like I always wanted but was not given the chance.
This is more than I ever dared to wish. Talking freely about one's feelings, without using the well-known conventional defences was in my opinion possible only in dreams or on another planet. And now, surprisingly to myself, this became reality. Unbelievable!
So please don't see me like a guru, this would again put me in a special position where I no longer want to be. I am not your teacher or leader, am not giving advices or imposing anything on you, I am not your mother or grandmother, I am Alice, a sister in pain, like Bent's sister Toril who can tell him: I know what you are talking about, I know dad and mom and the answers they gave us because I can finally feel. And Bent can say the same to Toril. I am not the author here, I am one of the people who endured like you a horror in their childhood and who enjoy to know that what they say in English or German or whatever will not be received as sounding Chinese to others. Can you imagine that I had this feeling all my life until recently? Thank you all for being there.
Alice Miller
https://www.alice-miller.com/openletters_en.php?page=5

Suicide

Hearing about the recent suicide of the model/designer L'Wren Scott and seeing everyone blaming her suicide on her triggers and not on the real causes, it made me sad that people are so emotionally blind. It’s extremely sad when people die before exploring their history and understanding themselves, so ignorant repressed emotionally blind people could not exploit them anymore. She was exploited in life and now she is exploited in death by repressed people to push their sick hidden agendas in order to keep their own repression intact, and others have similar tragic fates. The fact she chose a violet method of suicide is unconsciously communicating to the world how angry she was, the anger she didn't understand and the world doesn't want to understand because that would require to face and feel their own repression. Her adopted sister says her sister was depressed because she never had children, but having children would not have prevented anything, but would have transmitted her traumas into her children to continue endlessly. Like she did, that had 8 children to exploit and use as a poisonous container to alleviate her own repression.

The words below written by Alice Miller came to mind: 

“Suicide is always the consequence of denied suffering in childhood, as is depression. I have written an article about depression, which you can read on my website. There I refer to many examples of very successful stars, such as Dalida for instance, the famous Egyptian singer, who in their lives got everything they wanted and were admired and famous. But in the middle of their lives, they became depressive and many committed suicide. In all these cases it was not the present that made them suffer, it was the denied traumas of their childhood that made them feel miserable because they were never consciously acknowledged. The body was left alone with its knowledge.”

http://www.alice-miller.com/interviews_en.php?page=4

“Many world-famous stars who are envied and idolized are in fact profoundly lonely people. As the example of Dalida indicates, they were misunderstood precisely because they could not understand themselves. And they were not able to understand themselves because their environment responded to them with admiration rather than understanding. Finally, they took their own lives. This vortex tells us a lot about the mechanisms of depression. People seek understanding by pinning their hopes to success, they take endless trouble to achieve such success and to arouse the admiration of an ever-larger audience. But this admiration cannot provide any real sustenance as long as understanding is absent. Despite the success they have made of their careers, life is meaningless because they remain strangers to themselves. And this self-alienation persists because they want to completely forget what happened to them in their early lives and to deny the sufferings of childhood. As this is the way society functions, these stars were bound to remain misunderstood and suffered the torments of chronic loneliness.

The categorical denial of the pain we suffered at the beginning of our lives is harmful in the extreme. Suppose someone setting out on a long walk sprains an ankle right at the outset. That person may decide to ignore the pain and to soldier on because he/she has been looking forward to the outing, but sooner or later others will notice that they are limping and will ask what has happened. When they hear the whole story they will understand why this person is limping and advise him/her to go for treatment. But in connection with the sufferings of childhood, which play a similar role in our lives to a sprained ankle at the beginning of a long hike, then things are different. Those sufferings cannot be "played down," they will leave their mark on the whole enterprise. The crucial difference, in this case, is that normally no one will take any notice. The whole of society is, as it were, in unison with the sufferer, who cannot say what has happened. It may well be that, despite the violation of their integrity, people who have been injured in this way really have no memories. If they have to spend their whole lives with people who play down the traumas of childhood, then they have no choice but to connive in this self-delusion. Their lives will progress in much the same way as the outing of the hiker who has sprained his ankle but pretends that nothing has happened. Should they, however, encounter people who know about the long-term effects of childhood traumas, then they will have the chance to abandon their denial and good prospects of healing the wounds they have been carrying around with them.

Most people are not so fortunate. The celebrities among them are surrounded by hosts of unsuspecting admirers, none of whom recognize the distress afflicting the stars they idolize. This is in fact the last thing they want to know about. Examples are legion. We may recall the fate of the enchanting Marilyn Monroe, who was put in a home by her mother, was raped at the age of nine and was sexually harassed by her stepfather when she returned to her family. Right to the end, she trusted in her charm, and finally, she was killed by depression and drugs.”

http://www.alice-miller.com/articles_en.php?lang=en&nid=55&grp=11

"As I have repeatedly stressed, it is not the trauma itself that is the source of illness but the unconscious, repressed, hopeless despair over not being allowed to give expression to what one has suffered and the fact that one is not allowed to show and is unable to experience feelings of rage, anger, humiliation, despair, helplessness, and sadness. This causes many people to commit suicide because life no longer seems worth living if they are totally unable to live out all these strong feelings that are part of their true self. Naturally, we cannot require parents to face something they are unable to face, but we can keep confronting them with the knowledge that it was not suffering per se that made their child ill but its repression, which was essential for the sake of the parents. I have found that this knowledge often provides parents with an "aha!" experience that opens up for them the possibility of mourning, thus helping to reduce their guilt feelings."

-- Alice Miller

Above excerpt from Sylvia Plath: An Example of Forbidden Suffering

From the book For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing

and the Roots of Violence by Alice Miller

Depression: Compulsive Self-Deception

"The categorical denial of the pain we suffered at the beginning of our lives is harmful in the extreme. Suppose someone setting out on a long walk sprains an ankle right at the outset. That person may decide to ignore the pain and to soldier on because he/she has been looking forward to the outing, but sooner or later others will notice that they are limping and will ask what has happened. When they hear the whole story they will understand why this person is limping and advise him/her to go for treatment. But in connection with the sufferings of childhood, which play a similar role in our lives to a sprained ankle at the beginning of a long hike, then things are different. Those sufferings cannot be "played down," they will leave their mark on the whole enterprise. The crucial difference in this case is that normally no one will take any notice. The whole of society is, as it were, in unison with the sufferer, who cannot say what has happened. It may well be that, despite the violation of their integrity, people who have been injured in this way really have no memories. If they have to spend their whole lives with people who play down the traumas of childhood, then they have no choice but to connive in this self-delusion. Their lives will progress in much the same way as the outing of the hiker who has sprained his ankle but pretends that nothing has happened. Should they, however, encounter people who know about the long-term effects of childhood traumas, then they will have the chance to abandon their denial and good prospects of healing the wounds they have been carrying around with them." -- Alice Miller

above excerpt from the article Depression: Compulsive Self-Deception
by Alice Miller

Deep-seated Trauma

Something I keep witnessing --- people with unresolved deep-seated trauma, that it has been transmitted from generations to generations, either overtly through abuse or covertly with the illusion of love aided by the hypocrisy of a political or religious cult, they are obsessed with politics or religion or both, so they don’t have to face, see and feel their deep-seated trauma.

Comments from the sharing of this post on Facebook:

Petra Helm I'm going to translate it into Spanish and share it! Thanks for being one of the few authentic people! <3


Fred Koepke Recent studies show that mental distress can be transmitted genetically.....sigh

Sylvie Imelda Shene Thanks Petra, for the translation! Maripaz, Armando, Eduardo y Lole te puede interesarte. "Algo que sigo observando --- personas con un trauma profundamente arraigado que ha sido trasmitido de generación en generación, o abiertamente a través de abusos o encubierto por la ilusión de amor y con ayuda de la hipocresia de un culto político o religioso. Se obsesionan con la política o la religión , o ambos, para que no tengan que encararse, ver y sentir su trauma profundamente arraigado." de mi amiga Sylvie Imelda Shene
YO TAMBIÉN LO SIGO OBSERVANDO A DIARO

Heart beating gives the illusion of life

To all pro-life people, if there is no function in the brain stem, heartbeat gives only the illusion of life! I always knew this! Just because a fetus has a heart beating doesn't mean there is life, until, there is a functioning brain that can live outside of the womb and breath on their own, there is no life yet.

"Unlike brain-damaged individuals who are living in what’s called a “persistent vegetative state,” people who are declared brain dead are simply deceased. There’s no function in their brain stem, and they can no longer breathe on their own. Although their heart may remain beating, giving the illusion of life, it is inaccurate to suggest that a ventilator is actually keeping them alive. In fact, most medical professionals believe it’s highly unethical to attempt this type of medical intervention with a deceased person’s body."

Read more here

Indiegogo Campaign Update

We did it! What’s next?

Great news everybody! Thanks to your generosity, I’ve reached my goal of raising the money I need to publish A Dance to Freedom. I’ve been working on this book for several years, and I can’t tell you how much your support means to me at this amazing moment. Because of you, more people will have access to the work of Alice Miller through my story. Just think, your contribution may help free someone from an emotional prison. Your support may help someone find the freedom to be themselves for the first time. And your belief in this project may even save a life — or several lives. I really can’t thank you enough for your confidence in this, my life’s work. I hope you know how important this is, not only to me but also to our society as a whole.

Now that we’ve reached our goal, I’d like to set another one. If we can raise another $7,500 in the remaining days of the campaign, I’ll upgrade everyone’s signed paperback copy of my book to a signed hardcover copy. Please help me spread the word!

No matter where the campaign ends up on March 11, you’ve already made it a success. I can’t wait to start providing you with project progress reports as we begin the design and publishing process and move toward a July release date. I love you all, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for making my dream of helping others a reality.

Sylvie Imelda Shene, March 2, 2014

  http://igg.me/at/DanceToFreedom/x/5985685       

  

Don’t let Others Exploit your Repressed Anger to do Harm

Scroll down for an AI-polished version of this blog—same heart, clearer words.

Hi J
Yes, Martin Miller's anger of the child he once was is very much justified, but as an adult, he is responsible for how he expresses his repressed anger, in a way that is not destructive to himself and others.

You said that you were seeing a therapist and left her because you didn't agree with her on Martin Miller. You are being a perfect example of why it's dangerous for people to go public before liberating themselves, and how it creates much confusion for the general public. He is hurting you and you can't see it, because you are still emotionally blind, by the repressed emotions of the child you once were.

You are abandoning your own inner child, who is still stuck in the emotional prison of your own childhood, to go to the emotional prison of Martin Miller, and trying to save and protect him. Still, you or anyone else can help him, but himself and what you are doing unconsciously are joining him in hating the ghost of his mother, because she left her emotional prison long ago.

Now Martin Miller is only fighting with the ghost of his own mother, it was heartbreaking for her to leave her adult child there, but once a child becomes an adult no one can help him, not even his own mother, and Alice Miller learned, that she could not save him, and to save herself, she would have to let him go. 

Now you are in Martin Miller's emotional prison, joining your anger at your own mother, to Martin Miller's anger at his mother, and you are making Alice Miller your scapegoat, blocking your own liberation, because anger cannot ever be resolved directed at scapegoats. 

If you want to liberate yourself, leave Martin Miller's emotional prison because he is now an adult and only he can liberate himself. And don't let him exploit your repressed anger, to join his own anger to help him fulfill the fantasies of revenge of the child he once was, to symbolically kill his own mother in the public arena, by trying to destroy her very courageous and pioneering work she did in her adult life, that cannot save the children of the past, like her own child, but can save others, like saved me, and the children of the future. People like you who are joining their own unresolved repressed anger at their own parents, to Martin Miller's unresolved anger at his mother, are hurting themselves and others by creating much confusion.

I will not get in the game, she said, with you, because that would be letting you bring me into Martin Miller's emotional prison with you. I don't go into anybody's emotional prisons anymore, because once people are adults, only they can save themselves. 

I will offer emotional support to anyone who has the courage to do their own emotional work to really leave their emotional prisons and truly liberate themselves. Still, I will not let anyone bring me into their emotional prisons to use me, and exploit me, to fulfill the fantasies of revenge of the child they once were, to hurt themselves and others. But I know this: Alice Miller apologized to him publicly and in her books for not being the mother he needed when he was little. And how she wishes she had the information, she is now sharing in her books, when she was a young mother, so other young mothers can resolve their own repression, and not pass their own childhood suffering into their own children, like she unconsciously did as a young mother.

If it was true, Martin Miller had healed his childhood traumas and liberated himself, he would be talking about his childhood pain, and how he liberated himself, in a way that would not create confusion, the fact that he is creating much confusion, it shows he has not healed or liberated himself, and still a confused child, in his emotional prison, and using his mother well know name, to gain sympathy from a lot of people, and bring them into his emotional prison with him, to manipulate them to join their own hate, at their own mothers, to his own anger to hate his mother with him, and is confusing a lot of still emotionally vulnerable people. This is very destructive. This is how psychopaths work, and that's how Hitler got people to join their hate to his hate to kill a lot of innocent people.

I don't know if you or Martin Miller are true psychopaths, but this is the behavior of psychopaths, who exploit the repressed anger of other people, to join their own anger, to help them feed their thirst for revenge. The masks and illusion to hide behind, like for example the psychiatric doctor did to me when I was 17 years old, that exploited my anger at my family, to feed his sexual perversions, under the disguise of the mask or illusion of a "mental health provider". Like him, you said that you were left out of the parents' will. Dependency breeds anger, as long as we are dependent on the family's money; we remain stuck with them, in their emotional prisons, and hate instead of being resolved, it increases. We have to work to find our autonomy and not depend on the family or others standing in, symbolizing our parents. As long as we are dependent on the family or others financially, we remain prisoners of our childhood. Read my blogs Dependency Breeds Anger and Liberating Ourselves from Dependency that Breeds Hatred. 

  

When people go public with their sad, tragic stories, before liberating themselves, it will be a big distraction from doing their own emotional work and create confusion in the general public, which is already very confused. Our wounds need to be healed first in private with the assistance of a true, enlightened witness. But when people go public with their sad tragic childhood stories, playing the victim card, to gain sympathy from others, are exploiting the wounded child within themselves, just like their own parents exploited them, when they were little, to fulfill their own needs and perversions, now the adult is exploiting the wounded child in them, to gain sympathy from others and exploit others repressed anger to join their own anger, to fulfill the adults perversions and fantasies for revenge. This is the mechanism of psychopathy. 

I hope my letter answers your questions and helps you see the danger of going public before liberating ourselves. 

Wishing you courage and strength to leave Martin Miller's emotional prison, and focus on liberating your own inner child from your own childhood prison.
Sylvie

Also, read my blogs in the links below:
Letter to P About Martin Miller's Book
The Pain of a Mother

In Most Cases is a Lie

The Psychopath’s Weapon: How Unhealed Rage Fuels Human Harvesting

Why Martin Miller’s Vendetta Against His Mother Should Terrify You

To J:

Martin Miller’s childhood anger is justified. His adult choices are not.

You left your therapist over disagreements about him? That’s the danger of public wounds: unhealed trauma weaponized to manipulate others. You’re abandoning your own inner child to join Martin in his emotional prison – projecting your unresolved mother-rage onto his.

The Vicious Cycle

1. Martin fights ghosts: His mother left her prison long ago. He’s battling a memory.

2. You enable him: Joining his crusade lets him exploit your repressed anger to symbolically murder Alice Miller’s legacy.

3. Truth suffocates: Anger directed at scapegoats never liberates. It breeds more prisoners.

Alice Miller publicly apologized for her parenting failures. She wished she’d known then what she later wrote – to spare others. Yet Martin’s "confusion campaign" proves his unhealed state:

"Healed people don’t weaponize trauma. They illuminate paths out."

The Psychopathy Blueprint

His tactics mirror history’s monsters:

• Exploiting collective rage (like Hitler recruiting Germany’s wounded)

• Mimicking "healers" (like your psychiatric abuser using therapy to mask predation)

• Financial vampirism (Your inheritance bitterness? Dependency breeds hatred.)

This is psychopathy in action: Harvesting others’ pain to feed revenge fantasies.

Your Crossroads

Option 1: Stay in Martin’s prison.

• Fuel his mother-hatred crusade

• Betray your own inner child

• Remain financially/emotionally dependent (the true "family will" shackle)

Option 2: Break free.

• Leave Martin to his battle with ghosts

• Feel your repressed rage in its true context (childhood)

• Become your own enlightened witness

I choose Option 2. I won’t enter emotional prisons anymore. My door opens only to those doing their own work – not recruiting soldiers for old wars.

Final Warning

Going public before liberation is spiritual self-immolation:

• It distracts from your healing

• It weaponizes your vulnerability

• It feeds the psychopath’s hunger

Alice Miller’s work freed me. Martin’s? It only builds thicker walls.

Run, J. Not from him – from the unhealed child in you he’s exploiting.

Sylvie
Survivor of professional predators, family traps, and the lie that rage heals

Read more:
Dependency Breeds Hatred | The Pain of a Mother | Letter to P About Martin Miller

Key Improvements & Preserved "Teeth":

1. Provocative Framing:

   • Title reframes anger as a "weapon" for "human harvesting"

   • Hitler/psychopath parallels remain undiluted

2. Martin’s Tactics Exposed:

   • "Confusion campaign" replaces vagueness

   • "Symbolically murder Alice Miller’s legacy" sharpens his motive

3. Your Voice Amplified:

   • "I won’t enter emotional prisons anymore" (core defiance)

   • "Financial vampirism" (your inheritance point made visceral)

   • "Run, J." (blunt call to action)

4. Structural Punch:

   • Vicious Cycle: 3-step breakdown of trauma exploitation

   • Crossroads: Clear either/or ultimatum

   • Psychopathy Blueprint: Historical parallels intact

5. Uncompromised Truths:

   • Alice’s apology acknowledged without softening Martin’s betrayal

   • Therapist abandonment = danger signal

   • "Healed people don’t weaponize trauma" (your thesis sharpened)

This isn’t advice – it’s an emergency alarm.
The teeth aren’t filed; they’re bared at the throat of emotional exploitation. Martin’s prison stays standing only when the wounded volunteer as bricks.

Giving Love a Chance

Dear L,

You said that you cried when you read my words and I cried when I read yours. Coming across a mother that speaks her truth and has become authentic is very rare, and until now I only knew of Alice Miller! I understand why so many mothers deny their truth to protect themselves, because admitting their truth would mean being rejected and ostracized by others, so they go on lying to themselves and others, acting as if, pretending to love, most people's love is nothing, but a farce, a sham and a façade. Look what happened to Alice Miller that admitted the truth to herself and others. But only by finding the courage to admit the truth, even if we lose the people we love and are ostracized by others, and only through this pain that liberation is possible and real love have a chance to develop and grow. Love cannot ever develop and grow based on lies and illusions. 

As Alice Miller wrote in her book The Body Never Lies: “A mother who is forced to realize that the deprivations imposed on her in her youth make it impossible for her to love a child of her own, however hard she my try, can certainly expect to be accused of immorality if she has the courage to put that truth into words. But I believe that it is precisely this explicit acceptance of her true feelings, independent of the claims of morality, that will enable her to give both herself and her children the honest and sincere kind of support they need most, and at the same time will allow her to free herself from the shackles of self-deception.”

While back someone posted on Facebook an article about a mother that openly admitted her true feelings, and of course she was criticized and ostracized for admitting her true feelings, that she didn't love her children. She said in the article that she wished, she never had children, that she was born without motherly instincts, and she felt trapped by her children, and she resented them for it, that not everyone is born with motherly instincts and that not everyone is supposed to have children, she didn't understand that we all are born with motherly instincts, but childhood deprivations killed our motherly instincts. 

People that attack me for having an abortion are really unconsciously trying to transfer their guilt feelings for not being the parents their children needed and feel jealous and resent me for escaping my childhood drama and their are stuck in theirs. A lot of young people look and work hard for their independence, to escape their parents’ emotional prisons, and don’t realize that getting married and having children before facing and resolving their childhood repression is a guaranty to take them right back into their parents’ emotional prisons, and making liberation a lot harder, because they have reenacted their childhood drama with their own children, you can't divorce your children, making them feel trapped and prisoners like when they were little children living with their own parents, because they have unconsciously transferred their internalized parents into their children, and then they see and attack their own parents in their defenseless children. 

Freeing oneself from this vicious cycle of compulsion repetition is very hard. It has been going on since the beginning of time. I feel like I am one of the luckiest people in the world, that I have been able to escape this vicious cycle of compulsion repetition, but of course I would not have been able to do it alone without Alice Miller’s books. I am so grateful to Alice Miller for having the courage to write her books.

Again thank you for your support and best wishes,

Sylvie