The Guit Trip

Guilt-tripping is a form of #EmotionalAbuse and another favorite tactic of #narcissists. #PsychologicalManipulation #NarcissisticAbuse
 

Psychological Manipulation

THE GUILT TRIP

A guilt trip involves induced feelings of

guilt or responsibility, mostly unjustified, which are stirred up by the manipulator. Guilt-tripping behaviors are commonly experienced in close relationships, like romantic, friendly, professional, and familial relationships.

Someone Trying To Guilt-Trip You May:

Bring to your attention their own hard work and efforts, making you feel like you've failed to meet their standards.

• Use sarcasm and passive-aggressive behavior to react to situations. • Ignore your attempts to discuss the problem

• Give you the silent treatment.

• Deny they are annoyed, although their behavior says otherwise • Show no eagerness to improve the situation themselves.

. Communicate their irritation with you through their body language, like a sign, cross arms, and slam objects [and the eye-rolling] DR. MELANIE CABRERA, PSY

Using Abortion as Hook to Manipulate

F, 

Thank you for writing. You are right, an unintended pregnancy means not desired and every time someone is born that is not desired, planned and wanted for the rights reasons, it’s a very sad and tragic beginning indeed and because most people cannot face and feel the tragedy of their own history, they hang onto their illusion of love and this explains the hypocrisy that governs our world. 

This is why I fight so hard for the women’s right to choose to carry or not to carry a pregnancy to term and give birth to a new being. 

I am also doing all I can to remove the stigma from abortion, so if women find themselves pregnant with an unintended pregnancy --she will not feel pressure -- to carry a pregnancy to term and give birth to a new being she does not want and feels ready to love and in this way prevent from more unwanted children from being born to just suffer-- and as an adult -- because of these disowned and unresolved childhood injuries will become openly and aided by hypocrisy a danger to society, allowing this insanity and suffering to go on until the end time. 

You are right many women unconsciously have a baby just to trap the father and takes advantage of the stigma of abortion in our society to force fatherhood on her partner, but sadly these women don’t realize that they are really trapping themselves and the innocent new being they bringing into the world to use as a tool of manipulation, because in most cases men just walk away and the worse it can happen to them, is that they have to throw money at what they see as a problem, triggering the mother’s unresolved repressed rage of the child she once was, because the instrument she created “the child” to use as a tool of manipulation didn’t work and now feels trapped and blames the child for her plight and starts taking it out on the child that has nothing to do with it, and this is another reason why I want to do all I can to remove the stigma from abortion and put the stigma where it belongs, because if it should be a stigma somewhere, it should be on those that bring children into the world to unconsciously to use and exploit.

Abortion can also be used by women to unconsciously manipulate the man in their lives. I know a case of a young woman with a lot of unresolved childhood injuries that became pregnant and her partner did not feel ready to be a father and talked her into having an abortion, which she did, but then she used unconsciously the abortion, to make her partner feel guilt and have control over him by accusing him that he had turned her into a murderer and blaming all her problems on the abortion, of course society stigma on abortion gives unconscious very sick women reins to use abortion as the hook to control men, and then to alleviate their guilt feelings they decide to have a child, conceiving a child out of guilt instead out of love to use as a medication to alleviate their guilt feelings, by many hours talking with this lady it was revealed how she used the abortion as the hanger to hook on the partner’s unresolved guilt feelings from his own childhood traumas to have control over him. 

I am wondering if you were trapped into fatherhood. Anyway this young man was very angry at his, now ex-partner, for deceiving him, because besides using his unresolved guilt feelings to control and manipulate him, she also had several affairs during their 20 years of marriage and confessed to never have loved him, but that she married him to take revenge on him, she also came to see clear that she was taking revenge on this man for the wrongs done to her by her own father when she was defenseless little girl, of course, today they are divorced, because their marriage was not real and they decide to become real and not live a lie anymore, but he is very angry and feeling all his anger at his ex and of course she deserves some of his anger, because she deceived him too, but who deserves most of his anger is his mother, because his mother was the first women that deceived him and used him as a tool of manipulation to force his father to marry his Mather, if he had a mother that truly loved him and never used him as an instrument of manipulation to get what she wanted, he would not ever had fallen in love in the first place with a very damaged women that would exploit and deceive him like his mother did when he was a defenseless little boy, as a child he could not leave his disturbed mother and father, but as an adult can gather the courage to face and feel the tragedy of his own childhood and leave a woman standing in symbolizing his mother, but he still has difficulty in feeling his feelings within the context of his own childhood and stays stuck, because as long the repressed feelings are not seen and felt within the context of our own childhood, they blind us and they drive us into repetition compulsion to reenact our childhood drama sooner  or later in one form or another and sadly I am seeing him repeating or reenacting his childhood drama all over again with a new woman he is getting involved with.

I agree that we need to do all we can to help young girls become conscious of their childhood traumas before having children, so they do not pass their own traumas into their children, just like Alice Miller says: “This incapacity to love from the outset occurs much more often than we imagine. It is not the fault of the mothers but of the ignorance of society. In a progressive maternity ward, a woman having her baby should have access to enlightened assistance in perceiving and becoming fully aware of the body memories within her. This would prevent her from passing on the traumas of her own childhood (abandonment, violence, and so on) to her baby."

"If the repression stays unresolved, the parents’ childhood tragedy is unconsciously continued on in their children” Alice Miller (The Drama of the Gifted Child: The search for the True Self) Page 23

I don’t think it’s a good idea to make mandatory or force vasectomy into young men, because I don’t think nothing should be forced on anyone, but I do agree it’s a great idea and should be encouraged for young men to volunteer for the procedure to protect themselves from women that might try to get pregnant just to trap them into fatherhood and to prevent unintended pregnancies altogether!

Men are not included in the punishment for abortions for the same reason the bible asks for women to be stoned for adultery and men go Scot free. Because these laws and the bible were written by men!!! 
Yes,  it's about control and abortion is the perfect hook.

Yes,  it's about control and abortion is the perfect hook.

Also, read my answer to S in the blog titled  Removing the reins of guilt

Unintentional Cruelty Hurts, Too

Steps on the Path to

Reconciliation: Anxiety,

Anger, and Sorrow--

but No Guilt Feelings

Unintentional Cruelty Hurts, Too

When we examine the child-rearing literature of the past two hundred years, we discover the methods that have systematically been used to make it impossible for children to realize and later to remember the way they were actually treated by their parents. Why are the old methods of child raising still so widely employed today? This is a mystery I have tried to understand and explain from the perspective of the compulsive repetition of the exercise of power. Contrary to popular opinion, the injustice, humiliation, mistreatment, and coercion a person has experienced are not without consequences. The tragedy is that the effects of mistreatment are transmitted to new and innocent victims, even though the victims themselves do not remember the mistreatment on a conscious level.

How can this vicious circle be broken? Religion says we must forgive the injustice we suffered, only then will we be free to love and be purged of hatred. This is correct as far as it goes, but how do we find the path to true forgiveness? Can we speak of forgiveness if we hardly know what was actually done to us and why? And that is the situation we all found ourselves in as children. We could not grasp why we were being humiliated, brushed aside, intimidated, laughed at, treated like an object, played with like a doll or brutally beaten (or both). What is more, we were not even allowed to be aware that all this was happening to us, for any mistreatment was held up to us as being necessary for our own good. Even the most clever child cannot see through such a lie if it comes from the mouths of his beloved parents, who after all show him other, loving sides as well. He has to believe that the way he is being treated is truly right and good for him, and he will not hold it against his parents. But then as an adult he will act the same way toward his own children in an attempt to prove to himself that his parents behaved correctly toward him.

Isn't this what most religions mean by "forgiveness": to chastise children "lovingly" in the tradition of the fathers and to raise them to respect their parents? But forgiveness which is based on denial of the truth and which uses a defenseless child as an outlet for resentment is not true forgiveness; that is why hatred is not vanquished by religions in this manner but, on the contrary, is unwittingly exacerbated. The child's intense anger at the parents, being strictly forbidden, is simply deflected onto other people and onto himself, but not done away with. Instead, because it is permissible to discharge this anger onto one's own children, it spreads over the entire world like a plague. For this reason we should not be surprised that there are religious wars, although such a phenomenon should actually be a contradiction in terms.

Genuine forgiveness does not deny anger but faces it head-on. If I can feel outrage at the injustice I have suffered, can recognize my persecution as such, and can acknowledge and hate my persecutor for what he or she has done, only then will the way to forgiveness be open to me. Only if the history of abuse in earliest childhood can be uncovered will the repressed anger, rage, and hatred cease to be perpetuated. Instead, they will be transformed into sorrow and pain at the fact that things had to be that way. As a result of this pain, they will give way to genuine understanding, the understanding of an adult who now has gained insight into his or her parents' childhood and finally, liberated from his own hatred, can experience genuine, mature sympathy. Such forgiveness cannot be coerced by rules and commandments; it is experienced as a form of grace and appears spontaneously when a repressed (because forbidden) hatred no longer poisons the soul. The sun does not need to be told to shine. When the clouds part, it simply shines. But it would be a mistake to say that the clouds are not in the way if they are indeed there.

If an adult has been fortunate enough to get back to the sources of the specific injustice he suffered in his childhood and experience it on a conscious level, then in time he will realize on his own--preferably without the aid of any pedagogical or religious exhortations--that in most cases his parents did not torment or abuse him for their own pleasure or out of sheer strength and vitality but because they could not help it, since they were once victims themselves and thus believed in traditional methods of child-rearing.

It is very difficult for people to believe the simple fact that every persecutor was once a victim . Yet it should be very obvious that someone who was allowed to feel free and strong from childhood does not have the need to humiliate another person. In Paul Klee's Diaries we find the following anecdote.

From time to time, I played tricks on a little girl who was not pretty and who wore braces to correct her crooked legs. I regarded her whole family, and in particular the mother, as very inferior people. I would present myself at the high court, pretending to be a good boy, and beg to be allowed to take the little darling for a walk. For a while we'd walk peaceably hand in hand; then, perhaps in the nearby field where potato plants were blooming and June bugs were all over, or perhaps even sooner, we would start walking single file. At the right moment I'd give my protégée a slight push. The poor thing would fall, and I'd bring her back in tears to her mother, explaining with an innocent air: "She fell down." I played this trick more than once, without Frau Enger's ever suspecting the truth. I must have gauged her correctly. (Age five or six)

No doubt, little Paul was repeating something here that was done to him, probably by his father. There is only one brief passage about his father in the Diaries:

For a long time I trusted my papa implicitly and regarded his words (Papa can do anything) as gospel. The only thing I couldn't bear was his teasing. On one occasion, thinking I was alone, I was playing make-believe. I was interrupted by a sudden amused "hmpf!" which hurt my feelings. It was not the only time I was to hear this "hmpf!"

Mockery from a beloved and admired person is always painful, and we can imagine that little Paul was deeply wounded by this treatment.

It would be wrong to say that, because we understand its origins, the harm we compulsively inflict on another person does not cause harm and that little Paul did not hurt the girl. To recognize this makes the tragedy visible but at the same time offers the possibility for change. The realization that even with the best will in the world we are not omnipotent, that we are subject to compulsions, and that we cannot love our child in the way we would like may lead to sorrow but should not awaken guilt feelings, because the latter imply a power and freedom we do not have. Burdened by guilt feelings ourselves, we will also burden our children with guilt feelings and tie them to us for a lifetime. By means of our mourning, we can set our children free.

Distinguishing between mourning and guilt feelings might also help to break the silence between the generations on the subject of the crimes of the Nazi period. Mourning is the opposite of feeling guilt; it is an expression of pain that things happened as they did and that there is no way to change the past. We can share this pain with our children without having to feel ashamed; guilt feelings are something we try to repress or shift to our children or both.

Since sorrow reactivates numbed feelings, it can enable young people to realize what their parents once inflicted on them in the well-meaning attempt to train them to be obedient from an early age. This can lead to an eruption of justifiable anger and to the painful recognition that one's own parents, who are already over fifty, are still defending their old principles, are unable to understand the anger of their grown child, and are hurt and wounded by reproaches. Then the child wishes he or she could take back what has been said and undo all that has happened; because now the old familiar fears that these reproaches will send the parents to their graves return. If children are told early and often enough, "You'll be the death of me yet," these words remain with them all their life.

And yet, even if a person is once again left alone with this awakened anger because his aging parents can bear it just as little as before, the mere admission of this feeling to consciousness can lead out of the dead end of self-alienation. Then at long last the true child, the healthy child, can live, the child who finds it impossible to understand why his parents are hurting him and at the same time forbidding him to cry, weep, or even speak in his pain. The gifted child who adapts to parental demands always tries to understand this absurdity and will accept it as a matter of course. But he has to pay for this pseudo-understanding with his feelings and his sensitivity to his own needs, i.e., with his authentic self. This is why access to the normal, angry, uncomprehending, and rebellious child he once was had previously been blocked off. When this child within the adult is liberated, he will discover his vital roots and strength.

To be free to express resentment dating back to early childhood does not mean that one now becomes a resentful person, but rather the exact opposite. For the very reason that one is permitted to experience these feelings that were directed against the parents, one does not have to use surrogate figures for purposes of abreaction. Only hatred felt for surrogates is endless and insatiable--as we saw in the case of Adolf Hitler--because on a conscious level the feeling is separated from the person against whom it was originally directed.

For these reasons I believe that the free expression of resentment against one's parents represents a great opportunity. It provides access to one's true self, reactivates numbed feelings, opens the way for mourning and--with luck--reconciliation. In any case, it is an essential part of the process of psychic healing. But anyone who thinks that I am reproaching these aging parents would be misunderstanding my meaning completely. I have neither the right nor the grounds to do so. I was not their child, was not compelled by them to be silent, was not raised by them, and--as an adult--know that they, like all parents, could do no differently than behave the way they did.

Because I encourage the child within the adult to acknowledge his feelings, including his resentment, but do not absolve him from these feelings, and because I do not place blame on the parents, I apparently create difficulties for many of my readers. It would be so much simpler to say it is all the child's fault, or the parents', or the blame can be divided. This is exactly what I don't want to do, because as an adult I know it is not a question of blame but of not being able to do any differently. Children cannot understand this, however, and they fall ill in the attempt to do so because of a lack of access to their feelings. Only if the child in the adult suspends his futile attempt to understand can he begin to feel his pain. I believe that the children of those adults who finally dare to face their feelings will benefit as a result.

Perhaps even this explanation cannot clear up the misunderstandings that frequently arise in this connection, for they are not rooted in the intellect. If someone learned from an early age to feel guilty for everything and to regard his parents as beyond reproach, my ideas will of necessity cause him feelings of anxiety and guilt. We can see just how strong his attitude, instilled at an early age, is by observing older people. As soon as they find themselves in a situation of physical helplessness and dependence, they may feel guilty for every little thing and may even regard their grown children as stern judges, providing the children are no longer submissive as they once were. As a result, the grown children feel they have to spare their parents out of considerateness, and the fear of hurting them condemns the children to silence once again. Since many psychologists never had the opportunity to free themselves from this fear and to find out that parents need not die if they hear the truth about their child, they will be inclined to encourage a "reconciliation" between patients and parents as quickly as possible. If the underlying rage has not been experienced, however, the reconciliation is an illusory one. It will only cover over the rage that has been bottled up unconsciously or has been directed against others and will reinforce the patient's false self, even at the expense of his children, who will certainly sense the parent's true feelings. And yet, in spite of these impediments, there are an increasing number of books in which young people confront their parents more freely and openly and honestly than was previously possible. This fact awakens hope that critical writers will produce critical readers who will refuse to allow themselves to be made to feel guilty (or more guilty) by the "poisonous pedagogy" to be found in the professional literature (in the areas of education, psychology, ethics, or biography). Taken from the book “"For Own Good: Hidden cruelty in child-rearing and the roots of violence" by Alice Miller http://nospank.net/fyog17.htm  

Removing the reins of guilt

Dear S,

Thank you for writing. In order for me to get an e-mail to inform me someone left me a comment, I need to subscribe to my own posts and I keep forgetting to do that. Thank goodness I subscribe to my last post and got an email notifying me someone left me a comment and then reading your last comment I found out you had left me a comment on the post "Letter to D" also.

Your comments mean a lot to me too, it’s nice to be acknowledged, and please feel free to write me anytime, it’s no bother at all, I enjoy reading your comments. I might not answer you right away, because I have what I call a real job that takes a lot of my time, and plus writing is one of the hardest things in my life to do, but you can be assured eventually I will answer you!

I don’t like labels period, especially the label of psycho/sociopath, because is nothing more than people’s repressed emotions of the wounded child they once were driving them blindly into actions that hurt themselves, others, or both, and by reading your comments you seem to be very aware of the wounded child in you and taking responsibility for it, so I don’t think you are a psychopath/sociopath. To me, a true psychopath/sociopath are those that memorize good knowledge but they don’t use this knowledge to help themselves first and remain wolves inside wearing sheep’s clothing deceiving themselves and others, so they don’t have to face their internalized parents going on idolizing their parents and childhood so not to face and feel their fears of being alone with the painful excruciating feelings of the child they once were and Like parrots use this good knowledge to manipulate others, posing as loving caring people, but under their illusion of love, they misguide their followers into a deeper trap making it harder for true liberation to ever be possible to them and for the people blindly following them.

I too was raised at first in the cult of the catholic religion and then my older sisters became involved with a destructive cult that believes in the insane reincarnation theory. And I too went through the feelings of betraying them, but you are not betraying them, but going along with their illusion of love and seductive lies would be betraying yourself. The more you get in touch with the feelings of the child you once were and feel them in the right context the more you will be able to distinguish between genuine and pretend feelings and never again be deceived by people masquerading with the illusion of love.

Feeling afraid is normal and before you can feel the painful feelings of the child you once were you have to make it safe for you, create a safe place “ a home” where you are safe and free to feel.  Guilty feelings are the reins unconsciously our parents and society install on us to control us and to keep us chained into their emotional prison for eternity. This quote by Alice Miller explains how these guilt feelings are installed: “If we were always punished by our parents for the slightest offense, then we integrated a very different kind of knowledge: that owning up to our mistakes is dangerous because it loses us the affection of our parents. The legacy from this experience can be permanent feelings of guilt.”

We must find the courage to remove these reins and feel the pain that we were not loved because real love does not keep us chained by guilt feelings.

It took me years to give up the idea of trying to explain to my family. I wrote many letters to them before I realize that I was talking to deaf ears and let them go, but then I transferred this illusion or false hope into my boyfriend a substitute figure, and took a few more years to give up this illusion that no one in the external world could ever make up for what I need as a child, but did not get and now the only way to free myself was to feel the pain of the child I once was. Just as Alice Miller says:  "Pain is the way to the truth. By denying that you were unloved as a child, you spare yourself some pain, but you are not with your own truth. And throughout your whole life, you'll try to earn love. In therapy, avoiding pain causes blockage. Yet nobody can confront being neglected or hated without feeling guilty. "It is my fault that my mother is cruel," he thinks. "I made my mother furious; what can I do to make her loving?" So he will continue trying to make her love him. The guilt is really protection against the terrible realization that you are fated to have a mother who cannot love. This is much more painful than to think, "Oh, she is a good mother, it's only me who's bad." Because then you can try to do something to get love. But it's not true; you cannot earn love. And feeling guilty for what has been done to you only supports your blindness and your neurosis." Read more here

I wish you much luck, courage, and strength in your journey to liberation,

Sylvie

The Betrayal You Carry: On Parents, Scapegoats, and Unearned Anger

Here's a polished version with a stronger title and tightened prose, preserving your raw honesty and emotional intensity:

Dear D,

You’ve lingered in my thoughts since your last letter. Writing back felt heavy—not just from my own busyness, but from carrying your repressed anger. I know facing truth is agony. But as Alice Miller writes:

"Pain is the way to truth. Deny you were unloved as a child, and you spare yourself pain—but lose your truth. You’ll spend life begging for love. Therapy stalls when we avoid pain. Yet confronting neglect or hatred brings guilt: ‘My mother’s cruelty is my fault. What must I do to earn her love?’ This guilt shields you from a devastating truth: you were fated to have a mother who couldn’t love. Believing ‘I’m the problem’ lets you keep trying. But love isn’t earned. Guilt for what was done to you? It feeds your blindness. Your neurosis."

You feel I betrayed you. But the real betrayal came decades ago—from your parents. I tried to make your mother see. To protect you. She lacked the courage to shield you from a father who exploited you to feed his emotional hunger. On those Portugal summers, I watched it: you, a child, forced to be your father’s partner—not his daughter.

Your rage at me? Justified—but misdirected. It belongs to them. Scapegoating me lets that wound fester. Truth is the only scalpel: feel your repressed fury in its rightful context—childhood—and it dissolves. You free yourself.

I bought these books for you. They name what was done to you:

1. "Silently Seduced" (Kenneth Adams) — On covert incest.

2. "The Emotional Incest Syndrome" (Patricia Love) — When a parent’s love suffocates.

3. "Toxic Parents" (Susan Forward) — Reclaiming your life.

I left them with your mother. She refused to see. No excuses—she speaks English fluently. What good is language if not to seek self-knowledge? What good are degrees if they license emotional blindness? Miller was right:

"Universities churn out experts blind to child abuse. Why? Because cruelty masquerades as ‘parenting.’"

Your last email? Déjà vu. Growing up in Portugal, I was blamed whenever I refused to perform expected roles. My crime? Not soothing others’ unresolved pain. Now I know: their anger wasn’t about me. Yours isn’t either. I’m just the trigger. The scapegoat. Read more on transference here.

Sponsoring your move from Portugal was an illusion. I don’t feed those anymore. Geography doesn’t heal trauma. You can’t outrun yourself. I learned this in America: liberation came through facing my truth—not crossing an ocean. Now I offer that knowledge on a silver platter. Take it.

I can’t feel your pain for you. If I could, I would—you’re my niece, my goddaughter. Your freedom would be my joy. But this battle is yours alone. When you’re ready to fight it, I’ll stand with you. Until then? I won’t polish illusions.

Courage, D. Feel your truth. It’s the only path out.

Sylvie
(For context, see my earlier post: I Will Not Be Your Scapegoat)

Original letter below

Dear D,

Since your last letter, you have been on my mind constantly, and I have wanted to write to you, but because I am so busy these days, and plus writing to someone who is directing their repressed anger at me, it makes it even harder to sit down and write. 

I know the truths I talk about are very hard to face and feel, but for you to free yourself, you need your truth, like Alice Miller says: "Pain is the way to the truth. By denying that you were unloved as a child, you spare yourself some pain, but you are not with your own truth. And throughout your whole life, you'll try to earn love. In therapy, avoiding pain causes blockage. Yet nobody can confront being neglected or hated without feeling guilty. "It is my fault that my mother is cruel," he thinks. "I made my mother furious; what can I do to make her loving?" So he will continue trying to make her love him. The guilt is really protection against the terrible realization that you are fated to have a mother who cannot love. This is much more painful than to think, "Oh, she is a good mother, it's only me who's bad." Because then you can try to do something to get love. But it's not true; you cannot earn love. And feeling guilty for what has been done to you only supports your blindness and your neurosis."

http://www.alice-miller.com/interviews_en.php?page=6

You feel betrayed by me, but the person who has really betrayed you was your father and mother when you were a defenseless little girl. I tried to make your mother see and take action to protect you, but I was not able to, and now you are suffering because your mother lacked the courage to protect you from your father, who was using and exploiting you to fulfill his emotional needs. 

You were betrayed by your parents, not me, but now because I did not say what you wanted to hear. I did not behave the way you like to; it triggers your justified anger, but that anger was caused by the betrayal of your parents, and as long as you direct your anger at scapegoats, you will stay trapped, and it never gets resolved. 

Only when we feel our repressed feelings in the right context do they start to diminish and get resolved, and we free ourselves. 

On my summer vacations to Portugal, I would witness that instead of you relying on your father for emotional support, it was your father relying on you to get his emotional needs met, and this is very damaging to a child; you were more to your father a partner than his daughter. 

I bought the books below, thinking of you. They describe what happened to you as a small child to a T. I tried to share these books with your mother. Still, she too did not have the courage to open her eyes and see, she can’t use the excuse that she did not know English, because she like you had no problems learning the English language in school, me in the other hand, because of my learning disability I was not able to learn in school. If I had not left Portugal, I would never have learned the English language, and I would not have been exposed to this essential knowledge to help me liberate myself. I felt that she learning English was a total waste, because if what we learned is not used to help ourselves, why go through the trouble of learning it? What a waste, I left the books in Portugal. If you gather the courage to read them, you will see yourself in them:

“Silently Seduced: When Parents Make Their Children Partners Understanding Covert Incest” By Kenneth M. Adams

“The Emotional Incest Syndrome: What to do When a Parent’s Love Rules Your Life” by Patricia Love

“Toxic Parents: Overcoming Their Hurtful Legacy: and Reclaiming Your Life,” Susan Forward and Craig Buck ---

It’s amazing how a person goes to University and gets so much abstract knowledge. Still, they don’t get any self-knowledge the most important knowledge of all, because without self-knowledge we just deceive ourselves and others and with a degree from a University it’s just like getting a ticket to go into the world to spread their psychological virus to the masses and this is why we live in a world with emotionally blind people with degrees in power positions making decisions that put all of us in danger and this is why the world is in the position is in. Again, these words by Alice Miller come to mind: “…society we live in continues to turn a blind eye to the facts of child abuse in all its forms. Among thousands of professors at hundreds of universities, there is not one single university chair for teaching about child abuse and cruelty to children. Why? Because that cruelty successfully masquerades as parenting and education,” Alice Miller, taken from the book “The Truth Will Set You Free,” page 101
http://www.alice-miller.com/readersmail_en.php?lang=en&nid=682&grp=0506

Reading your last e-mail is like a déjà vu. When I was growing up in Portugal, just because I did not say or do what people expected of me, it would trigger their anger. They would blame me for it, but I was not the cause of their anger, just like, NOW, I am not the cause of your anger, I am just the trigger. Back then, I did not understand these psychological mechanisms. I thought it was my fault for not being able to be and do what they expected of me. Today, I know very well what is happening, even though it’s never pleasant to have people trying to make me their poisonous container or scapegoat, I am getting better at handling people’s transference every day. In the link below, you can read a great article about transference:

http://www.alice-miller.com/articles_en.php?lang=en&nid=116&grp=11

I see clearly that me sponsoring you so you could leave Portugal is an illusion, and I don’t feed people’s illusions anymore. Leaving Portugal will not solve your problems if you move to a new place without facing and feeling your painful truth first. The only thing that changes is the scenery, but your unresolved personal issues will follow you everywhere you go, everywhere you go, there you are! We can’t run from ourselves. Me leaving Portugal and coming to America did not solve my problems; the knowledge I acquired here helped me break free from the emotional prison I was born in, and now I am bringing this knowledge, in a tray, to anyone in Portugal that have the courage to face and feel their personal painful truths. I can’t face and feel other people’s painful truths, if I could do it for you, I would do it, because you are my niece and god-daughter and nothing would make me happier than see you free, but I can’t do it for you, just like no one could do it for me, only you can do it, NOW, and if you ever gather the courage to do it and need someone to talk to, I am here to listen to you and give you support in your liberation, but I don’t have time to feed people’s illusions.

I wish you much courage and strength to face and feel your painful truths, and I hope one day you can liberate yourself.

Sylvie

Also, read the conversation with D in the post before this one

http://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2011/06/i-will-not-be-scapegoat-or-poisonous.html 

Narcissists are Quick to Dismiss the Feelings of Guilt and Shame

"The truth is that narcissists have fragile egos and a lot of repressed shame. But acknowledging shame requires giving up power and becoming vulnerable. Since they lack these abilities, narcissists find it incredibly difficult to face shame.

How Does a Narcissist Cope with Feelings of Guilt and Shame?

Narcissists frequently struggle to acknowledge guilt or shame due to their exaggerated sense of self-importance and lack of empathy. So, when confronted with situations that may trigger these unpleasant feelings, narcissists may use various defense mechanisms such as projection, rationalization, or blame-shifting.

Narcissists are Quick to Dismiss These Feelings However They Can

We may feel guilty or ashamed when we are aware of our misbehavior or inappropriate actions. While some narcissists may occasionally feel a pang of remorse or shame, this emotion is frequently transitory and shallow.

Or, more commonly, narcissists avoid individuals or circumstances that make them feel guilty or ashamed rather than dealing with those feelings directly."

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/do-narcissists-feel-guilt-shame-kamini-wood-xjbzc#:~:text=While%20some%20narcissists%20may%20occasionally,dealing%20with%20those%20feelings%20directly.

Abusers are like: how dare you ruin my reputation by telling people the things I did and said

NARCISSISTS ONLY TELL HALF TRUTHS. Those half-truths are the ones that make them look good.

Narcissists make you look crazy. They will purposely get you to react by prodding and probing and doing things to upset you or set you off. They will treat you with such a lack of respect that you have a hard time holding back, and then you explode. Screaming and acting crazy and saying awful things back to them. Appearing like you are the one out of control. Don't fall for it. Don't react, respond. Either walk away or calmly respond. They want you to react in an out-of-control manner, so they can point the finger at you and say, He/she is crazy. -Maria Consiglio

A gentle reminder: You don't have to be the "bigger person." You don't have to accept insincere apologies. You don't have to tolerate relationships that drain you. You don't have to spend your whole life showing up for people who have no interest in showing up for you. --Michell C. Clark

A narcissist wants to convince you that your reactions to their actions are the problem when, without their actions, there would be no reactions. E.S.

Narcissists use rivalry and jealousy to create a theatre of conflict, ensuring their victims stay apart and their ego remains inflated. E.S.

Yep!

Comments I made in the book discussion of Daniel Mackler

Sylvie Imelda Shene: Even dough I agree with every thing said in this excerpt. I just started reading the book and find his choice of words to be highly confusing, even abusive, and I can’t recommend this book. Alice Miller is the only person I encounter on this planet, that, I agree with 100%. The words below written by Alice Miller to me, when I asked her to comment on letters I received from one of her readers, came to mind:
“AM: I have learned over the years of my work on the internet that there are readers who SEEM to understand SOME of what I have written, at least intellectually, but they are still so afraid of their very cruel parents and of their repressed FEELINGS of rage towards them that they are constantly looking for scapegoats. They thus live in a continual confusion pretending that they are healed and even offering help and empathy to others. But eventually they use unconsciously other people (even the ones who are quite friendly to them) as a poisonous container like their parents did to them, and if the offended people begin to defend themselves they can become very mean. I can only urge you to trust your feelings and to NOT offer your empathy and interest to everybody just because they say they read and understood everything I have written. In most of the cases it is a lie. To understand my books means to overcome the fear of one`s parents, to honestly feel the justified rage TOWARD THEM and to no longer use others to getting free from the accumulated rage.”
Alice Miller wrote this message

Sylvie Imelda Shene: Alice Miller’s critic is not the only thing I am concerned about, there is more, like for example his views on abortion and sex, his choice of words can be very confusing and guilt inducing to his readers that still are emotionally blind and take his words for face value and not see he might be unconsciously telling his true story of what happened to him and how he was treated as a child by using harsh words. When it comes to abortion no one says it better than Alice Miller “Not everyone is capable of thinking in real, concrete terms. Many seek refuge in religious beliefs. In their weakness, they place their trust in “relics,” awaiting salvation at the hands of one stronger than themselves. Anyone who claims to be a strong and knowledgeable authority for such people, and to be acting on their behalf, has the duty to be conscious of the appropriate facts. If they aren’t, if they ignore or neglect that duty, clamming instead that their palpable lack of information and their abstract conceptions of “life” are sanctioned by God and practiced in the name of humanity, they are acting against life, by misusing the weakness and trust of the faithful and dangerously confusing them. The injunction against abortion goes even further: Consciously or unconsciously, it represents support for cruelty against children and active complicity in the creation of unwanted existences, existences that can easily become a liability for the community at large. … It is, in fact, not surprising to find that those who are both victims and apologist for the use of violence and severity against children are often those who most passionately proclaim their love of the unborn child, i.e., the kernel of life. Abortion can, indeed, be seen as the most powerful symbol of the psychic annihilation and mutilation practiced since time immemorial on children. But to combat this evil merely at the symbolic level deflects us from the reality we should not evade for a moment longer: the reality of the abused and humiliated child, which, as a result of its disavowed and unresolved injuries, will insidiously become, either openly or aided by hypocrisy, a danger to society.”
http://sylvieshene.blogspot.com/2011/01/protecting-life-after-birth.html#!/2011/01/protecting-life-after-birth.html
I don’t have time to write right now, but as soon I can I will go into more details.

Sylvie Imelda Shene: Sabina, I agree with most of what you are saying about sex and when a person becomes fully conscious, naturally becomes abstinent from sex, but not by choice, but because it’s near to impossible to find another conscious partner at the same level. Telling unconscious people not have sex, is not realist and do not work and the author of this book seems to have a problem even with masturbation! Why should not a person enjoy his/her body? Was he not allowed to enjoy his own body as a little boy? The purpose of life is to have fun in balance without hurting yourself or others, to be enjoyed, and shared and for us to become free to enjoy life in the present moment, we must face our history and feel our repressed feelings, at our own pace. We must face the pain in our lives. The only way out is through it. Nothing in the external world, no religion, not a job, not geographical travel or move, not a relationship and not any amount of money can save us from the pain of our past. Until we walk through our pain, we will keep reenacting, repeating, and recreating our past in the present moment. Dr. Alice Miller in her book, The Truth Will Set You Free; Overcoming Emotional Blindness and Finding Your True Adult Self says: “the past always catches up with us, in our relationships with other people and especially with our children.” The only way to release the pain is to face it, articulate it and feel it as it arises. If we can feel it we can heal it. I know sometimes the pain can be overwhelming, and we need to take a break from it by going to work, taking care of ourselves, and some distractions of safe fun, but we must take time to face, be, articulate our pain and feel it as it arises until is gone. Because pretty much every person on the planet have been abused, traumatized to a degree by parental and society ignorance, pain comes to every one’s life. The suffering comes because we run, avoid, repress and deny our pain. If we don’t acknowledge and take responsibility for our wounds, but instead we deny and repress them, the wounds inflicted on us, we will inflict those same wounds on others and the next generation. I wonder if the author was extremely sexually abused as a child and now wants to repress his sexuality and of his readers – what we repress will find expression in very dysfunctional way and will harm us and others even more. All religions have been trying to repress people’s sexuality and the author sounds preach like the very extreme religious people that use strong, harsh language that is guilt inducing and we have seen religion’s guilt inducing where gotten us. I wonder if one of his parents was a preacher -- Children that are preached to, learn to preach -- Maybe his parents were extremely critical of him and used strong, harsh language and made him feel guilt and now unconsciously he is extremely critical and passing this guilt to his readers.

Sylvie Imelda Shene: I also stand by my words that this book is confusing and if something is confusing is also abusive to me. Saying that this book is the continuation of Alice Miller’s work is a big lie even if people are not aware and can’t see the hidden lie. Alice Miller’s work is sooooooo much more ahead of this book.
DM’s book is soooo tinted with morality and so manipulative that brings back the old memories into my mind when I was living with my religious fanatic and manipulative older sisters, that tried so hard to push down my throat their believes and morality.
The letter written to Alice Miller in the link below articulates what I feel DM’s book is trying to do to his readers.
http://www.alice-miller.com/readersmail_en.php?lang=en&nid=2371&grp=1108

Sylvie Imelda Shene: I am very aware that I cannot open the eyes of people that don’t want to see and feel and if people choose to believe in lies is their problem.
Just like Alice Miller confirmed in her answer to my letter in the link below:

From: Alice Miller am@.com>
Subject: Re: Saying the truth or being loyal
To: s@.com
Date: Sunday, November 9, 2008, 1:21 AM

AM: Thank you for your letter. I am sorry that my answer to your previous letter didn't appear on the web site under your text. I wrote: "Congratulations to your understanding. You are right, you can't make someone to see who DOESN'T WANT to see."
Alice Miller wrote this message
http://www.alice-miller.com/readersmail_en.php?lang=en&nid=2337&grp=1108

Sylvie Imelda Shene: I am not going to comment here anymore, because I am very aware I cannot make people see and feel what they are not ready to see and feel and if they rather believe in lies is nothing I can do, but to walk away. When someone is trying to confuse you consciously or unconsciously is abuse even if people can’t see it as such.

Sylvie Imelda Shene: I have to clarify the phrase that seems have created confusion “'If something is confusing to me it is abusive to me' I should have said if someone is telling me a lie consciously or unconsciously it’s abusive to me, because lies are always confusing and abusive, of course there are a lot of things in this world that I don’t understand and are not abusive, but lies are always abusive no matter who says them and how nice they sound.

S’s Letter

S, I think it's important that I mention what I witnessed happening at the DM's book discussion http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/note.php?note_id=471710483293 you were I agreeing with me, but the moment DM showed up and share his opinion, which of course has the right to do so, you moved right to his side and apologized to him for disagreeing with him and your misunderstanding and my question was -- why does she have the need to do that? Maybe she still carries the fear of her parents and now someone symbolizing her parents, in this case, DM and like when she was a very little girl would not dare to rebel against her parents for fear of punishment and repressed her true feelings in order to please her parents and be the "good girl" her parents desired, now, in her adult life this internalized fear of her parents is still keeping her from staying true to herself. You know this happened to me also on a discussion board a year or so ago at amazon.com on the topic, if spanking was harmful to children, and most people there were pro-spanking and I felt the need to comment and expose their ignorance and of course these very unconscious people, started to personally attack me right away, they called me the B word, radical, and all kind of things, you name it! One poster that identified himself as being a Psychiatric doctor took my side at first, and of course temporally I felt better that I was not alone anymore against those very mean unconscious people, but the moment the pro-spanking people started to direct their anger at him accusing him of being a radical and lunatic because only a lunatic would be at Sylvie's side! the next day he took the pro-spanking side agreeing with them that my comment was too radical – below is the comment I used to re-post over and over again and they thought was too radical and they could not stand and triggered them the most. I now, understand and see very well these psychological mechanisms and did not affected me much that this doctor one day was on my side and the next day like a scared little boy took the abusers side. A professional doctor should have dealt with his own fear and learned how to handle transference. I thought of the little children going to his office with his parents and one day he takes the child's side, but in the moment the parent starts transferring their anger into him he leaves the child alone and takes the parents side, how damage that is to a child to one day feel like somebody is on his side, but a day later to find himself again abandoned in an emotional desert island. Children have no way of understanding that the reason this person abandoned him also was because of his internalized fears of his own parents. This is why people that go out offering help to others without experiencing, understand and walk through their own fears first, they will unconsciously and compulsively pass their psychological virus into others under the disguise of help and this is very damaging to people that are still wounded, especially to children.

Amazon.com post: These people are so "SMART" that they don't see the more they mention my name and project themselves into me the more they make themselves look bad. Keep making yourselves look bad, ignorant and very dark people.

People that idealize their childhood and parents they will keep having limitless craving for scapegoats on whom they can avenge themselves for the fears and anxieties of childhood without having to re-experience those fears. DEFENSELESS LITTLE CHILDREN MAKE PERFECT SCAPEGOATS FOR THEM, COWARDS. Pro-spanking people suffer and secretly enjoy seeing others suffer too, otherwise why would they fight so hard for the parents right to spank their innocent children, when children misbehave is never the child's fault, but the parents fault and if someone needs a spanking would be the parents. Children are like sponges or antennas that absorb all of what their parents repressed. What parents repress, children express, so if you don't like what you see in your children go inside of yourself and take responsibility for all that is repressed in yourself and your children will change without you having to do much. And what is so sad for me it's that most of these pro-spanking, hypocrites, cowards hide behind "God" to do their evil work. Read the article "how Evil is born anew with every new generation" in the link below:

http://www.alice-miller.com/articles_en.php?lang=en&nid=47&grp=11

It's so sad that in the 21 century people still are debating if it's ok to spank a child. In the 21 century everyone should know the dangerous of spanking children and every person in power should be doing everything to make sure every child is protected from harm. Would we be debating today if slavery of black people or any other race is ok, fortunately is common knowledge that slavery of another race is cruel and ignorant. Why can human beings see that doing it to children is even more cruel, ignorant and very dangerous? Most people objective is not freedom for themselves and others. Most people objective is to one day have their own slaves. The easiest way to have your own slaves is to give birth to them because our society does nothing to protect children in the first years of life, the most important years of a person's life." Poisonous Pedagogy The pedagogical conviction that one must bring a child into line from the outset has its origin in the need to split off the disquieting parts of the inner self and project them onto an available object. The child's great plasticity flexibility, defenselessness, and availability made it the ideal object for this projection. The enemy within can at last be hunted down on the outside. Peace advocates are becoming increasingly aware of the role played by these mechanisms, but until it is clearly recognized that they can be traced back to methods of child raising, little can be done to oppose them. For children who have grown up being assailed for qualities the parents hate in themselves can hardly wait to assign these qualities to someone else so they can once again regard themselves as good, "moral," noble, and altruistic. Such projections can easily become part of any Weltanschauung." Alice Miller "THE CHILD AS POISON CONTAINER The main psychological mechanism that operates in all child abuse involves using children as what I have termed poison containers--receptacles into which adults project disowned parts of their psyches, so they can control these feelings in another body without danger to themselves. In good parenting, the child uses the caretaker as a poison container, much as it earlier used the mother's placenta as a poison container for cleansing its polluted blood. A good mother reacts with calming actions to the cries of a baby and helps it "detoxify² its dangerous emotions. But when an immature mother's baby cries, she cannot stand the screaming, and strikes out at the child. As one battering mother put it, "I have never felt loved all my life. When the baby was born, I thought he would love me. When he cried, it meant he didn't love me. So I hit him.² Rather than the child being able to use the parent to detoxify its fears and anger, the parent instead injects his or her bad feelings into the child and uses it to cleanse his or herself of depression and anger."http://www.psychohistory.com/htm/05_history.html

---Then they accused me of violating Alice Miller copyright and I assure them that she did not mind me distributing her literature freely. One morning I woke up thinking I bet they wrote to Alice Miller to complain about me violating her copyright and I went to her website to readers' mail page and sure enough I found the following letter, when I saw the letter with the tile "Respecting the copyright" and I knew right away it was about me and I clicked on it with excitement to read Alice Miller's answer.

"Respecting the copyright Saturday October 31, 2009

Dear Ms. Miller,

On a "no-spank" thread on Amazon, one of your readers has copied and pasted pages upon pages of your work. One of the copies was of a webpage you allow people to copy and re-post in its entirety, but most of the content seems to end with an "all rights reserved" copyright. In some cases, the person is even copy/pasting the works of your fellow authors and attributing your website, which might not exactly rub them the right way.

http://www.amazon.com/tag/health/forum/ref=cm_cd_et_md_pl?_encoding=UTF8&cdForum=Fx1EO24KZG65FCB&cdMsgNo=6427&cdPage=258&cdSort=oldest&cdThread=Tx2RVZKR3QEDU6P&cdMsgID=Mx28QB17UEUHKGE#Mx28QB17UEUHKGE

We've been concerned about her zeal for copy/paste of copyrighted works for some time, but responsibility dictates that since the poster has failed to see the legal and moral issues, we should at the very least alert you of this.

AM: Thank you for your letter and the link. I opened it and found a discussion led very respectfully by Sylvie Shene who seems to understand much about the dangers of spanking that produce beside other things ignorant parents in future. Of course, the Internet allows everybody to show themselves, their emotional insights as well as their emotional blindness (like "I was very much beaten but I turned out very well"). But I didn't find an example of anybody using my name for a text that I have NOT written. Did I miss anything? If you did find this kind of abuse, of disrespecting my copyright, please let me know."

This letter is no longer available at Alice Miller's website, I belief the coward that wrote it asked her to remove it, because I had copied and pasted it into the amazon.com thread with the following comment and a link to it: To the person that wrote to Dr. Alice Miller, did her answer put your concerns to rest? It's so funny to witness to the extent the pro-spanking people go to, to stop me from sharing the enlightened information here, they tried to break me, but that did not work, because you can not break what's not breakable anymore! Would not it be easier to put me in your ignore list? What are you afraid of? Afraid your children might come here? Become enlightened and be able to see through your lies and illusions. This just shows how conniving some pro-spanking people are. The next morning I clicked on the link from the amazon.com thread to see if it was working and the letter was not longer available at her website. This person did not like the Alice Miller's response and he/she asked her to remove it, because when people clicked on the link could see for themselves their desperation. Later they accused me of fabricating this letter myself! All my life I have stood alone against the liars and cowards in this world and it felt so good to have Alice Miller stand on my side, I never had anyone before stand on my side like that, I have no words to express how happy I felt to know I was not alone anymore.

Alice Miller has been the only person that truly has been on my side.

http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=458883030451

Banished Knowledge: Facing Childhood Injuries

Quotes from the book " Banished Knowledge: Facing Childhood Injuries" by Alice Miller

 

Preface  

The only possible recourse a baby has when his screams are ignored is to repress his distress, which is tantamount to mutilating his soul, for the result is an interference with his ability to feel, to be aware, and to remember. Page, 2

Parents who have never known love, who on coming into the world met with coldness, insensitivity, indifference, and blindness and whose entire childhood and youth were spent in this atmosphere, are unable to bestow love - indeed, how can they, since they have no idea of what love is and can be? Page, 2

A human being born into a cold, indifferent world will regard his situation as the only possible one. Everything that person later comes to believe, advocate, and deem right is founded on his first formative experiences. Page, 2

2 - Murdering for the Innocence of the Parents  

I was unable to question the actions of my own parents because of my lifelong fear of the feeling that re-experiencing my former situation might arouse: my sense of dependence on my parents who had no inkling of either their child's needs or their own responsibility. For everything they did to me and failed to do for me, I always found countless explanations, so I could avoid asking: 'Why did you do that to me? Why didn't you, Mother, protect me, why did you neglect me, ignore what I said? Why were your versions of me more important than the truth, why did you never tell me you were sorry, confirm my observations? Why did you blame me and punish me for something for which you were clearly the cause?' Page, 19

3 - The Wicked Child

When a child must consume all her capability and energy for the required labour of repression; when, in addition, she has never known what it is to be loved and protected by someone, this child will eventually also be incapable of protecting herself and organizing her life in a meaningful and productive manner. Page, 37

It is only from adults that an unloved child learns to hate or torment and to disguise these feelings with lies and hypocrisy. Page, 44

I have seen difficult children, even in psychiatric clinics where they resisted the most ingenious pedagogic methods - for instance, by not speaking, by refusing food, by tearing out their hair - because there was no one around who was genuinely interested in their torment and able to understand their pain. Page, 46

A loved child receives the gift of love and with it that of knowledge and innocence. It is a gift that will provide him with orientation for his whole life. An injured child lacks everything because he lacks love. Page, 48

4 - Theories as a Protective Shield

According to Baurman, ninety percent of rape victims are young girls or women, two thirds of them between the ages of five and thirteen. Page, 68

Child prostitution is also a problem in the industrial countries. UNICEF has estimated that some two million children of both sexes are being sexually exploited throughout the world. This does not take into account the sexual abuse that occurs within the family. Page, 70

In the therapy I personally underwent, I discovered that, with every inner confrontation with my parents, the guilt feelings that had been instilled in me reinforced my repression, barred my access to reality, and blocked my experiencing of pain. It was only when I could query my supposed guilt that those feelings surfaced. And only when I could feel that, without and guilt on my part, I had been ignored, not taken seriously, scarcely even noticed by my parents, did I realize what had happened. It became clear that it had not been up to me to teach my parents a sense of responsibility, that it has not been in my power as a babe in arms to render them capable of loving. The only thing I had been able to do was show them that I was useful, that I could be exploited, and that I would never respond with reproaches. At the time, life offered me no other option.  Page, 70  

How I longed to believe that all signals were deceiving me, that things weren't really that bad, and that only my suspicion was wicked and unfair. How I wished that psychoanalysis might be right, because of my longing to cling to the illusion of loving parents. Page, 71

Every patient clings to fantasies in which he sees himself in the active role so as to escape the pain of being defenseless and helpless. To achieve this he will accept guilt feelings, although they bind him to neurosis. Page, 72

The patient must uncover the facts with the aid of his feelings; he must examine his discoveries, query his own statements, until he arrives at the certainty: such and such actually happened. This knowledge enables the therapist to accompany the patient on his journey, a journey that often leads through hells and torture chambers. These must be returned to, again and again, until every detail of the traumatic scene can be experienced, to allow the effect of the trauma to dissolve and the injury at last to heal. Page, 73

It is only in the child that traumas are bound to lead to psychic wounds because they damage the organism in its growth process. These injuries can heal if one dares to see them, or they can remain unhealed if one is forced to go on ignoring them. Page, 78

7 - Without Truth there can be no Help

A great deal of understanding is shown for an unemployed father who beats his children. There is no problem understanding an overburdened executive who does the same thing, especially when he is irritated by his wife. The wife also meets with understanding when she can't help beating her child after the milk boils over. Page, 130

The Jungian doctrine of the shadow and the notion that evil is the reverse of good are aimed at denying the reality of evil. But evil is real. It is not innate but acquired, and it is never the reverse of good but rather its destroyer. Page, 142

Evil people
Our knowledge cannot alter them. They can change only if they sense, not merely intellectually but with their feelings, how they have been turned into evil people. Only then will they be able to remove the blockages and, by experiencing the blocked pain, liberate the abused child who had to wish to harm anyone on coming into the world, the child who wanted love but found no one to make that possible for him. All he found was barbed wire and walls on all sides, and he believed this to be the world. When he grew up he built gigantic worlds full of walls and barbed wire, or complicated philosophical and psychological systems, in the hope and expectation of receiving love in return, the love he never received from his parents when he was an 'unworthy life.  Page, 143

8 - The Enlightened Witness

Formerly abused children could never say, 'How dreadful my childhood was!' Instead they said, 'That's life, that's normal. That's how I'll bring up my own children too. After all, I've turned out all right'. The early destruction of their learning capacities bears late fruit. Page, 149

People who from earliest childhood have been taken seriously, have been respected, loved, and protected, cannot but treat their own children in the same way because their souls and their bodies have absorbed and stored this lesson at an early age. From the very beginning they learned that it is right to protect and respect the weaker, and it becomes something they take for granted. They will need to psychology textbooks to raise their children. Page, 151

Appendix - The Way Out of the Trap

The child is not a toy or a kitten; he is a bundle of needs requiring a great deal of loving care to develop his potential. Those not prepared to give the child this must not have children. Page, 160

To beat a child, to humiliate him or sexually abuse him, is a crime because it damages a human being for life. It is important for third parties also to be aware of this, since enlightenment and the courage of witnesses can play a crucial, life-saving role for the child.  Page, 160

This is not inevitable is, during childhood, he had the chance - be it only once to encounter someone who offered him something other than pedagogy and cruelty: a teacher, an aunt, a neighbor, a sister, a brother. It is only through the experience of being loved and cherished that the child can ever discern cruelty as such, be aware of it, and resist it. Without the experience he has no way of knowing that there is anything in the world except cruelty; the child will automatically submit to it and, years later, when as an adult he accedes to power, will exert it as being perfectly normal behavior. Page, 161

What happens when a child reared in love, protection, and honesty is suddenly beaten by someone? The child will scream, give vent to his anger: Why are you doing this to me? None of this is possible when a child trained from the very outset to be obedient is beaten by his own parents, whom he loves. The child must stifle his pain and anger and repress the whole situation to survive. For to be able to show anger the child needs the confidence based on experience that he will not be killed as a result. A battered child cannot build up this confidence; children are indeed sometimes killed when they dare to rebel against injustice. Hence the child must suppress his rage to survive in a hostile environment, must even stifle his massive, overwhelming pain in order not to die of it. So now the silence of forgetting descends over everything, and the parents are idealized - they have never done any wrong. 'And if they did beat me, I deserved it.' This is the familiar version of the torture that has been endured. Page, 162

To forget and to repress would be a good solution if there were no more to it than that. But repressed pain blocks emotional life and leads to physical symptoms. Page, 162