this post is a follow up from one i had made earlier today called power, control and synthesis
anyway, i wanted to express some thoughts that were connected to those expressed in that subject in terms of the aspects of transference/projection as they are related to the idea of forgiveness.
what i learned from my own experience stated in the thread, how i released a rant against a person who i had begrudged for about 3 years based my own projections onto him who also happened to be my employer, of what a self-centered and deceitful person i perceived him to be. i saw him in many respects as an 'abuser' type figure, and the reason for that being because of the fact that he held the power to inhibit my own self-determination, such as my abusers did, be they sexual, spiritual, emotional, intellectual or psychic.
what i realized is that the inability to forgive, has been tied up with degree in which i had transfered and projected my own undesirable character attributes onto others. in characterizing others in such and such a manner, i realized the connection to my own anger at having my own freedom [ie. power] to self-determine limited by the actions or decisions of others in situations where the balance of power was out of whack.
because of this, usually my anger at them led me to develop frozen badittudes about them, which cast them in thought memory prison from which i could not release them, until i came to the understanding that they were for all intents and purposess proxy models of my abusers.
in this process, i came to understand that prior to my abuse, i had no recollection of having the need to forgive anyone for anything. that was because there was no connection to them in the sense that they took something from me that was not theirs to take, ie, once again, my own power to self-determine.
in fact, prior to the abuse, i do not even have any memories recalling seeing myself as an 'i' who identified with self-ownership, someone with an i-thou relationship with life. i was very well situated and satisfied in my unperceived role as a mere thread in the giant fabric of my life. so the abuse in my early life groomed me for panic as my normal modus operandi, such that any situation where i would sense that i, as a self contained entity, would be in danger of having my safety breached. because of that, i built fortresses around myself, so that i could be prepared in the event of future attack. these walls not only kept me safe within, but they also kept me separate from the world of possibility and potential that lay beyond their brick and mortar.
and this is the crime of forgiveness; that in unforgiving, we imprison ourselves, lock ourselves into a mindset that rules out the possiblity of expansive freedom of expression, a 'sin' against the spirit of growth. when we do not forgive, we not only lock ourselves in, but we lock others out. the separations themselves are a 'sin' against the essential life force tendency to synthesize all points of view from separateness into unity and confluence.
lack of forgiveness locks us into a state of separation from which we cannot escape.
yes, religion and other forms of spirituality create mandates against an unforgiving attitude, but none of them have explained how we became unforgiving in the first place, or how to get out of the unforgiving attitudes we thunk ourselves into. they merely judge the act of unforgiveness, and the state of being unforgiving. and of course we have inherited the 'mea culpa' mentality which does not serve well the principles underpinning the rules that attempt to reinforce it.
level one forgiveness, is a purely human attempt at merely going thru the motions of forgiveness, mostly out of fear of the moral retribution according to one's adoption of a prescribed personal/cultural moral code. saying i forgive, and truly forgiving are not the same; mere intentionality will neither lead me, nor those i hold captive to true freedom.
level two forgiveness stands outside of a moral mandate, and its effects can be evidenced by the manifestation of the whole physical realm in all of its diversity. how could such diversity co-exist in time and place in perfect balance, without that balance between tolerance, agreement, acceptance, being reflected on deeply subconscious and abstract levels, expressing confluence therein?
level three forgiveness, will arise as it purports, to the extent we share in its work synthesizing all disagreement into a new paradigm of cooperation. but that can only happen to the degree that we allow new levels of 'love' to permeate us and our lives and the lives of others.
with my newer understanding, i can truly let go of all persons, places and things i held captive in the past.
now my new challenge is to learn to live with the daunting responsibility that is now mine, to live as i have never been able to live before when my life task was primarily as warden for all my hostages.
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