As a litigator the first thing I would do was to identify the parties to a claim; that is a claimant who brings the claim and a defendant against whom the claim is brought. Both would argue culpability and hopefully a compromise is reached depending on the nature of the claim and the relationship between the parties. Others might be added as defendants to the proceedings too.
So when as an adult you realise oh crap I was shat on by my parents but how can I even let them know that I know or how can I even question their crapping and crappiness? I mean can I really take my parents to task?! Oh gosh is that even an option? After all we were brought up with the morality of the fourth commandment. Mothers and fathers can never be wrong. Never. Period. That’s it. I said it. No arguments. That’s that. It’s the end of the matter and I want to hear none of it again.
Sound familiar! Yet to disentangle and integrate that which is not the original self one must apportion blame to the cause of the effect. But it only goes as far as the work is still in progress. After all once the original self surfaces that child like wonder and innocence returns and one can see the network of synchronicities and how all was woven perfectly in order to unpeel the petty self.
So, one will eventually see that the parents were also tarnished in their experience as a child and will equally have a right to bring a legitimate claim against their own parents. We as a society revolve as a collective consciousness and what prevails in an era as the norm will often have an impact on parenting style. Whether cultural or national or religious all people will have a common way of parenting such as don’t hold the baby too much they might get spoilt; don’t sleep with the baby they will develop a sleep association; so we have sleep training for example. All is geared to providing a cushioning for the parents.
But isn’t it the case that we need more support in terms of sleep training since our lives have become more demanding and yet whilst we want to have children we simply cannot parent them?
We have a lot more resources now and there is a collective move to look inward and into our child self for answers than there was a few years ago. So our parents wouldn’t have the resources to look. And with other pressures mounting on them and a tight family system and patriarchal, to question their way of parenting let alone putting to task their ancestors would be taboo if not forbidden -the unthinkable!
I wonder whether in the end when we are fully integrated we need to really tell them about this process depending on of course how the parents would take it and whether they would be open to this. Some patents may become interested and want to heal their own trauma and finally get some reprieve to learn why they are depressed of otherwise suffering from chronic stress when their environment poses no danger.
I know that my mother lives in constant anxiety and stress.
I don’t think after our healing we will really require their validation let alone participation nor will we need to blame them because the integrated self is the best version of you that’s not walking with an open wound but a wound that’s almost healed and maybe just left a scar to remind you how far you have come.
As long as feel the need to blame then know that you are still in recovery. And that’s okay. There’s no time limit. Be gentle let yourself be as opposed to judge yourself for that. Keep feeling the blame and anger till it’s synthesised into whatever else comes next.
I don’t want to suggest what might happen next for fear of sounding just like that parent you are now in a pickle because of.
When we are done integrating more often than not if we can bear it we will most likely love our parents or not. The problem of fostering a grudge is that it doesn’t stop the cycle. No healing has taken place. You are still bitter.
We are talking about parents who more than likely didn’t have half the tools that we now have at our disposal. Hell even google only came in our lifetime. The whole issue must be seen in context. Resources were limited; we didn’t share our darkness and shadow self as we do now. People are a lot more aware now and are willing to put in the inner work. We can see past the facade of perfect families and careers. We now know there’s a lot of crap that goes on behind the smoky faces at work even.
How many times have we shared our time with our grandparents? Maybe missed Christmas dinner to be with them. Perhaps far less than we would like. Yet all these values come from what was embedded within that imprinted toddler. Just imagine that! Science can now explain a lot.